55626
The following is an excerpt from a dialogue with my language partner. For some
context, I told her that I went to the restaurant with my girlfriend and her
family on christmas eve. She then replied the following:

> クリスマスイブの食事の話をおもしろく読みました。日本では、クリスマスイブディナーというと、恋人同士で行くイメージですね。

My attempt at translation:

> "I enjoyed reading your story about the christmas-eve-meal. In Japan, there
> is the impression that..."

So, I think that 恋人同士で行く is an attribute to イメージ which itself is part of the
sentences predicative via the copula です(ね). I think 恋人同士で行く means "To go as a
couple (literal: To go being a couple). My main issue is that I have little to
no idea how to connect that with クリスマスイブディナーというと.  
From my more recent questions, I've learned that という can put the two elements
on both sides into a "A = B" relationship. Then, whenever と isn't used as a
quotative or conditional particle, and when it also doesn't connect two nouns
like "ミラーさんと田中さんはもう帰りました。", my last idea would be the functionality of
"AとBは違います。" = "A differs from B".  
However, if the latter should be the case, then it really gives me a headache
how to integrate クリスマスイブディナーという and 恋人同士で行くイメージですね into each other, especially
since I also dont really know how to handle the direct succession of と to という.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-01-02T16:08:42.667
55619
2018-01-04T10:43:49.543
2018-01-03T06:13:49.223
9831
20172
question
grammar
How to handle というと in this sentence?
As Leebo mentioned in the comment section, it's the conditional use of the
particle と.

Simply put, the pattern is "If A, then B", or A⟹B if you are more familiar
with logical expressions.

Here's a short example:

> 日本語{にほんご}で話{はな}すと人格{じんかく}が変{か}わる
>
> Whenever I speak Japanese, my personality changes.

Going back to your example "~というと" means "speaking of ~"

> 日本では、クリスマスイブディナーというと、恋人同士で行くイメージですね。
>
> Speaking of Christmas dinner, Japanese have the image of couples going out
> for dinner together.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-01-02T18:26:53.863
55626
2018-01-03T06:16:59.830
2018-01-03T06:16:59.830
9831
10083
55619
answer