Why is kanji needed

We would need Japanese characters for that. But it's ridiculous to expect that. Same as it's ridiculous to expect Japanese people to stop using katakana, and to suddenly pronounce words the same as the English pronunciation, when they are not English speakers. It is not just Japan, I have travelled the Globe and your de-facto English exists very little outside the business and tourist Industry.

Just try to speak to a local in English and most likely he won't understand you unless they learn English as a 2nd language and use it often. Holiday trips to Spain, Greece, etc we needed to learn the local lingo as few shop-owners could understand or use English. Why do some people think Japan has to alter their language system to pronounce English, or whatever other foreign languages, properly when they, Japanese, don't really feel the urgency of the issue when they're still in Japan?

English spoken countries also import quite a few foreign words and pronounce them as they wish. What if the original language speakers of the loanwords complain about that? OK well that makes it very clear then! What on earth are grammatical particles and modifiers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Stranger: I can respect that, but it puts Japanese at a disadvantage when they are purposefully taught incorrect pronunciation. With English it's the same especially when it comes to country names and some said names have even become accepted or at least understood in their home country eg.

Turkey or Paris. A minor one, but a common problem in my job. I teach a lot of individuals who travel abroad for business. My main point is that people all languages, if at all possible, should be taught to at least attempt correct pronunciation of words if they are applicable. Not shoved down their throat, but at the very least be aware that their usage is incorrect outside, but accepted locally. One that pops up is the use of "Renew" or "Reform" for shops instead of "Renovate" or "Remodel" or the food "Hamburg".

Short version: Learn good habits at the get go and it's much easier than having to "unlearn" bad habits later. They aren't purposefully taught the incorrect pronunciation, they are taught the Japanese pronunciation of these words.

Words take on a different pronunciation when they are borrowed into other languages. These are loan words. They are now words in the Japanese lexicon, that have a root from another language. It comes from German, but it sounds nothing like the German, and is a Japanese word. Only for a couple of days when they realize that they pronunciation is different than what they knew. It's a pretty easy lesson to learn for those who need to learn it, and at that time they will learn that the pronunciation of the English word if they are studying English.

On the contrary to this being a disadvantage, it gives them an advantage, as they have a base of Japanese words of English origin, making it easier to remember the English words as they learn them. Particles are elements that connect parts of a sentence together. They can denote a subject or object, and or mean things like 'etc' or 'and'. Modifiers take a kanji and modify it to give it tense, or change the meaning, or make it causative or passive or whatever.

Stranger: I can respect that, but I think we are going to have to agree to disagree. When I see Japanese talento on TV spoiting some nonesense English they think they picked up and completely misunderstand the meaning, other Japanese watch, listen and emulate. We are talking a short check of the jisho, or something they grabbed from a cafe somewhere. The usage of the words Smart, Revenge or Gorgeous come to mind. The next I get how they came into the language, and I do get that there will be wonky loan words in every language..

If Japanese in general don't care Believe it or not, it goes both ways and stereotypical pronunciation of the Japanese language by English speakers is mocked on this side of the shore.

I have heard stereotypical pronunciation of English speakers being mocked my own included. Although in my case it's more of a joke among friends than anything. For example, university professors who supposedly do their research in English. Well, they should know better, but I suspect many of them don't actually know what the proper pronunciation is and don't want to admit it.

This is different to foreign words in English. Many written languages had a messy development. That includes Chinese, as there are many sinitic languages onto which Chinese characters have been imposed, or which adopted them.

See for example the many discussions on the Language Log, such as this one on Cantonese. Even to briefly describe the relationship between spoken Cantonese and written Chinese is complicated, because formal Chinese writing when read out loud is pronounced in Cantonese without actually being Cantonese. The question arises of whether the Cantonese language is simply vernacular or not, but logically, formal Cantonese must also exist.

When that or vernacular Cantonese is written, it can't be done with the standard Chinese character set, and there are hundreds of characters I have seen it suggested that there are more than which are needed to render Cantonese words that don't exist in Mandarin. No, it started way before any English was heard in Japan.

Look at all the Chinese loan words, the Portuguese loan words Japanese is a sponge of a language, it likes to soak up whatever it comes into contact with. It does go both ways, but I rarely hear Japanese mock folk who cannot pronounce Japanese words correctly. And I have never heard a Japanese demand that furriers learn kanji, hiragana and katakana to prevent them mispronouncing basic words. There's nowt wrong wi' katakana, nowt wrong wi' English spelling. Any foreigners that say, " I don't see the need for Language and writing systems evolve over millennia, and now you recently arrive on Japan's shores and all of a sudden you're an expert, a scholar on what Japan needs and ought to do?

Anyway, I find that most people who blab like this are just too lazy or frustrated or not talented enough when it comes to studying Japanese, especially reading and writing. There's absolutely nothing wrong with Japan's writing system. Stop being one of those uppity, entitled, insensitive, arrogant westerners and just study already. Around the world, languages take in words from other languages. They've been doing it for hundreds of years, and they still do it.

Some languages, or rather cultures, are more amenable than others to this process. English and Japanese are two very mongrelized languages, though there are plenty of others. In the process of adopting loanwords into a language, any aspect of those words may change: the spelling if the two languages share a writing system , the pronunciation, or the meaning. In many cases, all three.

The pronunciation invariably changes, because unless two languages are nearly identical, it sounds distinctly odd to try and retain accuracy when the easier alternative of corrupting the word to suit local tastes presents itself. In English, words adopted from French can even end up with two distinctly different pronunciations, such as masseuse or lingerie, which in North America have been severely, er, Anglicized.

