All Questions
99 questions
0
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94
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Hepburn romanization of "知りせば"
I have a question regarding romanization of the verb 知りせば, in Modified Hepburn Romanization System.
From what I know, 知りせば is a form of past tense of 知る, but is not used in modern japanese. せば would ...
- 3
0
votes
2
answers
132
views
Are there words whose kana spelling contains the sequence ょお/ョオ within the same morpheme?
The Kunrei-shiki standard (ISO 3602:1989; Documentation — Romanization of Japanese (kana script)) lists both よお/ヨオ and よう/ヨウ for yô, but in its Table 3b (Kana trigraphs representing palatalized long-...
4
votes
2
answers
485
views
What are the following ALA-LC kana-to-romanization mappings used for? – キィ/ニィ/ヒィ/ミィ/リィ/ギィ/ビィ/ピィ (all: -ī) and スェ (swe)
I looked through the ALA-LC romanization of Japanese (from the list of ALA-LC Romanization Tables), and there are some kana-to-romanization mappings which I am not sure what to make of.
(To prevent ...
2
votes
1
answer
406
views
When is ō romanised ou Vs oh?
Top of my head, I think of these 6 anime/manga:
ō's that are 'oh'
Tamaki Suoh (須王 環 Suō Tamaki) from OHSHC
Ōtsuki (大槻) from Kaiji - ok I can't find on the fandom page, but I swear the subs say ...
- 605
1
vote
2
answers
642
views
How to add spaces in Japanese transcriptions in romaji?
Is there any rules to add spaces when transcripting Japanese using the Latin alphabet? Per instance, Google Translate transcripts a sentence such as "空は青いと思います" into "Sorahaaoi to ...
- 11
0
votes
1
answer
108
views
What is the Japanese name for the genus of plants "Saxifraga"?
What is the Japanese name for Saxifraga (rockfoil) genus of plants (or any more well-known species within this genus) and how is it written in rōmaji?
0
votes
1
answer
1k
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Understanding how macrons work in romaji
I understand how it works for Ohayō the o here is omitting the u from う, so without the macron it would be "ohayou". Even Tōkyō becomes Toukyou. But what about other vowels? such as ī ē ā ū ...
- 3
1
vote
1
answer
376
views
Pronunciation of long o (e.g. in Street Fighter)—"oo" or "ou"?
I have very little knowledge regarding Japanese, but I'm curious about the pronunciation of the long o. In Street Fighter, according to my basic research, the "ō" in "hadōken" is ...
- 280
4
votes
2
answers
872
views
Romaji for long vowel: 通り vs 東リ
I was told that in romaji the long vowel of o would be ō (see this tutorial)
However, I am confused by these two words. In Google Translate they both were romanized as Tōri (see here), but their 平仮名 ...
- 218
1
vote
1
answer
157
views
How do you type Warsaw in Romaji?
I'm learning Japanese and just beginning to type.
When I type warusawa in Romaji mode, this is what I see by default:
But what I want is this:
Is it only possible by typing in Katakana mode? Or is ...
- 113
2
votes
1
answer
197
views
How do I romanize "ように" and "二度と"?
First of all, sorry for any mistakes. English is not my native language, nor is Japanese, obviously.
Just curious, but (title). I saw some people romanizing "ように" as "you ni" and ...
- 23
0
votes
1
answer
330
views
Translation of words like マサラタウン
So I understand that translating literally is often not enough, since there has to be a "patching" between the cultures of the two languages. What I don't understand is how to handle ...
- 947
3
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Doumo or dōmo / arigatou or arigatō
this may be a silly question. However, is there a difference between the following sentences (in terms of spelling):
1) Doumo arigatou gozaimashita.
2) Dōmo arigatō gozaimashita.
Is one sentence ...
- 33
6
votes
1
answer
540
views
Is the first supposed invention of romaji in 1548 by a Japanese Catholic called Yajiro fact or fiction?
Any research I try leads back to sites I don't know if I can trust, because most of them are random fact articles. I've found an official site that has some of the history, but not this specific fact. ...
- 73
2
votes
1
answer
248
views
How have writers in English spelled うん?
I write fanfiction, some of it based on anime. There is the Japanese word うん, used to casually indicate agreement, very familiar to anyone who pays attention to the audio in subtitled works.
I am ...
- 25
0
votes
1
answer
131
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Romaji and Hiragana seem to disagree [closed]
I encountered 道路標識 (どうろひょしき) during my studies today. Google Translate shows romaji dōrohyōji. However, based on the hiragana alone, I was expecting to see dōrohyōshiki.
