お、を、ず、づ、じ、and ぢ

[akai ken]

Hey guys I have a couple of questions about those Hiragana characters. I'm learning Kana in the net, and the page I learn from says "o" is お but also を.

The same goes with ず and づ。And also with じ and ぢ。

What are the differences between this characters and where are they supposed to be used?

Thanks in advance!

 

[JimmySeal]

In modern Japanese, を is used to write the particle "o," and nothing else.

ぢ and づ are used sometimes when a word beginning with ち or つ is the second part of a compound word:
き＋つく=きづく (kizuku)
はな＋ち=はなぢ (hanaji)

They are also used sometimes to spell out the sounds "chiji" or "tsuzu":
ちぢむ (chijimu - to shrink)
つづく (tsuzuku - to continue)

 

[yukio_michael]

を is technically, "wo", as far as the syllabary is concerned; coincidentally, there are also "we" & "wi", but these characters are no longer used.

を as compared to お is only used as an object marker particle in a sentence. For example, the 'wo/o' in nani o shimasu ka? (何を為ますか?) ...as apposed to the o in word odaijini (おだいじに).

The difference between じ and ぢ depends on the word itself, (as well as ず and づ) when each is used. I'll quote wikipedia on this one...

There are two hiragana pronounced ji (じ and ぢ) and two hiragana pronounced zu (ず and づ). These pairs are not interchangeable. Usually, ji is written as じ and zu is written as ず. There are some exceptions. If the first two syllables of a word consist of one syllable without a dakuten and the same syllable with a dakuten, the same hiragana is used to write the sounds. For example chijimeru ('to boil down' or 'to shrink') is spelled ちぢめる. For compound words where the dakuten reflects rendaku voicing, the original hiragana is used. For example, chi (血 "blood") is spelled ち in plain hiragana. When 鼻 hana ("nose") and 血 combine to make hanaji 鼻血 "nose bleed"), the sound of 血changes from chi to ji. So hanaji is spelled はなぢ according to ち: the basic hiragana used to transcribe 血. Similarly, Tsukau (使う; "to use") is spelled つかう in hiragana, so kanazukai (かな使い; "kana use", or "kana orthography") is spelled かなづかい in hiragana.

 

[akai ken]

Ooook! Got it! Very clear explanations

Thanks again!

By the way, one more question now that we're on the topic.

How would you write a word with lets say double "t" ? For example "matte" or any other.

Does that you'll explain me also aplies to double "n"?

 

[yukio_michael]

How would you write a word with lets say double "t" ? For example "matte" or any other.

Doubled consonants in Japanese are indicated in hiragana using a smaller っ and, if you are using an IME, should be automatic, when typing words like 待って、もっと、ちょっと、etcetera.

While we are at it, there are a few rules for doubling vowels, double 'o' except when coming at the beginning of a word, like ookii, should be doubled as ou, as in daijoubu... Likewise, when you double the 'e', it is writen as 'ei' instead of 'ee', as in shitureishimasu

Does that you'll explain me also applies to double "n"?

Someone else is going to have to field this one, as I don't have the particular book which explains this, and I'm not having much luck searching around for the rules about how or if this is even possible...

The way I remember it there are may be a specific difference between when you have a word with say a syllabalic nasal 'n', instead of a 'n-' phoneme with a doubled consonant.

I don't have any word examples however, so I'm not sure.

 

[Nagato]

OK, I'll try to add yukio_michael san explanation.
まって
Thats small tsu （っ）or （ッ）in katakana is 促音(sokuon).
Sokuon - Wikipedia
not only "t" but usually used when there are double consonant(when romanized) in general except "n".
But some times it also used to represent the (') sound, like in やばっ、はやっ、etc.

ん/ン（撥音） is used to represents a "n" sound in general except when its followed by any vowel.
ex:
おんな(onna),
ングラライ (ngurahray), An International Airport in Indonesia,
さかん (sakan), etc

It's also used when there are double "m" in a word. ん is used for the first "m", like in あんまり(ammari, Im not sure its romanized as ammari, though).
This is the wiki about 撥音.

 

[akai ken]

Thanks a bunch! Lots of new concepts

 

[dark_secrester]

A slip up I made when I was learning Japanese was with Konnichiwa
I wrote it: こんんいちは when it should be こんにちは
I haven't come across a double n yet. Basically, if you get nna, nni,nne,nnu or nno write it as if it were n na, n ni, n ne, n nu, n no.
んんお XXXXXX NONONONO
んの YESYESYES

Hope I helped somebody
じゃまた
ジョー

 

[nice gaijin]

there is no double ん in Japanese, as it is a moraic nasal, and its pronunciation is dependant on the following character. Having two in a row would be unthinkable.

More about the moraic nasal (ん)
More about sokuon (っ)

also, dark_secrester: I feel that I must point out that じゃあまた is the proper way to say "see you later." Your posts have been missing the extended vowel

 

[Glenn]

Are you sure? I was pretty sure じゃまた was common.

[Edit] Or maybe it should be じゃ、また if you don't lengthen it. Still I'm pretty sure the non-lengthened version is perfectly acceptable.

 

[Supervin]

Hmm, with or without the extending あ is optional really. Haven't really tallied the times of either and compared them.

 

[nice gaijin]

with the pause it sounds plausible, but without the comma it all runs together and I end up reading it as 邪魔.

 

[JimmySeal]

with the pause it sounds plausible, but without the comma it all runs together and I end up reading it as 邪魔.

Or even 邪魔だ.

I think either じゃ、また or じゃあまた is fine.

 

[Glenn]

Haha, I didn't think of that! Well, if you say 邪魔だ you most likely wouldn't be seeing the person for too much longer!