Katakana (片仮名, カタカナ or かたかな, Katakana^?) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji, and in some cases the Latin alphabet. The word katakana means "fragmentary kana," as they are derived from components of more complex kanji. A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... Okinawan (Okinawan: Ê”ucināguci) is a Ryukyuan language spoken in Japan on the southern island of Okinawa, as well as the surrounding islands of Kerama, Kume-jima, Tonaki, Aguni, and a number of smaller islands located to the east of the main island of Okinawa. ... Not to be confused with the Aini language. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... It has been suggested that Shakukun be merged into this article or section. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Romaji ローマ字 Hentaigana (変体仮名) are alternative kana letterforms equivalent to standard kana characters. ... Unicode’s Universal Character Set potentially supports over 1 million (1,114,112 = 220 + 216 or 17 × 216, hexadecimal 110000) code points. ... ISO 15924, Codes for the representation of names of scripts, defines two sets of codes for a number of writing systems (scripts). ... Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... This article describes the modern writing system and its history. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Manyogana 万葉仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 For other meanings of Kana, see Kana (disambiguation). ...

Katakana are characterized by short straight strokes and angular corners, and are the simplest of the Japanese scripts.

There are two main systems of ordering katakana, the old-fashioned iroha ordering, and the more prevalent gojūon ordering. Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Manyogana 万葉仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 For other meanings of Kana, see Kana (disambiguation). ... The iroha (Japanese: , いろは) is a Japanese poem most likely written sometime during the Heian era (AD 794–1179). ... The gojÅ«on (五十音) is a Japanese ordering of kana. ...

Usage

In modern Japanese, katakana are most often used for transcription of words from foreign languages (called gairaigo). For example, "television" is written terebi (テレビ, terebi^?). Similarly, katakana is usually used for country names and foreign place and personal names. For example America is written アメリカ Amerika (America has its own kanji (ateji) Amerika (亜米利加, Amerika^?) or for short, Beikoku (米国, Beikoku^?) which literally means "Rice Country"). Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Furigana (Japanese: ふりがな), are a Japanese reading aid. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji Okurigana (送り仮名, literally accompanying letters) are kana suffixes following kanji stems in Japanese written words. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji The romanization of Japanese is the use of the Latin alphabet (called rōmaji )   in Japanese) to write the Japanese language, which is normally written in logographic characters borrowed from Chinese (kanji) and syllabic scripts... Transcription is the conversion into written, typewritten or printed form, of a spoken language source, such as the proceedings of a court hearing. ... Gairaigo (外来語) is Japanese for loan word or borrowed word, and indicates a transliteration (or transvocalization) into Japanese. ... This page is about the country United States of America. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... Ateji (当て字 ) guessed characters are Kanji selected to write a borrowed non-Chinese or native Japanese word with the intent of implying an etymology, which is fanciful or false. ...

Katakana are also used for onomatopoeia, letters used to represent sounds, for example pinpon (ピンポン, pinpon^?), the "ding-dong" sound of a doorbell, would usually be written in katakana. For the supervillain, see Onomatopoeia (comics). ...

Technical and scientific terms, such as the names of animal and plant species and minerals are also commonly written in katakana. For other uses, see Species (disambiguation). ... Minerals are natural compounds formed through geological processes. ...

Katakana are also often, but not always, used for transcription of Japanese company names. For example Suzuki is written スズキ, and Toyota is written トヨタ. Katakana are also used for emphasis, especially on signs, advertisements, and hoardings. For example, it is common to see ココ koko ("here"), ゴミ gomi ("trash") or メガネ megane ("glasses"), and words to be emphasized in a sentence are also sometimes written in katakana, mirroring the European usage of italics. Suzuki Motor Corporation ) is a Japanese multinational corporation company producing a range of automobiles (especially Keicars and small SUVs), a full range of motorcycles, ATVs, outboard motors, wheelchairs, and a variety of other small combustion-powered engine products. ... This article is about the automaker. ... Bold and Boldface redirect here. ... Italic can refer to: Italic languages Italic scripts Italic means Of or from Italy; the usage is most commonly restricted to talking about the people and languages of what is now Italy from the historic period before the Roman Empire. ...

