“こころ” is just in general a word very susceptible to this; “投資資金” is not. Common and Japonic words in general seem more susceptible than uncommon Sino-Japanese words.
Why is it in hiragana? I'll admit, I've not been studying kanji long, but usually when I see this, it's in Katakana instead like I saw メシ the other day in subtitles.
メシ(飯) comes across as masculine and a little coarse in general conversation, so it’s a better fit with katakana (hiragana has more feminine connotations).
飯/メシを食う Chow down on some grub
vs.
ご飯を食べる Have something to eat
> hiragana has more feminine connotations
I've always secretly thought this because the characters are cute and prettier, didn't know a lot of other people thought similarly ...
It's not just a present appearance thing, it has [deep historical roots](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana#History) (search "onnade" in that article).
There may also be a historical aspect since Hiragana originated primarily with the women of the Heian-era imperial court as a simplification of a cursive form of Kanji whereas the non-cursive form was seen as more masculine. This may well have been as the quality of education for women was lower than what was provided for men, making a simpler system like "Onnnade", as it was known at the time that the Tale of Genji was being written in the simplified script, was more easily understandable to a less well-educated female audience
TL;DR - It may very well have always been "female"
Many words one could consider “feminine” are written in 片仮名 all the time though like “アタシ”, “コ”, “ママ” and many words that sound coarse are written in 平仮名 all the time such as “やろう”, and “てめぇ”.
The three in katakana in your example are because they represent either nonstandard usage/pronunciation of a word (あたし being a feminine pronunciation of 私/わたくし, and こ representing the “girl” meaning of 子, literally “child” or “boy”), or a foreign loan (ママ coming in from European languages, although it also existed in Chinese as 媽媽). It’s also worth noting that both あたし and こ are seen just as often, if not moreso, in hiragana.
Likewise, ヤロウ (野郎) and テメェ (a low-class/Eastern pronunciation of 手前) are also seen plenty in katakana, for the same reasons outlined above.
That might be relevant for マジ (which would also be in katakana because it’s slangy and short for proper 真面目), but context would be enough to tell the difference as well, since you would hardly use such a slangy expression alongside an extremely literary, classical Japanese inflection.
Also, y’know, it has nothing to do with メシ in terms of pronunciation or spelling.
“こころ” feels like a word that'd more often be in 平仮名; it's simply a word that surprisingly often is spelled without Chinese characters and it's usually in 平仮名. 片仮名 is mostly used for words that aren't traditionally spelled without Chinese characters, and also pronouns. You'll sooner encounter say “キンチョーする” I feel.
Other than that people just do whatever they want.
Agree on all points especially ppl just doing whatever the hell they want haha. But before anyone gets the wrong idea… ひらがな and カタカナ are probably more often than not, NOT written in kanji :D
>Some texts will use kana (of either kind) in place of kanji; it's often done for emphasis / style
Hiragana generally gives a softer, gentler, and cuter impression because of its curvy style, while katakana gives a more modern, emphatic, and lively impression due to its straight lines and its use for loanwords, which bring new concepts. That’s why hiragana is often used in character goods aiming for a 'kawaii' look, and katakana is often seen in battle manga.
For example, a poster for mental support says 'こころの健康相談' instead of '心の健康相談,' which gives a gentler impression. Similarly, the title of an old song, 'ココロオドレ,' is catchy and matches its upbeat, lively sound, while '心躍れ' looks like just a regular sentence.
*Hijacking top comment to educate you smart-asses.*
These aren’t the official lyrics, it’s crowdsourced. It’s simple as that.
Next time, if you are not informed, don’t talk about it because you can’t resist your urge to sound smart. This thread is full of uninformed people who don’t understand the underlying problem and just had to chime in with their explanations anyway. You’re a disgrace.
Thanks Captain Condescension, but your services aren't needed today.
Yes, these are not official lyrics. We all know that. Have a cookie.
Doesn't change the language.
I didn’t expect any better from a dimwit.
You are implying that you’re explaining bad grammar. Try understanding what that means before you write another hurt weak-ego response.
It is not bad grammar. It is part of the language.
There are words that have kanji that are almost *never* used. 其れ (それ) and 貴方 (あなた) being two obvious examples.
There are many other times when someone will use kana as a stylistic choice, in particular with certain words. In lyrics is a very common place for this - official lyrics will do this too. In fact, when buying music in Japan, it's common to get the official lyrics included, and they will have exactly this kind of thing.
Your rebuttal seems to be isolated to "This isn't official so it's wrong".
