Writing a letter in Japanese is quite the epic topic. It’s sadly not as easy as writing something, stuffing it in an envelope, stamping it, and sending it. Japanese letters require you to think about certain formalities, set expressions, styles of writing, and even relationships between you and the person you’re writing to. It’s so complicated and convoluted that even Japanese people will buy books on the subject so that they can “read up on” and study the latest letter writing rules. Don’t feel bad if you feel lost.

The goal of this article is to help you to understand Japanese letters. It will take a little more research and studying to be able to write a letter in Japanese, but I think I’ll be covering the difficult part. After reading this article, I want you to understand things like the relationship between you and the person you’re writing to, the format of a Japanese letter (both vertical and horizontal), how to write the address on the envelope, as well as the concept of “set expressions.” This will give you the tools to write a letter, make things less confusing, and eventually get you to the point where you should be able to piece together a Japanese letter on your own (resources included in the last section of this article).

Let’s get straight into the first thing you must think about even before you pick up that pen and paper keyboard and monitor, relationships.

Relationships: AKA Who Are You Writing To?

In Japanese, hierarchy is much more important than in many other countries. You have the senpai-kohai relationship. Then you have teacher vs. student, boss vs. minion, older people vs. younger people, and the list goes on and on. On top of this, relationship statuses change when you’re asking for a request, but this (and many other things) will depend on how close you are to the other person. Relationships, your closeness, and where you stand in the hierarchy of said relationship dictate how you act and speak with that other person. Of course, this carries over to letters as well.

I am going to simplify it a bit for you though. In general, there’s going to be three types of letters. They are:

Informal: Friends, Senpai, People below you

Neutral: Teachers, Friends you are requesting something of, Superiors

Formal: People you don’t know, Superiors you are requesting something of

You may have noticed some patterns here. Informal relationships are people of a similar age, aka people who are on the same hierarchy level as you. Then, there’s neutral (which is really just regular-polite level) which has teachers and other superiors whom you have at least a moderately close relationship with, though friends that you are requesting something of get bumped up to this rung (because you have to be nice if you’re asking for something). Lastly, there’s formal, which includes people you don’t have a close relationship with (people you don’t know), as well as superiors that you’re asking something of. Asking something of someone automatically bumps them up to the next rung, as a rule of thumb.

Of course, as long as you stay in the Neutral or Formal levels, you’ll probably always be okay, so that’s what I’ll be sticking with in these articles as well. Informal is informal, and doesn’t really need to follow so many of the rules that I’ll be laying out here during this series.

The Materials

Now that you know who you’re writing to, it’s time to figure out what materials you need to use. I think a lot of this is just common sense, but just in case it isn’t, I’ve summarized and simplified a list provided by the (excellent) textbook, Writing Letters In Japanese.

• In general, white stationary without any pictures is most preferred.
• Business letters are usually written horizontally via a word processor.
• Personal letters to superiors should be written vertically on white stationary (hand written).
• For superiors, use a white envelope.
• Write in pen, using black or blue ink.
• Don’t write with pencils or markers.
• Postcards should only be used in informal occasions, or occasions in that call for postcards (like New Years).

Once you’ve figured out your materials (based on who you’re writing to), it’s time to learn how to use these materials. Sadly, not all of it is as simple as you might think. There are rules, Smokey!

Japanese Letter Formatting Rules

I will cover two types of letter: Vertical and Horizontal. This refers to how you’re writing your text. Does it go up to down or does it go right to left? Depending on which one you choose, there are a few differences you need to take note of.

Vertical Letters

These are the most personal. I suppose you’re putting a lot more work into this kind, because in general you’re writing them out by hand. Horizontal rule letters feel a little colder and less personal, though I think that’s changing. Usually, though, you can’t go wrong with a vertical letter, as it’s the standard style for letter writing in Japan.

As you can see there are various parts, and the positioning of each is important.

Opening: The opening word  consists of a set word, kind of like the word “Dear…” that goes at the beginning of English letters. In Japanese, this would be 拝啓 (はいけい) or 前略 (ぜんりゃく). These actually pair with the closing section, so be careful!

Set Expression #1: Right at the beginning of the letter there should be a set expression. This could be one of many predetermined topics or phrases, which are usually about weather, the season, health of the addressee, and so on and so forth. Certain topics will have certain opening set expressions as well, but we’ll go more into that later.

Content: This is where you actually write your letter and say the things you want to say. Notice how this is the only non-predetermined section out of so many? It’s weird.

Set Expression #2: After you finish saying what you want to say, it’s time for another set expression. This will usually be about the addressee’s health or good wishes for them.

Closing: This is like “sincerely…” in English letters. Unlike that, however, it is paired with the opening. 拝啓 goes with the closing greeting 敬具 (けいぐ). 前略 goes with the closing 草々 (そうそう). No mixing and matching.

Date: This is written a little lower than the text to its right. Use the Japanese numeral system for vertical letters.

Your Name: This is where you write your name. Put it down to the bottom of the column.

Addressee’s Name: This goes to the left of the date and your name, but higher than the date, and lower than all the text to the right.

PostScript (Optional): This is the P.S. portion of the letter. In Japanese, this is 追伸 (ついしん) or 二伸 (にしん), and is written to the left of the addressee’s name, lined up with the main text. This is a little informal, though, so don’t use it if you can help yourself.

As you can see, there’s a lot to consider even before you write any content. Luckily, horizontal letters are a lot simpler.

Horizontal Letters

Generally used in business sorts of situations, horizontal letters are mostly typed out and a lot simpler.

See? Much simpler.

Date: Goes in the top right. It’s written using Arabic numerals since it’s being written horizontally. １２月２５日, for example.

Addressee’s Name: This is where you put the name of the person you’re writing to. As with all letters, don’t forget their name honorific!

Set Expression #1: Here’s where the first set expression will go.

Content: This is where the content of your letter will go.

Set Expression #2: One more set expression for the addressee’s well being and health.

Your Name: This is where you sign your name, horizontally. Might be good to sign it with a pen instead of with the word processor, just to be a little more polite.

Horizontal letters are easier, but they can be considered rude if you send them in the wrong situations. Of course, email is a whole other thing (it’s all horizontal there), and I think it’s causing the mindset to shift a bit on this. Still, though, vertical is the default go-to for writing letters (especially by hand), so be sure learn about it even though this one is easier.