Pre-World War II official documents mix katakana and kanji in the same way that hiragana and kanji are mixed in modern Japanese texts, that is, katakana were used for okurigana and particles such as wa or o. Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji Okurigana (送り仮名, literally accompanying letters) are kana suffixes following kanji stems in Japanese written words. ... Japanese particles, joshi ) or teniwoha ), in Japanese grammar are suffixes or short words which come after other words such as nouns, verbs and adjectives, indicating a wide range of grammatical functions. ...

Katakana were also used for telegrams in Japan before 1988 and before the introduction of multibyte characters in computer systems in the 1980s. Most computers used katakana instead of kanji and/or hiragana for output.

Although words borrowed from ancient Chinese are usually written in kanji, loanwords from modern Chinese dialects which are borrowed directly rather than using the Sino-Japanese on'yomi readings, are often written in katakana. Examples include Sino-Japanese or Kango () in Japanese, refers to that portion of the Japanese vocabulary that originated in the Chinese language or has been created from elements borrowed from Chinese. ... The characters for Kanji, lit. ...

• マージャン (麻將/麻雀), mājan (mahjong); in Mandarin májiàng
• ウーロン茶 (烏龍茶), ūroncha (Oolong tea), from Mandarin wūlóng
• チャーハン (炒飯), chāhan, (fried rice)
• チャーシュー(叉焼), chāshū, from Cantonese cha siu, roast pig
• シューマイ (焼売), shūmai, from Cantonese siu maai, a kind of dim sum.

The very common Chinese loanword ラーメン (rāmen) is rarely written with its kanji 拉麺. This article is about the four-player game of Chinese origin. ... Rolled Oolong tea leaves Oolong (Chinese: ; Pinyin: ) is a traditional Chinese tea somewhere between green and black in oxidation. ... Fried rice (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ) is a popular component of Chinese cuisine and, by extension, various other forms of Asian cuisine. ... This article is about all of the Cantonese (Yue) dialects. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Dim sum (Chinese: 點心; Cantonese IPA: dɪm2sɐm1; Pinyin: diǎnxīn; Wade-Giles: tien-hsin; literally dot heart or order heart, meaning order to ones hearts content; also commonly translated as touch the heart, dotted heart, or snack), a Cantonese term... This article is about the traditional Japanese noodle soup. ...

There are rare cases where the opposite has occurred, with kanji forms created from words originally written in katakana. An example of this is コーヒー (kōhii), "coffee", which can be alternatively written as 珈琲. This kanji usage is occasionally employed by coffee manufacturers or coffee shops for novelty.

Katakana are sometimes used instead of hiragana as furigana to give the pronunciation of a word written in Roman characters, or for a foreign word, which is written as kanji for the meaning, but intended to be pronounced as the original. Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Furigana (Japanese: ふりがな), are a Japanese reading aid. ...

Katakana are also sometimes used to indicate words being spoken in a foreign or otherwise unusual accent, by foreign characters, robots etc. For example, in a manga, the speech of a foreign character or a robot may be represented by コンニチワ (konnichiwa) instead of the more usual hiragana こんにちは (konnichi wa). This article is about the comics published in East Asian countries. ...

Katakana are also used to indicate the on'yomi (Chinese-derived readings) of a kanji in a kanji dictionary. The characters for Kanji, lit. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... This page meets Wikipedias criteria for speedy deletion. ...

Some Japanese personal names are written in katakana. This was more common in the past, hence elderly women often have katakana names. Yamada Tarō, a common Japanese name (male) A modern Japanese name (日本人名) consists of a family name, or surname, followed by a given name. ...