The new pronunciation, spelling and meaning of adopted words are legitimate, because they are used within the context of the new language they have entered. You will unthinkingly use words every day in English that have been lifted from another language, in some cases not even knowing which exact language they did come from tea, pajamas, tattoo, boondocks, amok, taboo or how close they remain to the "original" version of the word, which may itself have come from another language anyway.

Wipeout: Bit late to respond, but the years ago argument is also illogical as you put it. Today we have the internet and live stream, global scale communication. Sure, in the s it didn't matter if you butchered your Chinese in England because nobody'd be the wiser. Today, it takes seconds to check a new word, especially when it first enters the language. Just because there is a historical precedent does not mean it is correct.

In addition, mostly what I am talking about is not even old words that have established year usage. Japan was also male dominance in the past, so the Katakana which is the male character was used for an official document. It seems to be because writing implements in the time were a board-like bamboo stick, and a curved line was difficult. Today I have learned hiragana yes even double and I already have my view on 3 writing systems :D.

True, BUT hey, I must be genius or what, why not using spaces between sentence words? You all even Japanese speakers say spaces. Why not writing it? Removing kanji characters does not mean that the meaning would be lost. Because if two speakers can understand each other by speaking and they speak by hiragana sounds then they could understand that written hiragana of kanji characters too.

Don't worry, there are some media that already incorporate spaces into Japanese text, like in some videogames, so your genius is very much appreciated. Yes, indeed, people can understand each other despite the homonyms because of the context, but writing gives you the opportunity to express what you actually mean. It is hard to explain, but in simple terms, it gives the writing a more precise meaning to indicate what the writer is actually trying to say. You know how English literature can have different interpretations, right?

Another reason is for brevity. Sometimes the word takes too much space when written in kana that they resort to using the less used kanji, especially in printed media like magazines or on TV when the kana would take up too much screen space.

Once you learn Japanese more, you would realize that Kanji makes the text more readable. Pure kana just gives me a headache when reading long text like in Pokemon. Like I said, it is hard to explain, but once you delve deeper into Japanese, you would learn to appreciate Kanji. If the Japanese themselves are not protesting about it including the smart people , I don't think you have the credibility to tell them what to do with it. Use your Facebook account to login or register with JapanToday.

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Actually, there are three pretty solid arguments against writing exclusively in hiragana. This sounds like it would have the potential to turn every sentence into a confusing mass of congealed language bits, but written Japanese tends to fall into patterns where kanji and hiragana alternate, with the kanji forming base vocabulary and the hiragana giving them grammatical context.

Adam Shrimpton. Not that it will ever happen, but Japan would do well to simplify a little Fox Sora Winters.

Deborah Lansford. Mike L. Japanese has three completely separate sets of characters Fall at the first hurdle. I think instead of just using romanji Romaji no 'n'. These are the romaji roman script systems You're right, but this article is about characters used for writing, not writing systems. It is not Katakana's fault. In one sentence, you can have all three! How amazing is that! However, for those who are considering picking up the language, it might be intimidating as three writing systems seems like a challenge — some might have the mentality that one writing system is hard enough to master!

Out of the three, kanji is usually the writing system that Japanese learners have difficulty in getting used to. Each character looks so complicated and there are so many characters that it seems like there is no end to them!

Because of that, some even drop the kanji and focus on the other two writing systems, hiragana and katakana. This brings up the question: how important is kanji in the Japanese language that one can just not study it? Does one really need to know the kanji to be fluent in Japanese? Kanji characters in the Japanese language are basically the Chinese characters. The Japanese adopted the kanji from them, however, there is no direct link between the two language families other than using the same characters.

In fact, there are even differences between how the Chinese pronounce their characters and how the Japanese pronounce their characters. The onyomi is the Chinese-style reading based on the sounds of the ancient Chinese languages. Kunyomi is the native Japanese reading. The kanji on its own is pronounced in kunyomi, but when it is connected with another kanji, both words are pronounced in the onyomi way most of the time.

How cool are the flexible changes of kanji in the Japanese language? You may not want to believe it, but kanji is extremely important in the Japanese language. They are so significant in interpreting the meanings of the sentence and words. FluentU even uses a learning program which adapts to your specific needs to turn every video into a language learning lesson and get you to actively practice your newly-learned language skills.

Access FluentU on the website to use it with your computer or tablet or, better yet, start learning Japanese on the go with the FluentU app for iOS or Android! You can then read newspapers and most books. So, I recommend setting a future goal and breaking it down. Do the math and figure out how many new ones you should learn per day.

Learning kanji is all about getting into a daily study habit. Stick with it and take note when you start to see results, because your successes will keep you motivated to reach further successes.

Learn Radicals Complex characters are made up of smaller parts called radicals. You can also guess at pronunciation sometimes. Often, characters with a certain radical in common will be pronounced similarly. Associate Images Some people find it easy to remember characters when you make image associations.

The most famous book about this is Remember the Kanji by James Heisig. Use a Great Dictionary, Book, or Online Resource Whenever you learn a new character, consult your dictionary and find words that use it.

Most kanji learning materials offer a few common vocabulary items for each entry as well. Another great resource is Kanji Damage : A very practical and context oriented online kanji book. Contains around Kanji. The irreverent style check out the Eazy-E mnemonic with the focus on examples might be exactly what you need. Forget the Order Japanese students learn kanji in an established order.