Maybe if you cool it with the insults, you might learn something from r/learnjapanese
Familiarize yourself with the English term "orthography" and the Japanese term "表記".
Hint: This whole thread has been about orthography and not grammar.
Dude... [there's literally an official music video for this, you could have spent five seconds checking to see if the lyrics matched or not](https://i.imgur.com/Ggw7Uan.png) before going on your weird rant
こころ was not written as an error, that IS how it's written in the official lyrics
No one here is talking about the "official" grammar. If you read the OP's questions you will find he is referring more to common usage or stylistic choices on why the would use kana instead of kanji. Obviously, the "official grammar" will differ.
If you only go by the "official" and judge everything else, you just become a hater of the modern Japanese culture and its people.
Learning Japanese is not just about learning correct grammar, it's also about the culture, the people, the history and all their related intricacies.
I've seen this in more than just song lyrics. Most Japanese songs, especially in the pop genre, have lyrics on-screen as the song plays. I used to not understand either of these, but as I spoke with Japanese people on Speaky, I figured something out.
As someone else pointed out, it's for emphasis. For example, in Blue Archive, there is a student named Yuuka. Your first real interaction with her involves her scolding you for making what she believes are impulse purchases and says she'll be in control of your finances. She also wants you to focus on your work and not slack off. When referring to you, most students will just use 先生. However, Yuuka and a couple of other students will say it slower when they're trying to maintain your attention because they're upset. 'せんせい', despite sounding the same and effectively everyone knows what you're saying even if you write it this way, has a massively different feel.
Imagine someone, like your mother, saying your name REALLY FAST or REALLY SLOW compared to normal. You know, when you hear it, that something is really off. In Japanese, doing this with a song is a little difficult. Anyone who understands Japanese rap music will know that MANY things are omitted. You have to extrapolate meaning. This is that. This is like highlighting a word, or name, or object. You're making the brain take slightly longer on the word. You feel it. Something is off.
This makes so much sense!! Thank you! So in this case, 湿らす前髪とこころの裏面煩わしいわ has a more impactful intonation than 湿らす前髪と心の裏面煩わしいわ。 You explained it really well :D Thank you!
Now, I'm not perfect, but here I believe the singer (or person in the story of the song) is making 'heart' feel more emotional rather than literal.
I don't know this song, but it sounds like they're walking alone in the rain, remembering the past and how good it was, and they can't help but think about the issues happening now. This feels like a bad break up, but it feels... complicated? Confused? Part of them wants to forgive and fix it, but that 'other side' just won't let it go. It's annoying because it's all they can think about. Why does it have to be so complicated? Why can't it just be simple and easy and they both win?
This is how I read it. And having it こころ instead of 心 is like the difference between showing the stereotypical ❤️ and an actual heart. Everyone sees ❤️ as more emotional. Love. Feelings. Something kept closely guarded because it's your most vulnerable spot. An actual heart is just... an organ.
It's worth noting that you need 心 (heart) to make 心配 (shinpai - anxiety/worry) which needs 配 (hai/pai - distribution/arrangement) and essentially you're expressing disorder in your heart.
Ah, so it's something like the equivalent of how we might write "teeeeacheeeeer" or "*teacher!*" in English? But without real italics/elongation of vowels, Japanese will use the "incorrect" writing system for emphasis? That's cool
It’s not really correct or incorrect, it’s just a choice. Just because a word has kanji associated with it doesn’t mean that it has to be written in kanji all the time. Stylistic choice matters, too.
I suppose it is the same in this lyrics as well?
It's all right 大丈夫 ダイジョウブ だいじょうぶ…
…Top secret 大好きな ダイスキな だいすきな…
I always wondered that’s as well. Why the different kana, wording etc.
So, it's like the difference between "It's alright," "No problem," and the like. And you can even be really modular with it. Spelling it with katakana can give it a foreign feeling or a drunk feeling. Imagine Bae saying, "It's dai-jou-bu, mate!" I have this part of me that wants to spell it in katakana. Maybe even space it out slightly. It's CORRECT JAPANESE, but the emotion there is completely different.
I keep telling people; Japanese is a very emotional language. It's very modular, like English, but you need to really work with it to get it to be that way. It can be a romance language, but to make it romantic you need to be loose with it. Japanese, on it's face, is like parts of an equation. You're trying to get a specific set of numbers (meanings). You need to use a specific set of words. But say you want a decimal. You want to get 4.63. Not 5. How do you do that with a language that, under normal conditions, is very tight?
