Japanese Writing System
Japanese contains 3 types of alphabets: Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana:
Kanji 漢字
Kanji originates from Chinese characters, and holds over 50 000 letters. However, only about 2000 are necessary to learn in Japan. It is the most used out if the three alphabets. There are a lot of kanji that is rarely used and unnecessary to know, so don't worry about learning every single 50 000 of them. We will only focus on the most used ones in this blog. There is a set of Kanji called Jouyo Kanji (常用漢字) which is what schools in Japan usually use, which is also what we will be focusing on.
Another thing about Kanji is that every Kanji character has two main pronounciations, the On-yomi way and the Kun-yomi way. The pronounciation of the word really depends on the context and what other Kanji it pairs up with. I don't recommend learning all the pronounciations of a Kanji at once, because it can get confusing. Instead, just slowly learn the different pronounciations through practice and reading.
Don't worry if you have trouble with Kanji, it just takes practice and patience. Even some Japanese people have a hard time with this alphabet.
Here are some very simple kanji that you can start of with:
犬 Inu Dog
猫 Neko Cat
愛 ai Love
一 ichi one
Hiragana ひらがな
Hiragana is the second most used alphabet of Japanese, and is made up of 46 characters. This is used to form words.
*please note that "tsu"（つ) is sometimes not pronounced the way it is and can be used to accent the letter that comes after.
Ex. tsu (つ) + ku (く) = kku (つく)
Katakana カタカナ
Katakana is probably the least used alphabet in Japanese, and is made up of 46 characters used for words brought from other countries. For example, カメラ (kamera) means camera. It has the same sounds as hiragana, but is written differently. It is pronounced the exact same way English, which is why katakana is used.
Don't worry if you have a hard time memorizing all of it now, it just takes practice and experience. Sometimes, you don't even need to write Japanese, you just need to speak it, so this may not even be necessary.
There is also something called furigana and romanization. These are just "helpers" that show beginners in the language the pronounciation of something. However, you most likely won't be able to find them in everyday Japanese text. It is best to avoid using them, but since it is just the beginning stage, we will use them for now. Later on, when more experience is gained, it will most likely be avoided.
Romanization
Spelt using English letters.
Ex. Japanese: ありがとうございました
Romanization: Arigatou Gozaimasu
Furigana
Spelt using hiragana. Located on top of Kanji characters to show the pronounciation of the Kanji.
Ex. かんじ <- Furigana
漢字 <- Kanji
Bookmark or print out this page to keep as a reference. Feel free to comment any questions you have below.
