The Japanese alphabet is made up of three writing systems: Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana. In this module, we will focus on Hiragana, which is the most basic and essential writing system for learning Japanese. In addition, we'll cover vocabulary related to time and dates in Japanese.
Hiragana
Hiragana is one of the three writing systems in Japanese, along with Katakana and Kanji. It is a phonetic system, which means that each character represents a sound or a syllable. Hiragana is used to write native Japanese words, grammatical particles, words without a corresponding kanji, and also to write kanji phonetically.
There are 46 basic characters in Hiragana, which can be modified by diacritics (additional signs) to represent additional sounds. For example, the letter "か" (ka) can be changed to "が" (ga) by adding two small dashes called dakuten.
Vocabulary of Time and Dates
Knowing vocabulary related to time and dates is critical to communicating effectively in any language. In Japanese, this is no exception. Below are some useful words and phrases:
- 今日 (きょう - Kyou) - Today
- 明日 (あした - Ashita) - Tomorrow
- 昨日 (きのう - Kinou) - Yesterday
- 一昨日 (おととい - Ototoi) - The Day Before Yesterday
- 明後日 (あさって - Asatte) - Day after tomorrow
- 時間 (じかん - Jikan) - Time/Time
- 分 (ふん - Fun) - Minute
- 秒 (びょう - Byou) - Second
Also, the days of the week in Japanese are:
- 月曜日 (げつようび - Getsuyoubi) - Monday
- 火曜日 (かようび - Kayoubi) - Tuesday
- 水曜日 (すいようび - Suiyoubi) - Wednesday
- 木曜日 (もくようび - Mokuyoubi) - Thursday
- 金曜日 (きんようび - Kinyoubi) - Friday
- 土曜日 (どようび - Doyoubi) - Saturday
- 日曜日 (にちようび - Nichiyoubi) - Sunday
To express dates, the Japanese use the Japanese numbering system, followed by the word for day, which is 日 (にち - nichi). For example, the first day of the month would be 一日 (ついたち - tsuitachi), the second day would be 二日 (ふつか - futsuka), and so on.
In short, Hiragana is an essential writing system for learning Japanese, and vocabulary related to time and dates is a crucial part of everyday communication. We hope this module has provided a solid introduction to both.
