Japanese (Japanese/にほんご? ), referred to as Japanese for short, whose characters are called Japanese, is the main language used by the Yamato people on the Japanese archipelago. Although Japan does not clearly define its official language in law, various laws and regulations stipulate the use of Japanese, and Japanese is also taught as a national language in school education. It is an indisputable fact that Japanese is the common language of Japan.
Although there is no accurate statistics on the Japanese-speaking population, there should be more than1.300 million Japanese-speaking people if the population in Japan and the Japanese living outside Japan are counted. Almost all Japanese nationals born and raised in Japan speak Japanese as their mother tongue. In addition, for the deaf, there is Japanese sign language corresponding to Japanese grammar and phonology system.
June 20 10, Japanese ranked fourth after English, Chinese and Spanish.
In the field of Japanese grammar, unless otherwise specified, the word "Japanese" generally refers to modern standard Japanese based on the middle-class dialect in the Edo Yamanote area (now around the center of Tokyo), and is sometimes called "* * * lingua franca".
Japanese and Chinese are closely related. In ancient times, due to the influence of Guanzhong culture, a large number of ancient Chinese characters were introduced into Japan with Chinese characters. In modern times, a large number of Japanese words entered China, replacing transliteration words and were adopted by China people.