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A question on Japanese writing | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| ruskivyetr Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5484 days ago 769 posts - 962 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Russian, Polish, Modern Hebrew | Message 1 of 7 27 May 2010 at 6:30am | IP Logged |
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Lately, I have been reading up on the writing systems of Japanese, and I had a question about the use of hirigana.
When you have a word written in kanji, and you have to add an ending or a prefix, would you use the hirigana to express that ending or prefix? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Levi Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 5570 days ago 2268 posts - 3328 votes Speaks: English*, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish Studies: Russian, Dutch, Portuguese, Mandarin, Japanese, Italian | Message 2 of 7 27 May 2010 at 6:31am | IP Logged |
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Yes.
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| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6771 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 3 of 7 27 May 2010 at 8:27am | IP Logged |
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To expound on Levi's concise answer, hiragana when used in this way is called "okurigana". Literally,
"accompanying kana". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okurigana 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| 学习语言 Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5338 days ago 4 posts - 4 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 4 of 7 27 May 2010 at 9:48pm | IP Logged |
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Yes, you are correct about the hiragana.
Hirigana is commonly used in Japanese with verbs, and other types of words. The main difference between Hirigana and Katakana is the katakana is used for foreign words (Names, companies etc.) that are brought into the Japanese language Example verb using hiragana 見る (miru) － To see 見まして (mimashite) － (I) Saw 見 is the only kanji, the rest are Hiragana Like I said, katakana is used for foreign words One would say スミス (sumisu) meaning the surname "Smith" using katakana and not すみす (sumisu) with hiragana 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Derian Triglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5311 days ago 227 posts - 464 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, German Studies: Spanish, Russian, Czech, French, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 5 of 7 27 May 2010 at 10:44pm | IP Logged |
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Another way of using kanji and hiragana together is this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furigana 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| furrykef Senior Member United States furrykef.com/ Joined 6475 days ago 681 posts - 862 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Latin, Italian | Message 6 of 7 28 May 2010 at 6:42pm | IP Logged |
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Since two people got it wrong in this thread, I thought I'd point out that the word is "hiragana", not "hirigana". Edited by furrykef on 29 May 2010 at 10:31am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Yukamina Senior Member Canada Joined 6267 days ago 281 posts - 332 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean, French | Message 7 of 7 28 May 2010 at 7:46pm | IP Logged |
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Kanji can also be used as prefixes and suffixes. For example 率 can be added to some words to mean "rate of..." so シンクロ率 means synchronization rate. Another is 不 which can be added to some words to negate them (like un- in English) ex. 不愛想 - unsociability
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