#1343: Creole in Japan (fwd)

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From: mihoko tsunetomi <miho0087@yominet.ne.jp>

    Very belated, we are slowly opening our eyes to Creole.
We had a small get together here in Tokyo for Sosyete Kreyol
Nan Japon, and our good friend, Mario was one of the attendants.
 Thank you, Mario, I am counting on you!
    The following is my translation from Nikkei Newspaper,
one of our major papers.  Whether you like it or not, this
is the first coverage on Creole with book guidance.  Who is the
Haitian author to come next?

>Ｎwe Step to Accept Creole in Japan
Translations promoting, deepening cultural understanding
12/12/99,Nikkei Culture Dept., Hiroki Matsuoka
     Creole, the language created by mixing the former colonial and local
languages in former colonies.  A boom is subsiding as the keyword for the
surface of new culture, but on the other hand,, its understanding is
deepening with translations of literature, analyses as the language coming
one after another.  On literature, much awaited translation of Rafael
Confian’s “Water of the Coffee” (translated by masanori Tsukamoto,
Kinokuniya Bookstore).  Confiann is one of the front runners of Creole and
French literature, but this is the first translation of his novel.
The speaker, returning to Martinique after wandering journeys, chases after
a girl in his memory of his childhood.  The matchless beauty who comes back
and forth between life and death, is the main character ,reviving the
history of the people and the town.
     The novel is full of the essence of Creole literature, with sentences
going freely beyond time, history of the area, the people who suffer to
establish their identity.
    The francophone Caribbean islands such as  the Antilles are the center
of Creole culture.
The culture is based on the oral daily conversation created by the Africans
taken there for the slavery, and the mixed blood.
    In Japan so far, general guidance books came first as the sociological
theories.  Now more books are being published to go further to step into the
charm of the language itself, including literature.  One of them is, “First
Creole ”, the essay with “the first Japanese grammar of Creole for the
beginners by Naruhiko Nishi.  Nishi wants the readers to taste the sound
which is far from French ? Messi instead of Merci.
     Katsuhiko Tanaka, linguist, explains the formation of Creole and
Japanese in his recent
Book, “Creole and Japanese”, concludes that the structures are similar.
Compared with Westerners, it is easier for Japanese to understand the simple
structure better.
    Why Creole now?  On one hand, as globalization is advancing, we have
more opportunities to be in touch with foreign things.  On the other hand,
we are to be tried our capacity to accommodate other cultures and languages.
“Creole is perfectly fit for the need today for us to accept the different
things while preserving our own identity” says  Kunio Tsunekawa professor
of Hitotsubashi University.
     From far to the near.  Japanese acceptance to Creole is showing a new
step forward.
                           (translated by Mihoko Tsunetomi)<

                                           Mihoko