It is very common to write words with difficult-to-read kanji in katakana. This phenomenon is often seen with medical terminology. For example, in the word "dermatology", 皮膚科, hifuka, the second kanji, 膚, is considered difficult, and thus the word hifuka is commonly written as 皮フ科 or ヒフ科 in katakana. Similarly, difficult kanji such as 癌 gan, "cancer", are often written in katakana or hiragana. Medical terminology is a process of accurately describing the human body and associated components, conditions, processes and procedures in a science based manner. ... Dermatology (from Greek δερμα, skin) is a branch of medicine dealing with the skin and its appendages (hair, sweat glands, etc). ...

Katakana is also used for traditional musical notations, as in the Tozan-ryū of shakuhachi, and in sankyoku ensembles with koto, shamisen, and shakuhachi. A RyÅ« (流) is any school of a Japanese martial art. ... A shakuhachi flute, blowing edge up. ... Sankyoku (三曲, often romanized sankyōku) is a three-member Japanese traditional musical ensemble. ... Japanese 13-stringed koto The koto (箏 or 琴) is a traditional Japanese stringed musical instrument derived from Chinese zithers. ... Kitagawa Utamaro, Flowers of Edo: Young Womans Narrative Chanting to the Samisen, ca. ...

Orthography

Foreign phrases are sometimes transliterated with a middle dot called nakaguro (中黒, nakaguro^?) or a space separating the words. However, in cases where it is assumed that the reader knows the separate gairaigo words in the phrase, the middle dot is not used. For example, the phrase コンピュータゲーム (konpyūta gēmu)(computer game), containing two very well-known gairaigo, is not written with a middle dot. An interpunct · is a small dot used for interword separation in ancient Latin script, being perhaps the first consistent visual representation of word boundaries in written language. ...

Katakana spelling differs slightly from hiragana. While hiragana spells long vowels with the addition of a second vowel kana, katakana usually uses a vowel extender mark called a chōon. This mark is a short line following the direction of the text, horizontal in yokogaki, or horizontal text, and vertical in tategaki, or vertical text. However, it is more often used when writing foreign loanwords; long vowels in Japanese words written in katakana are usually written as they would be in hiragana. There are exceptions such as ローソク(蝋燭)(rōsoku)(candle) or ケータイ(携帯)(kētai)(mobile phone). In linguistics, vowel length is the duration of a vowel sound. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category The chōon ) or bōsen ) mark is a Japanese symbol which is used to indicate a long vowel, especially in katakana writing. ... Nihongo (meaning Japanese language), written vertically in kanji Yokogaki (横書き, horizontal writing) and tategaki (縦書き, vertical writing) are two systems of Japanese writing. ... Nihongo (meaning Japanese language), written vertically in kanji Yokogaki (横書き, horizontal writing) and tategaki (縦書き, vertical writing) are two systems of Japanese writing. ...

A small tsu ッ called a sokuon indicates a geminate consonant, which is represented in rōmaji by doubling the following consonant. For example, bed is written in katakana as ベッド (beddo). Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyogana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji The sokuon (Japanese: ) is a Japanese symbol consisting of a small hiragana or katakana tsu. ... In phonetics, consonant length is when a spoken consonant is pronounced for an audibly longer period of time than a short consonant. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ...

The sokuon is sometimes used in places which have no equivalent in native sounds. For example, double-h in place of ch is common in German names. Bach, for example, comes out as バッハ (Bahha); Mach is マッハ (Mahha). The doubling of the "h" in Bach and Mach (or the underlying small tsu) is probably the kana that best fits those German names.

Related sounds in various languages are hard to express in Japanese, so Khrushchev becomes フルシチョフ (Furushichofu). Ali Khamenei is アリー・ハーメネイー (Arii Hāmeneii). The Japanese Wikipedia has references to イツハク・パールマン (Itsuhaku Pāruman) and イツァーク・パールマン (Itsāku Pāruman), Itzhak Perlman. Itzhak Perlman (born August 31, 1945) is an Israeli-American violinist, conductor, and pedagogue. ...

