English speakers say “Silence is golden,” but we don’t mean it. After all, would chat rooms have become so popular if we didn’t feel the constant need to voice our opinions?

For What’s Golden in Japanese …

I imagine that our cultural attachment to the idea of silence has Puritan roots. But silence also serves the most un-Puritan of motives. For instance, lawbreakers are notorious for saying “No comment.”

Of course, silence doesn’t always indicate evasiveness. The following expressions give a sense of the possibilities inherent in silence:

言い落とす (iiotosu: to leave unsaid, neglect to mention)
     to say + to fail (to do something)

With 言い落とす, the omission of words is accidental. Someone forgets to say whatever needs saying. Originally, 落とす meant “to drop,” so it’s as if a person has dropped words. The situation is somewhat like a cell phone call that’s breaking up, only 言い落とす happens out of absentmindedness.

言い残す (iinokosu: to leave unsaid)     to say + to remain

With 言い残す, the omission of words can be either intentional or accidental.

A Sample Sentence with 言い残す …

言い難い (iigatai: difficult to say, inexpressible)     to say + difficult

On the Yomi of 難 …

言い渋る (iishiburu: to hesitate to say)     to say + to hesitate

I “hesitated” with this breakdown, because 渋 has such disparate meanings, including “sour” (e.g., unripe fruit), “subdued,” “reluctant,” “to hesitate,” and “to have diarrhea”! Interestingly, when English speakers refer to “diarrhea of the mouth,” they mean quite the opposite of “hesitate to say.”

For More on the Meaning of 渋 …

Dead Silence

English speakers alternately refer to silence as “golden” or “dead”! And what about the Japanese? I can’t find kanji evidence of how they view it, but check out this interesting set of formations:

言語 (gengo: language, speech)     words + speech

不言不語 (fugen-fugo: silence)     no + words + no + speech

The word for “silence” is twice as long as the word for “speech”! Hey, that’s true in English, too, with two syllables for “silence” as opposed to one for “speech.”

Another word for “silence” uses the same structure as 不言 (fugen: no + words):

無言 (mugon: silent, mute)     no + words

For More Silence Compounds …

A little more “attitude” shines through in these words about the amount of speaking people do:

言い尽くす (iitsukusu: to tell all, to exhaust (a subject))
     to say + to exhaust, deplete

Interesting how, when you exhaust a subject, it’s exhausting for the speaker and listener alike! Also of note: the fun repetition of u sounds in tsukusu!

寸言 (sungen: pithy remark, epithet)     a bit of + words, speech

I thought the 寸 here represented the old Japanese inch (about 3 cm), but Jack Halpern tells us that 寸 also means “a bit of,” as in this bit of ateji: 一寸 (chotto: just a little). In any case, I love the breakdown of 寸言!

言霊 (kotodama: soul or power of language)     to say + soul

What’s Going on with the Rain in 霊? …

Perhaps 言霊 tells us most of all about the Japanese view of language. Words have power or even a soul. One doesn’t use them lightly. If one speaks, one measures them carefully (with the old Japanese inch, 寸!). And one may well opt to remain silent, even when there’s something pressing to say. Native speakers know that, thanks to the forcefulness of nonverbal cues, total silence is not at all the same as a lack of communication. Nonverbal communication involves this:

言外 (gengai: unexpressed, implied, implicit)     speech + outside

What is implied lies outside the realm of speech!

Someone may say this to you:

言外の意味をとってください。
Gengai no imi o totte kudasai.
Please read between the lines.
(Literally, please take the unexpressed meaning.)

Reading Even More Between the Lines …

And you thought it was hard enough to read kanji. Now you have to read between the lines of unexpressed speech. What did we get ourselves into when we took up Japanese?! You can ponder that question further as you try your hand at today’s Verbal Logic Quiz.

For the Verbal Logic Quiz …