History UsefulNotes / JapaneseRomanization

* ''Ha'', when used as the objective particle, is pronounced ''wa'' (which otherwise remains a different character), and Hepburn and Kunrei-shiki follow the pronunciation.

[[AC:Chi/Ti, Tsu/Tu, Shi/Si, Fu/Hu, Zu/Du/Dzu, Wo/O]]

''Wo'', which sounds like ''o'' and is used almost exclusively to denote the objective particle, is usually rendered as ''o'' in modern Hepburn and Kunrei-shiki.

''He'', when used as a directional particle, was rendered as ''ye'' in Old Hepburn (''ye'' was also how Old Hepburn romanized words beginning with ''e'' or the now-obsolete ''we''); Kunrei-shiki reduces it to ''e''.

The inflected ''tsu'', which sounds like ''zu'', deserves its own mention. Kunrei-shiki joins modern Hepburn in using the phonetic ''zu''. Nihon-shiki sticks with the same consonant for ''du''. Old Hepburn broke its phonetic scheme to use ''dzu'', which is where the "d" in "kudzu" comes from.

** "th" is turned into "s" when it's not voiced, like in the name "Smith" (su-mi-su). When it's voiced, the "s" is, too: "the" becomes "za" (although "z" is pronounced more like "dz" in most cases).

Note that some names were originally in Japanese but [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign meant to ''sound'' English]]. These names ''have'' no "real" translation, and can result in all kinds of arguments. A good example is the town called "ri-ze-n-bu-r" from ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'', which has been variously translated as Resembool, Risembul, Riesenburgh, and Liesenburgh.

''He'', when used as a directional particle, was rendered as ''ye'' in Old Hepburn; Kunrei-shiki reduces it to ''e''.

Similarly, there is such a thing as a "long consonant", which is usually written by a small "tsu" character before the syllable; this indicates that the consonant part of the syllable is held for longer. This is generally easier to deal with, as the English consonant is just doubled (e.g. "ka'''pp'''a"). It does get confusing when the character to be doubled is a "ch" or "sh" sound, though.

''Wo'', which sounds like ''o'' and is used almost exclusively to denote the objective particle, is often rendered as ''o'' in modern Hepburn.

** The "tee" sound doesn't exist in Japanese. It can also be written using "te-(small i)", but it's often replaced by "chi". So "steal" gets turned into "su-chi-ru".

The main exception to the spelling rule is a double "m" or "n", which is written by an additional "n" character rather than a "tsu". R and H cannot be doubled in Japanese, but H can be doubled in katakana to represent the German "ch" sound (e.g. Heinrich or Ludwig would be spelled he-i-n-ri-(small-tsu)-hi and ru-do-u(small i)-(small tsu)-hi).

[[AC:Chi/Ti, Tsu/Tu, Shi/Si, Fu/Hu, Zu/Du/Dzu]]

Note: There are a few cases where the doubled spelling for long "o" actually is "oo". Ooki (big), ooi (many) and ookami (wolf) are three such words. There are a few rare cases of "ee" as well.

Note that some names were originally in Japanese but [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign meant to ''sound'' English]]. These names ''have'' no "real" translation, and can result in all kinds of arguments. A good example is the town called "ri-ze-n-bu-r" from ''FullMetalAlchemist'', which has been variously translated as Resembool, Risembul, Riesenburgh, and Liesenburgh.

Note: There are a few cases where the doubled spelling for long "o" actually is "oo". Ooki (big) and ooi (many) are two such words. There are a few rare cases of "ee" as well.

** This is because "n" is assimilated so it's pronounced "m" before labials (i.e. "b", "p", and "m" in Japanese), so writing it "ko-mu-bo" is unnecessary. This assimilation also happens in other languages, whether the speakers are aware of it or not.

* The pair spelled the way they are in hiragana (ou): Toukyou. Again, in English this is a different sound, a dipthong as in the word "sound".

Looking at the kana tables, you may notice that there is no "ye" sound, but the unit of currency of Japan is the yen. This is a holdover from Meiji days where え(e) was romanized as "ye" (if spelled today, it would be "en"). This is usually limited to older things that want to keep it for old-time's sake, such as Yebisu Beer from the Ebisu district of Tokyo.

** The long "a" is used to stand in for all sorts of different English vowel sounds; together with the R/L collapse noted above, this is how "claw" is often mistranslated as "crow" and vice versa.

** the "tee" sound doesn't exist in Japanese. It can also be written using "te-(small i)", but it's often replaced by "chi". So "steal" gets turned into "su-chi-ru".

