Transcription of the Japanese language in Esperanto

Last updated

This article explains the transcription of the Japanese language in the Esperanto alphabet. Esperantists often use non-Esperanto transcriptions, such as Hepburn and Kunrei. However, the need for a transcription in the Esperanto alphabet is essential for non-Japanese speaking Esperantists to be able to pronounce words.

Contents

Summary

There are two well-known transcription systems of Japanese in Latin alphabet: Hepburn and Kunrei. However, there is no official Esperanto transcription for Japanese. This page presents one of the unofficial methods of transcription.

Transcription

Most books on Esperanto published in Japan provide tables for transcription. In 2012, a book by Kenichi Fujimaki, called Marugoto-esuperanto-bunpō-kaichōban まるごとエスペラント文法 改訂版 (lit. Revised Esperanto Grammar). [1] explains one way of transcription, however, as far as 1923, Yoshimi Ishiguro writes his Shotō esuperanto kyōkasho 初等エスペラント教科書 (lit. Beginning Esperanto Textbook), [2] explaining a transcription, however the remaining digital copies of his works are barely readable, so they are not included in this article.

Double consonant

The symbol "" / "" (small "" [tsu]) is not actually transcribed, but instead, indicated by doubling the following consonant. Example: Sapporo (さっぽろ).

According to Hepburn:

According to Kunrei:

Long vowels

These are various methods of transcribing the word とうきょう (Tokyo)

Diphthongs

The Japanese vowel i is changed to j and the vowel u is changed to ŭ for Esperanto transcription.

Consonants

If there is a じ (ji) before an ん (n) in a word, you must write it as ĝi. Otherwise, you can use either ĵi or ĝi.

When the syllable / is used at the beginning of a word, it is mostly transcribed as dzu, directly from Hepburn; but if the syllable is anywhere else in the word, it is mostly transcribed as zu.

Voiceless vowels

Generally, some vowels may not be said at all. This is very common in everyday speech in Japanese [3]

あ ア aい イ iう ウ uえ エ eお オ oや ヤ jaユ ゆ juよ ヨ jo
か カ kaき キ kiく ク kuけ ケ keこ コ koきゃ キャ kjaきゅ キュ kjuきょ キョ kjo
さ サ saし シ ŝiす ス suせ セ seそ ソ soしゃ シャ ŝaしゅ シュ ŝuしょ ショ ŝo
た タ taち チ ĉiつ ツ cuて テ teと ト toちゃ チャ ĉaちゅ チュ ĉuちょ チョ ĉo
な ナ naに ニ niぬ ヌ nuね ネ neの ノ noにゃ ニャ njaにゅ ニュ njuにょ ニョ njo
は ハ haひ ヒ hiふ フ fuへ ヘ heほ ホ hoひゃ ヒャ hjaひゅ ヒュ hjuひょ ヒョ hjo
ま マ maみ ミ miむ ム muめ メ meも モ moみゃ ミャ mjaみゅ ミュ mjuみょ ミョ mjo
ら ラ raり リ riる ル ruれ レ reろ ロ roりゃ リャ rjaりゅ リュ rjuりょ リョ rjo
わ ワ ŭaゐ ヰ ŭiゑ ヱ ŭeを ヲ ŭo
ん ン n
が ガ gaぎ ギ giぐ グ guげ ゲ geご ゴ goぎゃ ギャ gjaぎゅ ギュ gjuぎょ ギョ gjo
ざ ザ zaじ ジ ĝi / ĵiず ズ zu / dzuぜ ゼ zeぞ ゾ zoじゃ ジャ ĝa / ĵaじゅ ジュ ĝu / ĵuじょ ジョ ĝo / ĵo
だ ダ daぢ ヂ (ĝi) / (ĵi)づ ヅ (zu) / (dzu)で デ deど ド doぢゃ ヂャ (ĝa) / (ĵa)ぢゅ ヂュ (ĝu) / (ĵu)ぢょ ヂョ (ĝo) / (ĵo)
ば バ baび ビ biぶ ブ buべ ベ beぼ ボ boびゃ ビャ bjaびゅ ビュ bjuびょ ビョ bjo
ぱ パ paぴ ピ piぷ プ puぺ ペ peぽ ポ poぴゃ ピャ pjaぴゅ ピュ pjuぴょ ピョ pjo
イェ je
ウィ ŭiウェ ŭeウォ ŭo
ヴァ vaヴィ vi vuヴェ veヴォ vo
シェ ŝe
ジェ ĝe / ĵe
チェ ĉe
ティ tiトゥ tu
テュ tju
ディ diドゥ du
デュ dju
ツァ caツィ ciツェ ceツォ co
ファ faフィ fiフェ feフォ fo
フュ fju

Red letters indicate Kana no longer used in modern Japanese.

See also

Related Research Articles

Hiragana is a Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana as well as kanji.

