Questions tagged [readings]
読み. The reading of a kanji character or a word written in kanji characters refers to how it is “read” in terms of kana characters. Please use this tag rather than 'pronunciation' if it fits your question.
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How to choose between "よん" (yon) vs "し" (shi) for "四" (4) and "しち" (shichi) vs "なな" (nana) for "七" (7)?
Two numbers in Japanese have two pronunciation alternatives.
四 / 4 can be pronounced either "よん" (yon) or "し" (shi)
七 / 7 can be pronounced either "しち" (shichi) or "なな" (nana)
I know that "し" (shi) ...
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Why is 二十歳 pronounced はたち?
二十歳 is a (to me) bizarre exception to the usual number+さい rule for discussing age. Is this rooted in 20 being the Japanese age of majority?
Added: To be more specific: why isn't it pronounced にじゅうさい ...
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Reading (and usage) of 他: when is it 【た】, when is it 【ほか】?
他 is one of these common words that still to this day confuses me...
My general assumption is that:
used as a prefix, it should always be read 【た】, e.g.: 他人【たにん】
when treated as a "substantive" (...
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What is the difference between 「食う」 and 「食べる」?
I've often seen 「食べる」 used, when should we use 「食う」 ? Are these two interchangeable ? Can you provide examples ?
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Is there a difference between さみしい and さびしい?
Both mean "lonely" and appear to be valid readings for 寂しい.
Is there a difference in nuance? Is this difference due to dialect?
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When to read "その後" as "そのご", "そのあと" or "そののち"?
I've recently been seeing あと as well as ご as Furigana on top of 後 in その後, but is there a difference in usage or meaning between the different readings?
Looking at the Yahoo thesaurus, it seems it can ...
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Words/characters for fast food meal sizes: 並, 大, 特
When dining at Yoshinoya I never know how to ask for the size meal I want.
Their sizes are 並, 大, and 特.
I only know that "大" means big, but it also has two readings so I have no idea whether to ask ...
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Does anyone have advice on how to get over/through/around the intermediate language plateau? (Self-learner) [closed]
How do you get through this? Especially in regards to reading. How do you practice reading at beyond the beginner level (No little black sambo's or whatever other children's books like I found in the ...
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How many unique on'yomi are there?
This question is of interest to me because of my own difficulty with remembering on'yomi, as there are fewer possible on'yomi than kun'yomi. So there must be a finite number of valid on'yomi ...
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When Chinese personal names are written in Japanese in kanji is there always an obvious reading?
In their comment to an answer on the question "Are foreign personal names usually written in katakana rather than Romaji?", user sawa says:
... Chinese names should be written in kanji rather than ...
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Reading of 入る - 「はいる」 vs 「いる」
Sometimes I'm having trouble choosing the reading for 入る. There was a related question about the reading of 入れる, however my JMdict-based dictionary marks both 入る{はいる} and 入る{いる} as intransitive ...
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How do attendance checklists in Japan deal with multiple possible name readings?
Even though there are several recurring, easily guessable family name readings ([田中]{たなか}、佐藤{さとう}、田村{たむら}) in Japanese, there are usually many possible readings to people's names Kanji, especially ...
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How do you read simple arithmetic equations in Japanese?
My dictionary (EN → JP) suggests to translate "Three multiplied by four is twelve" as
3 × 4 = 12
without giving a hint as to how to read this in Japanese.
How do you read simple arithmetic ...
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How to read: the "~" (tilde) in "3~4 行"
How should I read the "~" mark that stands for range, as described in the title?
I saw this in the following sentence:
3~4行ごとに1行あけると読みやすい。
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Why is 五右衛門 read "goemon"?
Why is the name 五右衛門 read as ごえもん?
How can the three kanji 五右衛 be read with only two syllables?
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Pronunciation of "何" as "なん" or "なに"
"何" is pronounced as "なん" before counter-words like in "何時{なんじ}", "何歳{なんさい}" etc; or before particles like in "何で", "何とか" etc.
However, it remains to be pronounced as "なに" in some words like "何事{なにごと}...
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What's with this "On reading"/"Kun reading" thing? Is it important to learn both as a beginner?