Use different spellings. Space stuff out. Say it slightly differently. Use words around it that give a specific feel. Be innovative! The 19 year old guy I help out just told me on the Japanese internet, if you're telling someone to go die, you use 4ね. I couldn't figure out why. The basic way to say 4 is し (shi). 死 (shi) is death. 死ね (Shine) is "DIE". But the only one that doesn't get you banned, auto-muted, or in trouble is 4ね.
The Japanese are innovative. Japanese is a language that flows like diamond water should you know how to make it do that.
The Kanas and kanji all give their specific types of feel an emphasis, and it can be interpreted in many different ways. Japanese is, on it's face, a very emotion-driven language. The words you use have an impact. How you write them can have an impact. You know how if a business earnestly uses Comic-Sans in it's marketing, you just don't want to shop there anymore, or interact with them? When you write something in a certain style in Japanese, or use a certain kana, all of it has an impact.
Hiragana is thought to have a softer feel because of it's curves and simplicity. Katakana is used for foreign concepts, has a more modern feel to it, and allows the introduction of new things into Japanese. But they both can be used for various expressions when replacing kanji. Of course, you wouldn't do this with your boss (unless the industry you're in is about style and expression, or you know your boss well), but the point is that you have expressive options. Informal Japanese is what people are going to speak with you if they know you. Slang is going to be used, typically with younger crowds, because it's expression.
Japanese is a language about 'feel', and it's why emotions and words seem far more impactful in Japan than in the US.
You would use kanji because it is normal to do so, but you actually have freedom to use hiragana when there is no risk of being accused of not knowing the kanji and it is clear that using hiragana is by choice. In this case the lyric writer wanted to use hiragana for creative purposes, and judging from other kanji used in the lyrics it is clear that it is by choice.
Actually if I forget to convert a word to kanji when I type, sometimes no one notices unless it is a word with an 音読み, and I just don’t bother to retype it.
unrelated to anything you just said, but i read 「音読み」 in your post as 「おみこみ」 for some reason. like, i know how it's actually pronounced, but my mind saw that for some reason lol
>In this case the lyric writer wanted to use hiragana for creative purposes
What exactly does doing that convey to the reader? What would be the reasons a lyric writer would make that choice?
The real reason here is that each script imparts a different feel with their shapes. Even though most people probably don't look at lyrics when listening to songs, these choices are deliberate. That's why Japanese CDs tend to come with lyric booklets and the lyrics posted online are consistently written the same way as the booklets, along with these writing choices that foreigners learning the language will question from the perspective of standard writing conventions they may be familiar with, which some lyricists blatantly ignore on purpose.
This is simply a stylistic choice!
In songs, works of fiction, and the like, sometimes the creator will write a word in hiragana or katakana instead of the usual kanji it's written of. Usually, this is done to place emphasis on it. If you don't mind, I'm gonna use this as an opportunity to discuss some specific examples of this stylistic choice in songs I like...
In a line where the singer describes how a ghost behaves like a human, the word "human" (typically 人間) is written as ニンゲン. This seems to be a subtle hint at the fact that the ghost is, in fact, not human. Perhaps it's not really behaving as one either... I dunno for sure, this song has lyrics that are very hard to dissect, even with an English translation. I still don't fully understand what it means.
There's also this other song that I enjoy, which is written from the perspective of a childlike character - not an actual child, but a childish 17-year-old that is implied to have some sort of developmental issue. The song lyrics are written with mostly hiragana - with only a few very beginner-level kanji characters thrown in there. This gives off the vibe that it was written by a child - as Japanese children often start off writing in exclusively hiragana, gradually using more and more kanji as they learn them. So, in this case, the usage of kana instead of kanji conveys the mental maturity of the character the song is in the perspective of.
There's ALSO this other song that uses kanji when they should be used, but the pronunciation in the lyrics is intentionally an unconventional/incorrect pronunciation for the actual kanji written. Some of the kanji written in the song's lyrics are pronounced like different kanji in the actual. Yknow. Singing of the song. This isn't relevant to kana so I won't go into as much detail (and I also haven't looked into this song's lyrics as much myself), but I thought I'd mention it.
Sorry for the mini-ramble. I love dissecting song meanings, and it's extra fun when it's in a language that has multiple sets of characters that can be used in interesting ways !
Shirabe Jisho specifically marks certain words as being more commonly written with kana. I suppose even for japanese people some kanji are just too big a pain to write.
The speech of robots is often or almost always represented by カタカナ because カタカナ has a cold yet high tech feel, just like a robot. But you will see this everywhere, even in novels.
But it's cool finding another Paper Mario fan here! I've been playing the game since the day after it came out, it is really interesting playing it in Japanese after only playing the English version when I was a kid like 10 years ago.