* There's also [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wapuro_romaji "word processor romanization"]] or "wāpuro" which is technically a workaround for inputting Japanese with a QUERTY keyboard but is also used for informal writing, especially on the web. It tends to ignore all the difficulties below and just give a direct transcription of the "standard" kana reading; as such, the spelling may not match the actual pronunciation of words.

* The lack of ending consonants. "n" is the only consonant that Japanese allows to end a syllable, although "r" is also simulated by a horizontal dash. For everything else, an existing syllable is used, meaning there is an ending vowel (usually "u") that has to get chopped off when romanizing.

** "th" is usually turned into "s".
*** Only when it's not voiced, like in the name "Smith" (su-mi-su). When it's voiced, the "s" is, too: "the" becomes "za" (although "z" is pronounced more like "dz" in most cases).

There are a few syllables that turn into combinations, like "ji-ya", "chi-yo", etc., with the second syllable written smaller. In Hepburn this is turned into "ja" and "cho", but you can also see "jya" or even "zya".

The inflected ''tsu'', which sounds like ''zu'', deserves its own mention. Kunrei-shiki joins modern Hepburn in using the phonetic ''zu''. Hihon-shiki sticks with the same consonant for ''du''. Old Hepburn broke its phonetic scheme to use ''dzu'', which is where the "d" in "kudzu" comes from.

[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Japanese Romanization]] is the way that Japanese text gets transliterated into the Roman alphabet. The romanized text is often referred to as "Rōmaji", from Roman alphabet + "ji" meaning "characters" (much the way "Kanji" literally means "Chinese characters"). The word Romanization can actually refer to using ''any'' Latin-based alphabet (French, German, Polish, ...) to write a words originally written with ''any'' non-Latin script, but in English-speaking fandom it almost universally refers to Japanese-to-English transliteration.

UsefulNotes/JapaneseRomanization has faced controversy over the ages due to its great difference from European languages, so there are many different ways of romanizing Japanese. There are a few systems of romanization of Japanese that are already in place. Most common are Hepburn romanization, Kunrei-shiki Rōmaji, and Nihon-shiki Rōmaji.

Hepburn romanization and its revised variants are the most widely used methods of transcription of Japanese. The Hepburn system is based on English phonology, so a native speaker of English with no knowledge of Japanese will most likely pronounce it correctly more often than if a different system were used. Some linguists dislike the Hepburn method, as it can make the origins of Japanese phonetic structures unclear, but those in favour of it say that the Hepburn systems isn't supposed to be used as a linguistic tool anyway.

Particles

* When he へ is used as a particle it is written e.
* When ha は is used as a particle it is written wa.
* When wo を is used as a particle it is written o.

Long vowels

* The long vowels o and u are indicated by a macron
* In words of Japanese or Chinese origin, the long vowel e is written ei.
* In words of Japanese or Chinese origin, the long vowel i is written ii.
* In words of foreign origin, all long vowels are indicated by macrons.

In modified Hepburn:
* All long vowels are indicated by doubling the vowel, e.g. long o is written oo.
* The combination ei is reserved for cases where the two vowels are pronounced as distinct sounds, e.g. in the word Supein (スペイン), meaning "Spain".

Syllabic n

In traditional Hepburn:
* Syllabic n (ん) is written as n before consonants, but as n' (with an apostrophe) before vowels and y. It is written as m before other labial consonants, i.e. b, m, and p.
Examples: annai 案内, kin'en 禁煙, gumma 群馬

In revised Hepburn:
* The rendering m before labial consonants is not used, being replaced with n. It is still written n' (with an apostrophe) before vowels and y.

In modified Hepburn:
* Syllabic n is always written as n with a macron (n̄), such as is used to indicate long vowels in traditional Hepburn, which makes the use of apostrophes unnecessary.
Examples: an̄nai 案内, kin̄en̄ 禁煙, gun̄ma 群馬

Double consonants

* Double ("geminate") consonants are marked by doubling the consonant following the sokuon, っ, except for sh→ssh, ch→tch, ts→tts.


Kunrei-shiki rōmaji (literally: Cabinet-ordered romanization system, romanized as "Kunrei-siki" in its own system) is based on the older Nihon-shiki system, and was modified for modern standard Japanese, essentially meaning words are romanized not as they appear, but how they sound in modern spoken Japanese.

In the kunrei-shiki system:

# When he (へ) is used as a particle it is written e not he.
# When ha (は) is used as a particle it is written wa not ha.
# When wo (を) is used as a particle it is written o not wo.
# Long vowels are indicated by a circumflex, for example long o is written ô.
# Syllabic n (ん) is written as n' before vowels and y but as n before consonants and as a word final.
# Geminate consonants are marked by doubling the consonant following the sokuon, っ, without exception.
# The first letter in a sentence, and all proper nouns, are capitalized.

