Kaze Uta Budo Kai Forum Archive

We won't be studying writing in these lessons, but thought you might want to know this.

There are 4 different types of writing in Japanese.

1. Hiragana
2. Katakana
3. Kanji
------------
4. Romaji

The top 3 are the original Japanese writing systems. They're what people normally think of when you talk about Japanese writing.
There is a great site for learning the Japanese writing systems. http://www.kanjisite.com I go there at least once or twice a week.
If you're going to learn Japanese writing, I'd recommend learning them in the order listed above. Hiragana, Katakana, then Kanji (ugh)


The 4th, Romaji, is a modern system derived from English letters. It's great for learning the language because you don't have to take the time
to learn the first three just to be able to say hello.

So we'll be using romaji in these lessons.


Pronounciation.
The Japanese Language is made of syllables. Not necessarily letters like in English.
It only has 5 sounds that we would consider vowels.
They are

a i u e o

Where
a sounds like aaahhh.
i sounds like the e in we.
u sounds like the oo in soon.
e sounds like the e in get.
o sounds like the o in old.


You then make sounds and words by putting a "consonant" in front of the "vowels" to make syllables.

a i u e o
sa shi su se so
ka ki ku ke ko
ma mi mu me mo
na ni nu ne no
ta chi tsu te to
ra ri ru re ro

You get the idea.

So, lets take a look at a Japanese word.

sashimi

This would be pronounced in English as (Saw she me).

Or

izakaya

Phonetic (EE zah Kah Yah)

-sashimi is sushi without the rice
-izakaya is a bar