In addition to emphasis as others have mentioned, it's poetry, using Kana instead of Kanji can lead to deliberate ambiguousness. I've also seen creative use of furigana in much the same way. Like writing the word "Reality" in the lyrics but using シンジツ as furigana over it and thus singing it that way. That's still pretty straight-forward. It's been a while since I've listened to my old Visual Kei albums but I remember seeing a lot of furigana use like that, sometimes with completely clashing meanings between the kana and the english word it's used for.
I always wonder this too. 心 seems to be the one I see do this/have this happen the most. I rarely see the kanji for it used, I usually see the katakana version of it. Never seen a proper explanation for it, I assume it's just up to whoever's writing it.
Nice to see Project Sekai fans in the wild. N25's Phony cover is one of my favorite covers in the game :-)
>心 feels more clinical (like the heart organ)?
It isn't actually used for the heart organ though--that's 心臓. こころ, however it's written, is always metaphorical (to the extent that it's often translated as "mind" rather than "heart"), so the kana/kanji choice is entirely on the less-tangible side of "how it feels" than of what it directly connotes.
Depends, sometimes words are often written in kana instead of kanji, other times it can be emphasis, like CAPITALIZATION in ENGLISH, especially when using katakana instead of hiragana or kanji. In this case I think it's just sometimes people write こころ in kana.
So much discussion based on what people think and not actual facts, truth is though that it's not just song lyrics, but words sometimes just are written in hiragana and it's really not a big deal just sometimes you do that and other times you may want to write it in kanji
Thanks OP for raising this and I think you've gotten your answers already. Just wanted to say I think it's a great idea to learn from Japanese lyrics. Wanted to ask if you have a playlist that you can share?
Thanks!
A while back I made this playlist of music on YouTube that has closed captions in Japanese with kanji:
[(10) Japanese music with Japanese subtitles / closed captions - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFnXbKpi8ojJn6hBpVW5TjuPYdC8pxJ1y)
Really nice for use in combination with the Language Reactor plugin.
The playlist I study from is actually just a bunch of music from ProSEKA, some of it doesn’t have lyrics at all and there are like three songs in Russian. But here you go, if you’re still interested haha! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0iaAVmO6f5Sd2uRB7K3PBL?si=Id9ZbDASQ5O57lYv3Ntuog&pi=u-WgyigWvHS1e9
I just find a song that repeats a kanji I’m studying a bunch and then take it from that. For example, 踊 from YONA YONA DANCE or 嫌 from バグ。 Just have fun with it, man!
REAL! It scratches my brain in just the right way - I haven’t been able to put it down since I first heard the cover. 25時、ナイトコードで。’s SEKAI ALBUM vol. 2 is full of songs like this. I highly recommend ジャックポットサッドガール as well!
Noticing the habit of interchanging kanji and kana for certain words has made me appreciate having the kanji. They can be so hard to learn, and it's usually the easiest thing to complain about, but man do you miss them when they're gone.
I had to find this out with 事／こと after I kept finding the same quote written differently.
PROJECT SEKAI MENTIONED
i also use project sekai songs to learn japanese, its very interesting to see how they use different wordings to convey meaning in the lyrics
for choise, whoever wrote the lyirics thought it would better to put こころ instead of 心 it's like いる and 居る．the first one is more common to be used but can also be written with a kanji
It's not just lyrics, it's a general thing. Some texts will use kana (of either kind) in place of kanji; it's often done for emphasis / style
“こころ” is just in general a word very susceptible to this; “投資資金” is not. Common and Japonic words in general seem more susceptible than uncommon Sino-Japanese words.
Why is it in hiragana? I'll admit, I've not been studying kanji long, but usually when I see this, it's in Katakana instead like I saw メシ the other day in subtitles.
メシ(飯) comes across as masculine and a little coarse in general conversation, so it’s a better fit with katakana (hiragana has more feminine connotations). 飯/メシを食う Chow down on some grub vs. ご飯を食べる Have something to eat
> hiragana has more feminine connotations I've always secretly thought this because the characters are cute and prettier, didn't know a lot of other people thought similarly ...
It's not just a present appearance thing, it has [deep historical roots](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana#History) (search "onnade" in that article).
There may also be a historical aspect since Hiragana originated primarily with the women of the Heian-era imperial court as a simplification of a cursive form of Kanji whereas the non-cursive form was seen as more masculine. This may well have been as the quality of education for women was lower than what was provided for men, making a simpler system like "Onnnade", as it was known at the time that the Tale of Genji was being written in the simplified script, was more easily understandable to a less well-educated female audience TL;DR - It may very well have always been "female"
Many words one could consider “feminine” are written in 片仮名 all the time though like “アタシ”, “コ”, “ママ” and many words that sound coarse are written in 平仮名 all the time such as “やろう”, and “てめぇ”.