A few of the hiragana (and their katakana counterparts) sounds have been changed. These are:
||align=center border=1 width=50%
||しゃ sha ||ちゃ cha||つ tsu||ふ fu||くゎ kwa ||
||し shi ||ち chi||づ du|| ||ぐゎ gwa||
||しゅ shu ||ちゅ chu|| || || ||
||しょ sho ||ちょ cho|| || || ||
||じゃ ja||ぢ di|| || || ||
||じ ji||ぢゃ dya|| || || ||
||じゅ ju||ぢゅ dyu|| || || ||
||じょ jo ||ぢょ dyo|| || || ||


Nihon-shiki or Nippon-shiki Rōmaji ("Japan-style"; romanized as Nihon-siki or Nippon-siki in its own system) is the most regular out of all the major romanization systems for Japanese, and has a one-to-one relation to the kana writing systems. The intention of this system was to completely replace kanji and kana with a romanized system, which was believed by its creator that it would make it easier for Japanese people to compete with Western countries. Since the system was intended for Japanese people to use to write their own language, and consequently is not supposed to be easier to pronounce for English speakers (and isn't for the most part).

The only between Nippon-shiki and the later Kunrei-shiki is that the kana are translated differently, "ch" sounds as "t", "sh" sounds as "s", "fu" to "hu", "j" sounds to "z", 'sho, shu, sha' to 'syo, syu, sya' and di/zi ぢ/じ, du/zu づ/ず, dya/zya ぢゃ/じゃ, dyu/zyu ぢゅ/じゅ, dyo/zyo ぢょ/じょ, wi/i ゐ/い ("wi" is no longer used), we/e ゑ/え ("we" is no longer used), kwa/ka くゎ/か, gwa/ga ぐゎ/が are not distinguished and are single characters with one pronunciation.


'''Here's the breakdown of Japanese romanization''': \\
First off, in the Japanese language, there is technically no "l" ''or'' "r" sound. It is half way between both, kind of like a partly rolled "r", but is closer to "r" than an "l", and should be romanized as such with natively Japanese words. Regarding loan words written in katakana, it is contextual on whether it is romanized as an "l" or "r".

Secondly, you may see elongated vowels as the vowel with a macron (looks like Ō), acute accent (looks like Ó) or circumflex (looks like Ô), as well as the vowel just being written out doubled (OO).

Vowel sounds can be elongated by other vowels: for あ(a), it is only elongated by another あ, but there are う(u) and お(o) for お, and　え(e) and　い(i) for え. But these have exceptions. You can't just add an "u" sound to the end of a long "o" whenever you like, there are times and places for these both, like you wouldn't romanize 大き (big) as ''ouki'', it is ''ooki'' (you may some times see ''ohki'', which is entirely interchangeable with ''ooki'') since the word large (大), when written in hiragana, is おお. The same thing goes for え. This is a complicated concept, and This Troper is probably not the best source for it.

However, [[http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/ Tae Kim has a good guide for Japanese grammar]].

In regard to romanizing compound characters, you add や、ゆ or よ on the end of ぴ, び, じ, ぎ, り, み, ひ, に, ち, し or き. This changes the sound on all of them to the consonant sound plus ''ya'', ''yu'' or ''yo'', respectively, with the exception of ち and し, which exclude the "y" sound from it, and are just ''cha, chu, cho, sha, shu, sho''. You may see しゃ, しゅ or しょ be romanized as ''sya'', ''syu'' or ''syo'', but that is generally incorrect, although it can be what the author intended based on context. Some small children in Japan pronounce the sounds in that fashion, so it could be the correct romanization, but it is still an incorrect pronunciation on the part of the person in question.

There are some words that have a small つ in them (called the sokuon), and its function is to elongate the following consonant sound, and is romanized accordingly. For example, だった is romanized as ''datta'' and pronounced like ''dat-ta''.

The easiest part is the circles and double-dashes you see over hiragana and katakana. The circles always change it to a "p" consonant sound, but the double lines change it to its voiced counterpart. t to d, h to b, s to z, k to g. The only exceptions being づ, ぢ and じ. Both じ and ぢ and pronounced as "ji" (and romanzied accordingly) and づ is pronounced as "zu" and can be romanized "zu" or "dzu".

Historical note: You may notice that there is no "ye" sound, but the unit of currency of Japan is the yen. This is a holdover from Meiji days where え(e) was romanized as "ye" (if spelled today, it would be "en"). This is usually limited to older things that want to keep it for old-time's sake, such as Yebisu Beer from the Ebisu district of Tokyo.
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