In order to establish a basic reading ability, a student of the Japanese language should understand hiragana. Katakana is the next step. As all proper English words can be expressed with 26 letters, either upper-case or lower-case, all proper Japanese words can be expressed with 46 kana, either katakana or hiragana.
Katakana vs. Hiragana
Compared with hiragana, in general, katakana are straighter and blockier, with shorter if not fewer strokes. As a, i, u, e, and o are the basic romaji equivalents of hiragana, for the purposes of this article, A, I, U, E, and O will be used as the katakana equivalents. As ka, ki, ku, ke, and ko constitute the k-set of hiragana, KA, KI, KU, KE, and KO will be used for the K-set of katakana.
As capital and lower-case letters sometimes bear a strong resemblance to each other, and other times do not, katakana and hiragana have their similarities and differences. HE and he, for example, may seem exactly the same character, with almost no difference when written. YO and yo are completely different characters. The Japanese Writing Tutor has an excellent interface that can switch between katakana, romaji, and hiragana. The site also features animated directions showing how to write the characters.
While katakana can be used at any time in place of hiragana, in practice, there are only specific instances when katakana use is appropriate. The equivalent of overusing katakana in Japanese can be understood in the same way that writing an essay in English with the caps lock on would be inappropriate.
Katakana Usage Rules
Katakana are primarily used to write words that are not native to the Japanese language. For example, loan words in Japanese (excluding most Chinese words) are usually written in katakana. For example, the Japanese word for pizza is, in katakana, PIZA.
Non-Japanese names are also written in katakana. The author's foreign registration card in Japan listed his first name as KAIRU. Foreign movie stars are known in Japan by katakana pronunciation of their names.
Katakana is also used for onomatopoeias, some company names like SUZUKI or TOYOTA, and relatively new Japanese words, such as KARAOKE. Just as capital letters can used to emphasize, katakana is sometimes used in the same way.
Katakana Dakuten and Glides
Just as hiragana writing is supplemented with basic dakuten and glides to complete the full range of proper Japanese pronunciation, katakana follows the same rules.
There is essentially no change between basic ten-ten and maru usage for hiragana and ten-ten and maru usage for katakana. Glides are formed for katakana using the katakana Y-set.
However, there are some glides and ten-ten usage particular to katakana. Sofa is rendered in Japanese as SOFA, even though there is no standard FA katakana in Japanese. FA is expressed with katakana HU followed by a small katakana A, mimicking a Y-set glide. Dakuten on A, I, U, E, and O has recently been used to express the consonant v, as in VA, VI, VU, VE, and VO. New katakana glides and dakuten pronunciations are becoming more popular, especially with increased international online conversation. Following this trend, it seems likely that many currently non-standard usages of the characters will likely become standard in the future.
Katakana are essentially an alternative set of hiragana used for foreign or relatively new expressions in Japanese. A student of Japanese should try to memorize hiragana and katakana as larger set in order to develop a reading and writing ability as quickly and efficiently as possible. Mastering hiragana and katakana is key to Japanese fluency, especially because kanji, the next major step in reading and writing Japanese, can be difficult even for native Japanese speakers.
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