kana

Also known as Hiragana + Katakana, Hrkt, kana script, kanas

are syllabaries used to write Japanese phonological units, morae. In current usage, kana most commonly refers to hiragana and katakana. It can also refer to their ancestor , which were Chinese characters used phonetically to transcribe Japanese (e.g. ''man'yōgana); and hentaigana'', which are historical variants of the now-standard hiragana.

AI overview

Kana are two syllabaries—hiragana and katakana—used to write the sound units of Japanese, and they originated from Chinese characters that were adapted to represent Japanese phonetically. They matter because they form the foundation of Japanese writing, allowing speakers to represent the language's sounds in a systematic way.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Key facts

Writing system.name: Kana
Writing system.sample: Hiragana and katakana.svg
Writing system.caption: "Kana" written in katakana (left) and hiragana (right)
Writing system.imagesize: 220px
Writing system.type: Syllabary
Writing system.languages: Japanese, Ryukyuan languages, Ainu
Writing system.fam1: Oracle bone script
Writing system.fam2: Seal script
Writing system.fam3: Clerical script
Writing system.fam4: Regular script (Chinese characters)
Writing system.fam5: Kanji
Writing system.time: present
Writing system.iso15924: Hrkt
Writing system.region: Japan

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Image: Japanese Kana Mnemonic Chart.png

Show 6 more facts

native label: 仮名
Commons category: Kana
name: Japanese syllabaries (alias for Hiragana + Katakana)
Unicode range: U+FF66-FF6F,U+FF71-FF9D
inception: 0800-00-00
Stack Exchange tag: japanese.stackexchange.com/tags/kana

Sources (8)

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Article

14 sections

Contents

Etymology
Terms
Hiragana and katakana
Diacritics
Digraphs
Modern usage
History
Collation
Disadvantages
In Unicode
See also
References
Further reading
External links

are syllabaries used to write Japanese phonological units, morae. In current usage, kana most commonly refers to hiragana and katakana. It can also refer to their ancestor , which were Chinese characters used phonetically to transcribe Japanese (e.g. ''man'yōgana); and hentaigana, which are historical variants of the now-standard hiragana.

Katakana, with a few additions, are also used to write Ainu. A number of systems exist to write the Ryūkyūan languages, in particular Okinawan, in hiragana. Taiwanese kana were used in Taiwanese Hokkien as ruby text for Chinese characters in Taiwan when it was under Japanese rule.