Okurigana
Okurigana (送り仮名, literally "accompanying letters") are
kana suffixes following
kanji stems in
Japanese written words. Generally used to inflect an adjective or verb,
okurigana can indicate tense (past or present/future), affirmative/negative meaning, or
grammatical politeness, among many other functions. In modern usage,
okurigana are almost invariably written with
hiragana;
katakana were also commonly used in the past.
Adjectives in Japanese use
okurigana to indicate
tense and affirmation/negation, with all adjectives using the same pattern of suffixes for each case. A simple example uses the character "高" (high) to express the four basic cases of a Japanese adjective. The root meaning of the word is expressed via the
kanji ("高", read
taka and meaning "high" in each of these cases), but crucial information (negation and tense) can only be understood by reading the
okurigana following the kanji stem.
; 高い (takai) : High (positive, present/future), meaning "[It is] expensive" or "[It is] high"
高かった (takakatta) : High (positive, past), meaning "[It was] expensive/high"; 高くない (takakunai) : High (negative, present/future), meaning "[It is not] expensive/high"
高くなかった (takakunakatta) : High (negative, past), meaning "[It was not] expensive/high"
Japanese verbs follow a similar pattern; the root meaning is generally expressed by using one or more kanji at the start of the word, and then tense, negation, grammatical politeness, and other language features are expressed by following okurigana.
; 食べる (taberu) : To eat (positive, present/future, direct politeness), meaning "[I/you/etc.] eat"; 食べない (tabenai) : To eat (negative, present/future, direct), meaning "[I/you/etc.] do not eat"
食べた (tabeta) : To eat (positive, past, direct), meaning "[I/you/etc.] ate/have eaten"; 食べなかった (tabenakatta) : To eat (negative, past, direct), meaning "[I/you/etc.] did not eat/have not eaten"
Compare the direct polite verb forms to their distant forms, which follow a similar pattern, but whose meaning indicates more distance between the speaker and the listener:
; 食べます (tabemasu) : To eat (positive, present/future, distant politeness), meaning "[My group/your group] eats"
食べませ" (tabemasen) : To eat (negative, present/future, distant), meaning "[My group/your group] does not eat"; 食べました (tabemashita) : To eat (positive, past, distant), meaning "[My group/your group] ate/has eaten"
食べませ"でした (tabemasen deshita) : To eat (negative, past, distant), meaning "[My group/your group] did not eat/has not eaten"Okurigana are also used to disambiguate
kanji that have multiple readings. Since
kanji, especially the most common ones, can be used for words with many (usually similar) meanings—but different pronunciations—key
okurigana placed after the
kanji help the reader to know which meaning and reading were intended.
Disambiguation examples include common verbs which use the characters "上" (up) and "下" (down):
; 上がる (agaru) : "to ascend/to make ready/to complete", in which 上 is read "a"
上る (noboru) : "to climb/to go up", in which 上 is read "nobo"; 下さる (kudasaru) : "to give [to the speaker as an inferior]", in which 下 is read "kuda"
下りる (oriru) : "to get off/to descend", in which 下 is read "o"; 下がる (sagaru) : "to dangle", in which 下 is read "sa"
; 話 (hanashi) : talk, noun; 話し (hanashi) : to talk, a verb form, continuous
While the
Japanese Ministry of Education prescribes rules on how to use
okurigana, in practice there is much variation, particularly in older texts and online. For instance, the standard spelling of the word "kuregata" is 暮れ方, but it will sometimes be seen as 暮方.
