japanese essay format

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How to write sakubun.

Sakubun – writing (a paragraph, an essay, etc.), is an important part of teaching and learning Japanese. So Sakubun is considered a skill that is not easy to acquire for Japanese learners. In this post, Learn Japanese Daily will introduce to you the lesson: How to write Sakubun. Let’s start!

1.1 Sakubun meaning
1.2.1 How to write the title of Sakubun, your full name, school and class
1.2.2 The content of Sakubun
1.3 Japanese essay format

How to write Sakubun in Japanese

Sakubun meaning.

Sakubun (作文) is writing a paragraph, an essay, etc. in Japanese. When writing Sakubun, Japanese people will use a special type of paper called 原稿用紙 (Genkou youshi). This type of paper is divided into small squares for the sake of writing Sakubun easily. Genkou youshi is usually sold at 100 yen stores or at stationery stores in the schools.

How to use Genkou youshi (Japanese writing paper)

The most common 原稿用紙 (Genkou youshi) is the paper consisting of 20 lines on one side of that paper, and each line has 20 squares. So the total number of squares is 400.

There are rules when using Genkou youshi that writers need to know. The most basic way to use is to rotate the paper horizontally and write vertically from right to left. However, there are some Japanese language schools that allow students to to rotate the paper vertically and write horizontally from left to right. This post will guide you the first way (rotating the paper horizontally and writing vertically from right to left).

How to write the title of Sakubun, your full name, school and class

Before writing the content of Sakubun, you need to write your full name, your class and the title of Sakubun first.

Title: Write in the first line. Leave the first two or three squares blank (from top to bottom).

Full name: Write in the last squares in the second line, but you must leave the last square blank. There is one square between first name and last name.

School and class: It may or may not be written depending on the requirement. If you have to write, write in the second line (above the full name and there is one square between school – class and full name).

The content of Sakubun

– Leave the first square blank and start writing from the second square. When moving to the next paragraph, you also need to leave the first square blank and start writing from the second square.

– Commas, dots, question marks, exclamation points, and quotation marks are like a letter, so each of them is written in a single square. However, when these marks may appear at the beginning of a new line, you need to write them in the same square with the letter immediately preceding them in the old line (or write them in the margin at the bottom of the old line), in order to avoid these marks start a new line.

– For conversation sentences, dots and quotation marks are written in the same square. If the sentence is needed to be written in 2 or more lines, leave the first square blank and then write from the second square.

– Small letters such as っ、ゃ、ゅ、ょ are also written in a single square.

– The digits must be written in Kanji: 一, 二, 三, 万 v…v….

– If you need to write the numbers (0,1,2, etc.), write two numbers horizontally in the same square.

– With Alphabet letters, two lowercase letters can be written horizontally in the same square, and each capital letter can be written vertically in a single square.

Japanese essay format

You can write Sakubun according to the 4-part structure 起承転結, including: 起 – introduction, 承 – development, 転 – turn, 結 – conclusion.

Or you can write Sakubun according to the 3-part structure – 三段構成 (Sandan kousei), including: 序 – opening, 破 – body, 急 – conclusion.

To understand more about the way of writing as well as the structure of Sakubun, you can refer to some samples of Sakubun on different topics at category : Japanese essay .

Above is: How to write Sakubun. Hope this post can help you improve your writing skills. Wish you all good study!

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Apply the Essay Structure to Your Japanese Script

Introduction

*The target readers are those who will make a speech or presentation in Japanese.

Needless to say, “Introduction-Body-Conclusion” is one of the most well known methods for making essays and scripts in the world. One of its strengths is that you are able to logically express what you want to convey to your audience. However, this method is not actually that well known among Japanese people in comparison to other countries. In this article, you will learn how you can utilize the Introduction-Body-Conclusion structure for your Japanese script.

Introduction-Body-Conclusion for Your Japanese Script

Introduction part.

In this part, you are going to, quite literally, set up an introduction. Simply speaking, if you mention the following three points, you will cover the basics; what your topic is, why your audience is listening to you, and what you want your audience to do or feel throughout your script. In practice, it is better to get the audience’s attention by using interesting facts or information, or by asking a question.

今日きょうは私わたしの夢ゆめについてお話はなします。

I am going to talk about my dream today.

私わたしの夢ゆめは、私わたしの地じ元もとを復興ふっこうすることです。

My dream is to revive my hometown.

私わたしの町まちの人口じんこうはたった 2 に万人まんにんです。ですが、高齢者こうれいしゃは１万人いちまんにん以い上じょういます。

The population of my hometown is just 20,000. However, the number of the elderly is over 10,000.

そして、さらにこの高齢化こうれいしゃは進すすんでいくと言いわれています。

And, it is said that this aging population will continue to grow.

今日きょうの私わたしのスピーチで、私わたしたちを応援おうえんしてくれる人ひとが増ふえると嬉うれしいです。

I will be happy if my speech today could increase the number of people who support us.

In this part, you are going to prove how your aim, argument and conclusion are reasonable by showing the evidence, the statistics, the analysis, etc. You should explain that objectively, not subjectively, because in the introduction and the conclusion you will share your own ideas and opinions. Also, you should order the information from the most general to the most specific.

日に本ほんの現在げんざいの人口じんこうは１億いちおく２に千万人せんまんにんです。これが１億人いちおくにんまで減へります。

The current population of Japan is 120 million and it appears that it will continue to decrease to 100 million.

しかし、日に本ほんでも人口じんこうが増ふえ続つづける都市としがあります。それは東京とうきょうです。

However, there is a city whose population is increasing. That’s Tokyo.

日に本ほんは豊ゆたかな都市としと貧まずしい町まちに別わかれていきます。

Japan will be divided into one rich city and other poor towns.

若わかい人ひとは東京とうきょうにどんどん移い動どうしています。

Younger people are moving to Tokyo.

ですが、年配者ねんぱいしゃはそう簡単かんたんには住すむ場ば所しょを変かえられません。

Yet, the elderly cannot move as easily around a big city as younger people do.

多た少しょうの費ひ用ようがかかりますが、国くにとして貧まずしい町まちを支ささえるか、移い住じゅうのサポートをする必要ひつようがあります。

Although it may cost them, the government has to help maintain the poor towns or support the elderly in moving somewhere else.

ただ、もしその街まちがもう一いち度ど元げん気きになれば、全すべての問題もんだいは解決かいけつするでしょう。

If those towns were revived, all problems would be solved.

Conclusion Part

In this part, you are going to wrap up what you have been discussing and make your conclusion. That is to say, you are going to mention your topic, the background, and the reason why it is important again, which should be worded a little bit differently than earlier on in your speech, and then call for action or make your commitment for the future.

繰くり返かえしですが、私わたしの夢ゆめは地じ元もとを復興ふっこうすることです。

Again, my dream is to revive my hometown.

これは私わたしたちだけの問題もんだいではありません。

This is not only a problem for us.

私わたしの町まちが元げん気きになることは他ほかの町まちを大おおきく勇ゆう気きづけるはずです。

If my hometown is revived, it must also really inspire other towns

だから私わたしたちに皆みなさんの力ちからを貸かしてください。

Thus, please give us a helping hand

皆みなさんが私わたしの町まちに観光かんこうに来きてくれるだけで状況じょうきょうは大おおきく変かわります。

Even if you just go sightseeing in my hometown, it will make significant changes.

どうぞよろしくお願ねがいします。ありがとうございました。

Pros and Cons

The Introduction-Body-Conclusion structure is appropriate for explaining something and persuading someone to do something because of its logical structure. Thus, it is almost always used in academic and business situations. On the other hand, it is not appropriate for really making people think or playing to their feelings. If a person tries to use this approach for those purposes, it will not be as effective.

In regards to using this method for making a Japanese script for your speech, it is recommended that you use it only when your proposition has certain social values or factors to arouse sympathy. If not, you may look selfish because the Introduction-Body-Conclusion structure will work only for proving why you are right. On the other hand, people like to use it because its familiar to them. In that case, please try to put some humor into your Japanese script. That way, your audience will be engaged with a smile.

Transition Words and Phrases for Japanese Essays

June 9, 2020

By Alexis Papa

Are you having a hard time connecting between your ideas in your Japanese essay? In this article, we have listed useful transition words and phrases that you can use to help you let your ideas flow and have an organized essay.

Transition Words and Phrases for Japanese Essays

Japanese Phrases for Giving Examples and Emphasis

For example,

がいこく、たとえばちゅうごくへいったことがありますか。 Gaikoku, tatoeba Chuugoku e itta koto ga arimasu ka?

Have you been abroad, for instance China?

たぶんちゅうごくへいったことがあります。 Tabun Chuugoku e itta koto ga arimasu.

I have probably been to China.

Japanese Essay Phrases: General Explaining

しけんにごうかくするのために、まじめにべんきょうしなきゃ。 Shiken ni goukaku suru no tame ni, majime ni benkyou shinakya.

In order to pass the exam, I must study.

あしたあめがふるそう。だから、かさをもってきて。 Ashita ame ga furu sou. Dakara, kasa wo motte kite.

It seems that it will rain tomorrow. So, bring an umbrella.

Showing Sequence

まず、あたらしいさくぶんのがいせつをしようとおもう。 Mazu, atarashii sakubun no gaisetsu wo shiyou to omou.

First, I am going to do an outline of my new essay.

つぎに、さくぶんをかきはじめます。 Tsugi ni, sakubun wo kaki hajimemasu.

Then, I will begin writing my essay.

Adding Supporting Statements

かれはブレーキをかけ、そしてくるまはとまった。 Kare wa bureki wo kake, soshite kuruma wa tomatta.

He put on the brakes and then the car stopped.

いえはかなりにみえたし、しかもねだんがてごろだった。 Ie wa kanari ni mieta shi, shikamo nedan ga tegoro datta.

The house looked good; moreover,the (selling) price was right.

Demonstrating Contrast

にほんごはむずかしいですが、おもしろいです。 Nihongo wa muzukashii desu ga, omoshiroi desu.

Although Japanese language is difficult, it is enjoyable.

にほんごはむずかしいです。でも、おもしろいです。 Nihongo wa muzukashii desu. Demo, omoshiroi desu.

Japanese language is difficult. Nevertheless, it is enjoyable.

にほんごはむずかしいです。しかし、おもしろいです。 Nihondo wa muzukashii desu. Shikashi, omoshiroi desu.

Japanese language is difficult. However, it is enjoyable.

にほんごはむずかしいですけれど、おもしろいです。 Nihongo wa muzakashii desu keredo, omoshiroi desu.

