Japanese Dialects Masterpost
Dialects can be fun and offer cultural insight. They may be useful to learn, though usually only if you have geographical links to a specific area of Japan- perhaps you have family there, personal heritage there, you live there, or are going to do a language exchange in a specific area. Linguists may also be interested just because they are really interesting.
In almost all instances for non-Japanese people learning to understand a dialect when it’s spoken/written (rather than produce it in your own speech) would suffice for communication. As far as I can see the best reason to learn to actually speak a dialect is because you want to communicate with elderly people from that region specifically; most young people have had far more media exposure so they can easily use ‘standard Japanese’/ Tokyo dialect.
If a non-native Japanese speaker learns a dialect and can’t speak standard Japanese, they may find they are seriously limited in conversations and people will inevitably find it weird. They might just find they are incomprehensible:
’I spent three years living in Nemuro, the easternmost town in Hokkaido. […] Hokkaido-ben is often misunderstood outside Hokkaido, Nemuro-ben can’t be understood even in the next town over. So it’s basically useless unless you’re planning a trip to Nemuro (which I would recommend.) However, it does show how many variations there are in dialect, even within one island.’ [Tofugu, my emphasis]
Someone with a low communicative ability in English who could only speak using Cockney rhyming slang, but didn’t know standard English unfortunately would sound ridiculous to natives of that area. It would seem crazy to know ‘You’re ‘aving a bubble mate!’, but not ’You must be joking!’. They’d sound odd and in many instances their language would sound antiquated. Be aware that you may well get a similar reaction if you pepper your speech with regional dialect as a non-Japanese person without being conversationally fluent in standard Japanese. I’m not saying don’t learn dialects, please do if they interest you, learning to understand them when you hear them, rather than necessarily use them in your own speech, is a great idea. If you want to speak in them, please try to do it all in good time and in a respectful way that is not accessorizing the language and culture.
Many of the resources here will be only in Japanese, as this post is aimed at higher intermediate and advanced learners. The section below is in mostly English and will give you a general overview if you’re interested:
lingualift article (scroll down past their email sign up stuff to read)
FluentU will teach you a few basic phrases in a variety of dialects
Wikibooks has links to a few examples of phrases in different dialects
The wikipedia article will give you an informative introduction
Tofugu has a few articles on dialects: Hokkaido | Tohoku | Kansai
Japan Times article on dialects
For intermediate and Advanced learners:
I’ve organised this by prefecture, but it’s worth noting that some prefectures contain several dialects and I’m by no means an expert, I hope the Tumblr Japanese learning community can contribute to and help improve this post.
General:
Dictionary for dialects in EVERY prefecture
Short animations about various dialects
Women from every prefecture saying I love you in their regional dialect
There tend to be Line stickers on sale for dialects, as people think they’re cute and want to show local pride, try searching the Line sticker store for the dialect you want and you can use them in conversations, which will give you a little practise.
Big Weblio guide to all prefectures’ dialects
方言で話そう on Twitter will show you phrases in a variety of regional dialects from around the country
Project Guttenburg article which gets more into the linguistics of Kansai ben
I made a post on Kansai ben a while back and @similarjapanesewords made a post about it before too
video comparing local variations of the same phrase spoken by native speakers 1 2
This Youtube channel has a lot of different dialect tutorials (all Japanese)
There’s another Youtube channel here too (all Japanese)
The Japanese Wikipedia page has a lot more detailed information than the English page, naturally.
Maps of where some dialects are spoken
Wikipedia has a lot of basic introductory information on dialects, there are almost certainly dialects I’ve missed from this list, if you search for the prefecture or geographical location and the word 弁 or 方言 then you’re likely to find a dialect, even if it isn’t simply called [place name]弁.