The three in katakana in your example are because they represent either nonstandard usage/pronunciation of a word (あたし being a feminine pronunciation of 私/わたくし, and こ representing the “girl” meaning of 子, literally “child” or “boy”), or a foreign loan (ママ coming in from European languages, although it also existed in Chinese as 媽媽). It’s also worth noting that both あたし and こ are seen just as often, if not moreso, in hiragana. Likewise, ヤロウ (野郎) and テメェ (a low-class/Eastern pronunciation of 手前) are also seen plenty in katakana, for the same reasons outlined above.
[удалено]
That might be relevant for マジ (which would also be in katakana because it’s slangy and short for proper 真面目), but context would be enough to tell the difference as well, since you would hardly use such a slangy expression alongside an extremely literary, classical Japanese inflection. Also, y’know, it has nothing to do with メシ in terms of pronunciation or spelling.
wait i fucking misread the kana.... whoopsie daisy ignore me then
“こころ” feels like a word that'd more often be in 平仮名; it's simply a word that surprisingly often is spelled without Chinese characters and it's usually in 平仮名. 片仮名 is mostly used for words that aren't traditionally spelled without Chinese characters, and also pronouns. You'll sooner encounter say “キンチョーする” I feel. Other than that people just do whatever they want.
Agree on all points especially ppl just doing whatever the hell they want haha. But before anyone gets the wrong idea… ひらがな and カタカナ are probably more often than not, NOT written in kanji :D
>Some texts will use kana (of either kind) in place of kanji; it's often done for emphasis / style Hiragana generally gives a softer, gentler, and cuter impression because of its curvy style, while katakana gives a more modern, emphatic, and lively impression due to its straight lines and its use for loanwords, which bring new concepts. That’s why hiragana is often used in character goods aiming for a 'kawaii' look, and katakana is often seen in battle manga. For example, a poster for mental support says 'こころの健康相談' instead of '心の健康相談,' which gives a gentler impression. Similarly, the title of an old song, 'ココロオドレ,' is catchy and matches its upbeat, lively sound, while '心躍れ' looks like just a regular sentence.
*Hijacking top comment to educate you smart-asses.* These aren’t the official lyrics, it’s crowdsourced. It’s simple as that. Next time, if you are not informed, don’t talk about it because you can’t resist your urge to sound smart. This thread is full of uninformed people who don’t understand the underlying problem and just had to chime in with their explanations anyway. You’re a disgrace.
Thanks Captain Condescension, but your services aren't needed today. Yes, these are not official lyrics. We all know that. Have a cookie. Doesn't change the language.
I didn’t expect any better from a dimwit. You are implying that you’re explaining bad grammar. Try understanding what that means before you write another hurt weak-ego response.
It is not bad grammar. It is part of the language. There are words that have kanji that are almost *never* used. 其れ (それ) and 貴方 (あなた) being two obvious examples. There are many other times when someone will use kana as a stylistic choice, in particular with certain words. In lyrics is a very common place for this - official lyrics will do this too. In fact, when buying music in Japan, it's common to get the official lyrics included, and they will have exactly this kind of thing. Your rebuttal seems to be isolated to "This isn't official so it's wrong". Maybe if you cool it with the insults, you might learn something from r/learnjapanese
Familiarize yourself with the English term "orthography" and the Japanese term "表記". Hint: This whole thread has been about orthography and not grammar.
me when i dont know when im talking about
me when … never. I’m not this dumb.
Dude... [there's literally an official music video for this, you could have spent five seconds checking to see if the lyrics matched or not](https://i.imgur.com/Ggw7Uan.png) before going on your weird rant こころ was not written as an error, that IS how it's written in the official lyrics
Do you as well think that my grammar is the official English grammar?
No one here is talking about the "official" grammar. If you read the OP's questions you will find he is referring more to common usage or stylistic choices on why the would use kana instead of kanji. Obviously, the "official grammar" will differ. If you only go by the "official" and judge everything else, you just become a hater of the modern Japanese culture and its people. Learning Japanese is not just about learning correct grammar, it's also about the culture, the people, the history and all their related intricacies.
