An Introduction to Japanese
Japanese is the ninth most widely-spoken language in the world – even though it is barely spoken outside of Japan!
Compared to its complex writing system, Japanese is not a difficult language to speak: once you can pronounce all of the syllables of the hiragana and katakana syllabaries, you can pronounce any Japanese word. Pronouns are often omitted; verb endings do not change with regards to person, number or gender; there are only two tenses; there are no different forms for the plurals of nouns and definite/indefinite articles do not exist.
There are, however, different conjugations of verbs depending upon the level of politeness required. ‘Iku’ (‘to go’) can be used in its base form if you are talking to close friends; it becomes ‘ikimasu’ in polite conversation; ‘irassharu’ when talking to superiors and ‘ukagau’ or ‘mairu’ when talking humbly about oneself. The polite forms of verbs are normally the first taught as they are the most useful: polite forms are used when the person you are talking to is only an acquaintance. Nouns can also be made more polite by adding ‘o-‘ or ‘go-‘ to the beginning of them, which is common in the speech of Japanese women.
Fortunately, the '-masu' form is all that is needed for everyday, polite conversation.
Particles
Whereas English relies on word order to convey meaning, Japanese uses ‘particles’ to indicate a noun’s purpose within the sentence. は (pronounced ‘wa’) is used to show the subject of the verb; を (‘wo’) shows the object. In English, the placement of the words in ‘I eat the fish’ cannot be changed. In Japanese, ‘I’, ‘fish’ and ‘eat’ can come in any order, although it is conventional to use the pattern subject-object-verb. Thus, the sentence would probably be 「私は魚を食べます。」 (watashi wa sakana wo tabemasu). ‘Watashi’, meaning ‘I’, is followed by ‘wa’, so we know that ‘I’ is the subject. ‘Sakana’ is followed by ‘wo’, so we know that it is the object. Even if the sentence read 「魚を私は食べます。」(sakana wo watashi wa tabemasu) it would still be clear that ‘I’ was eating ‘the fish’ and not the other way around!
There is another particle, が (‘ga’), that is used to indicate the subject of a sentence. It is used in a slightly different way to は: the ‘how’ and the ‘why’ is too complicated for basic Japanese! The most likely use of が in the basic stages of Japanese is in a ‘I like’/’I hate’ phrase.
The phrase ‘I like apples’ is 「リンゴが好きです。」 (ringo ga suki desu). The phrase literally translates to ‘apples fondness are’!
Similarly, if you don’t like apples, the phrase is 「リンゴが嫌いきです。」 (ringo ga kirai desu).
This is also a good example of how Japanese does not use pronouns if they are not necessary. If someone offers you an apple and you turn them down, it’s obvious who doesn’t like apples!
There are other particles that are used as prepositions such as へ (e (‘to’)), に (ni (‘to’)), で (de (‘in’)), と (to (‘with’)) and か (ka) which is tagged on to the end of a sentence and indicates a question.
Pronunciation
Vowels
The pronunciation of vowels never changes. Even if two vowels are placed next to each other, such as in the word for ‘love’, ‘ai’, the vowels still retain their sounds; although it is pronounced similarly to the English word ‘eye’ in normal conversation, it is really two syllables. Long vowels are simply short vowels held for double the length of time.
‘a’ as in father
‘i’ as in hippo
‘u’ as in food
‘e’ as in emphasis
‘o’ as in otter
Consonants
‘k’ as in kick
‘g’ as in gap
‘s’ as in side
‘z’ as in zoo
‘t’ as in tank
‘d’ as in done
‘n’ as in name
‘h’ as in hoop
‘f’ – a cross between ‘f’ and ‘h’. Think of it as blowing out a candle! (This sound is present in the syllable ‘ふ/フ’.)
‘b’ as in beat
‘p’ as in pocket
‘m’ as in mother
‘y’ as in yacht
‘r’ – this sound is difficult to describe. It is somewhere between an ‘l’, an ‘r’ and a ‘d’! It’s best to listen to how a native Japanese speaker pronounces it.
‘w’ as in weird
‘ch’ as in chicken
‘sh’ as in shop
‘ts’ as in lots
‘j’ as in Jim
Syllabic ‘n’ sounds a bit like a quick ‘mm’ as in ‘Mm, I agree!’
The vowel sound ‘u’ is often lost in spoken Japanese: ‘desu’ (‘to be’) is often pronounced ‘dess’.
Everyday Phrases
Names
In Japan, the family name precedes the given name, so if someone introduces himself as ‘Tanaka Satoshi’, you know that he is ‘Mr. Tanaka’. Japanese likes to avoid using pronouns where possible and if a sentence does not work without one, using a name is preferable to using a pronoun. You should address someone as their family name unless they invite you to do otherwise. Even in schools, the teacher will refer to the pupils by their family names.
Another important point about addressing people in Japanese is to use the correct suffix.
* ‘-さん’ (‘-san’) is the usual, polite form of address. This is roughly equivalent to Mr. / Mrs. / Miss. / Ms., so the aforementioned Satoshi becomes ‘Tanaka-san’. This is the suffix to use when you meet someone for the first time.
* If you’re talking to a very young child, you can use ‘-ちゃん’ (‘-chan’): Mr. Tanaka’s 2-year-old son, Kenta, could become ‘Ken-chan’ (nicknames are often used with ‘-chan’).
‘-chan’ is also used when referring to girls (although '-san' may be used for older girls) and 'Ayame' may remain ‘Aya-chan’ to her friends well into adulthood.
Basically, '-chan' is used to show affection: a pet dog could be called 'John-chan' (bizarrely, 'John' is a popular name for a dog in Japan!); a female, teenage fan of a rock star could add '-chan' to his name – even cute, inanimate objects can be '-chan' or its variant, '-tan'!