Japanese Essay Phrases for Summarizing

われわれはこのはなしはじつわだというけつろんにたっした。 Wareware wa kono hanashi wa jitsuwa da to iu ketsuron ni tasshita.

We have come to a conclusion that this is a true story.

Now that you have learned these Japanese transitional words and phrases, we hope that your Japanese essay writing has become easier. Leave a comment and write examples of sentences using these Japanese essay phrases!

Alexis Papa

Alexis is a Japanese language and culture enthusiast from the Philippines. She is a Japanese Studies graduate, and has worked as an ESL and Japanese instructor at a local language school. She enjoys her free time reading books and watching series.

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StoryLearning

Learn A Language Through Stories

How To Write In Japanese – A Beginner’s Guide

Do you want to learn how to write in Japanese , but feel confused or intimidated by the script?

This post will break it all down for you, in a step-by-step guide to reading and writing skills this beautiful language.

I remember when I first started learning Japanese and how daunting the writing system seemed. I even wondered whether I could get away without learning the script altogether and just sticking with romaji (writing Japanese with the roman letters).

I’m glad I didn’t.

If you’re serious about learning Japanese, you have to get to grips with the script sooner or later. If you don’t, you won’t be able to read or write anything useful, and that’s no way to learn a language.

The good news is that it isn’t as hard as you think. And I’ve teamed up with my friend Luca Toma (who’s also a Japanese coach ) to bring you this comprehensive guide to reading and writing Japanese.

By the way, if you want to learn Japanese fast and have fun while doing it, my top recommendation is Japanese Uncovered which teaches you through StoryLearning®.

With Japanese Uncovered you’ll use my unique StoryLearning® method to learn Japanese naturally through story… not rules. It’s as fun as it is effective.

If you’re ready to get started, click here for a 7-day FREE trial.

If you have a friend who’s learning Japanese, you might like to share it with them. Now, let’s get stuck in…

One Language, Two Systems, Three Scripts

If you are a complete beginner, Japanese writing may appear just like Chinese.

But if you look at it more carefully you'll notice that it doesn’t just contain complex Chinese characters… there are lots of simpler ones too.

Take a look.

それでも、日本人の食生活も急速に変化してきています。ハンバーグやカレーライスは子供に人気がありますし、都会では、イタリア料理、東南アジア料理、多国籍料理などを出すエスニック料理店がどんどん増えています。

Nevertheless, the eating habits of Japanese people are also rapid ly chang ing . Hamburgers and curry rice are popular with children . In cities , ethnic restaurants serv ing Italian cuisine , Southeast Asian cuisine and multi-national cuisine keep increas ing more and more .

(Source: “Japan: Then and Now”, 2001, p. 62-63)

As you can see from this sample, within one Japanese text there are actually three different scripts intertwined. We’ve colour coded them to help you tell them apart.

(What’s really interesting is the different types of words – parts of speech – represented by each colour – it tells you a lot about what you use each of the three scripts for.)

Can you see the contrast between complex characters (orange) and simpler ones (blue and green)?

The complex characters are called kanji (漢字 lit. Chinese characters) and were borrowed from Chinese. They are what’s called a ‘logographic system' in which each symbol corresponds to a block of meaning (食 ‘to eat', 南 ‘south', 国 ‘country').

Each kanji also has its own pronunciation, which has to be learnt – you can’t “read” an unknown kanji like you could an unknown word in English.

Luckily, the other two sets of characters are simpler!

Those in blue above are called hiragana and those in green are called katakana . Katakana and hiragana are both examples of ‘syllabic systems', and unlike the kanji , each character corresponds to single sound. For example, そ= so, れ= re; イ= i, タ = ta.

Hiragana and katakana are a godsend for Japanese learners because the pronunciation isn’t a problem. If you see it, you can say it!

So, at this point, you’re probably wondering:

“What’s the point of using three different types of script? How could that have come about?”

In fact, all these scripts have a very specific role to play in a piece of Japanese writing, and you’ll find that they all work together in harmony in representing the Japanese language in a written form.

So let’s check them out in more detail.

First up, the two syllabic systems: hiragana and katakana (known collectively as kana ).

The ‘Kana' – One Symbol, One Sound

Both hiragana and katakana have a fixed number of symbols: 46 characters in each, to be precise.

Each of these corresponds to a combination of the 5 Japanese vowels (a, i, u, e o) and the 9 consonants (k, s, t, n, h, m, y, r, w).

(Source: Wikipedia Commons )

Hiragana (the blue characters in our sample text) are recognizable for their roundish shape and you’ll find them being used for three functions in Japanese writing:

1. Particles (used to indicate the grammatical function of a word)

は wa topic marker

が ga subject marker

を wo direct object marker

2. To change the meaning of verbs, adverbs or adjectives, which generally have a root written in kanji. (“Inflectional endings”)

急速に kyuusoku ni rapid ly

増えています fu ete imasu are increas ing

3. Native Japanese words not covered by the other two scripts

それでも soredemo nevertheless

どんどん dondon more and more

Katakana (the green characters in our sample text) are recognisable for their straight lines and sharp corners. They are generally reserved for:

1. Loanwords from other languages. See what you can spot!

ハンバーグ hanbaagu hamburger

カレーライス karee raisu curry rice

エスニック esunikku ethnic

2. Transcribing foreign names

イタリア itaria Italy

アジア ajia Asia

They are also used for emphasis (the equivalent of italics or underlining in English), and for scientific terms (plants, animals, minerals, etc.).

So where did hiragana and katakana come from?

In fact, they were both derived from kanji which had a particular pronunciation; Hiragana took from the Chinese cursive script (安 an →あ a), whereas katakana developed from single components of the regular Chinese script (阿 a →ア a ).

So that covers the origins the two kana scripts in Japanese, and how we use them.

Now let’s get on to the fun stuff… kanji !

The Kanji – One Symbol, One Meaning

Kanji – the most formidable hurdle for learners of Japanese!

We said earlier that kanji is a logographic system, in which each symbol corresponds to a “block of meaning”.

食 eating

生 life, birth

活 vivid, lively

“Block of meaning” is the best phrase, because one kanji is not necessarily a “word” on its own.

You might have to combine one kanji with another in order to make an actual word, and also to express more complex concepts:

生 + 活 = 生活 lifestyle

食 + 生活 = 食生活 eating habits

If that sounds complicated, remember that you see the same principle in other languages.

Think about the word ‘telephone' in English – you can break it down into two main components derived from Greek:

‘tele' (far) + ‘phone' (sound) = telephone

Neither of them are words in their own right.

So there are lots and lots of kanji , but in order to make more sense of them we can start by categorising them.

There are several categories of kanji , starting with the ‘pictographs' (象形文字 sh ōkei moji), which look like the objects they represent:

(Source: Wikipedia Commons )

In fact, there aren’t too many of these pictographs.

Around 90% of the kanji in fact come from six other categories, in which several basic elements (called ‘radicals') are combined to form new concepts.

For example:

人 (‘man' as a radical) + 木 (‘tree') = 休 (‘to rest')

These are known as 形声文字 keisei moji or ‘radical-phonetic compounds'.

You can think of these characters as being made up of two parts:

A radical that tells you what category of word it is: animals, plants, metals, etc.)
A second component that completes the character and give it its pronunciation (a sort of Japanese approximation from Chinese).

So that’s the story behind the kanji , but what are they used for in Japanese writing?

Typically, they are used to represent concrete concepts.

When you look at a piece of Japanese writing, you’ll see kanji being used for nouns, and in the stem of verbs, adjectives and adverbs.

Here are some of them from our sample text at the start of the article:

日本人 Japanese people 多国籍料理 multinational cuisine 東南 Southeast

Now, here’s the big question!

Once you’ve learnt to read or write a kanji , how do you pronounce it?

If you took the character from the original Chinese, it would usually only have one pronunciation.

However, by the time these characters leave China and reach Japan, they usually have two or sometimes even more pronunciations.

How or why does this happen?

Let's look at an example.

To say ‘mountain', the Chinese use the pictograph 山 which depicts a mountain with three peaks. The pronunciation of this character in Chinese is sh ā n (in the first tone).

Now, in Japanese the word for ‘mountain' is ‘yama'.

So in this case, the Japanese decided to borrow the character山from Chinese, but to pronounce it differently: yama .

However, this isn’t the end of the story!

The Japanese did decide to borrow the pronunciation from the original Chinese, but only to use it when that character is used in compound words.

So, in this case, when the character 山 is part of a compound word, it is pronounced as san/zan – clearly an approximation to the original Chinese pronunciation.

Here’s the kanji on its own:

山は… Yama wa… The mountain….

And here’s the kanji when it appears in compound words:

火山は… Ka zan wa The volcano…

富士山は… Fuji san wa… Mount Fuji….

To recap, every kanji has at least two pronunciations.

The first one (the so-called訓読み kun'yomi or ‘meaning reading') has an original Japanese pronunciation, and is used with one kanji on it’s own.

The second one (called音読み on'yomi or ‘sound-based reading') is used in compound words, and comes from the original Chinese.

Makes sense, right? 😉

In Japan, there’s an official number of kanji that are classified for “daily use” (常用漢字 joy ō kanji ) by the Japanese Ministry of Education – currently 2,136.

(Although remember that the number of actual words that you can form using these characters is much higher.)

So now… if you wanted to actually learn all these kanji , how should you go about it?

To answer this question, Luca’s going to give us an insight into how he did it.

How I Learnt Kanji

I started to learn kanji more than 10 years ago at a time when you couldn't find all the great resources that are available nowadays. I only had paper kanji dictionary and simple lists from my textbook.

What I did have, however, was the memory of a fantastic teacher.

I studied Chinese for two years in college, and this teacher taught us characters in two helpful ways:

He would analyse them in terms of their radicals and other components
He kept us motivated and interested in the process by using fascinating stories based on etymology (the origin of the characters)

Once I’d learnt to recognise the 214 radicals which make up all characters – the building blocks of Chinese characters – it was then much easier to go on and learn the characters and the words themselves.

It’s back to the earlier analogy of dividing the word ‘telephone' into tele and phone .

But here’s the thing – knowing the characters alone isn’t enough. There are too many, and they’re all very similar to one another.

If you want to get really good at the language, and really know how to read and how to write in Japanese, you need a higher-order strategy.

The number one strategy that I used to reach a near-native ability in reading and writing in Japanese was to learn the kanji within the context of dialogues or other texts .

I never studied them as individual characters or words.

