Nesaj123 wrote:What punctuation marks are used in Japanese and when are spaces used? (please give an example of each if you can, in romaji and hiragana)
eg. Full stop, question mark, exclamation mark, apostrophe, dash etc.
The basic punctuation marks are
。 Full stop or period. Used at the end of sentences, much the same as English.
、 Comma. Used to mark the end of a phrase and may indicate some emphasis on the end of the phrase.
「」 Quotation marks.
『』 Double quotes. Used for a quotation inside a quotation (e.g. 'He said "hello" to her').
？ Question mark. Not used in formal writing.
！ Exclamation mark. Not used in formal writing.
Here is an example from the beginning of a traditional story. As you can see, Japanese writing has no spaces.
むかし、むかし、あるところに、おじいさんとおばあさんが住んでいました。おじいさんは、毎日、竹の林に行って、竹を切って、かごやざるを作っていました。二人は、それを売って生活していました。
Mukashi, mukashi, aru tokoro ni, ojiisan to obaasan ga sunde imashita. Ojiisan wa, mainichi, kake no hayashi ni itte, kake o kitte, kago ya zaru o tsukutte imashita. Sore o utte seikatsu shite imashita.Once upon a time, in a certain place, there lived an old man and an old woman. The old man went to the bamboo grove every day, cut some bamboo and made baskets and strainers. These he sold to make his living. The next example (which is the next bit of the same story) has speech in quotation marks. There's no punctuation mark before the closing quote, and there's no question mark--it would be kind of redundant because the phrasing implies questioning:-
ある日、おじいさんは、いつものように竹の林の中に入っていきました。すると、何かがぴかぴか光っています。
「おや、どうして光っているんだろう」
Aru hi, ojiisan wa, itsumo no you ni kake no hayashi no naka ni haitte ikimashita. Suro to, nanika ga pika-pika hikatte imasu.
"Oya, doushite hikatte iru n darou"One day the old man went into the bamboo grove as usual. There was something twinkling brightly. "Oh my, why on earth is it shining?"マイケル