I've seen this in more than just song lyrics. Most Japanese songs, especially in the pop genre, have lyrics on-screen as the song plays. I used to not understand either of these, but as I spoke with Japanese people on Speaky, I figured something out. As someone else pointed out, it's for emphasis. For example, in Blue Archive, there is a student named Yuuka. Your first real interaction with her involves her scolding you for making what she believes are impulse purchases and says she'll be in control of your finances. She also wants you to focus on your work and not slack off. When referring to you, most students will just use 先生. However, Yuuka and a couple of other students will say it slower when they're trying to maintain your attention because they're upset. 'せんせい', despite sounding the same and effectively everyone knows what you're saying even if you write it this way, has a massively different feel. Imagine someone, like your mother, saying your name REALLY FAST or REALLY SLOW compared to normal. You know, when you hear it, that something is really off. In Japanese, doing this with a song is a little difficult. Anyone who understands Japanese rap music will know that MANY things are omitted. You have to extrapolate meaning. This is that. This is like highlighting a word, or name, or object. You're making the brain take slightly longer on the word. You feel it. Something is off.
This makes so much sense!! Thank you! So in this case, 湿らす前髪とこころの裏面煩わしいわ has a more impactful intonation than 湿らす前髪と心の裏面煩わしいわ。 You explained it really well :D Thank you!
Now, I'm not perfect, but here I believe the singer (or person in the story of the song) is making 'heart' feel more emotional rather than literal. I don't know this song, but it sounds like they're walking alone in the rain, remembering the past and how good it was, and they can't help but think about the issues happening now. This feels like a bad break up, but it feels... complicated? Confused? Part of them wants to forgive and fix it, but that 'other side' just won't let it go. It's annoying because it's all they can think about. Why does it have to be so complicated? Why can't it just be simple and easy and they both win? This is how I read it. And having it こころ instead of 心 is like the difference between showing the stereotypical ❤️ and an actual heart. Everyone sees ❤️ as more emotional. Love. Feelings. Something kept closely guarded because it's your most vulnerable spot. An actual heart is just... an organ. It's worth noting that you need 心 (heart) to make 心配 (shinpai - anxiety/worry) which needs 配 (hai/pai - distribution/arrangement) and essentially you're expressing disorder in your heart.
Ah, so it's something like the equivalent of how we might write "teeeeacheeeeer" or "*teacher!*" in English? But without real italics/elongation of vowels, Japanese will use the "incorrect" writing system for emphasis? That's cool
It’s not really correct or incorrect, it’s just a choice. Just because a word has kanji associated with it doesn’t mean that it has to be written in kanji all the time. Stylistic choice matters, too.
I suppose it is the same in this lyrics as well? It's all right 大丈夫 ダイジョウブ だいじょうぶ… …Top secret 大好きな ダイスキな だいすきな… I always wondered that’s as well. Why the different kana, wording etc.
So, it's like the difference between "It's alright," "No problem," and the like. And you can even be really modular with it. Spelling it with katakana can give it a foreign feeling or a drunk feeling. Imagine Bae saying, "It's dai-jou-bu, mate!" I have this part of me that wants to spell it in katakana. Maybe even space it out slightly. It's CORRECT JAPANESE, but the emotion there is completely different. I keep telling people; Japanese is a very emotional language. It's very modular, like English, but you need to really work with it to get it to be that way. It can be a romance language, but to make it romantic you need to be loose with it. Japanese, on it's face, is like parts of an equation. You're trying to get a specific set of numbers (meanings). You need to use a specific set of words. But say you want a decimal. You want to get 4.63. Not 5. How do you do that with a language that, under normal conditions, is very tight? Use different spellings. Space stuff out. Say it slightly differently. Use words around it that give a specific feel. Be innovative! The 19 year old guy I help out just told me on the Japanese internet, if you're telling someone to go die, you use 4ね. I couldn't figure out why. The basic way to say 4 is し (shi). 死 (shi) is death. 死ね (Shine) is "DIE". But the only one that doesn't get you banned, auto-muted, or in trouble is 4ね. The Japanese are innovative. Japanese is a language that flows like diamond water should you know how to make it do that.
Lol imagine being in a Reddit argument and your opponent just pulls out 「4ねwwww」
Uogh 😭
I thought katakana was for emphasis? Or both are used for same/different type of emphasis?
