Japanese language?

[Night Elf]

I've googled for this and am still a bit confused. Ds15 has chosen Japanese as his foreign language. I have to learn it along side him because he's not used to having to study in this manner.

 

There appear to be 3 alphabets: hiragana, katakana, and kanji.

 

We're learning characters from hiragana right now. So far we've been given: a, i, u, e, o, ka, ki, ku, ke, ko, sa, shi, su, se, so. Our vocabulary uses these characters, or do you call them sounds?

 

I understand that katakana is to be used when a foreign word, like an American word, cannot be properly translated into Japanese. But does this mean that the word that uses katakana will be inserted into a hiragana sentence? In other words, hiragana and katakana are used simultaneously?

 

And we're starting typing practice today which uses kanji. Where the heck did that come from?

 

I am assuming we'll learn this as the course proceeds, but I feel like we've been thrown in without detailed explanation. I'm the kind of learner that needs to know WHY before I can do something. In fact, we're so confused that what the course considers to be one week's worth of work is taking us 3 weeks total. I sure hope we don't stay at this slow pace but I'm scared to move on if we don't have the foundation they are laying!

 

Anyway, here's to seeing if anyone can help.

[americastamps]

I don't speak much Japanese, but lived there for a few years, so hopefully I have this right.... Hiragana is mostly used by children before they learn enough kanji, but you will also see some hiragana mixed in with kanji in a sentence...

You will also see katakana, for foreign words within a sentence of kanji or hiragana and kanji... The katakana are usually easy to figure out because if you say each characger you will usually make out the phonetical sounds of an English word, but sometimes another foreign word....think aisukurimu sorry, the romaji or romanized spelling may not be right in my example.....ice cream. Terebi. Television. Hanbaagaa hamburger....

[Tokyomarie]

I've googled for this and am still a bit confused. Ds15 has chosen Japanese as his foreign language. I have to learn it along side him because he's not used to having to study in this manner.

 

There appear to be 3 alphabets: hiragana, katakana, and kanji.

 

We're learning characters from hiragana right now. So far we've been given: a, i, u, e, o, ka, ki, ku, ke, ko, sa, shi, su, se, so. Our vocabulary uses these characters, or do you call them sounds?

 

Japanese words are made of of syllables that each begin with a consonant sound and end with a vowel sound- except for those words that begin with a, i, u, e, or o. There is only one consonant that can end a word or syllable- "n." Therefore, hiragana and katakana systems are referred to as syllabaries rather than alphabets because each character stands for a syllable.

 

I understand that katakana is to be used when a foreign word, like an American word, cannot be properly translated into Japanese. But does this mean that the word that uses katakana will be inserted into a hiragana sentence? In other words, hiragana and katakana are used simultaneously?

 

Yes, this is true. A sentence can include any or all of the three types of characters- hiragana, katakana, and kanji.

 

In standard Japanese, the kanji character gives the basic meaning to a word. Hiragana is used at the end of verbs to show tense and level of politeness. It can also be used for words that have no kanji associated with them or sometimes for emphasis. As you've figured out, katakana are used mainly for foreign loan words. It is often also used for emphasis, and sometimes for other purposes.

 

As the other poster has said, literature for very beginning readers uses only hiragana and katakana. As the grade level of the literature advances, you see more and more kanji being used. Sometimes the kanji will have small characters next to it (or above it when written horizontally). Those characters are called furigana and are meant to indicate the pronounciation of the kanji.

 

And we're starting typing practice today which uses kanji. Where the heck did that come from?

 

Kanji are Chinese characters- the same characters are used in Chinese writing. While the root meanings are often similar, individual characters and, especially, any two character combinations, do not necessarily have the exact same meaning between the two languages. You will learn later that characters are made up of combinations of strokes which form "radicals." Radicals combine to give each character it's basic meaning. Being a pictoral system, the characters were often derived originally from strokes that had some correlation to the form of the original concept. For instance, the character for mountain, or "yama" in Japanese, is 山, which looks like a mountain.

 

I am assuming we'll learn this as the course proceeds, but I feel like we've been thrown in without detailed explanation. I'm the kind of learner that needs to know WHY before I can do something. In fact, we're so confused that what the course considers to be one week's worth of work is taking us 3 weeks total. I sure hope we don't stay at this slow pace but I'm scared to move on if we don't have the foundation they are laying!

 

Anyway, here's to seeing if anyone can help.

 

What curriculum are you using?