FUJITSU's Guide to Japanese

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5PreliminariesFeatures of JapaneseI. Features of Japanese Grammar1. Parts of speechThe Japanese language is composed of nouns, adjectives, verbs, conjunctions, particles, etc.2. Word orderIn Japanese the predicate is always placed at the end of the sentence. Also, modifiers come before the word to be modified. 3. Predicate and conjugationIn Japanese, the predicate can be a noun, adjective or verb. You change the form of the predicate （conjugate it） to indicate tense and whether the sentence is affirmative or not. There are two types of adjectives in Japanese, i-adjectives and na-adjectives, and they conjugate differently.In Japanese, words do not change to indicate person, gender or number.4. ParticlesParticles are attached to words and phrases. Within a sentence, particles are used to indicate the relationship between words, to add various meanings and to show the speaker's intention.5. OmissionIf the subject or object of the sentence is understood from the context, it is frequently omitted. II. Japanese CharactersThere are three types of characters in Japanese: hiragana, katakana and kanji. Kanji and hiragana are used to write Japanese. Katakana is used to write foreign place names, foreign names, foreign cultural expressions, and foreign loan words used in Japanese. Other than these three types of characters, Romanized letters are also used. These are used to depict Japanese sounds in an easily understood alphabetical form for foreigners, so while they are often used on such things as station signs, etc., they are not found in ordinary usage. The core Japanese alphabet consists of 50 key hiragana and katakana characters. In Japanese these are referred to as "Gojuon."

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