Japanese Orthography

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Miyuki Takara attempts to read Konata’s strange handwriting.

Japanese is written using primarily a combination of morphemic script (kanji, Chinese characters) and moraic script (kana).

Kana

Gojūon table. In each cell, hiragana is on the left and katakana is on the right.

	a	i	u	e	o
∅	あ ア	い イ	う ウ	え エ	お オ
k g	か カ が ガ	き キ ぎ ギ	く ク ぐ グ	け ケ げ ゲ	こ コ ご ゴ
s z	さ サ ざ ザ	し シ じ ジ	す ス ず ズ	せ セ ぜ ゼ	そ ソ ぞ ゾ
t d	た タ だ ダ	ち チ ぢ ヂ	つ ツ づ ヅ	て テ で デ	と ト ど ド
n	な ナ	に ニ	ぬ ヌ	ね ネ	の ノ
h p b	は ハ ぱ パ ば バ	ひ ヒ ぴ ピ び ビ	ふ フ ぷ プ ぶ ブ	へ ヘ ぺ ペ べ ベ	ほ ホ ぽ ポ ぼ ボ
m	ま マ	み ミ	む ム	め メ	も モ
y	や ヤ ゃ ャ		ゆ ユ ゅ ュ		よ ヨ ょ ョ
r	ら ラ	り リ	る ル	れ レ	ろ ロ
w	わ ワ				を ヲ
		ん ン		っ ッ

Kana are moraic scripts (syllabaries) used to write Japanese. Each character represents a single mora, which is generally a consonant followed by a vowel. In modern Japanese, hiragana and katakana are used. Hiragana is the primary moraic script, used to write suffixes, structural words, and native words when not written in kanji. Katakana are used when it is desired for a word to stand out; generally when words are emphasized, onomatopoeia, loans, scientific names, or company names.

Kanji

Kanji are Chinese characters used to write Japanese. They can often look different from simplified and traditional Hanzi (Chinese characters used for writing Chinese). Kanji have several readings (yomi), so the pronunciation depends on context. On’yomi are readings corresponding to older Chinese loans, and can thus sometimes vaguely resemble Chinese pronunciations of Hanzi. Kun’yomi are readings corresponding to native Japanese morphemes.