Katakana is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hepburn romanization</span> System of Japanese romanization

Hepburn romanization is the main system of romanization for the Japanese language. The system was originally published in 1867 by American Christian missionary and physician James Curtis Hepburn as the standard in the first edition of his Japanese–English dictionary. The system is distinct from other romanization methods in its use of English orthography to phonetically transcribe sounds: for example, the syllable is written as shi and is written as cha, reflecting their spellings in English.

Esperanto is written in a Latin-script alphabet of twenty-eight letters, with upper and lower case. This is supplemented by punctuation marks and by various logograms, such as the digits 0–9, currency signs such as $ € ¥ £ ₷, and mathematical symbols. The creator of Esperanto, L. L. Zamenhof, declared a principle of "one letter, one sound", though this is a general rather than strict guideline.

The circumflex is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is also used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from Latin: circumflexus "bent around"—a translation of the Greek: περισπωμένη.

Kunrei-shiki romanization, also known as the Monbusho system or MEXT system, is the Cabinet-ordered romanization system for transcribing the Japanese language into the Latin alphabet. Its name is rendered Kunreisiki rômazi in the system itself. It is taught in the Monbushō-approved elementary school curriculum. The ISO has standardized Kunrei-shiki, under ISO 3602.

Ŭ or ŭ is a letter in the Belarusian Latin alphabet used since 1840/1845, based on u. It is also used in the Esperanto alphabet, publicly presented in 1887, and formerly in the Romanian alphabet. The accent mark (diacritic) is known as a breve.

A phonemic orthography is an orthography in which the graphemes correspond to the language's phonemes. Natural languages rarely have perfectly phonemic orthographies; a high degree of grapheme–phoneme correspondence can be expected in orthographies based on alphabetic writing systems, but they differ in how complete this correspondence is. English orthography, for example, is alphabetic but highly nonphonemic; it was once mostly phonemic during the Middle English stage, when the modern spellings originated, but spoken English changed rapidly while the orthography was much more stable, resulting in the modern nonphonemic situation. On the contrary the Albanian, Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian/Montenegrin, Romanian, Italian, Turkish, Spanish, Finnish, Czech, Latvian, Esperanto, Korean and Swahili orthographic systems come much closer to being consistent phonemic representations.

JSL is a romanization system for transcribing the Japanese language into the Latin script. It was devised by Eleanor Jorden for her 1987 book Japanese: The Spoken Language. The system is based on Kunrei-shiki romanization. Japanese Yale is a less well-known alternative name for the JSL system.

Nihon-shiki is a romanization system for transliterating the Japanese language into the Latin alphabet. Among the major romanization systems for Japanese, it is the most regular one and has an almost one-to-one relation to the kana writing system.

Polivanov system is a system of transliterating the Japanese language into Russian Cyrillic script, either to represent Japanese proper names or terms in Russian or as an aid to Japanese language learning in those languages. The system was developed by Yevgeny Polivanov in 1917.

The Royal Thai General System of Transcription (RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai words in the Latin alphabet. It was published by the Royal Institute of Thailand in early 1917, when Thailand was called Siam.

In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, for example in Arabic, Estonian, Finnish, Fijian, Japanese, Kannada, Kyrgyz, Latin, Malayalam, Old English, Scottish Gaelic, Tamil and Vietnamese.

Wāpuro rōmaji (ワープロローマ字), or kana spelling, is a style of romanization of Japanese originally devised for entering Japanese into word processors while using a Western QWERTY keyboard.

The sokuon is a Japanese symbol in the form of a small hiragana or katakana tsu. In less formal language, it is called chiisai tsu (小さいつ) or chiisana tsu (小さなつ), meaning "small tsu". It serves multiple purposes in Japanese writing.

Tsu is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one mora. Both are phonemically, reflected in the Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki Romanization tu, although for phonological reasons, the actual pronunciation is, reflected in the Hepburn romanization tsu.

The romanization of Japanese is the use of Latin script to write the Japanese language. This method of writing is sometimes referred to in Japanese as rōmaji.

In contemporary Japanese writing, foreign-language loanwords and foreign names are normally written in the katakana script, which is one component of the Japanese writing system. As far as possible, sounds in the source language are matched to the nearest sounds in the Japanese language, and the result is transcribed using standard katakana characters, each of which represents one syllable. For example, America is written アメリカ (A-me-ri-ka). To accommodate various foreign-language sounds not present in Japanese, a system of extended katakana has also developed to augment standard katakana.

ISO 11940-2 is an ISO standard for a simplified transcription of the Thai language into Latin characters.

References

  1. Kenichi, Fujimaki (2012). まるごとエスペラント文法改訂版, Revised Esperanto Grammar. Japana Esperanto-Instituto. p. 94. ISBN   978-4-88887-072-6.
  2. 修, 石黒 (1923-01-01). 初等エスペラント教科書. 東京. pp. 10–11.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  3. Teshigawara, Mihoko (2002). "Vowel Devoicing in Tokyo Japanese" (PDF). SFU Digitized Collections.