punctuation masterpost
Being a completely different language than English in every other way, it stands to reason that of course Japanese would have unique punctuation as well. I find that not many resources go over them much and they can really trip up new learners, so I’m doing it now.
。Period: Same function, just looks different.
「」Quotation Brackets: Same function as quotation marks, they just look different. They’re also orientated differently when writing vertically.
か/よ Particles: I’ve gone over particles before. Particularly these two, which are used as question markers and exclamation markers, respectively.
◯ “Maru”: These large circles are used to indicate blank spaces in speech, much like typing ____ in English. They are also a quick, informal way of writing 丸 because they’re pronounced the same.
・Word Breaks: The same function as / marks. Can also be used for emphasis or to indicate pause. Commonly seen when directly translating English to Japanese (ex ヒラリ・コリントン= Hillary Clinton).
々 Repeaters: A symbol used when repeating the same character in a word (漸々 = zenzen).
っ Sound Repeaters: You may have noticed that some words in Japanese use double-consonants. When writing in kana, that would be indicated with a tiny つ character. (まったく = mattaku).