Why is しき romanized as ji ...
- 115
1
vote
1
answer
182
views
Romanizations of Japanese using consonant diacritics?
The Hepburn romanization, to express the different realizations of some consonants before /i/ or /u/, uses different spellings from the other syllables in their groups:
/si/ > "shi"
/zi/ > "ji"
/ti/ >...
- 283
0
votes
1
answer
151
views
Are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4....... also considered Romaji?
Are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4....... also considered Romaji? If they are not written using kanji?
- 6,785
3
votes
1
answer
136
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What does one call words or phrases that cannot be or rarely refered to with kanji
I have found that many words are only used in hiragana and because of this i can't seem to find a good way to learn them as i am studying words that use kanji due to the site i am using. Like-ごめんなさい, ...
- 153
9
votes
3
answers
1k
views
Was 術 (as in 柔術) ever pronounced jitsu?
柔術 is often rendered in English-speaking countries (and France, Germany, and Brazil) as "jiu-jitsu" or "ju-jitsu", even though the actual Hepburn romanization is "jūjutsu".
Wiktionary's page on 柔術 ...
- 233
1
vote
1
answer
345
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Writing conventions / pronunciations for words with っ
I'm currently trying to figure out on how to do karaoke for some songs and I got a bit confused about the following. So let's say you have the words like
ずっと [zutto]
のって [notte]
How would you write ...
- 267
2
votes
1
answer
4k
views
What does hoi mean?
I'm a General Music teacher.
One of my 1st grade books has a song called, "Naka Naka Hoi."
The (what I'm learning may be the romaji) words are:
Naka Naka Hoi
Soto Soto Hoi
Naka Soto Soto Naka
Naka ...
- 21
1
vote
1
answer
113
views
What is the correct romaji/kanji for a phrase that sounds like “fui cabaru”
A japanese Aikido master used the term that sounds like “fui cabaru” or the “up” position of the a sword. I also believe it means something like “the place your hat goes”.
Can you tell me the correct ...
- 113
1
vote
1
answer
695
views
On hiragana, romaji and pronunciation
I have heard a Japanese teacher explain how long vowels should be pronounced and how they should be written when using hiragana. That's what I saw on the whiteboard:
がっこう - gakkoo, (not gakkou)
Is ...
- 2,275
3
votes
1
answer
744
views
Kanjis to Romajis first letter [closed]
I'm fond of Unicode and what romanization attempts. My goal is to get a first latin char (for sorting purposes) of a non-latin character - so far I succeeded by transcribing Cyrillic, Greek, Hebrew, ...
- 133
0
votes
2
answers
420
views
How do Japanese people use 🅱️-substitution, if at all?
A common internet meme is to use 🅱️ as a replacement for B's in a word, such as "🅱️oneless" or "trou🅱️le". Sometimes it's additionally done for C's, such as "🅱️o🅱️a 🅱️ola". Is this a thing ever ...
- 221
3
votes
2
answers
7k
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Is rōmaji actually used in Japan?
I am a Japanese beginner and I see many instruction books containing rōmaji. As I understand, rōmaji helps English speakers to pronounce the words. But is rōmaji really used in Japan or by Japanese ...
- 143
3
votes
1
answer
794
views
How Dakuten works with Romaji?
I was reading different hiragana charts and saw that "ち(chi)", applying dakuten it can be read as "dzi" or "ji".
Other hiragana words in dakuten also have different ways of pronunciation depending ...
24
votes
2
answers
5k
views
Why are police boxes labeled Koban (in roman letters) in Japan?
I understand that the word for police box is Koban or 交番 in kanji, but why is the signage always in roman letters - Koban.
My guess would be to make it easier for foreigners to read, but wouldn't ...
- 1,081
0
votes
1
answer
427
views
Correct spelling of "Gemu Otaku"
In studies on contemporary Japanese culture, they use "Gemu Otaku" in the sense of "video game nerd", "game freak".
Is this an academic term only or do people actually use this term in Japanese ...
2
votes
1
answer
714
views
Is ii or ī more common in rōmaji?
A question about rōmaji: Is it more common to use ī or ii? For loanwords, it seems to be
common to use ī, e.g.
コーヒー kōhī
アンチーク antīku
For other words, using ii seems more common, e.g.
涼しい ...
- 137
2
votes
1
answer
203
views
Reversed S in Japanese transliteration
I recently found a strange spelling of a reversed S (Ƨ) on an old Japanese matchbox label (late 19th century), in the phrase "MANUFACTURED IN ƧEIRYUKWAN". At first I thought this was just a mistake in ...
