韓中日3か国における医学用語の現状

Abstract

Medical terms in Korea, China, and Japan have mainly been discussed with regards to how they have been influenced by the terms Japanese scholars created in the Edo era. This work examines the present state of these terms in each of these countries, looking at how they have been standardized, revised, and added to throughout history en route to their modern forms. In Korea, many medical terms were initially borrowed from the Japanese language, understanding of which depended on the written forms of Kanji characters. As the exclusive use of Hangul, a featural alphabet, became increasingly prominent, decreased understanding of medical terms became an important issue. A large number of medical terms have been proactively replaced by Korean language-specific words or widely known words of Chinese origin, resulting in decreased dependency on terms from the Japanese language. In contrast, various alterations to medical terms have been made in China, giving rise to many words and terms unique to China. For example, the readings of certain terms have been changed to avoid confusion of words which were originally homonyms, and the written forms of characters making up terms have been altered as connotations of characters have changed over time. While most discussions and revisions of medical terms in China concern standardization, understanding of terms has not been considered a major problem. In Japan, the spread of medical terms in society has been limited as many terms consist of Kanji characters with readings particular to medical contexts or abbreviated forms used only in medical fields. To resolve issues with communication and understanding, strategies such as paraphrasing and the addition of clarifying explanations have been proposed, but revisions of the terms themselves have not been observed. Grasping the present state of medical terms is important as terminology in Korea, China and Japan continues to evolve. Considering the issues in understanding and standardization of terms arising due to societal changes over time, and how they have been dealt with to date, the future direction of medical terms in these countries is of great interest.