Why Japanese to English is harder than it looks
Japanese leaves out what is obvious. Subjects and objects disappear when context supplies them, so a perfectly clear Japanese sentence can have neither “I” nor “you” in it. English demands both, which means the translator is reconstructing information the original never wrote down.
Politeness is in the verb, not the vocabulary. Iku, ikimasu and mairimasu all mean “go” at three levels of formality. English has one “go” and puts the register in the surrounding words, so a keigo email and a casual message can flatten into identical English.
The verb comes last, after everything else. A long Japanese sentence withholds the action until the end, and often the negation with it. You cannot translate left to right; you have to reach the final word before the first English word is safe to choose.
Three writing systems run together. Kanji, hiragana and katakana mix in a single sentence, and the same kanji can be read several ways depending on the word. This is why a screenshot or a copied message translates far more reliably than a guess at how something is pronounced.
Written by Hardik Vegad, Co-founder, Translatify. Last updated .
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