difference between hiranga and kanji

[appleraja]

hey i was just wondering, is japan more dominated in hiranaga or kanji?
is it like u can write the same words in hiranaga as in kanji but they look different?
example 一　いち　the first one is kanji of one the second one is hirgana of the word "one"

[Louise3]

Well there's an awful lot more kanji than hiragana, so it's kanji generally.
Hiragana is rather like an alphabet, and kanji actual words; but they mix together.

[mandolin]

Kanji makes reading the Japanese easier eventually. Because they rarely use spaces, if ever, it helps you parse your sentences. Kanji are used for major things like nouns, adjectives, and verbs. Hiragana is used mostly for word endings, particles, and auxilliary words (like 'kara').

Don't worry too much about the technicalities of it just yet, I just listed these to illustrate how it will eventually benefit you to know kanji.

Ganbatte!

[appleraja]

一(that is one in kanji right?) 　いち　(one in hiranga right?)
when i type in hiranga it automatically translates to kanji it change the hirgana to the kanji
can u tell me if the hiranga is correct

[Louise3]

Edit: Sorry, read the kanji as a hyphen, ehehe.
Yeah, the first is kanji and the second hiragana for one.

[appleraja]

ic thanks, so i should prob use the kanji form of one more?
heres an off topic question too, i saw a good page on this website about number system and i lost it does anyone kno where it is?

[Harisenbon]

I wouldn't say that Japanese is necessarily dominated by one or the other. They're both needed. There are some words that are not or can not be written only in Kanji (like verbs and adjectives), so you have to have a mix. Also, the feeling of a word changes depending on how it is written.

Tomodachi - romaji
ともだち - hiragana
トモダチ - katakana
友達 - kanji

all have different feelings and nuances to them for a native Japanese speaker.

[deathelysium]

appleraja wrote:
heres an off topic question too, i saw a good page on this website about number system and i lost it does anyone kno where it is?

do you mean this: http://www.thejapanesepage.com/grammar/6.htm#6?

[appleraja]

hmm kinda but it looked a lil differnt i thik like by clay , it had like a chart of chinese and japanese together from 1-10 numbers

ah i found it
http://thejapanesepage.com/readarticle. ... icle_id=12

[colind]

Harisenbon wrote:
Also, the feeling of a word changes depending on how it is written.

Tomodachi - romaji
ともだち - hiragana
トモダチ - katakana
友達 - kanji

all have different feelings and nuances to them for a native Japanese speaker.

Harisenbon, I am aware of the difference, but I have no idea what the difference is.
By any chance could you explain the slight differences in nuance or give a web site that does. I'm really interested about this

[Harisenbon]

I unfortuately haven't found any hard fast rules or explanations. And the way I feel about them is probably different from how a Japanese person feels, so I won't try to explain. : ( Sorry.

Now that I think about it, I had a book that had one or two examples but I can't find it now. If I find it, I'll post.

[colind]

thanks for your response, hehe i'll have to ask a japanese friend hey... no worries!

[appleraja]

hey, when writing kanji or hiranga, do u put spaces between words?

[Supergrunch]

Japanese uses no spaces, other than dots between katakana words to indicate Western spaces.

[mandolin]

if they write in all kana, they will use spaces between words.

My pen-pal still writes to me in mostly kana, with a couple kanji that I've told him I know, and he includes spaces. Problem with that is any given person will put spaces in different places than another. Like some people will put "Watashiwa" all together or as "Watashi wa". Doesn't really matter, but just don't rely on spaces in general.