(keitai-l) Re: shortened phrases and words

From: Gerhard Fasol <fasol_at_eurotechnology.com>
Date: 09/11/00
Message-ID: <39BCF3EB.F95E10D5@eurotechnology.com>
George Ritter wrote:
> 
> Intensely interesting.  Does anyone have a list of these shortened Japanese
> phrases and words?

Japanese language is full of those shortened phrases and words. That's
not specific to keitai at all. Often it's the "most significant" kanji of
a long name: as an example - 東京大学 becomes 東大, or 
the railway company: 東京急行 becomes 東急, or the railway line
from Tokyo to Yokohama 東京横浜線 becomes 東横線, or the motorway
from Yokohama to Yokosuka becomes: YokoYokosen (横横線).
By the way this custom (such as many similar customs) are not specific
to Japan and Japanese language but are also found in China. For example:
Beijing University: 北京大学 becomes 北大.

Good luck George with learning Kanji! 
The bad news is that there are up to 60,000 total -
the good news is you only need about 2000-3000 of them in Japan for
daily life, and a good computer contains about 10,000.

Gerhard Fasol
http://www.eurotechnology.com/
fasol@eurotechnology.com
Received on Mon Sep 11 17:56:27 2000