Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
It is a phonetic lettering system. The word hiragana means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", as contrasted with kanji). [1] [2] [3] Hiragana and katakana are both kana systems. With few exceptions, each mora in the Japanese language is represented by one character (or one digraph
Hiragana, the main Japanese syllabic writing system, derived from a cursive form of man'yōgana, a system where Chinese ideograms were used to write sounds without regard to their meaning. Originally, the same syllable (more precisely, mora ) could be represented by several more-or-less interchangeable kanji, or different cursive styles of the ...
In the Japanese language, the gojūon (五十音, Japanese pronunciation: [ɡo(d)ʑɯꜜːoɴ], lit. "fifty sounds") is a traditional system ordering kana characters by their component phonemes, roughly analogous to alphabetical order. The "fifty" (gojū) in its name refers to the 5×10 grid in which the characters are displayed.
The modern Japanese writing system uses a combination of logographic kanji, which are adopted Chinese characters, and syllabic kana.Kana itself consists of a pair of syllabaries: hiragana, used primarily for native or naturalized Japanese words and grammatical elements; and katakana, used primarily for foreign words and names, loanwords, onomatopoeia, scientific names, and sometimes for emphasis.
Enclosed Ideographic Supplement (Unicode block) has a single hiragana character: U+1F200 Kana Supplement (Unicode block) has a single katakana and 255 hentaigana characters Kana Extended-A (Unicode block) continues with additional 31 hentaigana characters
A (hiragana: あ, katakana: ア) is a Japanese kana that represents the mora consisting of single vowel [a]. The hiragana character あ is based on the sōsho style of kanji 安, while the katakana ア is from the radical of kanji 阿. In the modern Japanese system of alphabetical order, it occupies the first position of the alphabet, before い.
Get AOL Mail for FREE! Manage your email like never before with travel, photo & document views. Personalize your inbox with themes & tabs. You've Got Mail!
The hiragana is written in three strokes, while the katakana is written in two. Both represent [ja]. Their shapes have origins in the character 也. When small and preceded by an -i kana, this kana represents a palatalization of the preceding consonant sound with the [a] vowel (see yōon). [1]