Table of katakana

This is a table of katakana together with their Hepburn romanization. The first chart sets out the standard katakana (characters in red are obsolete, and characters in green are modern additions to the katakana, used mainly to represent sounds from other languages.) Learning to read katakana is often complicated by the similarities between different characters. For example, shi シ and tsu ツ , as well as so ソ and n ン , look very similar in print except for the slant and stroke shape. (These differences are more prominent when written with an ink brush, due to the directions of the strokes.)
Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji The Hepburn romanization system ) is named after James Curtis Hepburn, who used it to transcribe the sounds of the Japanese language into the Latin alphabet in the third edition of his Japanese–English dictionary, published... Ink brushes (筆, in Japanese fude) are speciality brushes used in East Asian calligraphy. ...

¹: ヲ ("wo") sounds the same as オ ("o"), but it's rarely used except when the corresponding hiragana has to be represented in an all-katakana environment.

²: These katakana were introduced into the education system in the early Meiji period, but never became widespread. [1] [2]

Yōon (拗音) is a feature of the Japanese language in which a mora is formed with an added y sound. ... The hiragana あ. あ in hiragana or ã‚¢ in katakana is one of the Japanese kana that each respresent one mora. ... The hiragana い. Look up い in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... In Japanese writing, the kana う (hiragana) and ウ (katakana) occupy the third place in the modern GojÅ«on (五十音) system of collating kana. ... In Japanese writing, the kana え (hiragana) and エ (katakana) occupy the fourth place, between う and お, in the modern GojÅ«on (五十音) system of collating kana. ... In Japanese writing, the kana お (hiragana) and オ (katakana) occupy the fifth place, between え and か, in the modern GojÅ«on (五十音) system of collating kana. ... か, in hiragana, ã‚« in katakana, ka (IPA: ) under Hepburn romanisation, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... き, in hiragana, ã‚­ in katakana, ki in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... く, in hiragana, or ク in katakana, and ku in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... け, in hiragana, or ケ in katakana, and ke in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... こ, in hiragana, or コ in katakana, or ko in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... さ, in hiragana, or サ in katakana, or sa in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... し, in hiragana, or ã‚· in katakana, or shi in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... す, in hiragana, or ス in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... せ, in hiragana, or ã‚» in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... そ, in hiragana, or ソ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... た, in hiragana, or ã‚¿ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ち, in hiragana, or チ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... つ, in hiragana, or ツ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... て, in hiragana, or テ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... と, in hiragana, or ト in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... な, in hiragana, or ナ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... に, in hiragana, or ニ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ぬ, in hiragana, or ヌ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ね, in hiragana, or ネ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... Look up の in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Ha as it appears in hiragana. ... ひ, in hiragana, or ヒ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ふ, in hiragana, or フ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... へ, in hiragana, or ヘ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ほ, in hiragana, or ホ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ま, in hiragana, or マ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... み, in hiragana, or ミ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚€, in hiragana, or ム in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... め, in hiragana, or メ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚‚, in hiragana, or モ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚„, in hiragana, or ヤ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ゆ, in hiragana, or ユ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... よ, in hiragana, or ヨ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ら, in hiragana, or ラ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚Š, in hiragana, or リ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚‹, in hiragana, or ル in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚Œ, in hiragana, or レ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ろ, in hiragana, or ロ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... わ, in hiragana, or ワ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ゐ, in hiragana, or ヰ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚‘, in hiragana, or ヱ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚’, in hiragana, or ヲ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ã‚“, in hiragana, or ン in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... か, in hiragana, ã‚« in katakana, ka (IPA: ) under Hepburn romanisation, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... き, in hiragana, ã‚­ in katakana, ki in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... く, in hiragana, or ク in katakana, and ku in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... け, in hiragana, or ケ in katakana, and ke in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... こ, in hiragana, or コ in katakana, or ko in Romaji with Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... さ, in hiragana, or サ in katakana, or sa in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... し, in hiragana, or ã‚· in katakana, or shi in Romaji under Hepburn romanisation (IPA: ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... す, in hiragana, or ス in katakana (IPA ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... せ, in hiragana, or ã‚» in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... そ, in hiragana, or ソ in katakana (IPA ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... た, in hiragana, or ã‚¿ in katakana (IPA ), is one of the Japanese kana or scripts, which each represent one mora. ... ち, in hiragana, or チ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... つ, in hiragana, or ツ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora, pronounced  . Not to be confused with sokuon, which are identical but somewhat smaller. ... て, in hiragana, or テ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... と, in hiragana, or ト in katakana (IPA ), is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... In Japanese, the kana Ha (written as は in hiragana and ハ in katakana, IPA ) represents a phoneme of the language. ... ひ, in hiragana, or ヒ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ふ, in hiragana, or フ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... へ, in hiragana, or ヘ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ほ, in hiragana, or ホ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... In Japanese, the kana Ha (written as は in hiragana and ハ in katakana, IPA ) represents a phoneme of the language. ... ひ, in hiragana, or ヒ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ふ, in hiragana, or フ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... へ, in hiragana, or ヘ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... ほ, in hiragana, or ホ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... Image File history File links Katakana_obsolete_yi. ... Image File history File links Katakana_obsolete_ye. ... Image File history File links Katakana_obsolete_wu. ... ã‚’, in hiragana, or ヲ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. ... In Japanese writing, the kana お (hiragana) and オ (katakana) occupy the fifth place, between え and か, in the modern GojÅ«on (五十音) system of collating kana. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... The Meiji period ), or Meiji era, denotes the 45-year reign of Emperor Meiji, running, in the Gregorian calendar, from 23 October 1868 to 30 July 1912. ...

