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Romaji (ローマ字 "Roman characters"), sometimes misspelled as Romanji, is a Japanese term for the Latin alphabet. Romaji are often used in Japanese text for abbreviations, metric measurements, and to clarify the spelling of foreign names.In English usage, romaji usually refers to the romanization of Japanese words that would usually be written in kanji or kana. Japanese may be written in romaji for many reasons: street signs for visiting foreigners; transcription of personal, company, or place names to be used in another language context; dictionaries and textbooks for learners of the language; or even simply for typographic emphasis.
There are a number of different romanization systems in use: the three main ones are Hepburn, Kunrei-shiki ( ISO 3602), and Nihon-shiki ( ISO 3602 Strict). Hepburn (long-vowel omitted) is the most widely used. Modified Hepburn, which uses a macron to indicate some long vowels and an apostrophe to note the separation of easily confused syllables (for example, the name じゅんいちろう is written with the syllables jun-ichi-ro and u, and is romanized as Jun'ichiro in Modified Hepburn) is widely used in Japan and among foreign students and academics.
1 Development of romaji
The earliest Japanese romanization system was based on the Portuguese language and its alphabet. It was developed around 1548 by a Japanese Catholic named Yajiro. Jesuit presses used the system in a series of printed Catholic books so that missionaries could preach and teach their converts without learning to read Japanese. In general, the early Portuguese system was similar to Nihon-shiki in its treatment of vowels. Some consonants were transliterated differently: for instance, the /k/ consonant was rendered as "c," and the /h/ consonant as "f," so Nihon no kotoba ("The language of Japan") was spelled "Nifon no cotoba."
Following the expulsion of Christians from Japan in the early 1600s, romaji fell out of use, and were only used sporadically in foreign texts until the mid-1800s, when Japan opened up again. The systems used today all developed in the latter half of the 19th centuryAlternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical ( 18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801- 1900. Events The Little Ice Age ended.
In the Meiji era, some Japanese scholars advocated abolishing the Japanese writing system entirely and using romaji in its stead. Several Japanese texts were published entirely in romaji during this period, but failed to catch on because of the large number of homonymHomonyms are words which have the same form (orthographic/phonetic) but unrelated meaning. If they only differ in one way, they are called homophones and homographs respectively. In derivation, homonym means "has the same name", homophone means "has the ss in Japanese, which are pronounced similarly but written in different characters. Later, in the early 20th century19th century 20th century 21st century more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901- 2000 in the sense of the Gre, some scholars devised syllabaryA syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. A symbol in a syllabary typically represents an optional consonant sound followed by a vowel sound. In a true syllabary there is no systematic graphic systems with characters derived from Latin: these were even less popular because they were not based on any historical use of the Latin alphabet.
2 Modern systems
- Hepburn generally follows English phonology and so gives the best indication to many Westerners of how a word is pronounced in Japanese. It was standardized as American National Standard System for the Romanization of Japanese (Modified Hepburn), but this status was abolished on October 6October 6 is the 279th day of the year (280th in Leap years). There are 86 days remaining. Events 105 BC Battle of Arausio: The Cimbri inflict a major defeat on the Roman army of Mallius Maximus 891 Formosus becomes Pope 1600 Jacopo Peri's Euridice the ea, 19941994 is a common year starting on Saturday, and was designated the International year of the Family''. Events January events January 1 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) goes into effect January 6 Nancy Kerrigan is clubbed on the right leg by an. Hepburn is the most common romanization system in use today, especially in the English-speaking world. Japanese school children now learn Hepburn when they first begin to learn the English alphabet in junior high school.
- Nihon-shiki is the oldest and least used of the three main systems. It follows Japanese phonology and the syllabary order very strictly and is hence one of the few systems of romanization that allows lossless mapping to and from kana. It has also been known as ISO 3602 Strict form.
- Kunrei-shiki is a slightly modified version of Nihon-shiki, which eliminates several relics of the differences between the kana syllabary and modern pronunciation. For example, if the words kana かな and tsukai つかい are combined, in kana the result is written かなづかい with a dakuten (voicing sign) ゛ atop to indicate that the tsu つ is now voiced. Kunrei-shiki (and Hepburn) ignore the underlying kana and represent the sounds as they are pronounced (kanazukai), but Nihon-shiki retains the difference and romanizes the word as kanadukai. Kunrei-shiki has been standardized by the Japanese Government and ISO ( ISO 3602). Kunrei-shiki used to be taught to all Japanese elementary school students.