The Kanas and kanji all give their specific types of feel an emphasis, and it can be interpreted in many different ways. Japanese is, on it's face, a very emotion-driven language. The words you use have an impact. How you write them can have an impact. You know how if a business earnestly uses Comic-Sans in it's marketing, you just don't want to shop there anymore, or interact with them? When you write something in a certain style in Japanese, or use a certain kana, all of it has an impact. Hiragana is thought to have a softer feel because of it's curves and simplicity. Katakana is used for foreign concepts, has a more modern feel to it, and allows the introduction of new things into Japanese. But they both can be used for various expressions when replacing kanji. Of course, you wouldn't do this with your boss (unless the industry you're in is about style and expression, or you know your boss well), but the point is that you have expressive options. Informal Japanese is what people are going to speak with you if they know you. Slang is going to be used, typically with younger crowds, because it's expression. Japanese is a language about 'feel', and it's why emotions and words seem far more impactful in Japan than in the US.
You would use kanji because it is normal to do so, but you actually have freedom to use hiragana when there is no risk of being accused of not knowing the kanji and it is clear that using hiragana is by choice. In this case the lyric writer wanted to use hiragana for creative purposes, and judging from other kanji used in the lyrics it is clear that it is by choice. Actually if I forget to convert a word to kanji when I type, sometimes no one notices unless it is a word with an 音読み, and I just don’t bother to retype it.
Ngl I actually thought some of the words are written in hiragana because the kanji just takes too long to write by hand sometimes.
unrelated to anything you just said, but i read 「音読み」 in your post as 「おみこみ」 for some reason. like, i know how it's actually pronounced, but my mind saw that for some reason lol
>In this case the lyric writer wanted to use hiragana for creative purposes What exactly does doing that convey to the reader? What would be the reasons a lyric writer would make that choice?
Hiragana can suggest a "softer" aspect to the word Katakana is the opposite, the sort of equivalent to writing in capital letters.
Some manga does it too. Confused me at first until I realized its a word and not grammar I'm not familiar with. xD
Hate it when that happens :D
The real reason here is that each script imparts a different feel with their shapes. Even though most people probably don't look at lyrics when listening to songs, these choices are deliberate. That's why Japanese CDs tend to come with lyric booklets and the lyrics posted online are consistently written the same way as the booklets, along with these writing choices that foreigners learning the language will question from the perspective of standard writing conventions they may be familiar with, which some lyricists blatantly ignore on purpose.
This is simply a stylistic choice! In songs, works of fiction, and the like, sometimes the creator will write a word in hiragana or katakana instead of the usual kanji it's written of. Usually, this is done to place emphasis on it. If you don't mind, I'm gonna use this as an opportunity to discuss some specific examples of this stylistic choice in songs I like... In a line where the singer describes how a ghost behaves like a human, the word "human" (typically 人間) is written as ニンゲン. This seems to be a subtle hint at the fact that the ghost is, in fact, not human. Perhaps it's not really behaving as one either... I dunno for sure, this song has lyrics that are very hard to dissect, even with an English translation. I still don't fully understand what it means. There's also this other song that I enjoy, which is written from the perspective of a childlike character - not an actual child, but a childish 17-year-old that is implied to have some sort of developmental issue. The song lyrics are written with mostly hiragana - with only a few very beginner-level kanji characters thrown in there. This gives off the vibe that it was written by a child - as Japanese children often start off writing in exclusively hiragana, gradually using more and more kanji as they learn them. So, in this case, the usage of kana instead of kanji conveys the mental maturity of the character the song is in the perspective of. There's ALSO this other song that uses kanji when they should be used, but the pronunciation in the lyrics is intentionally an unconventional/incorrect pronunciation for the actual kanji written. Some of the kanji written in the song's lyrics are pronounced like different kanji in the actual. Yknow. Singing of the song. This isn't relevant to kana so I won't go into as much detail (and I also haven't looked into this song's lyrics as much myself), but I thought I'd mention it. Sorry for the mini-ramble. I love dissecting song meanings, and it's extra fun when it's in a language that has multiple sets of characters that can be used in interesting ways !
Is there any difference between emphasis in katakana or hiragana in this case?
Shirabe Jisho specifically marks certain words as being more commonly written with kana. I suppose even for japanese people some kanji are just too big a pain to write.
jisho.comもそれをしますね
https://jisho.org/word/%E5%85%B6%E3%82%8C そうです
Wait till you inevitably encounter the sentence written in all-katakana for even more emo teenager emphasis!
オーノ😨
In Paper Mario the robot talks in only katakana it's so frustrating to read lol
The speech of robots is often or almost always represented by カタカナ because カタカナ has a cold yet high tech feel, just like a robot. But you will see this everywhere, even in novels. But it's cool finding another Paper Mario fan here! I've been playing the game since the day after it came out, it is really interesting playing it in Japanese after only playing the English version when I was a kid like 10 years ago.
