Translator of Japanese words into transcription - romaji

There is an amazing amount of material available online for Japanese language learners. For those who have reached an advanced level, everything is clear: any blogs, books, articles are suitable for them. But what should beginners do, where can they look for texts to practice? Materials full of complex vocabulary and hieroglyphs are not suitable for them. In this article, we will share with you resources where you can find Japanese texts for beginners.

NHK Web Easy

NHK is a Japanese national broadcaster. In Japan, it owns several television channels and radio stations and is the customer of new programs and series. One of its channels, NHK WORLD-JAPAN, can even be watched in Russia if you have cable TV. True, it broadcasts in English, but it will definitely appeal to those who want to get to know Japanese culture better.

Why is NHK so useful for beginners learning Japanese? You can find news for beginners . From the name it’s clear - it’s called NHK Web Easy and is intended for Japanese language learners. Each story is taken from an actual article published on NHK's main website and adapted to suit students' needs. The vocabulary is simplified, complex hieroglyphs are removed, the readings of the rest are signed, which, by the way, can be disabled. A special button will direct you to the original article, which is posted on the main NHK news site. Another plus: all articles have an audio track, so you can practice your listening skills at the same time.

Writing

Today we will learn to distinguish hieroglyphs, katakana and hiragana from each other, then we will learn the features of rendering long vowels, and also talk about small letters.

Hiragana

Hiragana originated from the rapid writing of hieroglyphs, and therefore differs greatly from hieroglyphs and katakana in the smoothness of its elements. Here is a list of all hiragana characters:

• Home page ???るれゎわゐゑをん

As you can see, some symbols are repeated, differing either in a smaller size or in an additional symbol in the upper right corner.

Dakuten and Handakuten

There is a special symbol - ゛ (two small lines in the upper right corner). In Russia it is usually called 濁りnigori

(emphasis on
i
), although in Japan it is more commonly called 濁点
dakuten
.
This symbol means the voicing of a consonant in a syllable, i.e. for example, かka
with the nigori symbol turns into が
ga
, た
ta
into だ
da
, etc.

Another special character is ゜ (small circle in the upper right corner). It's called まるmaru

or sometimes 半濁り
hannigori
(in Japan - 半濁点
handakuten
).
This symbol is used in a slightly non-standard series on x
, in this series in syllables with nigori the sound “
x
” turns into “
b
”: (は
ha
→ば
ba
, ひ
hi
→び
bi
, etc.), and in syllables with maru - in “
p
”: (は
ha
→ぱ
pa
, ひ
hi
→ぴ
pi
, etc.).

Small letters

In native Japanese words, a variant of the small letter is actively used - small っtsu

.
This syllable in a reduced version means doubling the consonant sound coming after it, i.e. for example ぱpa
→っぱ
ppa
, さ
sa
→っさ
ssa
, etc. There are actually several other meanings of this symbol, but they are extremely rarely used, so they will be discussed later.

In addition, small ones

, ょ
ё
, ゅ
yu
are used to convey softened syllables, with the exception of syllables starting with
and
, to write for example the syllable
mya
you need to take the syllable み
mi
and add after it a small ゃ
ya
→ みゃ
mya
.
And for any other consonant, you need to take the same syllable ending in and
(no other way!), and add a small softening vowel.
The same thing happens with ょё
and ゅ
yu
.
But if we see a large softening letter after a syllable, for example みや, then this entry is already read as miya
.

In addition, reduced versions of letters are actively used to write foreign words, but such words are usually written in katakana. And small letters are sometimes used to convey features of speech and intonation; they can mean lengthening a vowel or raising the tone at the end. This notation is commonly used in manga and will be discussed in future lessons.

Lengthening the sound of a vowel

у is most often used to lengthen the sound of a vowel in Japanese.

, とう
to+y → then:
, すう
su+y → su:
, ゆう
yu+u → yu:
etc.
But sometimes doubling is indicated by repeating a vowel - おおо+о → о:,
but strangely enough, in some words such doublings do not turn into lengthening of the vowel, but two vowel sounds are read, for example 遠い
tooi
“distant” and 湖
mizuumi
“lake”. In traditional Cyrillic transcription it is not customary to show exceptions in any way, but we will try to mention non-standard reading of words.

