THE ART

OF JAPANESE PUNCTUATION

MARCH 21, 2016 2773 WORDS WRITTEN BY KOICHI AND KRISTEN DEXTER ART BY AYA
FRANCISCO
When you're sitting there writing something, you may take the little things for granted little things
likeperiods, commas, and quotation marks. That's cool they only bind together everything a
sentence holds dear. If you didn't have these little things, this "punctuation" if you will, the fabric of
sentence time would tear apart, creating some kind of super-black hole. (Ironically, it would just look
like a period.)
And, wouldn't you know it, punctuation exists in Japanese as well! It's not that much different from
English punctuation, but there are definitely a few things to keep in mind if you want to read
Japanese more easily or one day get into Japanese translation. In this article, I'm going to cover
pretty much all the Japanese punctuation you'll run into. In order to learn it, it'll only take a quick
read. Feel free to use this article as reference!
Let's get started with some backstory.

JAPANESE PUNCTUATION BEFORE THE WEST

This may be shocking, but before the Meiji era there was no punctuation in Japanese. Their version
of the modern-day period ( ) was introduced from China centuries earlier. But of course, but it was
ignored. When itwas used, it was put just about anywhere to mean just about anything.
Thanks to Emperor Meiji's love for Western literature, punctuation like the period and comma ( )
eventually made its way into written Japanese. In 1946, some years after the Meiji Restoration, the
Ministry of Education passed a bill, letting people know how they were supposed to use them.
Luckily for us English speakers, this means that a lot of Japanese punctuation symbols are nice and
familiar! Unless of course you're trying to read anything pre-WWII, in which case the punctuation is
weird and/or nonexistent.

FULL-WIDTH SPACING
One thing that really stands out to me in Japanese writing is the spacing. While it differs between
operating systems, handwriting style, and your Japanese IME, Japanese typography tends to be
something known as "full-width." English, on the other hand, is "half-width." Can you see the
difference?

nandedarou?

While you can type in half-width spaces in Japanese, it looks crowded compared to text you'll see
everywhere else. The Japanese language was made to be nice and spread out. And that carries over to
their punctuation, as well. There are technically no spaces between letters or words in Japanese. The
only place you will find "extra" space is after punctuation, where they are automatically included.
This saves anyone typing in Japanese from having to hit the space bar unnecessarily, especially since
it's done so infrequently otherwise.
To sum things up, you don't usually have to worry about adding spaces between sentences.
Punctuation has you covered. For example:

Find the comma and the period. There's a little half-width (normal width in English) space after
them, even though I didn't add them in. All I did was type the comma and period themselves it all
counts as one "letter", even when you try to highlight it (go ahead, try and highlight the above
sentence).
Now that you know all about empty space in Japanese writing, what about learning all the (main)
Japanese punctuation available to you? Let's do it!

JAPANESE PUNCTUATION MARKS

Because Japanese punctuation is so similar to English punctuation, there is a lot of overlap. As I
mentioned earlier, however, there also tend to be a lot of subtle differences, which I'll go over below.

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Period

The Japanese period is used much the same as the English period. It marks a full-stop, or end to a
sentence. In vertical writing, it sits at the bottom right, below the character before it. If the sentence
is on its own or has quotes, however, the Japanese period is omitted most of the time. Japanese
periods look like this:

The period itself is a small circle, and not a dot. This character is used the majority of the time in
written Japanese, though, occasionally, you will see Western-style periods when a sentence ends with
an English word.

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Comma

The Japanese comma, like the Japanese period, is used in much the same way as the English one. It's
put in the same place as the period (bottom right after the word) in vertical writing, as well.

Comma usage in Japanese is incredibly liberal compared to English. You can stick it pretty much
wherever you want a break or pause in your sentence. Just don't abuse the power, please, it, is,
irritating.

()

Single Quotation Marks

Instead of things that look like "this" for quotation marks, which would get confusing because of
dakuten (more on that later), the Japanese use little half-brackets to indicate quotes. Although these
are called "single quotation marks" or "single quotes", which might make you think of 'this', they are
the most common style of quote to use in Japanese. Almost any time you need to use a marker for
quotes, you'll use single quotes.