History

Katakana was developed in the early Heian Period from parts of man'yōgana characters as a form of shorthand. For example, ka カ comes from the left side of ka 加 "increase". The table below shows the origins of each katakana: the red markings of the original Chinese character eventually became each corresponding symbol. The following text needs to be harmonized with text in the article History of Japan#Heian Period. ... It has been suggested that Shakukun be merged into this article or section. ... Japanese name Kanji: Hiragana: Korean name Hangul: Hanja: Vietnamese name Quốc ngữ: Hán tá»±: A Chinese character or Han character (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ) is a logogram used in writing Chinese, Japanese, sometimes Korean, and formerly Vietnamese. ...

Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ...

Computer encoding

In addition to fonts intended for Japanese text and Unicode catch-all fonts (like Arial Unicode MS), many fonts intended for Chinese text also include katakana (such as MS Song). In digital typography, Arial Unicode MS is an extended version of the OpenType font Arial. ...

Katakana have two forms of encoding, halfwidth hankaku (半角, hankaku^?) and fullwidth zenkaku (全角, zenkaku^?). The halfwidth forms come from JIS X 0201 originally. This includes halfwidth Katakana in right side area of ASCII. That is, most halfwidth Katakana could be represented by one byte each. In the late 1970s, two-byte character sets such as JIS X 0208 were introduced to represent Hiraganas, Kanjis and other characters. JIS_X_0208 has its own Katakana area independently of one-byte character set such as JIS_X_0201. Katakana of JIS_X_0208 takes two-byte (at least), so many (especially old) devices output these Katakanas as two-byte-width. This is why Katakana of JIS_X_0201 is called halfwidth and JIS_X_0208, fullwidth. Therefore, most encodings have no halfwidth Hiragana. Half-width kana (はんかくカナ) refers to the katakana character portion of the character set specified by JIS X 0201. ... JIS X 0201, developed in 1969, was the first Japanese character encoding to become widely used. ... Image:ASCII fullsvg There are 95 printable ASCII characters, numbered 32 to 126. ... JIS X 0208 is a Japanese Industrial Standard defining a set of kanji indexed by a pair of integers from 1 to 94 (this is known as the kuten pair of the kanji). ...