Envelopes And Addresses

The address system in Japan is quite different from America and much of the rest of the world. You’ll want to know about that before sending a letter, otherwise it may not get to the desired location (that being said, the Japanese postal system is baller). Once you know the address, though, there are some rules as to where you should be putting the mailing address, return address, and stamp.

Vertical Envelopes

This is the tall type envelope which you will often see in Japan. It’s good for vertically written letters, as you can crease your letter parallel to the lines you’re writing.

As you can see there are a few different things compared to the envelopes you might be used to. First off, you’ll want to put the postal code in boxes provided. Then, on the front of the envelope, you’ll want to put the address on the right side (written vertically) and the addressee’s name on the left, written in slightly bigger letters than the address to help differentiate. On the flap side of the envelope you should write the return address. Your name and address should go on the left side in the same format as the addressee’s name and address (though size isn’t going to matter as much), and your postal code should go in the boxes if they’re provided.

Horizontal Envelopes

With horizontal envelopes, there are a couple ways to do it.

1. You can turn the envelope sideways so it’s taller, and write the address in the same way you’d write it with a vertical envelope.
2. You can write things horizontally. Just like the vertical envelope, the addressee’s address goes on the front, with their address on top and their name written bigger below. If the boxes for the postal code are posted vertically, turn the envelope and write it in the direction they’re printed (horizontally). On the back of the envelope (flap side) you can put your address and name at the bottom.

A lot of the rules carry over from vertical envelopes, so this should be a little easier. So what about when you’re sending a letter to Japan?

Sending Letters To Japan From Overseas

When you are sending a letter to Japan from outside of Japan, you can write the address in romaji (though Japanese is preferred, if you can), and write it in the format that’s normally accepted in your country. Just be sure to write “JAPAN” at the bottom of the addressee’s address so they know to send it there!

Opening Set Expressions

This is perhaps the most difficult section of all when it comes to writing letters in Japanese. Luckily, these are set expressions, meaning you can just look them up, use them, and gone on with your life. The tricky part comes when you have to come up with some of your own (in certain specific situations), though we’re going to just ignore that for now.

The first set of set expressions is the one that comes before the start of your actual content. It generally has to do with weather, the season, or health of the addressee. There are expressions for each month, season, as well as different opening greetings for various inquisitions on the addressee’s health. Here are some examples, though there are many more set expressions worth knowing (or knowing where to find, which I’ll go over at the end).

January:

寒さひとしお身にしみる今日このごろ…
In this time of piercing cold…

新春とは申しながら、まだまだ寒さが続いておりますが…
While it is the New Year, the cold continues.

Spring:

春の日うららかな今日このごろ…
In this time of beautiful spring days…

日本はあたたかくなっているころでしょう…
I guess it must be getting warmer in Japan…

August:

厳しい残暑が続いておりますが…
The oppressive heat continues to linger…

December:

今年も押し迫りましたが…
This year is drawing to a close… (used after Dec 20)

Health Related:

いかがお過ごしていらしゃいますか？
How have you been?

私もおかげさまで元気にしております…
Fortunately I am doing well (thanks to your help)…

Writing A Reply To A Letter

お手紙ありがとうございました…
Thank you for your letter…

These set expressions are only a drop in the bucket. There are at least several set expressions for each month, season, and situation, and there are probably more out there. The thing about set expressions is you are expected to write with said set expressions, otherwise your letter isn’t going to come off as polite. While creativity is encouraged in Western letters, using some set expression rules is more important in Japanese, which makes things both harder and easier.

Closing Set Expressions

After your main content you have to go back into set expressions. There are fewer of these, but it’s still basically the same thing as the opening ones. Here are some examples:

Making A Request

どうかよろしくお願い致します。
Kindly look after this matter for me.

Give My regards

奥様に宜しくお願いします
Please give my regards to your wife.

Good Health

お寒さの折からお体をお大切に
Please take care of yourself since it’s cold.

Request A Reply

お返事を待ちしております
I look forward to your reply.

I think closing set expressions are a little simpler than the opening ones, but they’re all basically the same thing and you’ll see the same ones over and over a lot.

Where To Go From Here?

So as you can see, writing letters in Japanese is a big ordeal, though once you learn all the rules and do a little practice it’s not all that bad. In fact, it’s very set in stone, meaning that as long as you follow the rules you’ll be able to write a great letter in Japanese.

The next step, I think, is to take a look at examples. Writing letters in Japanese definitely takes an intermediate or advanced knowledge of the language, so if you possess said knowledge and want an English textbook, I’d recommend Writing Letters In Japanese. It contains plenty of example letters as well as lessons going over all of them to help you get your letter writing skills up to snuff. Alternatively, if you’re fairly advanced in Japanese, the Japanese website Midori-Japan’s 手紙の書き方 will do the trick. This site includes many example letters for many different and often specific situations as well as a list of set expressions that you can pull from. Basically, everything you need to template out a proper Japanese letter.

I hope this article and those sources help you to get started writing letters in Japanese! It’s a crazy letter writing world over there, but once you get your foot in the proverbial letter-writing door it become easier. I want to write more on this topic soon, including examples for plenty of different letter-writing situations, but we’ll see if it’s next week or a week in the future to come. Writing letters in Japanese is a huge topic, as I think everyone has come to understand so long as you’ve read to this point.

Sources:
Writing Letters In Japanese
About.Japanese.com
Japaneseteachers.net

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One of the best tools for learning Japanese to come up in recent history has been mnemonics. Using mnemonics can help you learn vocabulary and kanji faster, have more fun with studying, lose weight, and pay off your student debt (only some of these things are true).

It’s been more or less accepted in the field of educational psychology for decades that mnemonics help people learn a second language. Using mnemonics, you can learn vocabulary more quickly than through normal means.

But aside from all of the academic talk, learning with mnemonics usually feels a lot better too. Nobody likes memorizing things by rote, repeating them over and over and over until they finally stick. Using mnemonics is a process that makes a lot more sense and can actually be fun.

What Are Mnemonics?

Mnemonics are a different way of remembering things. It’s any kind of technique or trick you can use to better learn and remember something. You use something that you already know or can learn easily and connect it with something you don’t.

A mnemonic could be a word, a memory, a story, a picture, an acronym, a song, a dance, or anything else you can imagine. The important thing is that mnemonic is distinct, memorable, and strongly associated with whatever you’re trying to remember.