Katakana

Katakana originated from the simplified writing of kanji hieroglyphs, that is, by throwing out some elements, therefore it differs from hieroglyphs in the small number of strokes (but there are also hieroglyphs with a small number of strokes, so it will be difficult to distinguish them from katakana at the initial stage) and differs from hiragana in the absence of smooth transitions.

• ? ?ンヴヵヶ

Since foreign words are usually written in katakana, the alphabet has a number of traditions for recording sounds that are not found in the Japanese language. For example the sounds l

transmitted near
p
.
Due to the fact that Japanese does not distinguish between softened sounds t
and
h
, for example, the sound
ti
in a foreign word will be written as ティ
te + small and → ti
, and
chi
as チ
ti
(in order not to confuse these syllables ティ we transcribe as
t' and
, a チ like
ti
).
It is worth saying that few Japanese can clearly distinguish ti
and
chi
, so both options are usually pronounced the same, and the difference in the recording is made to make it easier to restore the original word and is used only in recently borrowed words, still quite often in place
ti
is used チ
ti
.
Stress and long vowels in borrowed words in katakana are indicated by a line - ー, for example マーma:,
while Japanese words written in katakana are written in the same way as in hiragana to draw attention to them - by lengthening with ウ
у
. Nigori and maru are used in the same way as in hiragana.

Katakana also has a lot of different features for more accurately conveying foreign words; in the following lessons we will get acquainted with them and learn how to write foreign words in katakana.

Kanji

Let me remind you that kanji are Japanese characters, each individual character means an object or phenomenon, and is not just used to indicate sound. Each hieroglyph has several readings, which are used depending on the word. They can be distinguished from katakana and hiragana by the large number of elements in one character and the absence of smooth lines. Here is a list of 80 (46 - according to “Learning Japanese Hieroglyphs”, Neva, St. Petersburg, 94) initial hieroglyphs studied in the first grade of a Japanese school:

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In total, 1006 signs are studied per course at the school. For kanji, the hiragana reading in 6.5 pt font is often signed at the top - this writing option is called furigana. Sometimes kanji is replaced with hiragana: in principle, there are no strict rules for the use of kanji and, if desired, you can generally write the entire text in hiragana, but few people do this, since a large amount of hiragana in the text is a sign of illiteracy, and besides, it happens that different hieroglyphic spellings are written in hiragana the same way (except that the tonic stress changes during pronunciation) and they may simply not understand you.

Furigana:

(written in kanji

)

Text with and without kanji:

• S: 可愛い猫です 。
• Without: かわいいねこです。

(written by kawaii neko des

- this is a cute cat)

Since it is difficult to highlight individual words without hieroglyphs, spaces are often placed in it: かわいい ねこ です。 For example, this is how the text is written in old console games (Final Fantasy I), where it is impossible to use kanji for technical reasons (swelling of the character table, which is not necessary in principle ), or texts for children (for example, all Pokemon games).

Asahi Gakusei Shinbun

Most likely, many of you have heard about the Asahi newspaper - one of the oldest and largest Japanese newspapers. However, the publishing house publishes articles not only for adults, but also for children. Asahi Gakusei Shinbun is intended for elementary and middle school students, and beginners can consider this division as difficulty levels . By the way, the site does not use furigana (signature readings of hieroglyphs), so it is well suited for those who want to practice reading basic hieroglyphs.

EhonNavi

EhonNavi is an online store of children's picture books, but on its website it offers over 1,500 titles to read for free . The only catch is that you can only watch one book once at one sitting, and you won’t be able to return to the previous page.

On the main page of the site at the top there is a menu with the age of the child - from 0 to 12 years, which can be considered as difficulty levels. However, remember that for very young children the books are written in kana, without the use of hieroglyphs, and they can be quite difficult to read.

Some books on the site can only be purchased, some can be viewed partially (green button ためしよみ), and some can be read in full (yellow button 全ページ). Similar inscriptions will be on the page of each book under its cover. Full versions of publications are available only to registered users.

In a cafe, restaurant

Collected Tales of Fuku Musume

On this site, fairy tales are divided into categories: famous Japanese fairy tales, scary fairy tales, fairy tales from different parts of the world, and so on. There are quite a lot of them - from 400 to 500 stories, so it will last a long time. Some of them have a duplicate audio track . It can be used both for listening and for training pronunciation and reading speed, if you read a fairy tale together with a speaker.

