Just started learning Japanese, and I’m wondering when to use each of the writing systems. I have seen Japanese sentences use a mixture of all three writing systems, and I know that every word in Japanese can be written in Hiragana or Katakana.
Kanji – Most words have a Kanji, it shortens the word and helps differentiate words in a sentence. If a word has a kanji, it’s highly likely that kanji will be used most if not all the time, so it’s important to know it. Furigana (small hiragana) may sometimes be found above words to provide the pronunciation, but you’ll really only find that in content that children, as well as adults, will be reading.
Hiragana – Particles, some words, and the end of words like verbs and adjectives.
Katakana – Foreign words, emphasis, and animal names (yes even if animal names have kanji)
You use them in basically the same way you choose when to use each letter of the Roman alphabet when writing in English: in other words, you just use what happens to be required by the word you’re writing. There actually *is* a bit more flexibility and taste involved in the choice than there is in English, but for now, don’t worry about that. Just think of it like each word has a spelling with which it’s generally written, and that way can use any combination of the scripts.
Katakana is used for foreign loan words. It’s also sometimes used stylistically or to add emphasis to a word, kind of similar to italics in English.
You’re right that every word can be written in hiragana. In fact books for young kids are written entirely in hiragana because they don’t know kanji yet. But in adult texts, as a general rule, most nouns and the roots of verbs and adjectives are usually written in kanji. The grammatical parts of the sentence (particles, verb conjugations etc) are written in hiragana.
However, just because a word *has* kanji doesn’t mean it will *always* be written in kanji. There are many words that have kanji but aren’t regularly written in kanji in everyday communication. Sometimes because the kanji are overly complicated, but often it just feels overly formal and stuffy to write the kanji e.g. 今日は→こんにちは, 有難う→ありがとう, 随分→ずいぶん, 何時→いつ.
Don’t stress yourself about it now. As you learn vocab you’ll learn which to use for which words. And as you start reading in Japanese you’ll develop a sense for how each script can be used stylistically.
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Kanji – Most words have a Kanji, it shortens the word and helps differentiate words in a sentence. If a word has a kanji, it’s highly likely that kanji will be used most if not all the time, so it’s important to know it. Furigana (small hiragana) may sometimes be found above words to provide the pronunciation, but you’ll really only find that in content that children, as well as adults, will be reading.
Hiragana – Particles, some words, and the end of words like verbs and adjectives.
Katakana – Foreign words, emphasis, and animal names (yes even if animal names have kanji)
You use them in basically the same way you choose when to use each letter of the Roman alphabet when writing in English: in other words, you just use what happens to be required by the word you’re writing. There actually *is* a bit more flexibility and taste involved in the choice than there is in English, but for now, don’t worry about that. Just think of it like each word has a spelling with which it’s generally written, and that way can use any combination of the scripts.
Katakana is used for foreign loan words. It’s also sometimes used stylistically or to add emphasis to a word, kind of similar to italics in English.
You’re right that every word can be written in hiragana. In fact books for young kids are written entirely in hiragana because they don’t know kanji yet. But in adult texts, as a general rule, most nouns and the roots of verbs and adjectives are usually written in kanji. The grammatical parts of the sentence (particles, verb conjugations etc) are written in hiragana.
However, just because a word *has* kanji doesn’t mean it will *always* be written in kanji. There are many words that have kanji but aren’t regularly written in kanji in everyday communication. Sometimes because the kanji are overly complicated, but often it just feels overly formal and stuffy to write the kanji e.g. 今日は→こんにちは, 有難う→ありがとう, 随分→ずいぶん, 何時→いつ.
Don’t stress yourself about it now. As you learn vocab you’ll learn which to use for which words. And as you start reading in Japanese you’ll develop a sense for how each script can be used stylistically.