Confused? It’s a little complicated at first, but let me give an example to break it down a little bit.

A Colorful Mnemonic Example

Schools use mnemonics all the time to teach things like days of the week, the mathematical order of operations, or US states. If that doesn’t seem familiar, then try this technique that a lot of science teachers use.

There are seven basic colors in the rainbow, and they are:

• Red
• Orange
• Yellow
• Green
• Blue
• Indigo
• Violet

Lots of teachers turn this initially meaningless series of letters (ROYGBIV) into a name: “Roy G. Biv.”

Your pal Roy G. Biv

It might seem ridiculous at first, but for most people it’s a lot easier to remember the name of this made-up person than it is to remember the proper order of the colors of the rainbow. Once you have that name memorized, it’s easy to work backwards and figure out why his name is Roy G. Biv and what that all means.

Using Roy G. Biv as a mnemonic might seem gimmicky and silly, but over a decade after I first learned about it in school, I’m still able to easily remember the name and what it stands for. That’s the power of mnemonics.

Types of Mnemonics and Techniques

Aside from constructing colorful, fictional characters, mnemonics are used all the time to help people learn Japanese. There are a lot of different types of mnemonics and technicques used in learning Japanese, covering everything from kanji to days of the week. Here are some of the more common and/or effective mnemonics used in teaching and learning Japanese:

Keyword Mnemonics

Keyword mnemonics are probably the most common mnemonic used to learn Japanese. Here’s how a keyword mnemonic works: you have a word you want to learn. You take something similar to that word you want to learn, and make a link between the two using vivid, memorable imagery. Take this example from our ebook Hiragana42:

There are lots of things you can do to make keyword mnemonics more vivid and memorable: adding in different senses (i.e. smell, taste) into the mnemonic, or overdramaticizing or exaggerating the mnemonic (like imagining the “ひ” nose as a massive, pimply, covered in warts, etc.), for example. There’s a lot that falls under the keyword mnemonics umbrella.

Pictographs

One of the most basic types of mnemonics used for learning Japanese is pictographs, or imagining a picture in Japanese characters. It makes a lot of sense, considering that early kanji were more or less pictographs.

The most common examples are kanji like 月 and 日, which mean moon and sun respectively. It’s easy to imagine 月 as a crescent moon and 日 as a sun.

It can be very effective early on in learning Japanese, but pictographs get hard once characters get complicated.

Songs

Several of my Japanese teachers have used songs in their lesson plans, usually to teach series or patterns of words. For instance, when I was young I learned the order of the kana (あ、か、さ、etc.) through a song. In high school, my Japanese teacher taught us the days of the week in Japanese using the familiar song Frère Jacques, and another song for days of the month.

Movement

For learning directional or physical words, moving your body while learning certain words can be very helpful. Many Japanese teachers teach their students different directions (右、左、前、後ろ、上、下) while encouraging students to point in the directions while saying them. You might touch your hands while learning the Japanese word for hands (手)—stuff like that.

Japanese Learning Resources That Use Mnemonics

Nowadays, lots of different books, websites, and apps use mnemonics to teach Japanese. The most famous example is James Heisig’s book Remembering the Kanji, which pioneered using mnemonics to learn kanji.

Since Remembering the Kanji was released in the 70^s, there have been a lot of resources that have built on that initial concept. Other traditional textbooks, like Henshall’s A Guide to Remembering Japanese Characters have also used mnemonics to teach kanji.

More modern resources use menmonics a lot too. Tofugu uses them to teach hiragana in our ebook, Hiragana42 and to teach kanji on WaniKani and in lessons in TextFugu.

Besides all of the shameless self-promotion, other sites like Kanji Damage and Memrise also use mnemonics to teach kanji. Dr. Moku uses mnemonics to teach hiragana and katakana, and I’m sure I’m missing many other resources that incorporate mnemonics.

You don’t even necessarily need a textbook or a website to teach you mnemonics. Sometimes, the most memorable mnemonics are the ones that you create yourself. This can be especially helpful if you’re having trouble with a particular vocabulary word, phrase or kanji.

No one technique or resource will be able to teach you Japanese in its entirety, but if you’re serious about studying Japanese, then you should definitely have mnemonic resources in your arsenal. Take a look at any of the resources I mentioned above or at our list of Japanese resources and find which ones work for you the best.

Bonus Wallpapers/GIFs

Aya has once again provided us with some extra desktop backgrounds and animated GIFs. Enjoy!

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GIF (700×438)
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Instead of a regular post today, I wanted to post up a few things. To be fair, one of the sections of this post is about a ginormous guide that was originally going to be this post (but was too guide-y), so if you’re looking for your regular dose of Japanese content, just jump to the link in section one and have yourself a fine ol’ time.

How To Count Anything In Japanese (The Guide)

I wanted to write a guide on Japanese counters that was a little different than most guides out there. We already have a very basic Japanese counters guide up in the Guides Section, so obviously I didn’t want to just do that again. I think one of the problems with Japanese counters guides is that they don’t really contextualize things very well. Sure, 一匹 means “one small animal,” but… what is a “small animal?” What isn’t a “small animal”? What is sometimes a “small animal” but sometimes not a “small animal?”

The only way to figure that sort of things out is by experience, so I wanted to create a guide that would give you some of that experience by listing things that can be counted by various counters. In my Japanese counters guide, I list the counter, its reading, and its meaning. Then, below it, I wrote out a list of things that can be counted in that way. Read that list to understand and contextualize how the counter works. It’s not just a “small animal,” it’s a dog, a cat, a mosquito, a frog, a tortoise, etc.

Go To: How To Count Anything In Japanese

I hope you enjoy this guide and I hope it is helpful to you over the next couple of months / years of Japanese study. Don’t try to learn it all at once, but definitely use it as a reference to understand counters you’ve learned but don’t completely understand yet.

“Project Kuma”

Like I mentioned before, “Kuma” (it won’t be called Kuma, but this is like a super-secret code name) is a site that will have Japanese materials that intermediate / advanced level students of Japanese can use to use to study and bridge that gap between advanced and fluency. It will be flexible, allowing someone to use the materials to focus on things that they need the most help with. Most important of all, the materials will be more interesting than the standard Japanese language resources, hopefully making it more fun to learn.