- 129
1
vote
1
answer
618
views
How to write 日付 in romaji?
Looking at the google translator I find:
日付 (Hidzuke): Date
But when I try to write the same letter, it doesn't pop up kanji
Which all characters are used to write it?
- 13
16
votes
3
answers
7k
views
Standard mathematical operations, expressed in Japanese
First-time poster on this channel, so please forgive me if I screw anything up...
I'm currently writing a "Japanese Calculator" program as part of a personal project I'm working on which takes rōmaji ...
4
votes
5
answers
3k
views
Is it possible to algorithmically convert Japanese text to Romaji?
I am a programmer and I recently wrote two browser extensions, one will translate English text to "pronunciation" replacing all words founf on a web page, and another will replace all Chinese ...
- 143
5
votes
0
answers
190
views
Why do people romanize 新聞 as "Shimbun"? [duplicate]
Is there a reason why [新聞]{しんぶん} is often romanized as "Shimbun" instead of the "Shinbun" its supposed to be? I ask as I've found that even brands like 毎日新聞 do this; romanizing their name as "Mainichi ...
- 3,422
1
vote
3
answers
6k
views
Hiragana - Long vowel e (ei or ee)
I am wondering about the long vowel e, and whether it is -ee or -ei. Let's use hē as an example, is hē written as へい or へえ?
- 11
1
vote
1
answer
1k
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In romaji, is りょう spelled 'ryou' or 'ryoo'?
This has been bothering me because I am writing a Memrise course and have been implementing the romaji by hand for cases like these (since the Memrise platform interprets りょう as 'riyou'). Intuitively, ...
- 165
11
votes
1
answer
95k
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Difference between yamero and yamete
I often hear this from animations and read it among users when making jokes on the internet, but I wonder exactly: what's the difference between yamero and yamete?
- 213
2
votes
2
answers
703
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Why is じどうしゃ (jidoushiya), jidōsha instead?
From what I understand, the hiragana characters above should make the word jidoushiya, but for some reason it is actually jidōsha.
Why did the word change this way even though the characters are:
...
- 153
4
votes
3
answers
8k
views
Romanization of じ and ジ with ji and zi
From some basic research I've found that when romanizing じ and ジ we can use "ji" or "zi." Apparently "ji" is used by Hepburn romanization which is the most popular for non-Japanese speakers but "zi" ...
- 105
8
votes
3
answers
3k
views
Why is D written as Đ in Japanese handwriting?
I've seen Japanese people write many letters/numbers "strangely". The most common one is D which is written with a stroke like this Đ
Why is that? Are there any other letters that are ...
- 615
2
votes
2
answers
1k
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Converting を from Hiragana to Romaji
I realize that it's usually better to just learn / use hiragana but I have been asked to look into coding up a solution to convert from Hiragana/Katakana to the modified Hepburn Romaji.
One point I ...
3
votes
2
answers
2k
views
The use of ô versus ō in rōmaji
Perhaps this question is completely unimportant, but I do not know if it is.
There is a very influential mathematical paper by Alexander Grothendieck often called his Tôhoku paper, because of the ...
12
votes
3
answers
31k
views
Long O — when is it OU and when OO?
I am learning hiragana and I've encountered a minor problem. The thing is that my book did mention how to deal with a long "O": just by adding another "O" or "U". However it doesn't explain in which ...
- 123
4
votes
1
answer
284
views
Why is a foreign person's middle initial written in romaji instead of katakana?
Foreigner's names are written in katakana, but I noticed that the middle initial is always written in romaji. I see this on business cards and in newspaper articles, when a middle initial is used.
- 6,785
14
votes
4
answers
12k
views
Does a small tsu double all consonants?
In several sources it's mentioned that a SMALL TSU doubles consonants. My problem is, some websites give almost identical examples with:
っ/ッ + (S, T, C, K, G, B, P)
But what about the others?:
っ/ッ + (...
- 143
2
votes
2
answers
724
views
How can I write "tchi"
As in title, how can I write "tchi" in katakana as in the word "hotchikisu" (paper fastener)?
- 21
6
votes
2
answers
247
views
How would one go about romanizing Aynu Itak?
I've been casually studying Itak on and off in between my usual schoolwork and obvious Japanese studies. However, I've been more and more bothered by a particular issue as I've gone on: how does one ...
- 962
0
votes
1
answer
147
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How is Y森飯ルド romanized?
A little context:
This is the name of a rather obscure Japanese band. The lead singer goes by the name of Yasue Dangerous Ojisan (ヤスエでんじゃらすおじさん) and this is his blog.
Record label and retailer Tower ...
- 145