Dates and times

Fantajikan

Previously, this was a whole website with stories in Japanese, but it was closed and only a channel on Youtube remained. Each video lasts approximately 1 to 2 minutes. They work like this: the announcer reads a fairy tale, and at this time the text and the accompanying picture appear on the screen. Even if you don’t understand something, the video sequence will make your task easier : from the illustrations you can intuitively guess what is happening in the fairy tale.

At the station

Watanoc

Watanoc is a digital magazine written in simple Japanese. The site itself, like any “real” news site, is divided into several categories: cuisine, events, culture, and so on. Each text has an English translation, and many potentially confusing words and grammar are explained. All site materials are divided according to the levels of Nihongo Noryoku Shiken (N5, N4, N3).

Japanese folk tales for children

As you can already understand, material intended primarily for children can be a good help for adults learning Japanese. The website above was created by Tom Ray. He translated traditional stories for his own needs, and then decided to open access to them to everyone. The page of each fairy tale consists of Japanese text and its translation into English in sentences or phrases. They are supplemented by a list of vocabulary grammatical structures found in the text . All fairy tales are very simple, with a minimum number of hieroglyphs - only the most basic ones appear.

How to find your level?

One way is to follow social media accounts that match your interests. On Twitter, for example, you can see an endless stream of short texts that sometimes act as recommendations for longer articles. When you don't know where to start, browsing social media like this can help you find Japanese websites that you'll want to read more often. Some users may use online slang that is too obscure, but there are accounts that use simple Japanese for students, such as @yasashiinews. The NHK News Web Easy website is also a good source of up-to-date news written in simpler language.

As for printed reading materials, they can be difficult and expensive to obtain outside of Japan, but for those living in the country there are a huge selection of options at a better price than materials aimed at foreign students - the only problem is to choose the one that suits your level. Different books are aimed at different grade levels in elementary school, and I used them as a rough guide early on. I've also found that paperback bunkobon books are better for teaching because they tend to have the pronunciation of the rarer kanji written next to them in kana (furigana), while tankobon, the hardcover books, usually don't have such notes.

Wasabi

This is a site created specifically for Japanese language learners. You can also find Japanese fairy tales there. All stories are divided into several parts and have audio attached. It has two reading speed modes - slow and fast, as well as the same two modes, but with pauses so that you can repeat out loud after the speaker . In addition, each fairy tale is accompanied by an English translation and a list of key vocabulary.

Emergencies

Nippon Talk

Nippon Talk publishes texts that are somewhat reminiscent of mini-essays in the format of their arguments. All readings of hieroglyphs are signed at the top, and, in addition, the author also publishes a translation into English. The site is also divided into categories, but only a subset of the texts are currently available, so it may not be suitable as a primary reading source.

Of course, there are much fewer materials for those who have just started learning Japanese than for those who continue to improve their skills. If you have access to Japanese bookstores, newbies can also try reading manga for children or in the casual genre. Watch series like よつばと！(Yotsuba), Dragonball, しろくまカフェ (Shirokuma Cafe), チーズスイートホーム (Chi's Sweet Home). Also, you shouldn’t pass by children’s literature, as we have already seen. The main thing is to find what you like. Good luck in learning the language!

texts in Japanese for beginners than for those continuing to study it. We have shared sites that publish Japanese texts for beginners.

Read what interests you

In this series, we looked at the three main systems for writing Japanese text, from hiragana and katakana to kanji.
To read Japanese, you need to learn them, but that's not all. You can memorize kanji and count the number of characters you have mastered, and learn all 2,000 joyo-kanji needed for basic literacy, but none of this automatically ensures the ability to read Japanese text fluently. Ultimately, there is no substitute for reading itself. To improve reading skills, at first short passages from language textbooks are sufficient, but over time it is time to move on to texts written for native speakers. With so much reading material available, it can be difficult to decide where to start. When choosing, you should consider one important factor - your motivation, that is, what will really make you read and want to learn more. Based on this, it is worth choosing the level of complexity of the text, since an overly complicated text can reduce interest, which will affect learning outcomes.

One effective way is to choose the same types of materials that you enjoy reading in your native language, be it news or other articles, comics, games, fiction or non-fiction. For example, on my own path to free reading, I spent a lot of time poring over the mysteries of novels by Keigo Higashino and Haruki Murakami. Since everyone's personal preferences are different, it's difficult to give specific advice that will suit everyone, but here are a few ideas for navigating the seas of available material.