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If Kanji are necessary to disambiguate homophones, how come it's still used, being that Japanese people seem to know the difference when speaking?
Kanji aren't necessary to write Japanese
Your rationale is correct; Japanese is a living, spoken language; people are able to understand each other by sound only, therefore a writing system based on ...
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If Kanji are necessary to disambiguate homophones, how come it's still used, being that Japanese people seem to know the difference when speaking?
This is definitely a bit harder for native English speakers to pick up on at first, but sometimes homophones in Japanese are distinguishable by the pitch accent. So some of them aren't an issue at all....
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14
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Why are Japanese fonts different to Chinese?
I assume you're specifically talking about kanji/hanzi glyphs. (Hiragana are obviously more cursive.) Basically the overall appearances of typical Chinese hanzi and Japanese kanji fonts are not ...
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Why are Japanese fonts different to Chinese?
I basically agree with @naruto's answer - the main reason is that if a Japanese designer chose a relatively unique Japanese font for design aesthetics, it is normally a challenge to get a matching ...
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8
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Differences of words like 先輩 between Japanese, Chinese, and Korean?
There are multiple different facets to your question. Let me try to address at least some of them.
Background
First, some background.
Languages
Chinese, Japanese, and Korean are wholly independent ...
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7
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Deciphering Kawaii Writing
Handwriting is always harder to read, but I think in your case you miss practice. For me, reading difficult handwriting comes down to recognizing which strokes are used, and based on their number and ...
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6
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How to address a family?
Actually it's not a good idea to translate it. Japanese mail carriers can read envelopes written in English format, and a bizarre mix of the Japanese and English styles would make your envelope look ...
- 307k
6
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If Kanji are necessary to disambiguate homophones, how come it's still used, being that Japanese people seem to know the difference when speaking?
Thinking briefly, I think that there is no problem even if we have no kanji in Japanese to disambiguate homophones or homonyms as OP thinks , but in fact we need kanji.
In conversation, not in ...
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6
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If Kanji are necessary to disambiguate homophones, how come it's still used, being that Japanese people seem to know the difference when speaking?
Most everyone's answers are correct, but I wanted to bring up one useful aspect of kanji which I don't think has been brought up. It may be limited to learners like me, but many times when I encounter ...
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Japanese reports
Yes, plain form is a standard for writing reports. In fact, 新完全マスター文法N3 has a chapter on this topic, on page 142. Here is what it says:
In order to ensure a unified tone, casual and formal language ...
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5
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Why use the kanji 伸 for "no" instead of the hiragana の, and the kanji 手 for "te" instead of the hiragana て?
That's because the word is 伸ばす. The 伸 kanji for this word has a reading of の.
As you might already know, Japanese has three distinct writing systems (not counting romanizations): ひらがな, カタカナ, and 漢字｛...
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5
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as mentioned .... to the right?
Yes, there are "directional references":
右記{うき} "written to the right (before)"
左記{さき} "written to the left (later)", "following"
They originate from vertical writing, but can be used figuratively ...
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General rule for writing simple kanji as hiragana in newspaper articles sometimes?
Regarding 時, this 時 is a 形式名詞 which should be written in hiragana if one needs to strictly obey guidelines. In general, you have to use とき when it translates to when, and 時 when it translates to time. ...
- 307k
5
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Does Okinawan have syllables Japanese doesn't?
(Disclaimer: my knowledge on phonology and Okinawan is very limited)
The glottal stop (/ʔ/) is a distinguishing feature in most Okinawan dialects. /ʔa/ and /a/ are different sounds in most Okinawan ...
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5
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Farewell letter in Japanese to a little sister
I think children of about six years old can't read kanji, so you should write the letter in hiragana.
If you are female(male), you should use ～のおねえさん(～のおにいさん) when you explain yourself. For example, ...
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5
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How inteligible is Japanese used in Buddhist texts?
These are the Sino-Japanese readings of Chinese characters, so the grammar isn't even that of Japanese, but of Chinese. This can be seen by the fact that the verb (行, 度) precedes the object (深般若波羅蜜多, ...
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4
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Are there general guidelines regarding the length of sentences in Japanese written text for the sake of readability?
This site talks about the sentence length using NHK,朝日新聞,日経 as a guideline. The author picked up 5 free article from each company. The methodology is splitting the text by the period symbol and then ...
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4
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How to express “X (and parenthetically Y)”?
This kind of interrupting parentheses are a common practice in Japanese too. Beware that, however, the linguistic and cultural difference between these two languages might make literal translations ...
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4
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I've seen 待つ in the te-form as both 待て and 待って; the latter should be correct. Does meaning/pronunciation change and why it would be written this way
For verbs that end in つ, the imperative (command) form ends in て. It's just a coincidence that that looks similar to the same verb in て form.
And yes, the pronunciation is not the same, as indicated ...
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3
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Presumptive form and 居ろう
Am I correct in that the V+おう form could formerly be used in place of Vだろう?
Yes, in the sense that it could be used both formerly and also contemporarily.
I've heard a phrase「控え居ろう」, which means "...
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Does Okinawan have syllables Japanese doesn't?
Yes, many sounds from Okinawan languages do not fit kana, but everyone sort of makes do with hiragana, katakana and kanji.
On that note, it is only common to write Ryukyu words in katakana when the ...
- 141
3
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Why use kana rather than kanji (and vice versa)
It's hard to answer this "generally"... there are many reasons to use kanji over hiragana, katakana over kanji, etc. But basically it's a stylistic choice. If you keep on reading manga, I think you ...
- 307k
3
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Difference in ambiguity between written and spoken Japanese?
I am not a native Japanese speaker, but used to speak it fluently. When I started to learn the language, I also worried much about many homophones which sounded same to me. Even though I knew native ...
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3
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Difference in ambiguity between written and spoken Japanese?
You are right in that misunderstanding is common in spoken Japanese. but usually people who use Japanese know which word has ambiguity and escape the word or confirm the kanji of the word (like ...
- 112
3
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Why is katakana considered its own character set while the Latin capital letters aren't?
(1) First of all, Japanese uses 5 separate scripts, not 3. They are:
Hiragana
Katakana
Kanji
Romaji
Arabic Numerals
All of these scripts are used frequently in Japanese, so it is not correct to say ...
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3
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漢文・古文-type expressions that survive in modern Japanese
I firstly thought 古語 or 古典語 would be the collective name you're looking for, but they are the Japanese in and before Meiji era, which seems to be too much older than those you are looking for.
...
- 341
3
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なるのではないか/なるのではないだろう meaning
Does なるのではないだろう need か to be grammatically correct?
No. All are grammatically fine. They can be used in appropriate sentences.
Is なるのではないか just a set phrase?
Practically I think it's better for ...
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