-
Hiragana Chart
The Japanese syllabary hiragana is one of three language sets that make up the Japanese writing system. Hiragana symbols are the cursive versions of katakana, so they are more flow-y looking than the others. It is a common phonetic system consisting of 46 monograph characters, with five vowel sounds and ten base consonants. This base monograph system is known as gojūon (五十音), meaning “fifty sounds” to represent the 5 x 10 grid, however yi, ye, and wu are unused and on the w row, ゐ (i) and ゑ (e) are rarely used and not counted, and ん (n) is a unique, independent sound. Hiragana Base Monographs (gojūon) vowels only あ (a) い (i) う (u)…
-
Japanese “Wa” (は) and “Ga” (が)
Two weeks ago I talked about Japanese particles and how the Japanese particle “ga” (が) (subject marker) started appearing in my Pimsleur lessons when I was expecting “wa” (は) (topic marker), and how it sounded new to me. But actually, last week my daughter and I were driving around and I played lesson one in the car for us to listen to together, and I was reminded that “ga” (が) was used then. This got me thinking more about the wa/ga situation. I am still fuzzy on when to use “wa” (は) and when to use “ga” (が), but in addition to the guidelines I mentioned in my Japanese particle…
-
Japanese Particles
Since I started my current language learning schedule in September of last year, I’ve used immersion methods both in my various listening lessons and in my Duolingo app, without referring to any kind of grammatical guides. But this week while I was listening to my level one Japanese lessons in Pimsleur, I heard something new that I had to investigate. Up until now, “wa” (は), has been used as a main word marker. In my lessons it was described as a word that translates to “as for,” so “watashi wa” (わたしは) would mean “as for me” or “I am.” Why わ and は sound the same but have different hiragana…
-
Japanese Language Learning: Ittekimasu and Itterasshai
My favorite phrases that I’ve recently learned are the Japanese expressions ittekimasu (いってきます) and itterasshai (いってらっしゃい). You use itterasshai when someone else is going away and it’s like saying “go and come back,” or “go and have a good time and come back” or “go and return safely!” This week I even saw it translated from Japanese television as “see you later,” (and yes, at this point I’m thrilled when I can recognize any Japanese words in a show or movie!) On the other side of that we have ittekimasu, which means “I’ll go and come back.” To break it down, the phrase ittekimasu is a combination of the verbs iku…
-
Delightful and Challenging Language Learning
This week in language learning, I continued my Pimsleur, Innovative Language, Fluent Fiction, and Duolingo, and also enjoyed watching some foreign language films in Spanish, Japanese, and Vietnamese. Watching language films while learning them is definitely a delightful and enriching experience, but for me, it’s a very humbling one to see how little I actually know at this point, especially in Japanese and Vietnamese, which I just started in the fall. But knowing that also gives me a sense of excitement that there’s so much more to unravel. The most challenging aspect so far is learning Hiragana, but I also think that the characters are so beautiful that I’d like…