My “minimum viable product” version of “Kuma” is nearly complete, which means I’m going to be sending out emails to Forever members on TextFugu soon. If there are enough unicorns in the air and if you collect and send to me all your tears, maybe the first invite will go out later this week. If there’s not enough magic, then the first part of next week is looking pretty good. It won’t be everything at once (because things will surely break), so if you are a Forever member on TextFugu and don’t get one right away, don’t fret too much. They’ll be rolling out to you soon. And yes, just like I said last time, TextFugu Forever members get “Kuma” Forever subscriptions on the house. So a big grizzly thumbs up to you.

After that I’ll open things up and have some kind of special Alpha pricing. Anyways, that’s the update on that.

Tofugu Summer Internship 2013

Recently we got all fancy and got ourselves an office. That means we can have real, live interns (not that they’re usually dead, I just mean in-person). This year we’ll be doing just that. We’ve mainly contacted Pacific Northwest area schools, but I know that there are a decent number of Washington and Oregon State Tofugu reader students out there who may or may not be interested in this position. If you are indeed one of those people, please pop on over to http://jobs.tofugu.com to learn more about the summer internship program that we’re offering.

Bonus Wallpapers!

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One of the things I’ve learned about learning a language over the years is that association in memory is a very (very) powerful tool. Memories are almost always learned best when you associate them with another already learned memory. So, if you can attach a new memory to an old one, then the effectiveness of your memorization will go up by quite a bit. This is why there are radicals and mnemonics in WaniKani… association is a very powerful tool.

That being said, there are other types of associations as well. You can connect two new memories together and learn them at the same time as a sort of “set.” If you do this, it becomes easier to memorize this group of things because they are connected to each other in some way. For example, take a look at these sets:

• Jack & Jill
• Dog & Cat
• Sun & Moon
• Mac & PC
• Good & Bad/Evil

The list, of course, goes on and on. Just going through this, there should be a couple of things you should have noticed. 1) These pairs go together. If you hear one side, the other side isn’t too far away in your brain. Maybe it came up automatically without you even trying. 2) A lot of these are opposites of each other, or antonyms. They pair because they are opposites, not because they are similar or the same. I think this association is easier than say “cool and cold.” “Hot and cold” is much easier to remember.

If you were to learn pairs like these, I don’t think it would necessarily be easier to learn “Jack & Jill” compared to just “Jack” or “Jill.” That being said, if you had to learn both “Jack” and “Jill” anyways, the existing association will make it so it’s not twice as difficult to learn (since there are twice as many items to learn, two instead of one). Instead, I’m guessing it’s about 1.5x as difficult to learn, which is a savings of 50%. Assuming this, learning items in pairs like this can be a powerful memory (and time-saving) tool.

Studying With Japanese Antonyms (Hantaigo & Taigigo)

Let’s try to put this idea into practice now. Talking about it is one thing, doing it is another. Depending on your level of Japanese, this will either be somewhat challenging or downright difficult. You’ll have to gauge all that on your own, though I think everyone can at least get something out of this.

Hantaigo and taigigo are the Japanese words for “antonym.” I’ll continue to use those terms going forward, so try to remember them. First thing you’ll want to do is go through this list. It’s fairly long, but I promise you these lists get way longer. I went through a couple thousand pairs and picked out the ones that were going to be more useful, and put them in the list below. That being said, there are much bigger lists out there, such as this one. If you’re finding this exercise way too easy, you should probably head on over to the bigger list (though this one is pretty big too, I think).

The first step is a painful one. Copy/Paste (or print out) this list somewhere where you can make highlights on it. Evernote would work well. Then, go through the list and highlight the words you know. Some of them will have only one side highlighted. Others will have both sides (nice, complete!). Still others will have nothing highlighted at all.

The next step will be to find the ones where both sides are highlighted. Good job! Then, find the ones with only one side highlighted. These are the ones you should focus on next. Put them into an Anki deck (or preferred flash card system) and learn them as a pair. Perhaps have one side with the Japanese + Reading + Meaning of one word, then the antonym Japanese + Reading + Meaning on the other. Remember, the point is to create associations. This group of words will be the most important and the easiest to learn. It is also the most effective part of this exercise.

After you’ve done that, it’s time to look at the ones you don’t know at all. Don’t worry about them. Come back to this list often to see what new words you’ve learned, then learn the other-side pair that will complete the set. This works best when you know one side already, not as well when you have to learn both sides of a pair at the same time.

Alright, have fun going through this list! I think you’ll know more than you think you know. If you’re having trouble reading things, use something like rikaichan/rikaikun to get the readings and meanings of things you don’t know.

あいうえお

会う (To Meet)　⇔　別れる (To Separate)
明るい (Light)　⇔　暗い (Dark)
悪 (Evil)　⇔　善 (Good)　… I’m going to stop translating here, good luck!
上げ　⇔　下げ
暑い　⇔　寒い
厚い　⇔　薄い
暖かい　⇔　寒い、冷たい
新しい　⇔　古い
あなた　⇔　私
甘い　⇔　辛い、苦い
余る　⇔　足りない
有る　⇔　無い
洗う　⇔　汚す
安心　⇔　心配、不安
安全　⇔　危険
安楽　⇔　苦労
いい　⇔　悪い
いいえ　⇔　はい
生かす　⇔　殺す
以下　⇔　以上
意外　⇔　当然
行き　⇔　帰り
生きる　⇔　死ぬ
医者　⇔　患者
忙しい　⇔　暇
以内　⇔　以外
入れる　⇔　出す
上　⇔　下
うるさい　⇔　しずか
氏　⇔　名
嘘　⇔　本当、拾
失う　⇔　得る
うまい　⇔　まずい
うまい　⇔　下手
憂い　⇔　喜び
嬉しい　⇔　悲しい
男　⇔　女
王子　⇔　王女
押す　⇔　引く
遅い　⇔　早い、速い
大人　⇔　子供
大きい　⇔　小さい
多い　⇔　少ない
重い　⇔　軽い
美味しい　⇔　まずい
音読み　⇔　訓読み

かきくけこ

開始　⇔　終了
借りる　⇔　貸す
可燃　⇔　不燃
簡単　⇔　複雑
北　⇔　南
義務　⇔　権利
休日　⇔　平日
昨日　⇔　明日
着る　⇔　脱ぐ
巨大　⇔　微小
嫌う　⇔　好む
黒　⇔　白
空車　⇔　実車
具体　⇔　中傷
下がる　⇔　上がる
苦しみ　⇔　楽しみ
軍人　⇔　文民
訓読み　⇔　音読み
現在　⇔　過去
現在　⇔　未来
現実　⇔　理想
個人　⇔　社会
困難　⇔　容易
子　⇔　親
混乱　⇔　整頓、秩序、統一