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Double Quotation Marks

Double quotes are a lot less common than single quotes, but they have one good purpose. You know
when you have to quote something that's quoting something else? In English, that usually looks like
this: "The dog said 'woof' and ran away."
In Japanese punctuation, double quotes go inside single quotes when you're quoting text within text.
It's the same rules as in British English punctuation (single first, double second).
Sometimes people will use these double quotes alone as if they are single quotes, but that's a stylistic
choice on their part.

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Wave Dash

The wave dash isn't really similar to the Western (straight) dash in use. But it's likely the wave dash
became popular because straight-line-dashes are already used in katakana to show a long vowel, and
not differentiating it here would be confusing.
There are some uses that are like the Western dash, like showing a range of something (,
, etc), but there are some Japanese-only uses of this punctuation, including drawing out and
changing the pitch of a vowel sound (), showing where something is from (),
and marking subtitles ().

() or () or () or ()

Interpunct

The interpunct is a dot that aligns with the vertical or horizontal center (depending on writing
direction) with the words next to it. It's typically used to break up words that go together. You see
this most often when you have multiple words written in katakana, like foreign names.
It can be used with Japanese words, as well, though the use is more specialized in those cases. Some
Japanese words, when placed side by side, can be ambiguous because combinations of kanji can
mean different things. And if you have too many kanji next to each other it can get confusing.
Finally, the interpunct is used to break up lists, act as decimal points when writing numbers in kanji
(why would you do that, please don't do that), and separate anything else that needs clarification. For
example:

or or () or ()

Question Mark

You'd think the Japanese question mark would be self explanatory, but there's a thing or two you
ought to know about it. Just like its Western-style counterpart it indicates a question that's simple
enough. Thing is, though that Japanese already has a grammar-based marker () to show that
you're making an inquiry, rendering any further punctuation redundant most of the time. As such,
you won't see question marks in formal writing. Casual writing is a different story, because 1) casual
writing has different rules in most languages and 2) Japanese speakers will often drop in
conversation in exchange for a questioning tone of voice, which is hard to convey without a question
mark.

() or or () or

Exclamation Point

The Japanese exclamation mark is used just like the Western one. It shows volume or emotion or
both. You won't see exclamation marks in formal Japanese, though it's really common everywhere
else, especially on Twitter, email, and text.

()

Parentheses

These look like English parentheses, but they have the extra spaces I mentioned when I covered fullwidth spacing. They're often used to show the kana readings of kanji words for example:
)
They're also used an awful lot online in Japanese dictionaries and other educational resources (like
dusty paper books). And, of course, they're used for annotations (like this) within a sentence.

() or () or () or
()

Thick Brackets

Finally! Some Japanese punctuation we don't have in English! Sure, we have [] brackets,

called in Japanese, but look at these dark ones! Brackets like this don't have a singular
use, and they can really be used for anything; showing emphasis, listing items, or just making your
brackets stand out more.

()

Brackets

Just like the thick brackets, there is no specific use for these curly braces either. Often, though, you'll
see them in inside normal bracketsand in mathematical equations, too. I could have added
about ten other bracket variations to this list. Seriously, there are way too many bracket types in
Japanese.

()

Ellipsis

Unlike the English ellipsis, the Japanese version typically hovers around the vertical middle of the
line, instead of sitting at the bottom (though they can be formatted that way, as well). There can be as
few as two or as many as six or more . They can symbolize the passing of time, silence, or a
pause. They also convey silent emotion, which you'll recognize if you read a lot of anime and manga.
Finally, you may also see them in text to symbolize long vowels or an omission or missing content.

JAPANESE PHONETIC MARKS

These aren't technically punctuation, but they're important symbols
you'll see in Japanese and you should know what they mean, too.

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Dakuten or Tenten

These are the little marks you see next certain kana to make them "voiced." What that means,
basically, is that your vocal cords vibrate when you say a them. They look like English quotations
marks, which is probably why the Japanese version was created and is used way more often. They
look like this when they're attached to kana:

And, just like the extra space that's added automatically between characters when you type in
Japanese, you don't have to add these dakuten manually. Thanks to romaji you just type things how
they sound for example, "ga" for and the correct dakuten are added to the hiragana or
katakana without any extra effort on your part. Thanks, technology!

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Handakuten or Maru

The handakuten is similar to dakuten, but this little open circle means that the consonant it's
attached to is "half" voiced. There are only a few of these in Japanese and they all make the "p" sound.