I was reading this article on Japanese numerals and I first encountered the whole On reading/Kun reading thing, with an additional column on "Preferred reading," which was almost always the On reading....
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How do I know when to read the kanji 抱 as 「だ・く」, and when to read it as 「いだ・く」, or even 「うだ・く」?
This sentence was in a grammar textbook:
彼{かれ}は同僚{どうりょう}にライバル意識{いしき}、ひいては殺意{さつい}すら抱いていた
... it means:
"He regarded his colleague as a rival, even to the point of
considering murder."
My ...
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Is there a specific time to pronounce 日本, にほん/にっぽん?
Are the two used completely interchangeably or are there specific situations where one might be used more than the other? For example I've never heard 日本語 said にっぽんご.
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When are 止める, 停める and 留める read as とめる, やめる or とどめる?
When are 止める, 停める and 留める read as とめる or とどめる (and in the case of 止める, やめる)?
I think 止めてください could be read as both やめてください and とめてください, which I think could maybe be translated as "cut it out" and "...
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What are the rules for reading numbers before a foreign counter-word?
Is there a rule of thumb for knowing the reading of a number when it is written in western numerals, and is followed by a loaned counter-word?
For example, how would you pronounce the "1" in 1セット? My ...
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Do native speakers consciously use phonetic elements in 形声文字?
Do native speakers of Japanese use phonetic elements when reading less common kanji? For example, does the compound 咆哮 look like ほうこう because of the elements 包 and 孝, even if you haven't learned to ...
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What's the reading of -中 as a suffix?
I see this all the time, but I don't know that I've heard it spoken.
For example: インストール中
Is it simply "なか"?
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Does the average native Japanese reader know how to pronounce a majority of Kanji found in books?
After studying Japanese for quite a while and having read many books (maybe over 50-60 over a bunch of different genres), despite the fact I generally have tried to learn the readings of most words I ...
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Some Japanese dictionaries (e.g. 大辞林, 大辞泉, and 明鏡国語辞典) use this inverted triangle outline symbol (▽) for some kanji compounds. What does it mean?
It doesn't apply to all the words, just some. Here are examples of words from that are marked with that symbol
悪い (with reading にくい): 大辞泉; 大辞林
面倒くさい (with reading めんどくさい): 大辞泉; 大辞林
皆 (with reading ...
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Reading and usage of 「垂オます」
A while ago I was chatting with a Japanese man and when he introduced himself instead of using 「申す」 or 「言う」 he used 「垂オます」, as in (His name)と垂オます.
Can this be used in the same way as 「申す」 and 「言う」 ...
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Why does Japan still use ペキン for Beijing?
Why not ベジン or even 北京{きたきょう}?
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What is the origin of 場所?
The kanji compound 場所 is bugging me. For the longest time, I did not know how to pronounce it, oscillating between ばどころ and じょうしょ. The correct pronunciation, however, is ばしょ. This is weird to me, ...
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What is the difference between 山道【さんどう】 and 山道【やまみち】?
To provide context, I stumbled upon this new term for me when reading this sentence:
田舎の山道を車で走っていたら、突然サルが飛び出してきた。
I looked 山道 up in a dictionary and I saw there are two possible readings. さんどう and ...
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How do native speakers "read" single-kanji signs when those kanji are not also standalone words?
In my time in Japan I've noticed a few kanji that can be used on their own commonly in various kinds of signs, yet I don't think they are also words in their own right:
押
引
危
開
閉
Since all kanji ...
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How are the different pronunciations of kanji used, such as onyomi and kunyomi?
Even when I think I've memorized how to read a particular kanji, 人 (ひと) for example, and try to read other words I find that it's also pronounced じん...and I'm sure it probably has many other readings.
...
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What does 中3の25% exactly mean?
I am not sure about the first part of
「中3の25%、短文も理解困難」
Do you read 中 as ちゅう here?
25% of 3 would be 0.75% if I am not mistaken. Therefore does it mean something like 「around 0.75% of the ...
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Do people actually ever say みょうにち?
I've heard people using あした (the common one) and あす (rather uncommon) to refer to "tomorrow".
I was wondering does anyone actually uses the reading みょうにち ?