さしすせそ

最初　⇔　最後
最古　⇔　最新
最高　⇔　最低
最大　⇔　最下
最良　⇔　最悪
栄える　⇔　衰える
左右　⇔　前後
参加　⇔　不参加
私　⇔　公
事実　⇔　虚構
自然　⇔　人
質問　⇔　解答、回答
市内　⇔　市外
自動　⇔　他動
弱者　⇔　強者
自由　⇔　専制、束縛、籐製
集中　⇔　散漫、分散
収入　⇔　支出
出発　⇔　到着
女性　⇔　男性
信用　⇔　不振
深夜　⇔　白昼
好き　⇔　嫌い
鋭い　⇔　鈍い
すべすべ　⇔　ざらざら
正確　⇔　不正確
正義　⇔　不義
精神　⇔　肉体
絶望　⇔　希望
全体　⇔　部分
全部　⇔　一部
前回　⇔　次回
善良　⇔　不良
増　⇔　減
続行　⇔　中止
外側　⇔　内

たちつてと

大量　⇔　少量
他人　⇔　自分
立つ　⇔　座る
父　⇔　母
父親　⇔　母親
地下　⇔　地上
着席　⇔　起立
中古　⇔　新品
つかむ　⇔　離す
着く　⇔　発つ
付く　⇔　取れる
妻　⇔　夫
強い　⇔　弱い
手　⇔　足
天　⇔　地
出口　⇔　入り口
天国　⇔　地獄
天使　⇔　悪魔
伝統　⇔　確信
得　⇔　損
時々　⇔　度々
特別　⇔　普通
年上　⇔　年下
取る　⇔　捨てる

なにぬねの

内　⇔　外
中　⇔　外
名前　⇔　苗字
苦手　⇔　得て、得意
入学　⇔　卒業
入金　⇔　出金
入社　⇔　退社
抜く　⇔　刺す
脱ぐ　⇔　着る、履く、被る
濡れる　⇔　乾く
濃　⇔　淡
登る　⇔　沈む

はひふへほ

入る　⇔　出
働く　⇔　怠ける
恥じる　⇔　誇る
外れ　⇔　当たり
東　⇔　西
引く　⇔　足す
光　⇔　影、闇
低い　⇔　高い
否決　⇔　可決
必要　⇔　不要
広い　⇔　狭い
皮肉　⇔　世辞
否定　⇔　肯定
美徳　⇔　悪徳
開く　⇔　閉じる
非力　⇔　強力
増える　⇔　減る
部下　⇔　上司
深い　⇔　浅い
不可能　⇔　可能
プロ　⇔　アマ
不足　⇔　充足
不利　⇔　有利
別人　⇔　同人
別々　⇔　一緒
変人　⇔　常人
便利　⇔　不便

まみむめも

前　⇔　後ろ
マイナス　⇔　プラス
マクロ　⇔　ミクロ
負け　⇔　勝ち
真面目　⇔　不真面目
まだ　⇔　もう
真っ黒　⇔　真っ白
真っ赤　⇔　真っ青
学ぶ　⇔　教える
迷う　⇔　悟る
丸　⇔　角
◯　⇔　×
未　⇔　既
見合い結婚　⇔　恋愛結婚
見上げる　⇔　見下ろす
見失う　⇔　見つける
右　⇔　左
南　⇔　北
右手　⇔　左手
短い　⇔　長い
未成年　⇔　青年
昔　⇔　今
無知　⇔　博識
無理　⇔　道理
無料　⇔　有料
息子　⇔　娘
明　⇔　暗
明確　⇔　曖昧
明色　⇔　暗色
メンタル　⇔　フィジカル
設ける　⇔　廃する
申し込む　⇔　受け付ける
目的　⇔　手段
モダン　⇔　クラシック
戻る　⇔　行く

やゆよ

山　⇔　谷、野、海
八重　⇔　一重
安い　⇔　高い
訳文　⇔　原文
約束　⇔　解約
安物　⇔　上物
勇敢　⇔　臆病
有形　⇔　無形
友好　⇔　敵対
有税　⇔　無税
有徳　⇔　不徳
有毒　⇔　無毒
有名　⇔　無名
有力　⇔　無力
夜　⇔　昼
洋語　⇔　和語
夜中　⇔　日中
理性　⇔　感情
利息　⇔　元金
良妻　⇔　悪妻
両手　⇔　片手
良友　⇔　悪友
良質　⇔　悪質

らりるれろわ

留守　⇔　在宅
冷凍　⇔　解答
連続　⇔　断続、単発
朗報　⇔　悲報
ロー　⇔　ハイ
老爺　⇔　老婆
ロング　⇔　ショート
Y軸　⇔　X軸
和語　⇔　漢語
若人　⇔　老人
和式　⇔　様式
和室　⇔　洋室
和書　⇔　洋書
和食　⇔　洋食
和風　⇔　洋風
和服　⇔　洋服
和本　⇔　洋本
ワイフ　⇔　ハズバンド
笑う　⇔　泣く
悪い　⇔　良い
我　⇔　彼
ワースト　⇔　ベスト

More That You Can Learn From Japanese Antonyms

When you go through these, there are a couple of patterns that become really apparent. There are some obvious ones, like how when you see a 不 or 無, it’s likely to mean the opposite of whatever comes after the 不 or 無. Then there are other kanji that act in a similar way as well, like how 悪 will refer to bad things, and oftentimes the counterpart will be 良 or 善, though the kanji that comes after will remain the same. Studying in opposites will help you to discover patterns like these, and these patterns will help you to make associations, which will help you to learn vocabulary more easily and effectively over the long term.

Studying these hantaigo/taigigo also give you some insight as to what actually are opposites in Japanese. For example, the opposite of “Japan” (or 和, there’s a whole crazy history on how this kanji came to represent Japan, if you’re interested) is 洋, which represents “the West.” That being said, occasionally the opposite of 和 will be 漢, which represents China. It’s interesting to see what words use what antonym kanji, depending on the word.