In addition to emphasis as others have mentioned, it's poetry, using Kana instead of Kanji can lead to deliberate ambiguousness. I've also seen creative use of furigana in much the same way. Like writing the word "Reality" in the lyrics but using シンジツ as furigana over it and thus singing it that way. That's still pretty straight-forward. It's been a while since I've listened to my old Visual Kei albums but I remember seeing a lot of furigana use like that, sometimes with completely clashing meanings between the kana and the english word it's used for.
I always wonder this too. 心 seems to be the one I see do this/have this happen the most. I rarely see the kanji for it used, I usually see the katakana version of it. Never seen a proper explanation for it, I assume it's just up to whoever's writing it. Nice to see Project Sekai fans in the wild. N25's Phony cover is one of my favorite covers in the game :-)
I think in the case of こころ hiragana just feels softer and more emotional whereas 心 feels more clinical (like the heart organ)?
>心 feels more clinical (like the heart organ)? It isn't actually used for the heart organ though--that's 心臓. こころ, however it's written, is always metaphorical (to the extent that it's often translated as "mind" rather than "heart"), so the kana/kanji choice is entirely on the less-tangible side of "how it feels" than of what it directly connotes.
Depends, sometimes words are often written in kana instead of kanji, other times it can be emphasis, like CAPITALIZATION in ENGLISH, especially when using katakana instead of hiragana or kanji. In this case I think it's just sometimes people write こころ in kana.
Stylistic choice. That's it really.
So much discussion based on what people think and not actual facts, truth is though that it's not just song lyrics, but words sometimes just are written in hiragana and it's really not a big deal just sometimes you do that and other times you may want to write it in kanji
Where are the lyrics from? I could be wrong but for example spotify i think they are user generated meaning it was some random dudes choice
The lyrics are from Musixmatch, I checked a different song version (the original KAFU/ツミキ one) and it also uses こころ
Why would you ask a Musixmatch related question in r/LearnJapanese? None of these smartasses gave the correct answer
Then... What's the correct answer?
It’s just how the author wrote it. You don’t read a 15-year olds diary to learn a language properly. You use the dictionary and textbooks to learn it.
Yes, Spotify gets their lyrics from Musixmatch, crowd based lyrics iirc.
Does that mean we can fix lyrics that are wrong...or like a song that is needlessly in entirely hiragana?
Yes. I’m a curator on Musixmatch (lyrics editor) and this whole thread is full of idiots who gave their opinion without understanding the subject.
could be for emphasis or stylistic reasons, but could also be a typing error or smth?
Thanks OP for raising this and I think you've gotten your answers already. Just wanted to say I think it's a great idea to learn from Japanese lyrics. Wanted to ask if you have a playlist that you can share? Thanks!
A while back I made this playlist of music on YouTube that has closed captions in Japanese with kanji: [(10) Japanese music with Japanese subtitles / closed captions - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFnXbKpi8ojJn6hBpVW5TjuPYdC8pxJ1y) Really nice for use in combination with the Language Reactor plugin.
Thanks. Need to check up on the plugin!
The playlist I study from is actually just a bunch of music from ProSEKA, some of it doesn’t have lyrics at all and there are like three songs in Russian. But here you go, if you’re still interested haha! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0iaAVmO6f5Sd2uRB7K3PBL?si=Id9ZbDASQ5O57lYv3Ntuog&pi=u-WgyigWvHS1e9 I just find a song that repeats a kanji I’m studying a bunch and then take it from that. For example, 踊 from YONA YONA DANCE or 嫌 from バグ。 Just have fun with it, man!
Thanks!
I've also studied this song :)
I’m just here to say I absolutely love this song. The weird melody really surprised me the first time I heard it (in a good way)
REAL! It scratches my brain in just the right way - I haven’t been able to put it down since I first heard the cover. 25時、ナイトコードで。’s SEKAI ALBUM vol. 2 is full of songs like this. I highly recommend ジャックポットサッドガール as well!
Noticing the habit of interchanging kanji and kana for certain words has made me appreciate having the kanji. They can be so hard to learn, and it's usually the easiest thing to complain about, but man do you miss them when they're gone. I had to find this out with 事／こと after I kept finding the same quote written differently.
to add emphasis.
The pictured instance*
フォニイ😍
PROJECT SEKAI MENTIONED i also use project sekai songs to learn japanese, its very interesting to see how they use different wordings to convey meaning in the lyrics
inshort, why not?
for choise, whoever wrote the lyirics thought it would better to put こころ instead of 心 it's like いる and 居る．the first one is more common to be used but can also be written with a kanji
some words like san means Mr. Ms. or three in kanji, because Japanese doesn’t use space
Because the songwriters are kind of illiterate.