/jp/ - Otaku Culture

NSA “Declassified” Publicly Available Text On Foreign Languages
https://www.nsa.gov/portals/75/documents/news-features/declassified-documents/cryptologic-spectrum/foreign_language.pdf

> The Ministry of Education in Japan has selected 1,850 Chinese characters for daily use, and ecommends the use of Chinese characters be limited to this range, if possible.
> This does not mean, however, that any written Japanese material can be read with the knowledge of only 1,850 characters.
> students of Japanese must learn about 2,000 characters along with more than 4,000 readings, while students of Korean and Chinese must learn only 2,000 characters with about 2,000 readings
> In Japanese, pitch and tone also act as distinguishing marks of morphemes, as in /hashi/ which means "edge," "chopsticks," "bridge," or "beak," depending upon pitch or tone.
> This analysis suggests that Japanese is probably the most difficult language for English-speaking students.


> This analysis suggests that Japanese is probably the most difficult language for English-speaking students.