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roop
Joined: 21 Mar 2006
Posts: 7
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Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 9:35 am
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is there a reason why naruto is written in katakana rather then hiragana?i don't know japanese(but i'm attempting to learn,slowly),but it seems like saying na-ru-to would sound the same be it ナルト or なると, but i'm sure i'm totally wrong.
anyone know?
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TranceLimit174
Joined: 21 Jul 2004
Posts: 958
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Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 10:51 am
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I've noticed that most anime characters, when their names are written are either written with katakana or kanji. Personally I don't know the reason for this but the only one I can think of is the fact that they are animated characters in a work of fiction and therefore are not Japanese, hence their names are written in katakana. But sometimes character names do get written in kanji (probably for the sake of meaning, such as hokage-fire shadow). Although I did notice that when Naruto made the blood contract so that he could summon Gamabunta, he wrote his name in hiragana.
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-gecko-
Joined: 26 Apr 2005
Posts: 285
Location: Near Seattle, WA
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Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 11:07 am
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I'm not a linguist, but I do know that katakana is used for foriegn words where hirigana is used to 'sound out' Japanese words. An example would be on a map of Okinawa intended for tourists there is the Kanji for the place name with hirigana above it for Japanese who are not familiar with local place names.
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Zalis116
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Joined: 31 Mar 2005
Posts: 6864
Location: Kazune City
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Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 11:21 am
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I think they use katakana for Naruto on a "because they feel like it" basis. I mean, it's hard to find a more japanese name than Sakura, but her name is also written in katakana in the credits. It's also common to see names in hiragana, mainly for girls' given names. If you look at the credits to Love Hina, for instance, the guys' names are in kanji, and most of the girls' names aside from Motoko (kanji), Suu, and Sara (katakana because they're non-Japanese), are in hiragana. You're right that there is no sound difference; I wouldn't read much deep linguistic significance into it.
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abunai
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Joined: 05 Mar 2004
Posts: 5463
Location: 露命
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Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 3:59 pm
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Katakana is often used for emphasis (similar to us using italics), but the most frequent use, the one that is taking place here, is to mark masculine style. It's rare for males to use hiragana to write their names, when they use kana.
- abunai
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#876907
Joined: 17 Nov 2017
Posts: 1
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Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2017 3:47 pm
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Zalis116 wrote: | I think they use katakana for Naruto on a "because they feel like it" basis. I mean, it's hard to find a more japanese name than Sakura, but her name is also written in katakana in the credits. It's also common to see names in hiragana, mainly for girls' given names. If you look at the credits to Love Hina, for instance, the guys' names are in kanji, and most of the girls' names aside from Motoko (kanji), Suu, and Sara (katakana because they're non-Japanese), are in hiragana. You're right that there is no sound difference; I wouldn't read much deep linguistic significance into it. |
I probably can't explain this with sufficient eloquence, so I ask you to willingly traverse some pretty gaping leaps of office with me.
Love Hina takes place on Earth, where Japan exists, and so people (the Japanese characters, at least) can actually have Japanese names, with the same meanings and etymologies as they would if those people weren't fictional.
Series like Naruto, Pokémon, Final Fantasy, et cetera, take place in world that are familiar to us, but ultimately aren't ours. Some characters have names that are supposed to sound Japanese, but technically aren't because those worlds don't have our world's Japan.
It helps to think of fantasy spellings of otherwise mundane-sounding (Anglo or Biblical) names in the Earthless otherworlds of stories like Star Wars and A Sonf of Ice and Fire.
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Errinundra
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Joined: 14 Jun 2008
Posts: 6516
Location: Melbourne, Oz
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Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2017 6:05 pm
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Reburying thread that died 11 years ago.
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