Kirk here with more news about Jikei Hospital and an observation about how English can be a rather difficult language.
As many of you know, Jikei Hospital has a long history of going out of its way to try to improve the chances that babies will be properly cared for, even when their mothers don’t feel they can take on the responsibility themselves. This article is the latest chapter in that story.
Now, for a linguistic observation:
One thing I like about the article is that it links to the original Japanese. As a student of the Japanese language, I often find myself agreeing when Japanese people say that “Japanese is difficult.” But, English can be pretty difficult too. For example, English has “will” and the subjunctive “would,” a distinction that the Japanese language doesn’t have a direct equivalent for, at least at the vocabulary level. This seems to be difficult for Japanese people, even those with otherwise outstanding skills. The following sentence is a case in point:
“‘It might be a harsh thing to say, but she will unlikely be able to raise the baby by herself,’ hospital chief Takeshi Hasuda told a press conference.”
I think it woud be better to say something like “she would not be able to” (not “will”) because it’s not yet clear what the mother will decide. Here’s the original Japanese:
「厳しいようだがご自身では育てられないと思う」
Or, perhaps “she is unlikely to be able to . . .” would be OK but the “she will unlikely be able to . . .” construction seems odd to me.
Conclusion: “英語は難しい！” (English is hard!)
