{"id":787,"date":"2022-06-30T06:42:12","date_gmt":"2022-06-30T06:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hellohello-learn-language.com\/Language-Blog\/?p=787"},"modified":"2022-06-30T06:42:42","modified_gmt":"2022-06-30T06:42:42","slug":"japanese-language-iphone-ipad-app","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hellohello-learn-language.com\/Language-Blog\/2022\/06\/30\/japanese-language-iphone-ipad-app\/","title":{"rendered":"Intriguing Facts About the Japanese Language"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

For native speakers of English, Japanese could be one of the most challenging languages to learn in the world. However, that has never stopped people from trying. With the growing popularity of Japanese media \u2013 from films, and music to video games and anime, more people than ever are attempting their hands. Before you delve further into your Japanese studies, here are some essential facts to know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the native language, it is actually called \u201cNihongo\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Japan calls itself \u65e5\u672c \u2013 pronounced \u2018Nihon\u2019 or \u2018Nippon\u2019 in the local language \u2013 but in other languages, it is generally called \u2018Japan\u2019 or some variation thereof. This is because early Portuguese explorers in China recorded the name as \u2018Jipangu\u2019 formed on the Mandarin pronunciation they heard, which sounded to them like \u2018Cipan\u2019. So, while you might be studying Japanese, you are actually studying \u2018Nihongo\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though Japanese uses Chinese characters, the language is not formed on Chinese<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Japanese written format uses Chinese characters, but the language actually was born in Japan, not China. How did it happen? Well, the Japanese language existed for centuries merely as an oral language that was not written down. Somewhere around the 5th<\/sup> century, Japanese scholars decided to correct that by learning to read classical Chinese and borrowing kanji characters to couple with the corresponding words in Japanese. Later, hiragana was formed as a simpler alternative to the more complex kanji.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It uses 3 writing systems<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 3 writing systems are the native Japanese alphabet hiragana and katakana and the Chinese characters known as kanji. The three writing systems are used combinedly, at times even within the same sentence. Kanji is combined with hiragana to make words and sentences, while katakana is used for foreign loanwords as well as to lend emphasis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No plurals<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Japanese language, there is no difference between saying \u2018There is a spider\u2019 and \u2018There are spiders.\u2019 So it could be harder to tell whether someone is saying there\u2019s a spider in your room, or your house has been overrun with several spiders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No articles<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Japanese also never differentiate amongst \u2018a\u2019, \u2018an\u2019, and \u2018the\u2019. While it doesn\u2019t cause many problems for English speakers of Japanese, it is a language point that is tricky for Japanese speakers of English.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through verbs only you can make sentences<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While English sentences generally follow a subject-verb-object (SVO) word sequence, Japanese uses a subject-object-verb (SOV) sequence. However, it is not really necessary to specify the subject \u2013 and objects are optional, simply as in English \u2013 so it is possible to make a sentence using merely verbs. In fact, people can have an entire conversation without ever using the subject.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Learn Japanese with Hello-Hello<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Learn Japanese with Hello-Hello’s iPhone and iPad apps<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hello-Hello, which is the leading mobile language learning application developer, offers users a unique opportunity to learn the Japanese language with iOS and Android Apps. Learn Japanese by Hello-Hello<\/a> iPhone app, which is developed in collaboration with The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL), offers 30 conversational lessons based on real-life situations rather than a collection of out-of-context words and phrases. Dialogues are presented and then broken down into sentence by sentence where you can practice pronunciation and writing skills. The key features of Hello-Hello’s Japanese app that make it THE BEST language learning app available on iTunes are – <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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