Nicholas
Frankel
10/30/12
Katakana Analysis (Final)
For my katakana
analysis project I chose the onomonopiac word “ピンポン”, translated to “ping pong”, which is the
word that Japanese people use to describe the sound of a door bell. In the
United States, the sound we typically equate to a doorbell is “Ding Dong”. It’s
not dissimilar to the Japanese equivalent; I find it interesting that we pick
up on different emphasis. Obviously the purpose behind this word being written
in katakana as oppose to hiragana or kanji is that it is a word for sound,
which is one of the primary uses for katakana along with assimilating loan
words. Also, just like in English, onomatopoeic words receive special regard. In much the same way Japanese writers use
katakana, in English, italics or quotations are used to mark onomatopoeia.
As I have
mentioned in previous posts, I’m a pretty big fan of Japanese cinema, and
especially of anime. I used to subscribe to anime magazines such as Otaku, and
read the stories about upcoming anime television and movie events. Often times,
katakana would be employed on the magazine cover and within the magazine for
what I imagine was pop emphasis. As stated in ようこそ, Japanese people, especially young
urbanites, believe foreign loanwords have a certain element of sophistication
and modernity to them. Often they would substitute native Japanese words for
use of these loan words. For instance, consider the words for “ticket”, チケット vs きっぷ. There is no need choose the katakana form over hiragana, its simply becoming trendy to do so. It seems loans words are
becoming more and more prevalent in modern Japanese colloquialisms.
To give another example,
in magna I've encountered the word "だめ" written as "ダメ".Why would they do this? There are several reasons
why the writer might use katakana instead of hiragana. Firstly, to use visual
or only slight semantic emphasis, almost like using bold or italics in english. Second, to describe
onomonopea. And lastly, its possible that the word is normally written in kanji
and the writer was trying to save time by using katakana. Most likely, the
first reason is the correct one. Katakana was developed out of necessity
and convenience. Subsequently, it is very prevalent in japanese media and pop
culture not only for its convenience but also for its aesthetic appeal to young
audiences.
