Learning Katakana

Katakana is sort of the more stylistic cousin of hiragana. The sounds are similar but there are two big differences in using Katakana in regard to Hiragana.

Katakana has different characters. For example the あ in hiragana is ア in katakana. Below there the standard Katakana-chart

Katakana is used only for specific words. Officially katakana is used for loanwords from other languages. For example the Japanese word for bread, パン (pan), is originally from Portugese and ビール (biru) is from the Dutch word for beer. Some more examples:

スーパー (suupaa) = Supermarket
キャンセル (kyanseru) = Cancellation
プロジェクト (purojekuto) = Project
スタイル (sutairu) = Style
カメラ (kamera) = Camera

The standard Katakana-chart looks like this

Pronunciation

Because the pronunciation of most katakana-words at least look like the loanwords they are derived from, it’s easy understanding their meaning. 

But that is not to say that it’s just a literal translation from English. Sometimes it can be a bit tricky reading what the katakana-word actually means because the pronunciation is a little different from the foreign words they are derived from.

For example, compare the word ‘television’ to the katakana equivalent  テレビ (terebi) or コンビニ (konbini) for a convenience store like 7-Eleven. Out of the blue you wouldn’t know what somebody was talking about right?  

Some katakana-words have even evolved into a somewhat other meaning making them even harder to understand. Take for example  アルバイト (arubaito) which means part-time job, derived from the German word arbeit.  ズボン (zubon) means trousers (or pants in American English) derived from the French word for underskirt and to make it stranger パンツ (pantsu) means shorts or underpants. Getting the two mixed will often cause laughter with Japanese natives. 

Other katakana-words are shortened or combinations of words like  テレビ and コンビニ. Other examples are: 

レジ = Cash register
フロント = Reception desk
デパート = Department store
イラスト = Illustration
メーク = Make-up

The Long Vowel

With hiragana to express a long vowel you add one. For example in the word for mother, おばあさん (obaasan) the ‘a’ coming from ba is extended by adding あ. This is important because it also changes the meaning. おばさん (obasan) without the extra ‘a’ means ‘aunt’. 

In katakana the creation of this long vowel is done by using a dash like ー. Sometimes people confuse this with the kanji-sign for ‘one’, but you can recognize it because it’s often combined with other katakana-characters. For example

You have seen

スーパー = Supermarket
ビール = Beer
デパート = Department store
メーク = Make-up

before, but other examples are

コーヒー = Coffee
バー = Bar
エレベータ = Elevator
ジュース  = Juice

Dakuten with Katakana

You probably noticed it in the examples above but just like with hiragana you can make other sounds with the standard katakana-characters by adding ” or a small dot. This is the chart for these sounds. 

And just like with hiragana you can make other sounds by combining katakana-characters. Look at the following chart for all kinds of combinations.