Help with hiragana

[Meolox]

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[Alan]

Your examples look good to me. I started learning hiragana at the same time I started learning spoken japanese. Reading and writing are the hardest parts of the language, so it's best to make an early start.

A few more (assuming I don't make any embarrassing typos)

おはようございます = ohayou gozaimasu
こんにちは = konnichi wa (Note that wa is represented by hiragana 'ha' in this case)
こんばんは = konban wa (Sometimes written as 'komban wa' in romaji)

[Tom]

My class started by having us memorize the hiragana alphabet. There is not a single instance of romaji in either of my textbooks. I think that this was probably a good choice on their part considering what it's done to my romaji skill.

Reading romaji on the Internet, and having to type it in order to get Japanese characters on the computer, was actually rather difficult to get used to. I still can't read romaji as fluently as hiragana, which is saying a lot because I'm still very slow at reading any other Japanese! The meaning also escapes me entirely unless I imagine what the words look like in Japanese script.

This is clearly a deficiency, but it means that all of my studying materials, including the stuff I make for myself, is in one of the three scripts. On the computer, Kanji is nearly as easy to enter as hiragana and katakana, so I wind up using a lot more of that as well. I think this helps with the immersion aspect of learning Japanese and gives me a lot more advanced practice than I would get falling back (or even thinking in) romaji.

[Meolox]

My class started by having us memorize the hiragana alphabet. There is not a single instance of romaji in either of my textbooks. I think that this was probably a good choice on their part considering what it's done to my romaji skill.

Reading romaji on the Internet, and having to type it in order to get Japanese characters on the computer, was actually rather difficult to get used to. I still can't read romaji as fluently as hiragana, which is saying a lot because I'm still very slow at reading any other Japanese! The meaning also escapes me entirely unless I imagine what the words look like in Japanese script.

This is clearly a deficiency, but it means that all of my studying materials, including the stuff I make for myself, is in one of the three scripts. On the computer, Kanji is nearly as easy to enter as hiragana and katakana, so I wind up using a lot more of that as well. I think this helps with the immersion aspect of learning Japanese and gives me a lot more advanced practice than I would get falling back (or even thinking in) romaji.

You read hiragana easier than Romaji
It will take me a while before i can read hiragana without a conversion table with me.

One more thing, is hiragana the most commonly used script for writing in japan or should i divert my attention to learning another.

[Belton]

One more thing, is hiragana the most commonly used script for writing in japan or should i divert my attention to learning another.

Stick with learning hiragana, then katakana, (then take a huge breath and face kanji.)

Kanji is what you need to read Japanese. I'd say that katakana is the next most common in terms of menus and signage. But for study it's best to start with hiragana.

But it's good to learn kana as early as possible I think. It does actually help with your ability to speak and listen I think. And if you can take notes as quickly in kana as you write English I think it'd be of major benefit. (for speed I still need to revert to romaji at times, or an odd mix that works only for me to read!)

Don't worry about kanji until you have a reasonable speaking level. I think it might just overwhelm you. But when you do learn some use them when writing.
(there is a school of thought that you can learn the english meanings of all the Daily Use Kanji using the Heisig method before learning to speak Japanese. It's an interesting idea but probably a years work. I've yet to find anyone who approached it this way. )

[Meolox]

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[Belton]

I think this is an excellent book for learning kana

Self Study Kana Workbook
Publisher: Jp Trading Inc
ISBN: 4883191583
http://www.amazon.com/Self-Study-Kana-W ... 883191583/

what I said on my site-->
http://www.shiawase.co.uk/reading/index ... 3170341031

Japanese for Busy People is a pretty good series. They've just redesigned the books and they now come with an audio CD.
I'd recommend getting the kana version.
http://www.amazon.com/Japanese-Busy-Peo ... 770030096/
There's also a new workbook. (I haven't seen yet) If it's more like the workbook for volume 2 it's well worth it. I think most of the previous workbook was incorporated into the new edition of the textbook.

[Javizy]

I can read hana slowly, and write it pretty easily after doing it a month or so. I'd put off learning katakana until you're familiar with hiragana because they're both constructed in the same way. You'll find katakana will only take a few days to learn if you're comfortable with hiragana.

I learnt hiragana by writing out the whole chart while saying the sounds out loud, then writing out words I'd learnt from JPod Beginner lessons and checking them in the PDFs (the vocab lists have the kanji, kana, romaji, and English in a nice little table). I read the hana transcripts as well to help my recognition. I recommend you at least sign up for a basic account if you haven't already to access the PDFs.

As for Kanji, it's probably best to put it off until you've memorised all the kana, otherwise you might be pushing your memory a bit. I've been working through Heisig's Remember the Kanji book since Sunday and can remember 122 so far. The purpose of the book is to help you remember how to recognise a kanji by a keyword, and how to write it correctly, this will make learning the readings/other meanings easier later on. I'd highly recommend it because I was making no progress with other methods.

Btw, I find the Beginner lessons a lot easier to grasp than the Survival Phrases ones. I can't really take it in if I don't understand the verb conjugations and other grammar; memorising set phrases is useful if you're planning to go to Japan soon, but if you really want to build your language skills I'd focus on the Beginner ones for now.

[Meolox]

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[Javizy]

Hana refers collectively to katakana and hiragana.

Foreign names, places, and words in general are written in Katakana. Think of it as "Japanised" English. Like I said, it works the same as Hiragana, so there are symbols for a, i, u, e, o, ka, ki, ku, etc. The one difference (that I know of) is that enlongated vowels are denoted with a ー.

As for names, you can have yours how you want really, whatever sound you're comfortable with, my guess would be:

デーリク　(notice the ー instead of エ)
Dee-ri-ku　
でえりく in hiragana if that helps.

EDIT: Katakana also allows foreign sounds such as je ( ジェ), che (チェ), fa (ファ), etc, to be represented with "little vowels".

[Belton]

Is "hana" short for hirigana?

It's kana. It means hiragana and katakana usually. (hana is a flower, or nose! w)

You also see it in the words; furigana, the writing over kanji explaining it; and okurigana, the endings to kanji needed in Japanese (as distinct from how Chinese use the characters).

Also, is there any way i could write my name "Derek" in hiragana or would Romaji be more appropriate for foreign names?

There are threads about this somewhere here if you do a search.
basically one of the uses of katakana is writing foreign words.
so Derek would become デリク or デレク I think.

[Meolox]

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[Jason]

You read hiragana easier than Romaji

Believe it or not, a point will come when you can read kanji faster than kana.

[annie]

You read hiragana easier than Romaji

Believe it or not, a point will come when you can read kanji faster than kana.

It's the same with English though, we don't read individual letters, instead we read the word.

I also read kanji a lot faster than kana.
And I'm hopeless with romaji.

Today's word was kariforunia.

[GoddessCarlie]

You read hiragana easier than Romaji

Believe it or not, a point will come when you can read kanji faster than kana.

It's the same with English though, we don't read individual letters, instead we read the word.

Ah yes, I'm begining to find with words like　こんにちは that I'm not reading every individual symbol like I do for everything else, but actually reading the word (and then I get worried and read every individual symbol to make sure I was right). It feels good though, like I'm slowly progressing. I've just started learning Kanji. (And, as a student in English lit as well as Japanese, well, I love reading and it is exciting to think that one day I will be able to read Japanese and not sit there for half an hour sounding out every syllable. )