You’ll also find that you will begin to learn opposite kanji. While the above are words or things you stick onto words, the more you look at vocab this way the more you’ll notice that kanji will have common counterparts as well. Even if you don’t know a word all the way, when you see the 有 kanji, you’ll know that you “have” something, and the opposite is probably going be 無, where you don’t have something. This list goes on and on, and the only way to understand it is to experience a lot of vocabulary. The more you know, the easier things will get.

And, of course, beyond the patterns there is a lot more to learn as well. If a useful word has an antonym, it will surely be useful too, even if it’s not as useful as its counterpart. Dogs can’t go without cats, and boys can’t go without girls. Just imagine if you learned only half of those at a time. How much easier would it be if you learned those pairs together? At least 1.5x easier, I’d say.

As I mentioned before, there are plenty of Japanese resources on hantaigo and taigigo. Here are some of the ones I looked at in order to put this list together:

• Hantaigo Jiten
• Hantaigo Database

Be sure to go beyond the list I provided, as it is just me going through thousands of hantaigo and picking out the ones that seemed useful. The list provided here is a start, but the rabbit hole does go much, much deeper should you wish it to do so.

If you study kanji for long enough you’ll begin to see patterns emerge. At first, they won’t make too much sense and you’ll think it’s pure luck. You’ll make a couple of connections and say “Hey! Nice! This made it easier to remember this kanji. Lucky me.” Then, you’ll go about your life as if everything was as it seems. What if I told you that you could have learned the readings of these kanji more quickly had you realized from teh start that these readings weren’t just a coincidence? Did you know that there are actually radicals that are designed to show you the reading of a particular kanji?

Not all kanji has this reading compound, however. Apparently 67% of the joyo kanji have this phonetic compound radical inside of them, though that doesn’t mean they’re always helpful to you, it just means one of these radicals exists there. Let’s first take a closer look at how you can find these “phonetic compounds.”

The Anatomy Of A Kanji

A standard kanji is made of a couple of parts (and sometimes some garbage). The left side / top is usually the “classifier radical.” This is the radical that you can use to look up the kanji in a kanji dictionary. Sometimes it may even give a hint to the meaning of a kanji, though this is pretty hit or miss (mostly miss). The right side is usually what’s known as the “phonetic compound.” This portion has a specific reading attached to it. If you see this phonetic compound, you can sometimes guess the reading of the kanji. Sometimes by learning one phonetic compound’s reading you can know how to read six or seven other kanji that contain it.

Now there are exceptions… tons of them, unfortunately.

First of all, sometimes the phonetic compound is on the left side, and not the right. This happens when the classifier radical is one of those classifier radicals that normally gets put on the right side. Anyways, you’ll have to watch out for these.

Secondly, not all kanji have a phonetic compound inside of them. Like I mentioned earlier, only 67% of them have it, and they’re not particularly useful. Of the ones that do have a phonetic compound, around 25% have readings that aren’t consistent and are irregular. Even the ones that are fairly consistent with their readings have exceptions. Basically, this technique is at best a way to guess the reading of a kanji and nothing more. Still, something is better than nothing. Just imagine if you’re taking the JLPT and you’re on the kanji section. This sort of thing will help you get a few extra answers correct.

Phonetic Compounds And Their Kanji

To find the phonetic compounds, I sat down with a kanji dictionary going through all the possible readings in the back index. After spending about a half hour going through these one by one, I realized that someone else has probably done all the work for me. Thank goodness, someone had. Luckily for me, a Hiroko Townsend of San Diego State University put in a lot of work into her thesis, listing these out for everyone to enjoy. Thanks Hiroko! You’re a boss.

Here are the radicals that contain fairly consistent phonetic compounds. There are some exceptions (not listed below), but in general they’re pretty straightforward. If you learn the phonetic radical / kanji in the left side column then you know the readings for all the kanji to its right. For some kanji that’s only slightly useful. For others, you learn the readings of a lot of kanji.

几 (き) → 机, 肌, 飢
亡 (ぼう) → 忙, 忘, 盲, 荒, 望, 妄
干 (かん) → 汗, 肝, 奸, 刊, 岸
己 (き) → 起, 記, 紀, 忌
工 (こう) → 紅, 空, 虹, 江, 攻, 功, 肛,
及 (きゅう) → 吸, 級, 扱
士 (し) → 仕, 志, 誌
方 (ほう, ぼう) → 肪, 坊, 紡, 防, 妨, 房, 謗, 傍, 芳, 訪, 放
中 (ちゅう) → 忠, 沖, 仲, 虫, 狆
化 (か) → 花, 貸, 靴
反 (はん) → 版, 板, 坂, 飯, 販, 叛
分 (ふん) → 粉, 紛, 雰
半 (はん) → 伴, 絆, 拌, 判
白 (はく) → 伯, 拍, 泊, 迫, 舶, 狛, 柏, 箔, 珀
皮 (ひ) → 彼, 被, 疲, 被, 披
付 (ふ) → 府, 符, 附, 俯
包 (ほう) → 抱, 泡, 胞, 砲, 飽, 咆
可 (か) → 河, 何, 荷, 苛, 呵, 歌
古 (こ) → 居, 固, 故, 枯, 個, 湖, 箇, 沽, 姑, 苦
生 (せい) → 姓, 性, 星, 牲, 惺
正 (せい) → 征, 政, 症, 整, 性, 牲
司 (し) → 伺, 詞, 嗣, 飼
且 (そ) → 粗, 祖, 狙, 阻, 組
旦 (たん) → 但, 胆, 疸, 担
令 (れい) → 冷, 鈴, 零, 領, 齢, 鈴
立 (りゅう) → 竜, 滝, 粒, 笠, 龍
申 (しん) → 神, 伸, 呻, 押, 紳
召 (しょう) → 招, 沼, 昭, 紹, 詔, 照
安 (あん) → 案, 按, 鞍, 鮟
同 (どう) → 洞, 胴, 桐, 恫, 銅, 洞, 筒
寺 (じ) → 侍, 持, 時, 塒, 峙
旬 (じゅん) → 洵, 殉, 恂
各 (かく) → 格, 喀, 閣, 額
圭 (けい) → 掛, 桂, 畦, 珪, 罫, 鮭, 硅
糸 (けい) → 系, 係, 繋
結 (けつ) → 潔
光 (こう) → 恍
交 (こう) → 校, 絞, 狡, 較, 郊, 効, 咬
共 (きょう, こう) → 供, 恭, 洪, 哄
次 (し)  → 姿, 諮, 資
成 (せい) → 盛, 誠, 筬, 城
朱 (しゅ) → 株, 珠, 殊, 蛛
我 (が) → 峨, 蛾, 餓, 俄, 鵞
甫 (ほ) → 浦, 捕, 哺, 匍, 補, 蒲, 輔, 舗
見 (けん) → 硯, 蜆, 現
辰 (しん) → 唇, 振, 賑, 震, 娠
肖 (しょう) → 宵, 消, 硝
弟 (てい) → 第, 剃. 涕
廷 (てい) → 庭, 挺, 艇
良 (りょう) → 郎, 浪, 朗, 狼, 廊
直 (ちょく, しょく) → 植, 埴, 殖, 稙
長 (ちょう) → 張, 帳, 脹
非 (ひ) → 悲, 緋, 誹, 鯡, 琲, 扉
朋 (ほう) → 崩, 棚, 硼
果 (か) → 課, 菓, 踝, 顆
官 (かん) → 棺, 管, 館
奇 (き) → 崎, 埼, 椅
其 (き) → 期, 欺, 棋, 基, 旗
金 (きん) → 欽, 錦, 銀
采 (さい) → 彩, 菜, 採
青 (せい) → 清, 靖, 精, 晴, 請, 情, 鯖, 静
昔 (しゃく) → 借, 惜, 錯
尚 (しょう) → 常, 裳, 掌
昌 (しょう) → 娼, 唱, 菖, 晶
禺 (ぐう) → 遇, 寓, 隅, 偶
扁 (へん) → 編, 偏, 篇, 蝙
則 (そく) → 側, 測, 惻
相 (そう) → 想, 箱, 霜
湘 (しょう) → 廂
莫 (ばく) → 摸, 膜, 漠, 博, 縛, 幕
高 (こう) → 縞, 稿, 藁,
曹 (そう) → 遭, 槽, 糟
曽 (そう) → 贈, 僧, 憎, 増
童 (どう) → 撞, 憧, 瞳
義 (ぎ) → 儀, 議, 犠, 蟻, 艤