Now, I could give you a few dozen ninja tricks for how to learn Japanese kanji. B ut the one secret that blows everything else out of the water and guarantees real success in the long-term, is extensive reading and massive exposure.

This is the foundation of the StoryLearning® method , where you immerse yourself in language through story.

In the meantime, there are a lot of resources both online and offline to learn kanji , each of which is based on a particular method or approach (from flashcards to mnemonic and so on).

The decision of which approach to use can be made easier by understanding the way you learn best.

Do you have a photographic memory or prefer working with images? Do you prefer to listen to audio? Or perhaps you prefer to write things by hands?

You can and should try more than one method, in order to figure out which works best for you.

( Note : You should get a copy of this excellent guide by John Fotheringham, which has all the resources you’ll ever need to learn kanji )

Summary Of How To Write In Japanese

So you’ve made it to the end!

See – I told you it wasn’t that bad! Let’s recap what we’ve covered.

Ordinary written Japanese employs a mixture of three scripts:

Kanji, or Chinese characters, of which there are officially 2,136 in daily use (more in practice)
2 syllabic alphabets called hiragana and katakana, containing 42 symbols each

In special cases, such as children’s books or simplified materials for language learners, you might find everything written using only hiragana or katakana .

But apart from those materials, everything in Japanese is written by employing the three scripts together. And it’s the kanji which represent the cultural and linguistic challenge in the Japanese language.

If you want to become proficient in Japanese you have to learn all three!

Although it seems like a daunting task, remember that there are many people before you who have found themselves right at the beginning of their journey in learning Japanese.

And every journey begins with a single step.

So what are you waiting for?

The best place to start is to enrol in Japanese Uncovered . The course includes a series of lessons that teach you hiragana, katakana and kanji. It also includes an exciting Japanese story which comes in different formats (romaji, hiragana, kana and kanji) so you can practice reading Japanese, no matter what level you're at right now.

– – –

It’s been a pleasure for me to work on this article with Luca Toma, and I’ve learnt a lot in the process.

Now he didn’t ask me to write this, but if you’re serious about learning Japanese, you should consider hiring Luca as a coach. The reasons are many, and you can find out more on his website: JapaneseCoaching.it

Do you know anyone learning Japanese? Why not send them this article, or click here to send a tweet .

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About This Page

This page introduces the variety of essays written by popular contemporary authors. Unless noted, all are in Japanese.

The author, さくらももこ, is known for writing a comic titled 『ちびまる子ちゃん』. The comic is based on her own childhood experiences and depicts the everyday life of a girl with a nickname of Chibi Maruko-chan. The author has been constantly writing casual and humorous essays, often recollecting her childhood memories. We have both the『ちびまる子ちゃん』 comic series and other essays by the author.

To see a sample text in a new tab, please click on the cover image or the title .

中島らも(1952-2004) started his career as a copyrigher but changed his path to become a prolific writer, publishing novels, essays, drama scripts and rakugo stories. He became popular with his "twisted sense of humour." He is also active in the music industry when he formed his own band. He received the 13th Eiji Yoshikawa New Author Prize with his 『今夜、すべてのバーで』 and Mystery Writers of Japan Aaward with 『ガダラの豚』.

東海林（しょうじ）さだお

東海林さだお(1937-) is a well-known cartoonist, but he is also famous for his essays on food. His writing style is light and humorous and tends to pay particular attention toward regular food, such as bananas, miso soup, and eggd in udon noodles, rather than talk about gourmet meals. (added 5/2/2014)

Collection of Essays: 天声人語 = Vox Populi, Vox Deli (Bilingual)

A collection of essays which appear on the front page of Asahi Shinbun . Each essay is approx. 600 words. KU has collections published around 2000. Seach KU Online catalog with call number AC145 .T46 for more details.

To see a sample text, please click on the cover image or the title .

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村上さんのところ "Mr. Murakami's Place" -- Haruki Murakami's Advice Column Part of Haruki Murakami's official site. He answers questions sent to this site. He will also take questions in English. Questions will be accepted until Jan. 31, 2015.

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Home » Articles » How to Write in Japanese — A Beginner’s Guide to Japanese Writing

Full disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. ?

written by Caitlin Sacasas

Language: Japanese

Reading time: 13 minutes

Published: Apr 2, 2021

Updated: Oct 18, 2021

How to Write in Japanese — A Beginner’s Guide to Japanese Writing

Does the Japanese writing system intimidate you?

For most people, this seems like the hardest part of learning Japanese. How to write in Japanese is a bit more complex than some other languages. But there are ways to make it easier so you can master it!

Here at Fluent in 3 Months , we encourage actually speaking over intensive studying, reading, and listening. But writing is an active form of learning too, and crucial for Japanese. Japanese culture is deeply ingrained in its writing systems. If you can’t read or write it, you’ll struggle as you go along in your studies.

Some of the best Japanese textbooks expect you to master these writing systems… fast . For instance, the popular college textbook Genki , published by the Japan Times, expects you to master the basics in as little as a week. After that, they start to phase out the romanized versions of the word.

It’s also easy to mispronounce words when they’re romanized into English instead of the original writing system. If you have any experience learning how to write in Korean , then you know that romanization can vary and the way it reads isn’t often how it’s spoken.

Despite having three writing systems, there are benefits to it. Kanji, the “most difficult,” actually makes memorizing vocabulary easier!

So, learning to write in Japanese will go a long way in your language studies and help you to speak Japanese fast .

Why Does Japanese Have Three Writing Systems? A Brief Explainer

Japanese has three writing systems: hiragana, katakana, and kanji. The first two are collectively called kana and are the basics of writing in Japanese.

Writing Kana

If you think about English, we have two writing systems — print and cursive. Both print and cursive write out the same letters, but they look “sharp” and “curvy.” The same is true for kana. Hiragana is “curvy” and katakana is “sharp,” but they both represent the same Japanese alphabet (which is actually called a syllabary). They both represent sounds, or syllables, rather than single letters (except for vowels and “n”, hiragana ん or katakana ン). Hiragana and katakana serve two different purposes.

Hiragana is the most common, and the first taught to Japanese children. If this is all you learn, you would be understood (although you’d come across child-like). Hiragana is used for grammar functions, like changing conjugation or marking the subject of a sentence. Because of this, hiragana helps break up a sentence when combined with kanji. It makes it easier to tell where a word begins and ends, especially since Japanese doesn’t use spaces. It’s also used for furigana, which are small hiragana written next to kanji to help with the reading. You see furigana often in manga , Japanese comics, for younger audiences who haven’t yet learned to read all the kanji. (Or learners like us!)

Katakana serves to mark foreign words. When words from other languages are imported into Japanese, they’re often written in Japanese as close as possible to the original word. (Like how you can romanize Japanese into English, called romaji). For example, パン ( pan ) comes from Spanish, and means “bread.” Or from English, “smartphone” is スマートフォン ( suma-tofon ) or shortened, slang form スマホ ( sumaho ). Katakana can also be used to stylistically write a Japanese name, to write your own foreign name in Japanese, or to add emphasis to a word when writing.

Writing Kanji

Then there’s kanji. Kanji was imported from Chinese, and each character means a word, instead of a syllable or letter. 犬, read inu , means “dog.” And 食, read ta or shoku , means “food” or “to eat.” They combine with hiragana or other kanji to complete their meaning and define how you pronounce them.

So if you wanted to say “I’m eating,” you would say 食べます ( tabemasu ), where -bemasu completes the verb and puts it in grammatical tense using hiragana. If you wanted to say “Japanese food,” it would be 日本食 ( nipponshoku ), where it’s connected to other kanji.

If you didn’t have these three forms, it would make reading Japanese very difficult. The sentences would run together and it would be confusing. Like in this famous Japanese tongue twister: にわにはにわにわとりがいる, or romanized niwa ni wa niwa niwatori ga iru . But in kanji, it looks like 庭には二羽鶏がいる. The meaning? “There are chickens in the garden.” Thanks to the different writing systems, we know that the first niwa means garden, the second ni wa are the grammatical particles, the third niwa is to say there are at least two, and niwatori is “chickens.”

Japanese Pronunciation

Japanese has fewer sounds than English, and except for “r,” most of them are in the English language. So you should find most of the sounds easy to pick up!

Japanese has the same 5 vowels, but only 16 consonants. For the most part, all syllables consist of only a vowel, or a consonant plus a vowel. But there is the single “n,” and “sh,” “ts,” and “ch” sounds, as well as consonant + -ya/-yu/-yo sounds. I’ll explain this more in a minute.

Although Japanese has the same 5 vowel sounds, they only have one sound . Unlike English, there is no “long A” and “short A” sound. This makes it easy when reading kana because the sound never changes . So, once you learn how to write kana, you will always know how to pronounce it.

Here’s how the 5 vowels sound in Japanese:

あ / ア: “ah” as in “latte”
い / イ: “ee” as in “bee”
う / ウ: “oo” as in “tooth”
え / エ: “eh” as in “echo”
お / オ: “oh” as in “open”

Even when combined with consonants, the sound of the vowel stays the same. Look at these examples:

か / カ: “kah” as in “copy”
ち / チ: “chi” as in “cheap”
む / ム: “mu” as in “move”
せ / セ: “se” as in “set”
の / ノ: “no” as in “note”

Take a look at the entire syllabary chart:

Based on learning how to pronounce the vowels, can you pronounce the rest of the syllables? The hardest ones will be the R-row of sounds, “tsu,” “fu,” and “n.”

For “r” it sounds between an “r” and an “l” sound in English. Almost like the Spanish, actually. First, try saying “la, la, la.” Your tongue should push off of the back of your teeth to make this sound. Now say “rah, rah, rah.” Notice how your tongue pulls back to touch your back teeth. Now, say “dah, dah, dah.” That placement of your tongue to make the “d” sound is actually where you make the Japanese “r” sound. You gently push off of this spot on the roof of your mouth as you pull back your tongue like an English “r.”

“Tsu” blends together “t” and “s” in a way we don’t quite have in English. You push off the “t” sound, and should almost sound like the “s” is drawn out. The sound “fu” is so soft, and like a breath of air coming out. Think like a sigh, “phew.” It doesn’t sound like “who,” but a soft “f.” As for our lone consonant, “n” can sound like “n” or “m,” depending on the word.

Special Japanese Character Readings and How to Write Them

There are a few Japanese characters that combine with others to create more sounds. You’ll often see dakuten , which are double accent marks above the character on the right side ( ﾞ), and handakuten , which is a small circle on the right side ( ﾟ).