Adding '-chan' is a very feminine/childish thing to do and should not be done in polite conversation.
* ‘-君’ (‘-kun’) is used when referring to a boy (or someone of inferior status), so Mr. Tanaka might call his 14-year-old nephew, Ren, Ren-kun. Girls are almost never referred to as '-kun'.
* ‘-先生’ (‘-sensei’) literally means ‘teacher’, but it can be used to refer to anyone learned or skilled. This word has become relatively well known in the West through martial arts films.
* '-様' ('-sama') is used to show more respect than '-san' and is used when addressing someone of a much higher rank or in a business setting when addressing customers. Interestingly, '-chan' and '-sama' can be blended to give the word '-chama', which is used for someone you both respect and have a great affection for – normally a grandmother!
These suffixes are never added to one's own name, but should always be remembered when addressing someone else: names are only used without a suffix in very informal situations, usually with someone the speaker knows very well.
Greetings
こんにちは。 konnichiwa Hello!
おはようございます。 ohayou gozaimasu Good morning!
こんばんは。 konbanwa Good evening!
おやすみなさい 。 oyasumi nasai Good night!
はじめまして。 hajimemashite How do you do?
どうぞよろしく。 douzo yoroshiku Pleased to meet you.
名前は何ですか。 namae wa nan desu ka What’s your name?
________です。 ________ desu My name’s _______.
お元気ですか。 o-genki desu ka How are you?
はい、元気です。 hai, genki desu I’m fine, thank you.
Courtesies
お願いします。 onegai shimasu Please.
ありがとう。 arigatou Thank you.
どういたしまして。 dou itashimashite You’re welcome.
ごめんなさい。 gomen nasai Sorry.
すみません。 sumimasen Excuse me.
はい。 hai Yes.
いいえ。 iie No.
Leaving
じゃね。 ja ne Cheerio!
ではまた。 de wa mata See you later!
また明日。 mata ashita See you tomorrow!
さよなら。 sayonara Goodbye.
Questions
これ kore This one
それ sore That oneあれ are That one over there
なに nani What?
これはなんですか。 kore wa nan desu ka What’s this?
どこ doko Where?
駅はどこですか。 eki wa doko desu ka Where is the station?
だれ dare Who?
あの人はだれですか。 ano hito wa dare desu ka Who is that person?
いつ itsu When?
パーティーはいつですか。 paatii wa itsu desu ka When’s the party?
何時 nanji What time?
何時ですか。 nanji desu ka What time is it?
どうして。 doushite Why?
いくら ikura How much?
それはいくらですか。 sore wa ikura desu ka How much is that one?
Numbers
Japanese numbers are tricky (especially so if they’re written in kanji!), but anyone who’s ever studied karate is off to a good start! Chances are, you’ve heard at least the first few numbers before:
一 いち ichi one
二 に ni two
三 さん san three
四 し / よん shi / yon four
五 ご go five
六 ろく roku six
七 しち / なな shichi / nana seven
八 はち hachi eight
九 きゅう / く kyuu / ku nine
十 じゅう juu ten
十一 じゅういち juu ichi eleven
十二 じゅうに juu ni twelve
二十 にじゅう nijuu twenty
二十 にじゅういち nijuuichi twenty-one
三十 さんじゅう sanjuu thirty
四十 よんじゅう yonjuu forty
五十 ごじゅう gojuu fifty
六十 ろくじゅう rokujuu sixty
七十 ななじゅう nanajuu seventy
八十 はちじゅう hachijuu eighty
九十 きゅうじゅう kyuujuu ninety
百 ひゃく hyaku one hundred
二百 にひゃく nihyaku two hundred
千 せん sen one thousand
This logical system continues throughout the hundreds (although there are occasional pronunciation changes) so 386 is ‘sanbyakuhachijuuroku’ (literally ‘three hundreds, eight tens, six’).
Unfortunately, higher numbers get very confusing: instead of ‘ten one thousands’, ‘10,000’ has its own kanji. So 100,000 is ‘juuman’ or ‘ten lots of ten thousand’ and 1,000,000 ends up as ‘one hundred lots of ten thousand’. This is a difficult mindset for Western learners to get in to. Also unfortunately for us, prices in Japan often reach thousands: a CD, for example, can cost ￥3000, so numbers can get large very quickly. (On the subject of money, it is worth noting that the Japanese word for ‘yen’ is ‘en’ (‘yen’ is a result of the West discovering the word back when classical Japanese dictated that ‘e’ was often spelled ‘ye’) and the symbol is ‘円’.)
On a more positive note, numbers are usually written in Western Arabic numerals. What's more, just knowing up to twelve is a great start: you can tell the time and know what month you’re in!
However, this isn’t the only set of numbers needed to speak Japanese. If you’re in a shop (a greengrocer’s, for example) and you want a specific number of things, you don’t use the numbers above. When you have a specific number of things, a counter must be used: there are many of these that must be attached to a number, such as ‘-mai’ for paper and ‘-hon’ for stick-like objects. When you don’t know the counter, the following numbers are used:
1つ hitotsu one
2つ futastu two
3つ mittsu three
4つ yottsu four
5つ itsutsu five
6つ muttsu six
7つ nanatsu seven
8つ yattsu eight
9つ kokonotsu nine
10つ tou ten
Thankfully, after ten, the first set of numbers is used.
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Confused?
The following are perhaps the most important phrases of Japanese you'll ever learn:
日本語を話せません。 nihongo wo hanasemasen I don't speak Japanese.
英語を話せますか。 eigo wo hanasemasu ka Do you speak English?
わかりません。 wakarimasen I don't understand.
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