Uses a radical from obsolete Japanese
孝* (こう) → 孝,  老, 考
径** (けい) → 径,  経, 軽, 怪, 茎
乍 (さく) → 作, 昨, 窄, 酢, 搾
低** (てい) → 低,  底, 抵, 邸, 抵
券* (けん) → 券,  巻, 圏, 拳
根**  (こん) → 根,  痕, 恨, 懇, 墾
退 (たい) → 腿
峡** (きょう) → 峡,  狭, 挟
浅** (せん) → 浅,  銭, 践
珍** (しん) → 診,  疹, 参
峰** (ほう) → 峰,  逢, 縫, 蜂, 蓬,
俊** (しゅん) → 俊, 峻, 悛, 逡, 竣, 浚
通** (つう) → 通, 桶, 痛
険** (けん) → 険, 験, 検
過 (か) → 渦,  堝, 鍋, 蝸, 窩, 禍
福** (ふく) → 福,  副, 複, 幅, 富, 蝠
滴** (てき) → 滴, 適,  敵
壁* (へき) → 壁, 癖
燥* (そう) → 燥,  操, 藻
* remove the bottom radical component
** remove the left side radical component

That right there is approximately 100 kanji/radicals that, if you learn the reading of them, you can guess the reading of around 500 total kanji. That’s around 1/4 of the joyo kanji list. Not a bad shortcut! I think one issue is that a lot of people don’t know that this little trick exists. Just by knowing that you can do this, you’ll begin to notice these patterns showing up in your own kanji learning. This will help to accelerate your kanji learning by a considerable amount in the long run.

So, if you’re studying kanji, go through this list and start making the connections. What phonetic compounds do you already know? Now, see what other kanji there are to the right that you know. See how it all sort of makes sense? Kanji isn’t as insane as people tend to think, though it’s still super complicated no matter how you look at it. You’ll spend a lot of time learning the kanji (even if you’re using, say, WaniKani), but things like this will win you some extra time.

Good luck studying that kanji thing!

–

Sources:
Phonetic Components In Japanese Characters
Decoding Kanji

For the last month I’ve been working hard on advanced materials for TextFugu. During that time, some changes have happened in my mind, and one way or another (I’ll explain in a second), it came to be that instead of an advanced section for TextFugu, we’ll be putting out an entirely separate resource. If all goes well, you’ll be able to lay your sweaty fingers all over it within the month, possibly sooner if you’re a member of TextFugu already.

I also wanted to announce this new (yet unnamed) product early because I wanted some help from any of you intermediate to advanced Japanese learners out there. More on that at the end of the post, but I was hoping you could tell me a bit about how you study your Japanese in certain situations.

Before we do that, though, here’s a little bit about the resource. We’ll call it “Kuma” because, well, I have no idea, but there are several bear pictures in the prototype version.

Intermediate / Advanced: Materials will be stories and articles in Japanese. Each will include an audio recording by the native Japanese speaker who wrote it as well as an English translation.

Variety: One thing that I thought was really important was that there was a large variety of authors writing the stories/articles. Right now there are about 25 different authors and well over 100 articles/stories, and I’m hoping for that number to grow for both of those things over time. As you become more advanced, it becomes more important to learn using different types of people. Men, women, younger, older, different viewpoints on life, different dialects… All these things are Japanese, and if you don’t hear and study with all of them, you’re only learning one type of Japanese. I want to cover many types of Japanese for you.

Flexibility & Simplicity: The goal of “Kuma” is to provide the materials. What you do with said materials is up to you. The more advanced you are at Japanese, the better you should be at knowing how you study best. I want to provide materials that allow you to study the things you need to study most. Need listening practice? Grab the audio and put it on your phone to listen to. Need reading practice? Go for it. Need to practice speaking? Why not try language shadowing? By keeping things simple, you have the flexibility to do what you want. TextFugu is more about hand-holding, “Kuma” is more about letting you do what you please.

It Is A Paid Service: Before you ask, yes, it is a paid service. Heavy discounts for early adopters. I haven’t decided on the final price point, but it will be similar to TextFugu when at full price. Probably will be a discount for TextFugu users, kind of like how WaniKani has a discount for TextFugu users.