Here’s how dakuten affect the characters:

And handakuten are only used with the H-row characters, changing it from “h” to “p.” So か ( ka ) becomes が ( ga ), and ひ ( hi ) becomes either び ( bi ) or ぴ ( pi ).

A sokuon adds a small っ between two characters to double the consonant that follows it and make a “stop” in the word. In the saying いらっしゃいませ ( irasshaimase , “Welcome!”), the “rahs-shai” has a slight glottal pause where the “tsu” emphasizes the double “s.”

One of the special readings that tend to be mispronounced are the yoon characters. These characters add a small “y” row character to the other rows to blend the sounds together. These look like ちゃ ( cha ), きょ ( kyo ), and しゅ ( shu ). They’re added to the “i” column of kana characters.

An example of a common mispronunciation is “Tokyo.” It’s often said “Toh-key-yo,” but it’s actually only two syllables: “Toh-kyo.” The k and y are blended; there is no “ee” sound in the middle.

How to Read, Write, and Pronounce Kanji Characters

Here’s where things get tricky. Kanji, since it represents a whole word or idea, and combines with hiragana… It almost always has more than one way to read and pronounce it. And when it comes to writing them, they have a lot more to them.

Let’s start by breaking down the kanji a bit, shall we?

Most kanji consist of radicals, the basic elements or building blocks. For instance, 日 (“sun” or “day”) is a radical. So is 言 (“words” or “to say”) and 心 (“heart”). So when we see the kanji 曜, we see that “day” has been squished in this complex kanji. This kanji means “day of the week.” It’s in every weekday’s name: 月曜日 ( getsuyoubi , “Monday”), 火曜日 ( kayoubi , “Tuesday”), 水曜日 ( suiyoubi , “Wednesday”), etc.

When the kanji for “words” is mixed into another kanji, it usually has something to do with conversation or language. 日本語 ( nihongo ) is the word for “Japanese” and the final kanji 語 includes 言. And as for 心, it’s often in kanji related to expressing emotions and feelings, like 怒る ( okoru , “angry”) and 思う ( omou , “to think”).

In this way, some kanji make a lot of sense when we break them down like this. A good example is 妹 ( imouto ), the kanji for “little sister.” It’s made up of two radicals: 女, “woman,” and 未, “not yet.” She’s “not yet a woman,” because she’s your kid sister.

So why learn radicals? Because radicals make it easier to memorize, read, and write the kanji. By learning radicals, you can break the kanji down using mnemonics (like “not yet a woman” to remember imouto ). If you know each “part,” you’ll remember how to write it. 妹 has 7 strokes to it, but only 2 radicals. So instead of memorizing tons of tiny lines, memorize the parts.

As for pronouncing them, this is largely a memorization game. But here’s a pro-tip. Each kanji has “common” readings — often only one or two. Memorize how to read the kanji with common words that use them, and you’ll know how to read that kanji more often than not.

Japanese Writing: Stroke Order

So, I mentioned stroke order with kanji. But what is that? Stroke order is the proper sequence you use to write Japanese characters.

The rule of stroke order is you go from top to bottom, left to right.

This can still be confusing with some complex kanji, but again, radicals play a part here. You would break down each radical top left-most stroke to bottom right stroke, then move on to the next radical. A helpful resource is Jisho.org , which shows you how to properly write all the characters. Check out how to write the kanji for “kanji” as a perfect example of breaking down radicals.

When it comes to kana, stroke order still matters. Even though they’re simpler, proper stroke order makes your characters easier to read. And some characters rely on stroke order to tell them apart. Take シ and ツ:

[Shi and Tsu example]

If you didn’t use proper stroke order, these two katakana characters would look the same!

How to Memorize Japanese Kanji and Kana

When it comes to Japanese writing, practice makes perfect. Practice writing your sentences down in Japanese, every day. Practice filling in the kana syllabary chart for hiragana and katakana, until there are no blank boxes and you’ve got them all right.

Create mnemonics for both kanji and kana. Heisig’s method is one of the best ways to memorize how to write kanji with mnemonics. Using spaced repetition helps too, like Anki. Then you’re regularly seeing each character, and you can input your mnemonics into the note of the card so you have it as a reminder.

Another great way to practice is to write out words you already know. If you know mizu means “water,” then learn the kanji 水 and write it with the kanji every time from here on out. If you know the phrase おはようございます means “good morning,” practice writing in in kana every morning. That phrase alone gives you practice with 9 characters and two with dakuten! And try looking up loan words to practice katakana.

Tools to Help You with Japanese Writing

There are some fantastic resources out there to help you practice writing in Japanese. Here are a few to help you learn it fast:

JapanesePod101 : Yes, JapanesePod101 is a podcast. But they often feature YouTube videos and have helpful PDFs that teach you kanji and kana! Plus, you’ll pick up all kinds of helpful cultural insights and grammar tips.
LingQ : LingQ is chock full of reading material in Japanese, giving you plenty of exposure to kana, new kanji, and words. It uses spaced repetition to help you review.
Skritter : Skritter is one of the best apps for Japanese writing. You can practice writing kanji on the app, and review them periodically so you don’t forget. It’s an incredible resource to keep up with your Japanese writing practice on the go.
Scripts : From the creator of Drops, this app was designed specifically for learning languages with a different script from your own.

How to Type in Japanese

It’s actually quite simple to type in Japanese! On a PC, you can go to “Language Settings” and click “Add a preferred language.” Download Japanese — 日本語 — and make sure to move it below English. (Otherwise, it will change your laptop’s language to Japanese… Which can be an effective study tool , though!)

To start typing in Japanese, you would press the Windows key + space. Your keyboard will now be set to Japanese! You can type the romanized script, and it will show you the suggestions for kanji and kana. To easily change back and forth between Japanese and English, use the alt key + “~” key.

For Mac, you can go to “System Preferences”, then “Keyboard” and then click the “+” button to add and set Japanese. To toggle between languages, use the command key and space bar.

For mobile devices, it’s very similar. You’ll go to your settings, then language and input settings. Add the Japanese keyboard, and then you’ll be able to toggle back and forth when your typing from the keyboard!

Japanese Writing Isn’t Scary!

Japanese writing isn’t that bad. It does take practice, but it’s fun to write! It’s a beautiful script. So, don’t believe the old ideology that “three different writing systems will take thousands of hours to learn!” A different writing system shouldn’t scare you off. Each writing system has a purpose and makes sense once you start learning. They build on each other, so learning it gets easier as you go. Realistically, you could read a Japanese newspaper after only about two months of consistent studying and practice with kanji!

Caitlin Sacasas

Content Writer, Fluent in 3 Months

Caitlin is a copywriter, content strategist, and language learner. Besides languages, her passions are fitness, books, and Star Wars. Connect with her: Twitter | LinkedIn

Speaks: English, Japanese, Korean, Spanish

Have a 15-minute conversation in your new language after 90 days

Japanese Writing Lab #1: Basic self-introduction

In a recent post I announced I would be starting a new program on my blog called “Japanese Writing Lab” that aims to motivate people to practice writing in Japanese, provides feedback on their writing, and allows them to see posts of other Japanese learners. This article represents the first writing assignment of that program.

For this assignment, I’d like to focus on a very common, but important topic: self-introduction, known as 自己紹介 (jiko shoukai) in Japanese.

Self-introductions can range widely from formal to casual, and from very short (name only) to much longer. This time, I’d like everyone to focus on writing a basic self-introduction whose main purpose is to actually introduce yourself to me and others in the group. So while it is a writing exercise, it actually serves an important purpose as well. Try to keep it brief (a few sentences is fine) and stick more to written language as opposed to spoken language. For example, you would avoid using things like “あの。。。” which you might say if you actually spoke a self-introduction.

For those who are comfortable writing a self-introduction in Japanese, you can go ahead and get started. If you have written one recently, I suggest you try to write one again from scratch without referring to it unless you really get stuck.

Once you finish this writing assignment please post it via one of the two following methods:

For those who have a blog (WordPress or anywhere else is fine): post it on your blog, and post a comment on this article including a link to your post. I also suggest adding a link on your post back to this article, so people who find your post can follow it to read other people’s submissions.
For those who don’t have a blog: simply post it as a comment to this article with the text you’ve written. [Note: creating a blog is pretty easy and free on many sites, so if you have a few minutes I’d just consider just trying to create a blog]

I’ll be reading through the submitted assignments and will try to make constructive comments. I highly recommend for everyone submitting to read other people’s submissions.

For those who are not too familiar with how to write self-introductions in Japanese, here is a general template to help you get started (taken from this Japanese website). If you want to do your own research on how to write a self-introduction, that is fine as well. Feel free to omit any of the below categories, for example if you don’t want to discuss where you live.

Keep in mind that for a self-introduction in Japanese, it is usually best to use at minimum basic polite language, like ~です and ~ます, since you aren’t likely to be on very familiar terms with those you are speaking to.

General template for basic self-introduction

僕（私) の名前は [your name here] です。

Place where you live (住所)

住所は[place where you live]というところです。

Hobbies (趣味)

趣味は [one or more of your hobbies]です。

仕事は「your current job」をしています。

Positive ending

[try to think of something positive to close with]

My submission

For each assignment I will give my submission as well, to help give you ideas. Feel free to send me questions or comments about my submission.

For this assignment I’ll keep things pretty simple and mostly follow the template I gave above, but in future assignments I’ll start using more advanced language and get more creative.

僕の名前はlocksleyuです。

住所はオレゴン州のポートランドですが、先週までは南フロリダに住んでいました。

趣味は色々ありますが、最近は日本の小説を読んだりチェスをやったりしています。

仕事はソフトウェア開発をしています。

このクラスで日本語の文章力を向上できたらいいと思います。

よろしくお願いします。

22 thoughts on “ Japanese Writing Lab #1: Basic self-introduction ”

Hi – I put together a WordPress site today so I could participate in this, and also to encourage me to write in Japanese.

Here’s my basic self introduction article: https://bokunojapanese.wordpress.com/2016/05/30/japanese-writing-lab-1-basic-self-introduction/

I tried once yesterday and once just now to post here and I am not seeing anything getting through. Are these comments moderated? Is there some other issue? I’m sick of retyping my introduction 🙁

The comments are moderated (that is the default setting of WordPress) but I check very often and approve pretty much all comments except for Spam. For some reason I didn’t see any of your comments from yesterday, only two from today.

I’ll read your other comment and respond now.

OK, this blog doesn’t seem to accept Japanese characters as comments (I just tried a third time).

