42
votes
Accepted
What does the highlighted portion of this handwritten Kanji say?
It says 聞いてるし.
is 略字 (the handwritten simplified/abbreviated kanji) of 聞.
Other kanji with 門, such as 問、間、開、閉 etc., can also be simplified the same way:
Other examples of 略字:
For more about 略字, ...
- 65.2k
24
votes
Accepted
Reading of 入る - 「はいる」 vs 「いる」
Basically, in contemporary Japanese, intransitive 入る = /hairu/. The /iru/ readings are essentially all survivals from an earlier stage in which 入る was just /iru/. (In fact, /hairu/ is basically /hau/ "...
- 10.1k
23
votes
What does the highlighted portion of this handwritten Kanji say?
This is the handwritten simplified version of , similar to simplified Chinese .
Note however that the simplified Chinese form of the radical has a break, and the "divider" is a single dot-like ...
- 36.3k
20
votes
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What does 中３の２５％ exactly mean?
yes, you read 中 as ちゅう , and 中３ as ちゅうさん
中３ is a shorthand way of writing 中学校3年生 which is (Japanese) Junior High School 3rd graders or in other words, 9th graders.
so 中３の２５％ would be "25% of (...
- 4,291
19
votes
How do attendance checklists in Japan deal with multiple possible name readings?
It's like this:
Teacher: 「野田{のだ} 努{つとむ}さん。」
野田: 「はい。」
T: 「いわい 隆{たかし}さんですかね？しゅくさんですか？」(the surname reads 祝)
祝: 「はふりです。」
T: 「はふりって読むんですか。珍しい名前ですね。はふり たかしさん。」
祝: 「はい。」
This conversation has ...
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19
votes
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Can I use English in place of katakana?
I think it matters a lot and that it's best to break from the habit if you intend to speak Japanese long-term. I think for place names it's somewhat understandable because the Kana is obviously there ...
- 7,351
18
votes
Do we really need to remember the kunyomi and onyomi reading of each kanji?
Adding to what others said, in my opinion you shouldn't think of it as memorizing all the readings for every kanji, abstractly. You should think of it as learning Japanese words (which you have to ...
- 5,314
16
votes
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たいまつ , why is it in this order: 松明?
I have long enjoyed Shogakukan's Kokugo Dai Jiten (KDJ) for its etymologies -- it's one of the few monolingual Japanese dictionaries to include etymologies for its terms.
This post relies on their ...
- 36.3k
15
votes
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What is the difference between 山道【さんどう】 and 山道【やまみち】?
さんどう is often an alternative name for a 登山道【とざんどう】 (a mountain trail/path where cars cannot pass). Modern hikers/trekkers normally use さんどう or とざんどう. For example 増毛山道 is a さんどう. When 山道 is combined ...
- 301k
15
votes
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What is the origin of 場所?
Not a real answer, but some facts to think about.
According to the 日本国語大辞典, the word 場所 is attested in Japanese since the 17th century, and the first appearance ever (the 甲陽軍鑑 of 1616) actually reads ...
- 2,359
15
votes
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Why does Japan still use ペキン for Beijing?
Supplementing the existing answer. Short answer: because there's neither /b/ nor /j/ in that word. Nor do they even exist in modern standard Chinese to begin with.
This may come as a surprise, but ...
- 11.4k
14
votes
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Is it possible to algorithmically convert Japanese text to Romaji?
Basically this is very difficult.
Real Japanese sentences on the net are mixture of kanji, hiragana, katakana and English alphabet. See Japanese writing system on Wikipedia.
Among these, hiragana ...
- 301k
13
votes
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Does the average native Japanese reader know how to pronounce a majority of Kanji found in books?
As long as you are reading common novels, you can generally believe that average Japanese speakers can pronounce almost all kanji that don't come with with furigana (But as for 図書館の魔女, I don't know, ...
- 301k
13
votes
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How is Tsuyuri Kumin's name (五月七日くみん) read with 3 characters when it's made up of 4 kanji?
Say we have a Japanese word that has a meaning, and we want to write it using kanji. If we cannot find any corresponding character, we have the option of combining characters and assigning the ...
- 306
12
votes
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How do I read 初商業誌?
It's read as はつしょうぎょうし.
You can never find it in dictionaries because it's actually three words:
初【はつ】: first (jisho.org)
商業誌【しょうぎょうし】: commercial book/magazine (often as opposed to dōjinshi)
商業【...
- 301k
12
votes
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Kanji that don't use their specified readings
First of all, be aware that 一日 is usually read ichinichi, to count one day, or tsuitachi, when it refers to the first day of a month (as in "April the 1st"). But the phenomenon you spotted in ippi ...
- 5,314
12
votes
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Remembering when to use [原]{げん} and when to use [源]{げん}?
Putting etymology aside, in modern Japanese...
源 means resource. When one can draw something useful from it, always use ○源. Similarly, a place from which something is (radially) emitted is described ...
- 301k
12
votes
How do attendance checklists in Japan deal with multiple possible name readings?
Well I don't know about school per se, but every form I've seen so far (Foreign registration, tax, social security, subscription to various utilities...) asks you to not only write your name, but ...
- 2,716
11
votes
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Why is 五右衛門 read "goemon"?
Originally, these kanji were thought to be pronounced as:
右衛門: u we mon
But since Japanese u and consonant w have little difference, the actual pronunciation was like:
右衛門: wwe~we mon
Later, ...
- 50.5k
11
votes
「電車が空く【すく】」 と「 電車が空く【あく】」
I cannot think of any practical uses of 電車が[空]{あ}く.
電車が[空]{す}く means, as passengers get off, the train gets more and more spacious. Probably it's more commonly used as
この電車は[空]{す}いている
Not many ...
- 1,084
10
votes
Why some tutorials teach writing Japanese numbers with Hiragana when they are actually written with Katakana (as on-yomi) in dictionaries?
Because it's a long tradition of kanji dictionaries, succeeded from the "first Japanese kanji dictionary" 漢和大字典.
Technically, kanji were foreign notions in Japanese; on'yomi was the pronunciation, ...
- 50.5k
10
votes
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How to pronounce "R → ∞ " in a mathematical context
R → ∞
is usually read
R を限りなく大きくする［と・とき］
R が限りなく大きくなる［と・とき］
I don't think that 「R → ∞ のとき」 is supposed to have a fixed natural pronunciation. You can ignore the の and read it as above, or you ...
- 47.9k
10
votes
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How is 中 read in 「昨日寝る中で電話がありました。」？
I would read it as なか. You read 「plain form of a verb + 中」 as 「～～する + なか」, e.g. 「雨が降る[中]{なか}」 cf: 「勉強[中]{ちゅう}」
By the way, 昨日寝る中で電話がありました。 doesn't sound natural. You could say [就寝中]{しゅうしんちゅう}に, ...
- 65.2k
10
votes
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How do attendance checklists in Japan deal with multiple possible name readings?
First, even native Japanese adults can correctly guess the reading of the kanji names of, say, only 90% of students, at most. Quite a few people have names (either first names or surnames) with really ...
- 301k
10
votes
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Why 東南西北 is read トンナンシャーペー in this lyrics?
とん・なん・しゃー・ぺー are unique readings of 東・南・西・北, respectively, used only by Japanese Mahjong players. I personally don't play Mahjong, but these unique readings are known to Japanese populations. Compared ...
- 301k
10
votes
Accepted
Is "gen" also a reading of this kanji? 間
It's called Rendaku. Regularly in compound words, though not always, the second part of a compound ends up voiced. So the reading of the kanji is in essence ケン, but with a dakuten (゛) or voice mark ...
- 646
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