Update: I’ve written an update on how best to learn Hiragana and Katakana
Some time around 2002 I first started learning Japanese. I began with a set of CD’s and a book full of “some random script” and I thought I’d just leave the book until later. I wanted to start speaking Japanese straight away! Big mistake!
I soon got bored, I had nothing but the CD’s, I didn’t want to read textbooks and a quick browse online didn’t find much. I thought learning by CD was the only real way to do it. I also became busy with partying university study. So my efforts slowly dwindled into nothing and I stopped.
6 years later, with some experience in self-teaching, I decided to try again. I found a lot more resources online. I began using advice from several sites (alljapaneseallthetime.com, goddesscarlie.com, wikihow.com) and carved out my own learning plan. My first step was to memorise the 255 kana, which contains hiragana and katakana.
I truly believe learning the kana first gives you a solid foundation to work from. It’s not difficult to memorise them if you use a tool such as Anki and some web games (Hiragana Drag-n-Drop, Katakana Drag-n-Drop).
Hiragana is made up of 46 basic symbols, with a total of 107 variations. It can be used to represent whole words but it’s mostly used alongside kanji to indicate prefixes, particles and grammatical word endings.
| Hiragana | Romaji | English |
| おいしい | oishii | delicious; tasty; |
| こんにちは | konnichiwa (konnichiha) | hello; good day; |
| またね | matane | good-bye; see you later; |
Katakana is made up of 46 basic symbols, matching the 46 hiragana, with a total of 148 variations. It is mostly used to write foreign words that do not have kanji representations. It is also used for technical and scientific terms.
Sometimes it can be very difficult to work out what foreign word the Katakana is referring to. There is a tendency within katakana to shorten the word, for example “Personal Computer” is shortened into パソコン (pasokon). It takes a bit of practice but eventually you will find it possible to work out the meaning by yourself.
| Katakana | Romaji | English |
| チョコレート |
chokorēto | Chocolate |
| クレジットカード | kurejitto kādo | Credit Card |
| アジアン・カンフー・ジェネレーション | ajian kanfū jenerēshon | Asian Kung-Fu Generation |
Sometimes, especially in children’s books, kana is written in small form next to difficult kanji to help the reader. This is called Furigana.
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In books for very young children hiragana is sometimes the only script used. In this case it is usually combined with spaces to make it easier to read. I’ll be looking for some of these books on my next trip to Japan. I think they would be great for practicing kana.
Now that I’ve learned the kana I feel comfortable using a few words with my Japanese penpals. At first I was overwhelmed with information about the Japanese language and a lot of the things I read I didn’t entirely understand. Eventually I began to put the pieces together and I feel I’ve now got a good grasp of what’s involved in learning the language. Now I’m learning the kanji and feel it’s only a matter of time (and a lot of practice!) until I can use Japanese fluently.
I continue to review the kana at least once a week to ensure I remember them all. I’m also starting to read through the Death Note books I purchased in Tokyo because they have furigana!
Check out Wikipedia for more in-depth information on Kana.
Photo Credit: massdistraction