I’m sorry that you are experiencing trouble. I’ll try to do my best help you out so we can get this solved (:

I have used Japanese before in comments. Let’s test now:

こんにちは [<- can you read this?] What happens when you try to write Japanese characters? Can you please make a post like this with some Japanese and some English so I can see what it looks like? Also, what browser/OS are you using? Can you try a variation of either? I am using Safari/Mac OS.

Thanks for the reply! Yeah, I’m reading that. The last three comments I have made that have included either all Japanese characters or a mix of Japanese and English have just…vanished. Like, I click “post” and the page refreshes but I don’t see my comment or even a “Your comment is pending” notification. I’m on Chrome on Mac OS, everything’s reasonably up to date.

Here’s a comment with English and hiragana only: こんにちは Thanks for helping me debug and sorry to be leaving so many comments on the blog ;_;

Here’s a comment with English, hiragana and kanji: こんいちは漢字は難しいですが、大切です。

Everything looks great now, I can see all the characters fine (: I’m guessing that was just some temporary issue with WordPress.

You can go ahead and try to put your self-introduction now. Just make a backup copy in case it gets deleted again.

You’re not going to believe this, but it STILL isn’t posting. I was avoiding making a new blog because I thought it would be “more work” but now I’m thinking that would be simpler after all.

Thats so weird, I wonder why. Maybe if you make a longer comment it doesn’t like it?

I agree it will probably be easier at this point to create your own blog, and that will have other benefits for you in the future.

But if you still want to try and troubleshoot the original issue I can help…

The good news is that WordPress makes it really easy to set up a new blog these days. I guess in retrospect I should have done that to begin with. Thanks for your help trying to debug this issue! https://nihongonoheya.wordpress.com/2016/06/02/first-blog-post/

Great, glad you were able to make a blog so easily! Will check out your blog later today when I get more time.

Hi, I have been reading several of your articles with great interest. The first that lead me to you was your comments on ‘Hibana’ by Naoki Matayoshi. A friend of mine in Japan is reading this book and I was curious about its content. Your translation is amazing. To introduce myself I set up a site, above link, however it doesn’t really seem to be a blog as such, so I may need to change that later. Anyway it’s accepted the script ok so you should be able to read it. I hope to join in here to improve my Japanese. Thanks for your time, Sylvia

Thanks very much for the comment and feedback!

Also, I’m glad you are interested in joining my program. I checked out your site, but like you said it seems like it isn’t exactly a blog, so I am not sure if I will be able to comment. Without that, it will be hard for me to correct your writings (I found a few errors I wanted to point out).

If it’s not too much trouble, would you mind trying to create a blog on WordPress.com? It should be pretty easy and it’s free.

Hi, Thank you for your reply. I think I’ve sorted it OK. See link below, I’ve never done a blog before so this is new to me! https://kafuka97.wordpress.com/

I just copied what I wrote before, no changes. Many thanks, Sylvia

PS: I do have a website which I have sent a link to.

Hello! My name is Jheanelle, I just found your website today and I think I’ve already looked through have of it. Its amazing. I’m interested in doing the assignments but I don’t have a blog so I’ll post it in the comments section.

ジェネルと言います。今日本に住んで仕事にしています。私は英語の先生です。色々な趣味があります。例えば、寝たり、韓国の番組を見たり、本を読んだりするのが好きです。日本語もっと上手になりたいそしてこのブログを見つけて嬉しくなった

どうぞよろしくお願いします

Hello Jheanelle. I’m sorry for the late reply but your message was showing up in Spam on my blog for some reason.

Thanks for the submission. Right now I am sort of taking a break from the writing labs since I didn’t get too much response from my readers, but I will consider restarting them again at some point. There is a few others however I posted (up to #3 or #4, I think).

I hope your Japanese studies are going well.

One minor comment, in your sentence “今日本に住んで仕事にしています” I think maybe you could have said: “今日本で仕事をしています” or “今日本に住んでで仕事もしています”

These might sound a little better.

One more thing, I recommend watching Japanese dramas instead of Korean if you want to improve faster (:

Hello locksleyu, I just posted my self-introduction here: https://soreymikleo1421.wordpress.com/2021/05/21/japanese-writing-lab-1-basic-self-introduction/ Thank you in advance!

Thanks! I just posted a few comments.

Formatting Japanese Writing

Formatting Japanese writing correctly is quite different to formatting English when hand writing. While modern Japanese is usually written from right to left as in English, it can also be written as in the traditional way which is right to left and top to bottom.

Formatting Japanese in such a way is quite formal and is used for written work such as homework, essays or letters to others.

As all Japanese characters fit perfectly inside a square, it helps formatting Japanese work like this using what’s called a Genko Yoshi which is a type of Japanese paper used for writing. It is printed with squares, typically 200 or 400 per sheet, with each square designed to accommodate a single Japanese character or punctuation mark.

Formatting Japanese using a Genko Yoshi

Below is a diagram outlining some of the different rules of formatting Japanese using a Genko Yoshi borrowed from this site.

1 . Title on the 1st line, first character in the 4th square.

2 . Author’s name on the 2nd line, with 1 square between the family name and the given name, and 1 empty square below.

3 . First sentence of the essay begins on the 3rd line, in the 2nd square. Each new paragraph begins on the 2nd square.

4 . Subheadings have 1 empty line before and after, and begin on the 3rd square of a new line.

5 . Punctuation marks normally occupy their own square, except when they will occur at the top of a line, in which case they share a square with the last character of the previous line.

Category: Resources • Writing

Tags: formatting • hiragana • japanese • language • learning • writing

Article by: Duncan Sensei

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The columbia anthology of japanese essays.

Zuihitsu from the Tenth to the Twenty-First Century

Edited and translated by Steven D. Carter

Columbia University Press

The Columbia Anthology of Japanese Essays

Pub Date: October 2014

ISBN: 9780231167710

Format: Paperback

List Price: $45.00 £38.00

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ISBN: 9780231167703

Format: Hardcover

List Price: $135.00 £113.00

ISBN: 9780231537551

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The focused ramble of the traditional Japanese essay format called zuihitsu (literally, 'following the brush') has appealed to writers of both genders, all ages, and every class in Japanese society. Highly personal, these essays contain dollops of philosophy, odd anecdotes, quiet reflection, and pronouncements on taste. In running alongside the main tracks of Japanese literature, this broad collection of zuihitsu brims with idiosyncratic interest. Liza Dalby, author of The Tale of Murasaki and East Wind Melts the Ice: A Memoir Through the Seasons

Savor a copy of The Columbia Anthology of Japanese Essays , and take a contemplative walk through the Japanese mind, full of poetic turns and pithy longings, ribald humor and lofty aspirations. Kris Kosaka, The Japan Times

Rich and highly enjoyable.... This evocative selection serves both as an excellent introduction to the genre for the English-speaking world and as a reminder that, no matter how distant or seemingly different the society, people's individual struggles, aspirations and aesthetics transcend their own times. Morgan Giles, Times Literary Supplement

Winner, 2016 2015-2016 Japan-United States Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature

About the Author

Asian Fiction and Literature
Asian Literature in Translation
Asian Studies
Asian Studies: Arts and Culture
Asian Studies: Fiction and Literature
Fiction and Literature
Literary Studies
Asian Studies: East Asian History
History: East Asian History

2022 IEICE Society Conference

Online September 6-9, 2022

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Writing your paper, paper example.

Although basic style settings are incorporated in each template, these are just examples and you may use different style settings as long as you observe the basic format requirements, such as the paper size and margins.
If you have a template you wish to recommend, we would appreciate receiving it. Please click here to send an email with your recommended template attached.

Writing your paper in electronic form

Maximum file size The file size of pdf file for general session will be smaller than 500K and the size will be smaller than 1MB for the symposium session. Please be careful if the pdf file size over the above limits, it cannot be uploaded from the web site. You can submit only a single file. Do not compress your file or apply security settings to it. (Please refer to " How to make a PDF (Portable Document Format) file" to learn how to reduce the file size.)
Page format Paper size: A4. Margins must not be smaller than the following. Top margin: 30 mm. Bottom margin: 27 mm. Left margin: 18 mm. Right margin: 18 mm. Inter-column spacing: 7 mm.
All used fonts in the pdf file must be embedded. The submitted pdf file will be published in DVD-ROM available both for Windows and Macintosh. (Please select "High Quality" or "Press Quality" in job options when you make your PDF file.) In case that the fonts might not be embedded, they cannot be expressed properly under some machine environment.
Permitted characters If you write your paper in Japanese, use only those characters covered by the JIS Second Level in order to avoid characters turning into meaningless symbols, depending on the type of computer used. In particular, if Macintosh users wish to use special symbols such as Roman numerals or numbers in circles, they should use the symbols listed in the JIS Codes.
Colors There is no restriction on colors used for characters or in diagrams. However, since papers will be printed on a monochrome printer for use in paper copies, select colors that are clearly distinguishable when printed in monochrome.
Resolution of photos and images The quality of photos and images may be degraded when a file containing them is converted to a PDF file. When you convert your file into a PDF file, you are recommended to select the highest quality that allows you to keep within the file size limitation.
File type The PDF (Portable Document Format) file you submit must be such that it can be displayed and printed by anyone using Adobe Reader 7.0 or higher.
Link PDF document must not contain link annotation(s).
Filename The filename should be your "application number" with the extension ".pdf".
Application and OS for making a PDF file There are no restrictions on the application used for making a PDF file. We recommend that you use WindowsXP or higher, or Macintosh 10.5 or higher, for the operating system.
How to make a PDF file A PDF file is normally made using Acrobat 7.0 or higher (or an equivalent product). For information about how to make a PDF file, refer to the manual for Acrobat (or its equivalent), or click here (Japanese only) . Details of Acrobat are available at https://www.adobe.com/ .
It is recommended that you use Acrobat Distiller to make a PDF file. In particular, if your file includes illustrations or other images, equations, or charts, do not use PDF Writer to make a PDF file.
After you have made a PDF file on your computer, print it using a different computer to check if it is printed correctly. (Sometimes, characters in equations, table or diagrams turn into gibberish.)
Deadline for submission of paper Your paper must arrive before 17:00 hours sharp, Wednesday, June 29, 2022 (17:00 hours, Japan time) .

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An Introduction to Japanese Sentence Structure

So you’ve learned some Japanese vocabulary .

Now, how do you string it into coherent sentences?

You’ll need to learn about Japanese word order, correct particle usage and the omnipresent です (“desu”).

This quick introduction will help you figure out how to get started with Japanese sentence structure.