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How to pronounce "R → ∞ " in a mathematical context
For example on this wikipedia page:
一方、右辺第二項は R → ∞ のとき 0 に収束するので、...
In English it would be something like "as R goes to infinity".
How would you usually read this in Japanese?
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How is 名 pronounced in computer terms?
For usernames, etc., you usually see like ユーザ名 or something similar. Or like on my Skype, it says Skype名. How is the 名 pronounced in these situations? I've never been able to conclusively find this ...
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Can I use English in place of katakana?
A habit that I have is replacing certain words with how I'd say them in English. For instance I'd write something like this: 私はイングランド人。 私はイーストアングリアに住んでいます, but say something like this: 私はEngland人。 ...
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Is かわいい wago or kango?
かわいい is sometimes spelled in kanji as 可愛い. This seems to be an 音読み reading which points to a Chinese loan, and Chinese does have this word.
However, the meaning of 可愛 as "cute" in Chinese seems to ...
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How to read the X in 5X4間?
A book about architecture I'm trying to read (it's a bit of a slog what with the technical jargon and such) contained this description of a temple building: 二重、初重5X4間、裳階 (もこし) つき、上重4X3間. So it's two ...
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Do native speakers pronounce long vowels えい or おう as one long vowel, or two different vowels?
In Japanese, long vowels ā, ī, ū are written as ああ (aa), いい (ii), うう (uu). However, ē and ō, in most cases, written as えい (ei) and おう (ou), but in other cases as ええ (ee) and おお (oo).
For example:
先生{...
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Do we really need to remember the kunyomi and onyomi reading of each kanji?
I am learning how to write kanji using the obenkyo app. I am trying to remember the strokes of each kanji and how to read them (onyomi & kunyomi).
But do I really need to remember the onyomi &...
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How to read single stand-alone language-name kanji?
So we all know that most (all?) countries' names can be written in kanji as well as kana. And occasionally kanji from these names are used to represent the language of those countries. For example, we ...
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Why is the Japanese word for "this year" not kyōnen or konnen but kotoshi?
I was testing myself on dates/times today and failed to get the reading right for "this year" (今年) based on the kanji. I had reasonably expected that "this year" might be read as ...
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Nuance between いっとき and いちじ as a pronunciation of 一時
I am writing a flashcards deck to memorize Minato-ku's list of 防災-related words.
Excerpt:
一時集合場所 いっときしゅうごうばしょ Temporary meeting places
一時滞在施設 いちじたいざいしせつ Temporary stay facilities
As you see, ...
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Pronunciation of 上下
上下 has lots of potential pronunciations:
じょうげ
うえした
しょうか
かみしも
Are there any guidelines on how to know which readings to use? I'm particularly interested in this sentence:
顔が上下に割れるかと思ったほど大きくにっこりして、....
10
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1
answer
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Which readings are used for 漢文?
If I am reading a Chinese text to a Japanese audience, how can I know which reading to use for each character? Of the 音読み, there can be 呉音, 漢音, and 唐音 to choose from.
Also for pronunciation, would ...
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How do you read zeros in abbreviated years? (i.e. 03年)
I came across 03年度 and 09年度, and while the meaning is clear I didn't know the actual way of reading it. My first reaction was ゼロさんねんど, but I have no way of checking if that's right. I thought it might ...
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Which readings would you use to pronounce people's names?
I'm confused whether it is normally appropriate to use On-readings or Kun-readings when dealing with people's names; I'm fine when its just two character names; I just make a logical deduction in my ...
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「電車が空く【すく】」 と「 電車が空く【あく】」
「電車が空く【すく】」と「電車が空く【あく】」はどう違いますか?
説明が難しい場合は、例文を教えていただけませんか。
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Most egregious examples of the reading of a kanji changing due to (textually) distant characters
I've been thinking about how Japanese people can read a text (out loud, say) when the readings of the kanji can be so variable depending on okurigana, suffixes, or prefixes that change the meaning and/...
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たいまつ , why is it in this order: 松明?
So torch is たいまつ, and is written in kanji as 松明. Matsu, however, means pine, which is the first kanji, not the second. Are there many words like this in Japanese that seem "out of order"? Is ...