Japanese Font Encoded

例えば、ポル語から想像がつくものは、、、

網掛けにしたものは、ポルトガル語と共通の語彙の想像がつきやすいと、「私が」判断したものです。英語におけるラテン語系語彙には、、、

ノルマンコンクェスト関係で入った西部フランス方言
プランタジネット朝関係で入ったフランス語
宗教関係・ルネサンス関係で採り入れられた本物のラテン語
近代以降、科学用語の補完のために、ラテン語の構造に従ってつくられた造語

、、、などがあり、また、以上を経てからポルトガル語に採り入れられたものもありますが、その区別はつけないものとします（現状の私の知識では区別できません。ごめんなさい）。「疑わしきは罰せず」ということで、「フランス語起源ときいた気がする」程度のもの（dangerousなど）は選びませんでした。逆に、ポル語とも共通する語彙については、遠慮なく選びました。他に、選択基準（のようなもの）としては、、、

固有名詞を除く
- ただし、一般名詞としても通用する語彙である場合は選ぶ（Liberal Democratic Partyなど）
- 略語は除く（LDP)
ラテン語構造でも、語源が固有語であるものは除く（unthinkableなど）

そして、数勘定・割合の計算にあたっては、またまた勝手ながら、、、

固有名詞を総数に入れない。
数字、数詞、be動詞、have動詞、助動詞、冠詞、代名詞、前置詞、接続詞、yes/no、notを総数に入れない（基本中の基本で、ロマンス系を知っているから・知らないから、という議論に絡まないものと考えました）。

そうすると、、、

総数438の内、ラテン語起源語彙（ポルトガル語から類推できるもの）が180。つまり、4割強が分かってしまうことになるのです。

さて、この割合。どう思われますか？ごらん頂いて分かるように、この文章は決して、ラテンアメリカや西欧のことを書いたものではありません。それでもこれだけあるということは、少なくとも「政治・経済」を話題にする（あるいは書くときには）ラテン語起源語彙の大きな助けが必要であると言えないでしょうか？

しかも！上記のとおりに除外した以外にも、なんだかんだでよく知っている言葉はたくさんあるでしょうから、感覚的な分母はもっと小さくなり、実質的な「ラテン語彙依存率」はもっと高くなるはずです。

つまり、「あれ、これって何だっけ？」と思いがちな（ちょっともったいぶった）語彙のほとんどが、このラテン語起源グループにあたるわけです。

そこで、ロマンス語の知識というバックアップを用意しておくことで、英語ボキャブラリーのフェイルセーフシステムを作ることができる、というのがここでのミソです。

The Man in Charge

Koizumi tamed his party and gave Japan 's economy new life. If he falters now, there will no one to blame but himself.

Japanese have a saying about angling for mudfish. "You may catch one under a willow tree," it holds, "but not a second at the same spot." Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi characteristically ignored that folk wisdom last week--and hauled in a second catch every bit as tasty as the first. On Saturday he repeated the risky one-day trip to Pyongyang staged in 2002 to free five Japanese citizens abducted in the 1970s, returning this time with five of their children in a deal that could improve ties with Kim Jong Il's isolated regime and bolster Koizumi's already impressive job-approval ratings. " I came here to change hostility into friendship and opposition into cooperation," he declared during a press conference in Pyongyang .

Critics say he went there to change the subject. The trip was suspiciously well timed to divert attention from a troubling pension-funding scandal that has forced his chief cabinet secretary to step down. Even the prime minister's allies acknowledge that, in part, the visit was staged to pump up his numbers ahead of parliamentary elections this summer. And why not? Koizumi's audacity only underscored how Japan 's silver-maned leader now stands head and shoulders above any real challenger--and why his Liberal Democratic Party-led coalition is set to triumph at the ballot box in July. "Koizumi is not a man of deep thoughts," says respected political commentator Takashi Tachibana. "But he has a strong will and he is good at making snap decisions. Whenever there is a poll, those who support him say they do so 'because there is nobody else'."

With two years left in his term, Koizumi finds himself in an unprecedented position. His can-do style has inspired near hero-worship (most notably among his huge consistuency of middle-aged housewives). Japan 's GDP has expanded by about 6 percent over the past six months--fruits of his "no-pain, no-gain" reform efforts, he claims--impressing even the international-ratings agencies. The emerging pension scandal has claimed two of his most prominent rivals, even as Koizumi has mended factional divisions within the LDP. The prime minister has achieved a degree of control over the Japanese political system that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. His challenge now is to craft a legacy for himself as the architect of Japan 's resurgence, both economically and as a key U.S. ally in East Asia .

Koizumi has in effect become the most "presidential" of Japan 's modern leaders. He's made himself indispensable in the electorate's eyes by wrestling policymaking away from the bureaucrats and into his own office. To fix his Pyongyang trip, for example, he called upon an old LDP ally, Taku Yamasaki, to broker a deal with North Korean counterparts in China . Reportedly, Yamasaki hinted that his boss would seek to normalize diplomatic relations with Pyongyang before his term ends. To the North, that timetable promises an expected $10 billion in reparations for Japan 's colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula . Left out of the loop, the Foreign Ministry bristled: one unnamed diplomat told the Asahi Shimbun newspaper that Koizumi's trip "leapfrogs the scenario of events we had envisioned."

Similarly, Koizumi has arrogated much more economic decision making to his office than his predecessors. Legislation once followed in the opposite direction in Japan : ministries and powerful LDP committees hammered out bills, then presented them for lawmakers and the prime minister to rubber-stamp. That made the P.M. expendable even in a culture averse to radical change. Koizumi doesn't handle every detail of complex issues--few of which he understands, say colleagues--like reforming debt-laden banks and failing state corporations. But he has deputized hard-charging ministers and protected them from LDP stalwarts accustomed to cabinets stacked with yes men. The best example: chief bank regulator Heizo Takenaka, who has pushed Japan 's megabanks to clean up their books with stringent new accounting rules. The LDP's old guard has lobbied for two years to oust hm, but no avail. "The credit [for Koizumi's economic successes] goes to the fact that he lets the 'brains' work and does not change their policies," says Takahide Kiuchi, a senior economist at Nomura Securities.

The strategy is dangerous: Koizumi has no one else to blame if things go wrong. But it seems to be working. The Nikkei index is up roughly 50 percent since hitting historic lows in March 2003, largely because of his government's efforts to shore up Japan 's wobbly financial system. Exports are expected to post double-digit growth this year, mostly to China . Companies like NEC and Toshiba have begun to invest in Japan again, building huge factories to produce high-end technology for the home market. For the first time in five years analysts are forecasting an end to deflation in

Japan

, along with a modest rise in interest rates now pegged at zero. Even consumers have started spending again, which suggests widespread optimism and promises strong GDP growth into 2005.

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