Hokkaidō | Hokkaidō ben dictionary | Hougen.u-biq | Tofugu introducation to Hokkaido ben
Aomori | Goo Aomori ben dictionary | Japanesepod101 1 2 3 4 5 | animation about Aomori ben | Kindle book written in Aomori ben
Iwate | Phrase guide | dialect dictionary
Miyagi | Hougen.u-biq | Vocabulary | Introduction to Miyagi ben | Sendai ben
Akita | Akita ben course | How to use け in Akita ben | How to use こ in Akita ben
Yamagata | A few introductory phrases | Yamagata ben phrases | Yamagata ben dajare | Yamagata ben grammar
Fukushima | Fukushima ben Dictionary | Usage guide
Ibaraki | Ibaraki ben dictionary | Learn Ibaraki ben phrases
Tochigi | Tochigi ben guide to pronunciation and expressions | Tochigi ben dictionary |
Gunma | Five page vocabulary guide | 7 lesson course in speaking Gunma ben
Saitama | North Saitama dialect vocabulary | Phrases | More vocabulary | Saitama ben dictionary on Goo
Chiba | East Chiba dialect | Learn Bōsō dialect | Another Bōsō website | Bōsō dialect quiz | Sotobō dialect guide
Tokyo | dictionary | Tokyo dialect on Jlect | Tokyo ben on Chaku wiki | About Tokyo ben | vocabulary
Kanagawa | 10 phrases | Yokohama and Kanagawa dialect dictionary | Kanagawa ben on chaku wiki
Niigata | Niigata ben dictionary | Japanesepod101 1 2 3
Toyama | Vocabulary | Toyama ben on Wikibooks | Simple phrases | About Toyama ben | Basic introduction to Toyama ben | Toyama dialect competition
Ishikawa | Ishikawa ben Dictionary on Goo | Wikibooks Ishikawa dialect guide | Kanazawa ben guide | English book on Kanazawa ben
Fukui | Fukuiben.com | Hokuriku dialect (spoken in several prefectures)
Yamanashi | Koshu Dialect Laboratory | Koshu ben dictionary | Yamanashi ben on Goo | There are a couple of posts here in English
Nagano | Goo Nagano ben dictionary | Nagano prefecture guide to Nagano dialect | Matsumoto dialect page
Gifu | Large vocabulary list | Mino ben guide | PDF guide with accent information etc | another vocabulary list | Short video in Mino Ben
Shizuoka | Page with links to several local dialects found in Shizuoka | Shizuoka ben version of a commerical | 10 funny phrases
Aichi | Hougen.u-biq | Nagoya ben website
Mie | phrase guide | features of Mie ben
Shiga | large word and phrase list | vocabulary list
Kyoto | Hougen.u-biq | vocabulary list | More vocabulary
Osaka | Hougen.u-biq | video tutorial | Kansai ben/Osaka ben word list
Hyōgo | vocabulary list | Hyogo ben on chaku Wiki |
Nara | Nara dialect on Chaku Wiki | Video discussing the subtelties of Nara dialect within Kansai ben | vocabulary list
Wakayama | Word list | Some honorific expressions in Wakayama dialect PDF | Wakayama ben article | Wakayama Kansai ben vocabulary | Apparently there’ll be a radio show about Wakayama dialect soon so maybe they’ll have a podcast
Tottori | dictionary | large word and phrase list | another vocabulary and phrase list
Shimane | Izumo-ben 出雲弁 | Izumo ben in detail
Okayama | large word and phrase list | Okayama ben corner | Interesting Okayama ben
Hiroshima | Hougen.u-biq | Hiroshima dialect
Yamaguchi | Yamaguchi ben | Vocabulary | quiz
Tokushima | Awa ben video tutorial | vocabulary list | large phrase and vocabulary list
Kagawa | vocabulary and phrase list | phrase list
Ehime | Some Iyo vocabulary | Iyo dialect guide
Kochi | Origins of Tosa ben and Hata ben PDF (bilingual) | Tosa ben introduction | Hata dialect introduction | The Lexicon of Kochi Japanese PDF (academic paper) | Kochi funpage on Youtube
Fukuoka | series of videos on how to use Hakata ben | video tutoiral | verb conjugations
Saga | Saga ben dictionary | Goo Saga ben dictionary
Nagasaki | Nagasaki ben resource with recordings of sample dialogues | Goo Nagasaki ben dictionary | A story book written in Nagasaki ben (available on Kindle)
Kumamoto | How to use Kumamoto ben | Kumamoto ken vocabulary, a lot of these seem rough/rude
Ōita | video | Goo Ōita ben dictionary
Miyazaki | Miyazaki ben explanation | vocabulary and explanation
Kagoshima | Vocabulary | big word list | More vocabulary and phrases
Okinawa | Traveller’s guide to Okinawan dialects | Huge list of Ryukyuan vocabulary | Uchinaguchi dictionary
There are books on dialects, typically designed for native speakers, such as this dialect dictionary, or this Tosa ben guide available in Japan, but you’d need some very advanced Japanese to be able to access them, in which case I doubt you’d be following my blog.
Beyond regional dialects there are also many languages that are native to Japan that are not Japanese. If you’re interested in learning Ainu, one of the Ryukyuan languages, Japanese sign language, or another language from Japan that is not standard spoken Japanese then this Tofugu article may interest you. Many of these languages are endangered.
Thanks to these bloggers who helped contribute to this post:
@suzustarlight @tomatograffiti @grapefruitcake
Disclaimer: There are a massive number of regional dialects in Japan, I am neither Japanese, nor an expert, so inevitably I will miss some off this list. If you want to share information about a dialect from a part of Japan you’ve visited or lived in please reblog and add some information or resources, so that we can get this post to a point where it’s as comprehensive as possible. Many thanks!
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