The Japanese Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) Structure

The japanese copula, です, past tense with でした, levels of formality of です, japanese verb placement, japanese verb categories, japanese verb negations, using verbs to express nuances, japanese post-positions, japanese particles, は (topic marker), が (subject marker), を (object marker), の (possession marker), に (time and movement marker), へ (direction and destination marker), で (location and means marker), も (similarity marker), と (noun connector), japanese adjective placement, い adjectives, な adjectives, modifying japanese adjectives, japanese question structure, inferred subjects in japanese, breaking japanese sentence structure rules, and one more thing....

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

Japanese sentences follow an SOV format.

SOV means “subject-object-verb.” This means that the subject comes first, followed by object or objects, and the sentence ends with the verb. You’ll see lots of examples of this throughout this article.

Let’s look at an example:

ジンボはリンゴを食べる。じんぼはりんごをたべる。 Jimbo — an apple — eats (Jimbo eats an apple.)

“Jimbo” is the subject, “eats” is the verb and “an apple” is the object. This sentence follows the SOV formula.

If you’ve ever heard someone speak Japanese, be it in real life or on TV, you’ve almost certainly come across the Japanese word です .

です is one of the most basic terms in the Japanese language, literally meaning “to be” or “is.” Many think of it as just a formality marker, but it serves all sorts of functions.

です is a copula, meaning that it connects the subject of the sentence with the predicate, thus creating a complete sentence. The most basic Japanese sentence structure is “A は B です” (A is B).

My name is Amanda. 私はアマンダです。わたしはあまんだです。

He is American. 彼はアメリカ人です。かれはあめりかじんです。

です also serves to mark the end of a sentence , taking the place of a verb. Also, です never comes at the end of sentences that have verbs ending in ます.

Tom likes tea. トムさんはお茶が好きです。とむさんはおちゃがすきです。

Tom drinks tea. トムさんはお茶を飲みますです。(Incorrect) トムさんはお茶を飲みます。(Correct) とむさんはおちゃをのみます

When describing something that happened in the past, です turns into でした .

The exam was easy. 試験は簡単でした。しけんはかんたんでした。

Yesterday was my birthday. 昨日は私の誕生日でした。きのうはわたしのたんじょうびでした。

As with many words in Japanese, です comes in different levels of formality : だ, です, である and でございます:

です is the basic polite form and will be most useful in everyday conversation.
だ is found in casual speech among friends or family.
である is used in formal written Japanese, such as in newspapers.
でございます is the most formal form, used when speaking to your superior or someone important.

If you’re at a loss for which form to use, just stick with です. The person you’re talking to will know you’re trying to be polite!

As I just said, Japanese verbs have only two tenses: past and non-past.

Like English, you form the past tense by changing the end of the verb.

I ran to the store. 私は店に走りました。わたしはみせにはしりました。

Mayu studied last night. 昨日の夜、まゆさんは勉強した。きのうのよる、まゆさんはべんきょうした。

Alice made cookies. アリスはクッキーを作った。ありすはくっきーをつくった。

Unlike English, Japanese verbs are highly regular.

Many can be divided into two categories: う verbs and る verbs . It’s important to know the difference between the two, as they conjugate differently.

Each verb also comes in a dictionary form and a polite form—the dictionary form is used for casual speech, or if you’re trying to look it up in, well, a dictionary.

う verbs are verbs which end in the sound う, ある, うる or おる in their dictionary forms. They become polite when you drop the う and replace it with います.

話す/話します (はなす/はなします, to talk)
行く/行きます (いく/いきます, to go)
飲む/飲みます (のむ/のみます, to drink)
作る/作ります (つくる/つくります, to make)

Verbs ending in the sound いる and える are almost always る verbs. る verbs become polite by dropping the る and replacing it with ます。

食べる/食べます (たべる/たべます, to eat)
見る/見ます (みる/みます, to see)
起きる/起きます (おきる/おきます, to get up)

There are only two significantly irregular verbs, する (to do) and くる (to come). Their polite forms are します and きます, respectively.

Negative forms are also made by changing the end of the verb , which varies depending on the verb type. For instance:

For う verbs, replace the う sound with あない.
For る verbs, drop る and replace it with ない. する becomes しない, and くる becomes こない.

You can learn much more about negating Japanese verbs here .

Although there are only two tenses, verbs in Japanese change to express nuances. Japanese sentence structure is a type that’s called agglutinative.

This is a fancy word used by linguists which means, in layman’s terms, “You add a bunch of stuff to the end of verbs.” Each verb has a root form that ends with てor で.

You can add to these root form endings to give more meaning. But this isn’t really essential for making easy Japanese sentences , so we’ll pass over it for now.

While English has prepositions, Japanese has post-positions.

Prepositions are words that show relationships between parts of a sentence, such as “to,” “at,” “in,” “between,” “from” and so on.

They come before nouns in English. But in Japanese, they follow nouns. へ means “to,” so this next sentence is literally, “Spain to went.”

I went to Spain. スペインへ行きました。すぺいんへいきました。

In the next example, 彼女 means “her,” so what you’re saying is “her from” rather than “from her.”

Did you hear from her? 彼女から聞きましたか？かのじょからききましたか？

In the same vein as post-positions, Japanese has little grammatical pieces called particles .

Japanese particles come directly after the noun, adjective or sentence they modify, and are crucial to understanding the meaning of what’s being conveyed.

There are dozens of particles in Japanese, but we’ll cover nine common ones: は, が, を, の, に, へ, で, も and と.

は marks the topic of the sentence, and can be translated as “am,” “is,” “are” and “as for.” Take note that though it uses the character for ha, it’s actually pronounced wa .

I am a student. 私は学生です。わたしはがくせいです。

The pen is black. ペンは黒いです。ぺんはくろいです。

In these sentences, 私 (わたし, I) and ペン (pen) are marked by は, making all of the information that follows directly pertaining to 私 and ペン, respectively.

が indicates as well as emphasizes the subject of the sentence, the one performing the action. In addition, it can join sentences as a “but,” and serves as the default particle for question sentences.

That bird is singing. あの鳥が鳴いています。あのとりがないています。

Who will be coming? 誰が来ますか？だれがきますか？

Yuta studied abroad in China (emphasis on Yuta) ゆうたさんが中国に留学しました。ゆうたさんがちゅうごくにりゅうがくしました。

は and が are two particles that can be easy to get mixed up , so here are some tips for keeping them straight:

は is a general subject, while が is more specific. は is also used as a contrast marker in sentences with が, to show that there is some sort of difference between the two subjects:

My little sister doesn’t like cats, but she likes dogs. 妹は猫が嫌いだけど、犬は好きです。いもうとはねこがきらいだけど、いぬはすきです。

を shows the direct object of a sentence, meaning that it indicates that the verb is doing something or the verb is being done to the object. It follows nouns and noun phrases.

I eat vegetables. 私は野菜を食べます。わたしはやさいをたべます。

Tonight, he will make dinner. 今夜、彼は夕食を作ります。こんや、かれはゆうしょくをつくります。

In the first sentence, “vegetables” are the object, and “eat” is the action being done to them. The same goes for “dinner” and “make” in the second sentence.

の serves as a possessive particle, marking something as belonging to something else. It also serves as a generic noun, meaning “this one.”

That is the teacher ’s bag. それは先生のかばんです。それはせんせいのかばんです。

I want to buy the yellow one . 黄色いのを買いたいです。きいろいのをかいたいです。

に is the movement and time particle, which shows the place towards which a thing moves when accompanied by a moving verb.

It also indicates destinations and places where something exists when it’s accompanied by いる/ある. It can translate as “to,” “in/at” or “for.”

Yukako came to the movie theater. ゆかこさんは映画館に来ました。ゆかこさんはえいがかんにきました。

There is a bench in the park. 公園にベンチがあります。こうえんにべんちがあります。

へ is a directional particle similar to に, but used exclusively for marking destinations. へ emphasizes the direction in which something is heading. It’s also read as e despite being spelled he .

I went to the restaurant. 私はレストランへ行きました。わたしはれすとらんへいきました。

When indicating direction, に and へ are often interchangeable, whereas へ is never used as “for/at.”

で can have several meanings, depending on the context. It can designate the location of an action, show the means by which an action is carried out or connect clauses in a sentence.

Shigeo went shopping at the department store. しげおさんはデパートで買い物しました。しげおさんはでぱーとでかいものしました。

I came to Canada by plane. 私は飛行機でカナダに来ました。ひこうきでかなだにきました。

That person is famous and kind. その人は有名で、優しいです。そのひとはゆうめいで、やさしいです。

も , which translates as “also/too,” is used to state similarities between facts. It comes after a noun, replacing the particles は and が.

Both rice and bread are tasty. パンもごはんもおいしいです。ぱんもごはんもおいしいです。

Erika’s hobby is hiking. My hobby is also hiking. エリカさんの趣味はハイキングです。私の趣味もハイキングです。えりかさんのしゅみははいきんぐです。わたしのしゅみもはいきんぐです。

On a similar note, saying 私もです (わたしもです, me too) is enough to show that you agree with what someone said.

と is used to make a complete list of nouns. It corresponds to “and.”

That store sells sandwiches and coffee. あの店はサンドイッチとコーヒーを売っています。あのみせはさんどいっちとこーひーをうっています。

She went to the movies with Brad and Connor. 彼女はブラッドさんとコナーさんと映画を見に行きました。かのじょはぶらっどさんとこなーさんとえいがをみにいきました。

Like in English, adjectives come before nouns in Japanese. A blue car in English is still a blue car in Japanese, but instead, you’d say 青い車 (あおいくるま).

There are two types of Japanese adjectives: い adjectives and な adjectives. The difference is in their conjugation.

い adjectives end in the character い, such as 面白い (おもしろい, interesting) and 難しい (むずかしい, difficult). The exception is words ending in えい, like きれい (beautiful), which are な adjectives.

い adjectives come directly before the noun that they modify.

Cute cat かわいい猫かわいいねこ

Slow bus 遅いバスおそいばす

“Expensive shirt” 高いシャツたかいしゃつ

な adjectives , with a few exceptions like the aforementionedえい ending, don’t end in い. While they go before nouns just like い adjectives, the character な is placed between the adjective and the noun.

Kind teacher 親切な先生しんせつなせんせい

Rude child 失礼な子供しつれいなこども

Safe town 安全な町あんぜんなまち

One thing that’s a little tricky is that い adjectives change to express negative or past tense. This is done by dropping the final い in the word and tacking on modifiers. For instance:

The word for cold is 寒い (さむい) but if you’re talking about yesterday being cold, you would say 寒かった (さむかった). If it’s not cold, you’d say 寒くない (さむくない).