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Small Tsu or Double Consonant

If you see this smaller version of the hiragana , it is not pronounced "tsu" (ever!). If you see it in
the middle of a word, before a consonant, it means that the consonant after it is a "double" consonant.
If you see it at the end of a word (before the particle in many onomatopoeia) then it's a glottal stop.
That means it's kind of like a constricted sound in your throat (that's your glottis in there, thus the
name). The katakana version looks like this .

() or () or () or ()

Long Vowel Mark

Long vowel marks mark long vowels. So, instead of , you'd write . Simple right?
You'll mostly see these in katakana, hardly ever in hiragana. The only time you'll see them with
hiragana is at the end of a sentence or after a drawn out particle or interjection. When it's used like
that, it's interchangeable with.

BONUS SYMBOLS
While we're at it, let's look at some other symbols you're bound to see in Japanese.

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Iteration Mark

This neat-looking kanji is something called an iteration mark. That's a fancy way of saying it is a
"repeater", i.e. any kanji it follows is repeated. You've probably seen it in words

like (people),
(sometimes), and even place names like (Yoyogi [Park]).
There used to be repeaters for kana too, but they're hardly ever used nowadays. They look like this:

Hiragana unvoiced:

Katakana unvoiced:

Hiragana voiced:

Katakana voiced:

: & Replacement

This may look like a small katakana (and it is), but it's also used as a replacement for the
counter (), especially in months: (). See how it isn't read , but ? So when you
come across , you read it as , or five months. You'll also see it pop up in place names

like Chigasaki , and Sekigahara . But instead of , it's

pronounced because rendaku. Totally not confusing, right?

()

Yen Symbol

The yen symbol is used just like the dollar sign $ in English. You put it before the numbers it's
referencing. You'll see this anywhere money is involved like receipts, price tags, online stores. But
make sure you don't accidentally write this: . is the kanji for yen. You need to pick! It's
either or .

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Postal Mark

This postal mark is used on addresses to indicate the postal code. That's pretty important if you have
a Japanese pen-pal or if you're going to be mailing things in Japan. The one in the circle is usually on
maps for post offices, so if you need to find the post office, look for this symbol. They're on mailboxes
too, usually in red and white, unlike the American blue you may be used to.

There are plenty of other punctuation marks in Japanese, but these are the main ones (or the ones
that I thought were important to learn). You'll also see a bunch of different brackets, colons, and so
on in Japanese. But it should be pretty simple to understand how they're used and what they're doing
there, now that you've learned the rules I've laid out here.
That does bring me to one last thing, which I think is pretty interesting, and that is:

KAOMOJI AS JAPANESE PUNCTUATION

Kaomoji , which translates to "Face Letters", is using text to draw little faces which show
some kind of emotion. They're basically Japanese emoticons. While kaomoji will probably never be
officially considered punctuation, I feel like it is a sort of new wave post-modern neo-punctuation.
When put together, they are characters that represent strong emotion, like the exclamation mark.
They can also represent confusion or a questioning tone, like a question mark. On top of that, there
are probably 20-30 different "feelings" they can represent that add to your sentences or paragraphs
or phrases. While they aren't a single character (neither is an ellipsis, so take that punctuation
snobs!), they do represent something which adds feeling to the sentence. That's basically what
punctuation does, so why not kaomoji too?
If kaomoji can indeed be considered punctuation, there'd be a lot of them too many to add to this
list. Good thing we have a big kaomoji guide.
In terms of using kaomoji in Japanese, they usually go at the end of sentences or phrases. Think of
them as periods that also convey emotion. Take that period! Go back to your soulless home in the
country of boring-ville(;;)

Anyways, there you have it. I hope you learned something new, and thought about kaomoji a little bit,
too. There really isn't a lot to learn when it comes to Japanese punctuation because you have most of
the concepts down already (assuming you're not reading this as a tiny baby). It's really the subtleties
that are interesting, I think, so enjoy them but don't get too hung up on them.
SOURCES

SEELEY, CHRISTOPHER. A HISTORY OF WRITING IN JAPAN. HAWAII: UNIVERSITY OF

HAWAII PRESS, 2000 (P.183-184).

TWINE, NANNETTE. THE ADOPTION OF PUNCTUATION IN JAPANESE SCRIPT. IN

VISIBLE LANGUAGE (1984) 229-237.

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