Japanese Words in English

At first, I was confused and frustrated that hiragana and katakana existed in Japanese writing. Why two ways of writing? Aesthetically, I preferred hiragana, with its loops, lines, and squiggles. Katakana was too angular, rigid, and disciplined to me. I felt katakana was a second-class writing system that wasn’t important to me. I was wrong. I realized I could often understand what was written in katakana, being used in many English loan words.

I can read Japanese!

オレンジ、バナナ、パイなプル、グレープフルーツ。Wow, orenji, banana, painapuru, gure-pufuru-tsu, I can read Japanese and understand what the words mean. The Japanese words for these fruits are similar to English to know their meaning. The same is true in the English language, Japanese words used in the English language don’t quite sound the same.

Japanese word. English pronunciation

Below are some Japanese words in the English language although, like loaned words in Japanese, native English speakers pronounce them differently. I’ve included the British pronunciation with phonetics to help show the difference. If you say the following words in Japanese to a native English speaker, they may not understand you!

If you are familiar with the Received Pronunciation Phonemes and their sounds, you will see British English pronunciation is different from the original Japanese word. Japanese and English languages possess sounds that are not in each others’ language therefore, sounds similar to the original are used instead.

The same but different

It isn’t to say you need perfect pronunciation to communicate in English but, please be mindful. Anime and アニメ have the same meaning but slightly different in pronunciation. Neither is wrong, just different in different languages.

【あなたの心が伝わるあなただけの英語】

英語でのコミュニケーションを、あなたらしい英語で。
一人一人のレベル、能力、興味に合った教材や方法を用いた英語レッスンプログラムを
オンラインで学べます。

”あなたの英語”でコミュニケートしたい方は、まずは無料カウンセリングをご予約ください。