な adjectives are modified exactly like nouns . For example:

The word 静か (しずか) means quiet. To say something was quiet, you’d say 静かだった (しずかだった), and to say it’s not quiet, you’d say 静かではない (しずかではない) or 静かじゃない (しずかじゃない).

Like verbs, these changeable adjectives are also agglutinating, which means you can add stuff to them.

Finally, questions are much easier to form in Japanese than in English. To ask a yes or no question, you simply tack on か at the end of the sentence.

Is he a nice person? 彼は優しい人ですか？かれはやさしいひとですか？

For what we’d call the “Wh- questions” in English, you simply substitute the question word in most cases:

What did you eat? 何を食べましたか？なにをたべましたか？

I ate octopus. タコを食べました。たこをたべました。

Where is he? 彼はどこにいますか？かれはどこにいますか？

He is at the house. 彼は家にいます。かれはいえにいます。

By now, you’ve probably noticed that the subject disappears from the sentence quite often. This is a particular quirk of the Japanese language where the subject is inferred whenever possible.

But there are hints that tell you what or who you’re talking about . It actually works the same way as pronouns in English. For example:

My father is a teacher. He teaches at the university. On weekends, he barbecues and drinks beer. He likes football but he doesn’t like baseball.

The way I see it, Japanese does the same thing but goes one step further— the subject disappears completely . In this next example, it’s inferred that the speaker is referring to himself:

私は先生です。英語を教えています。わたしはせんせいです。えいごをおしえています。 I am a teacher. Teach English.

Although technically the verb always comes at the end of a Japanese sentence, this isn’t always the case. Unlike in English, the sentence structure is very free.

In writing, you’d stick to the actual grammatical rules; in speaking people often break the rules and put parts of the sentence wherever they see fit.

For example, if you want to say, “I ate fried chicken,” the grammatically correct Japanese sentence would be:

私はフライドチキンを食べた。わたしはふらいどちきんをたべた。 I — fried chicken — ate

But in casual, everyday conversation , you can move the parts around and it’s no problem:

食べた、フライドチキン。たべた、ふらいどちきん。 Ate — fried chicken

フライドチキン食べた、私。ふらいどちきんたべた、わたし。 Fried chicken — ate — I

But each of the above utterances means the same thing. In English, it would be mighty strange if you said this.

For the purposes of learning basic Japanese sentence structure, however, stick to Subject-Object-Verb. That’s proper Japanese and you can learn the more casual forms of speech later.

A good way to remember the sentence structure is by exposing yourself to the language as much as you can.

For instance, you can use an immersive program like FluentU to watch authentic Japanese videos.

FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.

You can try FluentU for free for 2 weeks. Check out the website or download the iOS app or Android app.

P.S. Click here to take advantage of our current sale! (Expires at the end of this month.)

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With a bit of patience and practice , you’ll soon be on your way to speaking natural Japanese!

If you love learning Japanese with authentic materials, then I should also tell you more about FluentU .

FluentU naturally and gradually eases you into learning Japanese language and culture. You'll learn real Japanese as it's spoken in real life.

FluentU has a broad range of contemporary videos as you'll see below:

FluentU makes these native Japanese videos approachable through interactive transcripts. Tap on any word to look it up instantly.

All definitions have multiple examples, and they're written for Japanese learners like you. Tap to add words you'd like to review to a vocab list.

And FluentU has a learn mode which turns every video into a language learning lesson. You can always swipe left or right to see more examples.

The best part? FluentU keeps track of your vocabulary, and gives you extra practice with difficult words. It'll even remind you when it’s time to review what you’ve learned. You'll have a 100% personalized experience.

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The Ultimate Guide to Citing Japanese Sources Everything you need to know about properly giving credit in Japanese

September 4, 2015 • words written by Kristen Dexter • Art by Aya Francisco

Whether you're in high school, college, or grad school, you need to know how to cite your sources. Guides and styles litter the internet but the moment you have to cite something that isn't in English all of those sources of knowledge seem to dry up. That's where we come in! You're about to learn everything there is to know about citing Japanese sources and making your works cited/bibliography page with those sources. Let's get started.

What is a Colophon?

A colophon is something you're probably familiar with but never knew it had a name. It's that page at the beginning of a book that looks a little something like this:

citing japanese sources colophon example

It has all the information you need to write a citation, nicely organized into one easy to access place. Whether you're citing in MLA, Chicago, or APA, everything you need should be here. It has some extra info you don't need, like what font they used, but it's going to be your best friend regardless.

In Japanese this is called okudzuke 奥付（おくづけ） . These colophons are a little different from the ones your probably used to. They contain way more information than English language ones usually do. The terms they use can change simply for style purposes, and they are almost always at the back of the book (but sometimes they're at the front like English ones). This may sound daunting at first, but once you know what you're looking for it's actually quite simple!

Important Terms

Knowing what the colophon is will help, but not if you don't know what you're looking for. Here's what you need to have a complete citation:

Place of Publication
Date of Publication

That's all well and good, but if you don't know those terms in Japanese they aren't very helpful. Learn these words:

著 / 著者 – Author
発行所 / 出版社 – Publisher
出版 / 発行日 / 発行の年月日 – Date of Publication

The title should be pretty obvious, it's going to be on the cover and usually at the top of the colophon. The date is also pretty easy to find since it should be in roman numerals, but if you're using a super old, dusty book it might be written with the Japanese date. If you see something like 昭和６４ (Showa 64) that was 1989. But so was Heisei 1. Make sure to brush up on your Japanese calendar skills if you need to. Whenever you encounter these dates, change them over to the western calendar and use roman numerals.

If you'd like to know what the rest of the information you're looking at is, take a look at this vocabulary list:

発行者 – Publisher (Person)
発行人 – Publisher / Issuer (Person)
印刷者 – Printer
印刷所 – Printing Office / Press
編集 – Editor
組版所 – Typesetter

Edition Information:

初版 / 初版発行 – First Edition
〜版発行 – (number) Edition
第〜版発行 – (number) Issue / Edition
印行 – Reprinting

Less common nowadays:

本文製版 – Text Printing
印刷 – Printing
製本 /製本所- Book Making / Binding / Book Bindery
製版所 – Platemaking shop

Practice Makes Perfect

The best way to learn this kind of thing is with examples and practice. Here are a few colophons. Let's find the information we need to make a citation with some manga!

citing japanese sources terra formars colophon

Author: 貴家悠
Title: テラフォーマーズ
Publisher: 株式会社集英社
Place of Publication: 東京都

Author: 奥浩哉
Title: GANTZ -ガンツ-

That wasn't so bad, right? And they were very similar in style and used all the same terms. That's because, as you now know, they were both published by the same publishing company 株式会社集英社 which translates to Shueisha Publishing Co., Ltd. and is one of the biggest manga publishing companies in Japan.

Style and Consistency

Before we go over what to do with this information, you have to decide what style you're going to use. It doesn't really matter which one you pick, as long as you are consistent throughout your paper and works cited page. Some stylistic choices you get to make are:

MLA, Chicago, or APA
Japanese or English
Italics or No Italics

Your teacher/professor might choose that first one for you. Most of my professors preferred Chicago Style because of it's simple, straightforward citations. But you might have to follow a different one. Make sure you follow whatever those guidelines may be throughout your entire paper! You may never encounter APA (it's mainly used for psychology), so you should probably only focus on MLA and Chicago.

Using Japanese and/or English is the more fun and challenging decision you get to make. But if you provide both Japanese and English for one citation, you have to do it for all of them. That means translating non-translated titles and author names. If your professor doesn't speak Japanese you should probably provide English for their convenience. If your professor is Japanese and you're at a Japanese school you can stick with just Japanese. You can also choose to ditch the Japanese all together and only use English, but I wouldn't recommend it. Especially if you're using a Japanese-only source. Your professors might not like having to work harder to find what you're referencing.

Within your paper you'll need to decide whether you should or should not use italics when using romaji. If you're only using Japanese words in Japanese, you should not italicize them. Ever. Please don't, it's hard to read and looks terrible. But with romaji, it can be helpful for clarification reasons if you at least italicize Japanese words the first time you use them. Then you can leave them as is. Or you can choose to always italicize them. But never ever sometimes do and sometimes don't. If you're going to do one word one way, you need to treat the rest the same.

Works Cited

Your works cited/bibliography is where we put all this new knowledge to work. Once you pick your style, look up the guidelines, and put everything in the right place. This is where you make most of your stylistic choices. Are you using all Japanese, all English, or a mix? Choosing this before you start will make everything go much faster. And if you make your Works Cited before you write your paper, your in text citations will be more organized and easy to do.

After you decide what style you're going to use, you need to know a few important things about citing Japanese sources:

Last name always comes first in Japanese AND English
If you include English for one title you must include English for them all
Use macrons, or do not

When citing using Japanese you should always use Japanese name ordering. That means surname first and given name second. You might be thinking, but isn't that how all citations are done? Kind of. But you do not add a comma after the surname, like you would with an English language citation.

If you decide to provide English for a Japanese title, which can be pretty easy if it's been translated, you need to do it for all of them. This can be a pain if you realize you're using something that has never been translated or talked about in English. This means translating the title yourself. If you aren't comfortable with that, don't use any English at all. If you think that's fun and want some practice (or if your professor requires English and Japanese) give it a try!

Macrons are the long marks, or diacritical marks, you see over vowels to indicate that they are long (also called "heavy"). They let us know that you're saying よう and not よ.

They look like this: ā ī ū ē ō

You'll probably only see ū and ō, because they are the most common, but it is possible to see the others. If you decide to use them, you need to use them the whole time. That means you need to know your romaji well. The only exception for this is when a company or person has a specific stylized preference to their English name. If that's the case, like it is with Shueisha (technically Shuueisha or Shūeisha), then it's common to choose whatever their preference is to avoid misunderstandings.

Once you've figured all that out it's time to get citing! Below are citations in MLA, Chicago, and APA for the Terra Formars manga we cited above.

貴家悠. テラフォーマーズ. 東京都: 株式会社集英社, 2012. Print.

Sasuga Yuu 貴家悠. Terra Formars テラフォーマーズ. Tokyo 東京都: Shueisha Inc. 株式会社集英社, 2012. Print.

Sasuga Yuu. Terra Formars . Tokyo: Shueisha Inc., 2012. Print.

貴家悠. テラフォーマーズ. 東京都: 株式会社集英社, 2012.

Sasuga Yuu 貴家悠. Terra Formars テラフォーマーズ. Tokyo 東京都: Shueisha Inc. 株式会社集英社, 2012.

