It seems that in response to questions regarding the differences between 漢語 and their 和語 equivalents, it is often explained that the 漢語 is "more formal" than the 和語. As a result, I get the feeling that this is a trend.
One example of this, which made me think of this question, is What is the difference between [友達]{とも・だち} and [友人]{ゆう・じん}?.
And so, the originally question was this: Is this feeling of mine correct? And is it always that way, or are there some instances where the 和語 is clearly more formal?
Upon reading some comments, however, I realize that I am not entirely sure what even I mean by "formal" in the above questions.
Is there some consistent way in which we can understand "formal" as it is used in responding to these types of questions? Or are people using it to refer to a bunch of different concepts?
Answer
I think there's definitely lots of truth in that tendency. 漢語 was essentially the Latin of Japan for a long time; i.e the language of the elites. In fact, Chinese poetry is still compulsory in Japanese education, a bit like Latin I guess.
Because of this history, 漢語 is associated with art, science, government etc. and is thus generally more formal.
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