Although often said to be obsolete, in fact the halfwidth katakana are still used in many systems and encodings. For example, the titles of mini discs can only be entered in ASCII or halfwidth katakana, and halfwidth katakana were commonly used in computerized cash register displays, on shop receipts, and Japanese digital television and DVD subtitles. Several popular Japanese encodings such as EUC-JP, Unicode and Shift-JIS have halfwidth Katakana code as well as fullwidth. By contrast, ISO-2022-JP has no halfwidth Katakana, and is mainly used over SMTP and NNTP. Halfwidth katakana are commonly used to save memory space. The Sony MZ1 MiniDisc player, the first to hit the market in 1992. ... Extended Unix Code (EUC) is a multibyte character encoding system used primarily for Japanese, Korean, and simplified Chinese. ... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ... The title given to this article is incorrect due to technical limitations. ... ISO 2022, more formally ISO/IEC 2022, is an ISO standard (equivalent to the ECMA standard ECMA-35) specifying a technique for including multiple character sets in a single character encoding, and a technique for representing character sets which cannot be represented in 7 bits. ... Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is the de facto standard for email transmission across the Internet. ... The Network News Transport Protocol or NNTP is an Internet application protocol used primarily for reading and posting Usenet articles, as well as transferring news among servers. ...

Unicode

In Unicode, fullwidth katakana occupy code points U+30A0 to U+30FF [3]: The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ...

Halfwidth equivalents to the fullwidth katakana also exist. These are encoded within the Halfwidth and Fullwidth Forms block (U+FF00–U+FFEF) [4], starting at U+FF65 and ending at U+FF9F (characters U+FF61–U+FF64 are halfwidth punctuation marks):

Code points 32D0 to 32FE list Circled Katakana. Note: A circled ン is missing

Katakana for the Ainu language

Katakana is sometimes used to write the Ainu language. In Ainu language katakana usage, the consonant that comes at the end of a syllable is represented by a small version of a katakana that corresponds to that final consonant and with an arbitrary vowel. For instance "up" is represented by ウㇷ゚ (u followed by small pu). In Unicode, the Katakana Phonetic Extensions block (U+31F0–U+31FF) [5] exists for Ainu language support. These characters are used mainly for the Ainu language only: Not to be confused with the Aini language. ...

Example transcriptions of Katakana and foreign languages

Medicine

Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ...

Computing

Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ...

Names

Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ...

Regions

Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ...

Nations and cities

Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. ...

See also

• Japanese phonology for pronunciation.
• Hiragana
• Historical kana usage for a discussion of pre-war kana spelling
• Rōmaji for a comparison of romanization systems
• Taiwanese kana, katakana-based writing system once used for Taiwanese language

Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... Kana is a general term for two types of syllabic Japanese script: hiragana (ひらがな) and katakana (カタカナ). These were developed as an alternative and adjunct to ideograph based characters of Chinese origin, or Kanji (漢字). Hiragana and katakana (grouped vertically). ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Romaji ローマ字 The title given to this article lacks diacritics because of certain technical limitations. ... Languages can be romanized in a variety of ways, as shown here with Mandarin Chinese In linguistics, romanization (or Latinization, also spelled romanisation or Latinisation) is the representation of a word or language with the Roman (Latin) alphabet, or a system for doing so, where the original word or language... The Taiwanese-Japanese Dictionary Taiwanese kana (タイ ヲァヌ ギイ ã‚«ã‚¢ ビェン; Traditional Chinese:臺灣語假名; Pe̍h-ōe-jÄ«: Tâi-oân-gí ká-bêng; Pinyin: TáiwānyÇ” jiÇŽmíng; Romaji: Taiwan-go kana) is a katakana-based writing system once used to write Holo Taiwanese language, when Taiwan was administrated by Japan. ... See alternative meanings for other possible definitions. ...

External links

• Katakana code chart at Unicode.org
• Real Kana Practice katakana using different typefaces
• katakana stroke order diagrams on nihongoresources.com
• Animations showing how to write katakana
• Learn Katakana, simple game to learn Katakana alphabet.