Sasuga Yuu. Terra Formars . Tokyo: Shueisha Inc., 2012.

貴家悠. (2012). テラフォーマーズ. 東京都: 株式会社集英社.

Sasuga Yuu 貴家悠 (2012). Terra Formars テラフォーマーズ. Tokyo 東京都: Shueisha Inc. 株式会社集英社.

Sasuga Yuu. (2012). Terra Formars . Tokyo: Shueisha Inc.

(If you decided that you wanted to use macrons, Sasuga Yuu's name would look like this: Sasuga Yū.)

In Text Citations

In text citations are formatted the same as your works cited/bibliography page! Sometimes they are very similar, but there are usually small differences.

MLA loves to be short and sweet. You put the author's last name and the page number(s) you are citing in parenthesis after the quote or piece of information.

The first character to die has her neck snapped by one of the creatures (Sasuga 30).

Sasuga kills the first character within minutes of introducing her (30).

Sasuga's first female character's neck went, "Crack" (30).

Chicago uses footnotes and endnotes. They're indicated with numbers either at the end of each page (footnotes) or at the end of the paper (endnotes). Once you've cited something once in text, you get to shorten the rest of the citations that use the same work from then on.

Sasuga Yuu 貴家悠. Terra Formars テラフォーマーズ. (Tokyo 東京都: Shueisha Inc. 株式会社集英社, 2012), 3-40. Sasuga, Terra Formars , 3-40. Make sure you remember to add page numbers when you cite in text.

APA loves footnotes too, but these are more about elaboration than citation of where you got the information from. You should be citing in text with quotations like MLA does. They also really like dates, which makes sense since this is mostly used for psychology.

The main character yelled, "Aki" (Sasuga, 2012, p. 45-46), exactly six times after she died.

Supplemental Practice Citing Japanese Sources

If you'd like to test what you've learned you can! Below are three pdfs that you can use for practice. Use them to make your own works cited page and compare it to the answer sheet!

Colophon Practice
Colophon Practice Answer Key
Works Cited/Bibliography Answer Key

Dec 15, 2022

How to Start Writing a Japanese Diary Today

Updated: Aug 26, 2023

A hand opening a diary written in Japanese

Konnichiy’all!

I hope your studying is going well! And if you took the JLPT a few weeks back, I hope you’ve had some nice time to rest and relax and maybe even actually enjoy Japanese again.

Today I’ve got another new study method to introduce. This one is geared towards practicing writing and expressing thoughts in Japanese. A lot of the time we get really caught up in studying all the vocabulary, grammar, and kanji that comes with Japanese, and everything just becomes example sentence after example sentence. We forget to make time to practice thinking for ourselves as well. So, one habit that I highly recommend everyone stacking into their study routine is…

A Japanese language diary!

Now, by diary I don’t mean that you need to write out all your deepest thoughts and feelings and spill your secrets in Japanese. I mean, you can do this. It would certainly be wonderful practice. But rather, I just mean keeping a journal or notebook where you write about your day in Japanese on a consistent basis .

A Simple Format for Your Japanese Diary

Language diary entries don't need to be anything special or lengthy. You can talk about where you went, who you saw, what you did or ate or watched or felt - anything is okay! Short and simple is absolutely fine. I recommend locking the habit down with just a couple sentences a day at first, rather than straining to write an essay each time.

The important part here is the word consistent . As always, our goal here is to build long term language habits that are easy, accessible, and meaningful. We don’t ever want studying to feel like too much of a chore.

Here’s the format that I used at first, and that I’ve also used with my students studying English:

Weather. Sentence 1. Sentence 2.

So, for example:

12月14日（水曜日）

天気は晴れです。今日は朝ごはんにたまごやきを食べました。おいしかったです。

(Tenki wa hare desu. Kyou ha asagohan ni tamagoyaki wo tabemashita. Oishikattadesu.)

(The weather is sunny. Today I ate rolled omelets for breakfast. They were delicious!)

It’s as simple as that. And it’s scalable to any level. When I was first starting out and didn’t know many kanji, vocabulary, or verb tenses, it may have looked like this:

てんきがいいです。きょうはたまごやきをたべました。おいしい！

(Tenki ga ii desu. Kyou ha tamagoyaki wo tabemashita. Oishii!)

(The weather is nice. Today I ate rolled omelets. Delicious!

And at a higher level, it will start to sound more natural:

最近天気が暖かくなってきました。今日の朝ご飯に彼女が卵焼きを作ってくれたんです。美味しくて最高でした♡

(Saikin tenki ga atatakaku natte kimashita. Kyou no asagohan ni kanojo ga tamagoyaki wo tsukutte kuretandesu. Oishikutesaikoudeshita.)

Naturally, as your Japanese knowledge and speed increases, your entries will probably increase in length. It’s exciting to be able to express more complex thoughts! However, even once you’ve started branching into longer entries, you can always come back to this weather + 2 sentences format to maintain the writing habit on a busy day, or when you’re not feeling very motivated. Just like how you can save your Duolingo streak with a single lesson, just a sentence or two means you didn’t miss your writing habit for the day.

6 tips to make the most of your Japanese diary:

1. write in polite japanese.

When I started writing my diary, the teacher who checked my entries had a rule that I had to write in polite language. That meant desu/masu form, all the time. I hated this rule. I wanted to practice casual Japanese too! I didn’t want to sound like a robot.

Oh my god, I am so grateful now. The fact is that no matter what your plans are with Japanese, you are going to need to use polite language a lot. For starters, any interactions that happen with staff at restaurants, izakaya, hotels, stores, etc., should happen in polite language. And yes, there is definitely a foreigner card for not using the correct level of politeness in your speech, but it can still be shocking and make someone come off as rude when that was never the intention. Even if you make Japanese friends or date Japanese people while living in Japan, you’ll start off using polite language with new people - just like you would at home.

Of course, I’m not saying you shouldn’t ever use or practice casual language. But whether you’re interested in traveling, studying, living, or working here, you should be able to speak politely first and foremost. Please don’t be the foreigner who speaks anime Japanese in Japan. In 99% of situations, it’s way more acceptable to speak too politely than it is to speak too casually here, especially if you’re young. So, I recommend practicing expressing your thoughts in polite Japanese, so that when it’s time to convey them to a Japanese person, you won’t accidentally let bad vibes slip off your tongue.

2. Find the frequency and entry length that works for you

I gave a weather + 2 sentences/day recommendation above, but the truth is that I’ve actually used a slightly different format for about two years now. I had Japanese lessons with a volunteer teacher twice a week when I was living in the Kansai region, and my diary was my homework. I work very well with deadlines, so having the twice a week deadline meant I built the habit of writing my diary twice a week. To make up for the lower frequency, I wrote slightly longer entries, about 5-7 sentences per entry. It was really easy to stack the habit of writing my diary entries at lunch before my lesson. So, find the frequency and length that will play to your strengths and fit easily into your schedule.

3. Choose your focus and format

If you want to learn to write Japanese, I definitely recommend a written diary in a notebook or journal. As you build your writing habit, the most important and commonly used kanji for you personally will become muscle memory. There’s a ton of benefit beyond just learning to write as well - your hand is connected to your mind, and you’ll remember the readings and meanings of kanji and words more clearly by writing them down yourself.

That being said, many people these days don’t bother learning to write Japanese . I do have to say, even living in Japan I barely ever need to write in Japanese. Though I can’t speak for working in an actual Japanese company, as far as daily life goes, just knowing how to read and type is definitely enough to get by these days. Japanese people themselves are also forgetting how to write a lot of more complex kanji as we shift to using more and more technology in our lives.

So, if you’d rather only focus on learning how to express your thoughts in Japanese, then a typed diary in a Google document might be the way to go. It’s way easier to access, and therefore do, since most of us have our phones all the time. The choice is up to you and your language learning goals!

4. Don’t write the same thing every day

This is probably common sense for someone learning a language because of internal motivation, but my Japanese students are very guilty of submitting a full week of English diaries that all say “The weather is sunny. Today I ate curry/stew/a hamburger/corn. It was delicious.” Now, they’re probably all really wonderful at saying that their lunch was great, but I’m not sure that the diary homework benefitted them much outside of that.

For best results, mix and match the vocabulary and grammar you know to express lots of different ideas and opinions. It’s more fun this way, and you’ll learn a lot of stuff along the way without having to open a textbook.

5. Read it back to yourself out loud to check for mistakes

This was something I didn’t do for a long time because I had a teacher reading it for me, but I wish I had been doing it all along. Oftentimes when we’re writing fast we forget words, make small mistakes, or throw out something awkward or incorrect, even in our mother tongues. Naturally, it’s going to happen in Japanese too, probably to a greater extent.

More often than you’d expect, you can sense when something’s off just by reading it over one more time. Speaking aloud also lets you know if it sounds off for some reason, such as strange wording or a grammar mistake. (Actually, I’d recommend this strategy for editing any English writing as well, to be honest!)

Beyond this, reading your entries back to yourself provides nice reading practice and review of any of the new words you’ve looked up and learned while writing, as well as rare speaking practice of more than a sentence at a time.

6. If you fall off the horse, just get back on

As with any habit, study or otherwise, sometimes life gets in the way of consistency. To be honest, when I moved and my daily routine changed so much, I stopped writing my diary for a time as well. But even if you miss a day or a week or a month or a year, what’s important with is just picking it up again and getting back on track. Don’t bite off more than you can chew, stick to the weather and 2-sentence structure for as long as you need to, and build (and rebuild) habits at your own pace. I promise the effort pays off over time.

Well, that’s it for your Japanese diary! As always, good luck with your studies and I hope you find this method to be useful!

If you enjoyed this post and don't want to miss the next ones, please make sure to hit the like button and use the box below to subscribe to Konnichiyall! Additionally, any social shares of this post will help so much to grow the community!

読でくれてありがとうございます！

P.S. I’m planning to put together a Japanese diary circle with weekly deadlines to help with motivation. Ideally, I’d like for it to be a space where we can share diary entries, questions, and support each other in the learning process. I’ll be polling soon about frequency and potential platforms to use on my Twitter , so please give me a follow and vote!

Want more Japanese Language Learning content? Here are some of my go-to study methods and tips for learning Japanese on your own!

Where to Start with Self-Studying Japanese: Habit Building

The Secret to Actually Speaking Japanese: Podcasts

How to Fail the JLPT in 5 Steps

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Resource Guide for Japanese Language Students: Essays

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Collection of Essays: 天声人語 = Vox Populi, Vox Deli (Bilingual)

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