I’ve seen a couple of japanese celebrities using hiragana instead of katakana or kanji for their stage names. I’ve been searcing but couldnt find a reason or answer. Is it for them to be easily memorable or readable?
some people just prefer their names written in kana for stylistic purposes
like megumi hayashibara, one of the most famous anime voice actors and singers in history, writes her name 林原めぐみ despite there being a 恵＝めぐみ character
Other than styling, pretty sure they also do it for readability purposes..even Japanese natives can use the wrong reading for some kanji sometimes…specially when using 名乗り as some names, specially uncommon names, might be harder for people to know the proper pronunciation…I have also seen some natives online use katakana for their names (not sure if they do it in real life as well), but I’ve seen katakana used when they shorten their name…
Maybe they don’t have a kanji name? I met a person whose given name was in hiragana because she said her mom “visited a fortune teller before her birth and said it would be bad luck to give her a kanji name”.
Edit: reread the OP, I didn’t catch the stage name part, but I still like my story
Older females were often given kana only names, or katakana plus 子names.
Stroke count divination leads to character choices, which can be kana, or some really odd kanji that are not in computer systems, which makes the person default to kana in computer forms.
A number of Japanese names have kana in them.
There is no requirement to have kanji names.
If you have an odd name reading, people can misread your name. Kana is no misread.
You still see some names that use を in them. (pronounced O, not WO).
Hiragana is very often used for girls given names so just a given name in kana isn’t out of the ordinary.
Could be for effect (looks cuter/friendlier) also but there won’t be one “rule” that applies to all stage names.
Because it’s cute, soft, childlike and fitting for girls.
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some people just prefer their names written in kana for stylistic purposes
like megumi hayashibara, one of the most famous anime voice actors and singers in history, writes her name 林原めぐみ despite there being a 恵＝めぐみ character
Other than styling, pretty sure they also do it for readability purposes..even Japanese natives can use the wrong reading for some kanji sometimes…specially when using 名乗り as some names, specially uncommon names, might be harder for people to know the proper pronunciation…I have also seen some natives online use katakana for their names (not sure if they do it in real life as well), but I’ve seen katakana used when they shorten their name…
Maybe they don’t have a kanji name? I met a person whose given name was in hiragana because she said her mom “visited a fortune teller before her birth and said it would be bad luck to give her a kanji name”.
Edit: reread the OP, I didn’t catch the stage name part, but I still like my story
Older females were often given kana only names, or katakana plus 子names.
Stroke count divination leads to character choices, which can be kana, or some really odd kanji that are not in computer systems, which makes the person default to kana in computer forms.
A number of Japanese names have kana in them.
There is no requirement to have kanji names.
If you have an odd name reading, people can misread your name. Kana is no misread.
You still see some names that use を in them. (pronounced O, not WO).
Hiragana is very often used for girls given names so just a given name in kana isn’t out of the ordinary.
Could be for effect (looks cuter/friendlier) also but there won’t be one “rule” that applies to all stage names.
Because it’s cute, soft, childlike and fitting for girls.