Current TextFugu Members Get It Free: If you’re a Forever member of TextFugu before “Kuma” goes live, you’ll be getting a Forever account of “Kuma” as well. Obviously “Kuma” was supposed to be part of TextFugu before it grew into the monster size that it is, so it’s only fair that you guys get it for free as well. Monthly members at TextFugu will also be getting some free time on “Kuma” as well.

Bears: It will probably have bears. Bears are pretty cool.

I was really surprised to get as much of a response as I did from native Japanese speakers interested in making materials for advanced learners to study with. I was hoping to find one or two people. I ended up with around twenty-five. The amount of materials is still blowing me away, and it has caused this to become a very large project, much bigger than I thought it would be.

Right now I’m at the stage where I’m trying to create a template that will work for all or most of the materials, and this is where you come in (I hope!). Say you are given some Japanese text, the audio that goes with it, and an English translation… what do you do? How do you study with it? Let me know in the comments below for one hundred fugu points, redeemable for good karma at your local Buddha Bank.

Oh, and as for when you can use it… well, it will go something like this in terms of priority:

1. TextFugu Members
2. Wanikani Premium Members
3. Tofugu Newsletter Subscribers

So, if anything, be sure you’re subscribed to the newsletter so good things will happen to you. I’m hoping for the first invites to be sent out within a month. Don’t forget to tell me how you’d study with these materials in the comments below. It will help me to design a better lesson template!

I almost gave up on Japanese once.

When I first started self-studying Japanese, I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of stuff there was to learn. I can even remember that panicky feeling like it was yesterday: in one hand I had the CD sleeve for MARS, Gackt’s sophomore album, in the other I had a dictionary – and I was stuck on the line 「何も言わないで」 because at the time I couldn’t even make the connection between the dictionary form 言う and its conjugated form 言わない.

Once I recovered from the fact that Oh my god I don’t even know how to look things up in the dictionary, I realized I had to change tack. I needed very specific, actionable techniques that I could start using straight away – and more importantly, they had to be effective.

These techniques have served me really well – and I hope they’ll work for you too!

Keep It Short and Sweet – But Not Too Short

I once had a lecturer that said the best programmers were so focused that they could sit in front of a computer until their bladders exploded. Er… yeah, that’s not me. When it comes to learning Japanese, my attention span is more around the 45-minute mark, and yours might be similar.

I’ve mentioned before that time is precious, and I’m sticking to my guns. By keeping your study sessions short, you get more bang for your buck: you’ll learn the most while you’re focused. Studying past the point where your mind starts to wander is just a waste of time. Simple, right? Of course, you must focus only on Japanese during a study session – that means checking Facebook is out.

The only tricky part about this technique is figuring out how long your study sessions should be. Suppose you’re in the middle of a blog post when the phone rings, and by the time you hang up you’ve lost your train of thought. It takes a few minutes of mentally retracing your steps before you recall what it was you were going to write. Humans are, basically, very bad at context-switching – making sure your study session is long enough gives your brain a chance to shift its focus to Japanese.

Take Time to Think About It

One problem I had with self-studying Japanese was that it was too easy to trick myself into thinking that I knew more than I actually did. There’s a lot that you can figure out just with context, after all. I’ll show you what I mean; have a look at this for example:

Even if you don’t know any Japanese, you could probably tell it’s an ad for a job placement agency. If you know some Japanese and recognize just the word バイト, you could safely assume that agency specializes in part-time job placements. That was sort of how I got by, but I found it really hard when it came to speaking and writing in Japanese myself – and no surprise, since I didn’t really know how to form sentences properly.

To understand how Japanese is put together, I’ve found it quite useful to pause and just think about why something is the way it is. This is really helpful when coming across new grammar, and can be a good way to solidify something you picked up in class with a “real” example. Using that same ad again as an example:

タウンワーク!タウンワーク!
バイトが君に見つけてもらう時を待っているよ。

That last sentence is pretty interesting grammar-wise:

• there’s よ, your garden-variety sentence-ending particle
• the ている indicates an enduring state – waiting, in this case
• the entire バイトが君に見つけてもらう verb clause modifies the noun 時 just like an adjective would

… and so on. This might just seem too much to take on, especially if you’re just starting out. The idea is not to analyze everything down to the last detail – just pick one or two things to mull over. Besides, as your Japanese improves, there’ll be less things you need to figure out.

Input/Output

As I implied previously, Japanese fluency relies just as much on output skills like speaking and writing, as it does on input skills like reading and listening. (This of course depends on what your goals are: if you just want to be able to read raw manga, clearly “fluency” for you means focusing more on input rather than output.)

Improving your speaking skills can be as simple as talking to yourself in the shower. Japanese sounds, most notoriously ら and ふ, can be very different from English sounds, and something you learn only by doing. Besides, like the Fugu Lord says, you’re making use of time that would normally be wasted anyway, so there’s really no excuse not to try this.

Another way of improving your Japanese output skills is to practice with someone who has native Japanese fluency. Lang-8 is really good for improving your writing, for example, and sites like Mixxer can help pair you up with a Japanese language partner. If you live in a university town, finding a Japanese international student to be a conversation partner can be as simple as leaving a note on a community notice board.

There are definitely resources out there, you just have to sign up for them.

Do Repeat Yourself

I believe learning Japanese isn’t just about what you learn when you’re actively studying, but how much you can retain. But memory is a funny thing. You might not remember what you had for dinner yesterday, but a whiff of vanilla can send you back to when you were five, helping your mother make a batch of cookies. What is it that makes something stick?

Well, if I needed a smack across the face each time I needed to remember something, I don’t think I’d have any teeth left in my head! A much less painful way is simple repetition – and I think we can all agree that repetition is absolutely necessary to be any good at anything, be it Japanese, piano, tennis… you get the idea.

Short study sessions really help with this one: you literally have more time available for more study sessions, and since you didn’t study to the point of boredom previously, the next session won’t feel like such a chore. Also, in between those study sessions, your brain gets a chance to go over what you’ve just learned and turn it into long-term memories.

Besides having regular schedule of short study sessions, I’ve also found it handy to use some form of spaced repetition system. This works really well for those hard-to-remember kanji, or kanji look-alikes, and there’s no reason why you can’t make flashcards with grammar points. As for which SRS system to use: there’s Wanikani, of course, but also other options out there; just pick one that works for you.

So, short of moving to Japan to immerse yourself in the language and culture, what other techniques have you used in your journey to Japanese fluency? Which techniques worked best for you? Which didn’t? Share them with us in the comments!