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Hiragana usually spells long vowels with the addition of a second vowel kana for example, おかあさん ( o-ka-a-sa-n, "mother"). The sokuon also sometimes appears at the end of utterances, where it denotes a glottal stop, as in いてっ! (, "Ouch!"). However, it cannot be used to double an n – for this purpose, the singular n (ん) is added in front of the syllable, as in みんな ( minna, "all"). In Japanese this is an important distinction in pronunciation for example, compare さか, saka, "hill" with さっか, sakka, "author". Addition of the small y kana is called yōon.Ī small tsu っ, called a sokuon, indicates that the following consonant is geminated (doubled).
Minna no nihongo lesson 4 plus#
For example, き ( ki) plus ゃ (small ya) becomes きゃ ( kya). This changes the i vowel sound to a glide ( palatalization) to a, u or o. For example, は ( ha) becomes ぱ ( pa).Ī small version of the hiragana for ya, yu, or yo (ゃ, ゅ or ょ respectively) may be added to hiragana ending in i. Hiragana beginning with an h (or f) sound can also add a handakuten marker ( ゜) changing the h ( f) to a p. By adding a dakuten marker ( ゛), a voiceless consonant is turned into a voiced consonant: k→ g, ts/s→ z, t→ d, h→ b and ch/ sh→ j (also u→ v(u)). These basic characters can be modified in various ways. Wo ( を), pronounced, is common as a particle but otherwise extremely rare. Of the 50 theoretically possible combinations, yi, ye, and wu are obsolete, while wi ( ゐ), pronounced, and we ( ゑ), pronounced, are extremely rare in modern Japanese. These are conceived as a 5×10 grid ( gojūon, 五十音, "Fifty Sounds"), as illustrated in the adjacent table, read あ ( a), い ( i), う ( u), え ( e), お ( o), か ( ka), き ( ki), く ( ku), け ( ke), こ ( ko) and so forth (but si→ shi, ti→ chi, tu→ tsu, hu→ fu), with the singular consonant ん ( n) appended to the end.
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The word hiragana literally means "ordinary" or "simple" kana ("simple" originally as contrasted with kanji). Hiragana ( 平仮名, ひらがな, Japanese pronunciation: ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana, kanji and in some cases Latin script.