Japanese writing system is made of three different kinds of characters:hiragana, katakana, kanji and
katakana is
considered to be modified version of kanji.
When non-Japanese speakers like me think of Japanese writing, katakana
might be the first thing yet the only thing that pops up in their mind.
In Japanese language, there are three major reasons to use katakana:
loanwords, emphasis, and onomatopoeia.
Loanwords
are words or concepts that borrowed from other countries. Loanwords are
widely used today because it can replicate the foreign pronouciation and
also show an impression of sophistication and modernity.( "Japanese
Writing System") For eample, "コンビニ" in Japanese means convenient store
and it is pronouced "konbini". They sound very alike.
In addition, katakana is also used in the Japanese language for emphasis. For instance, "カッコイイ" that used in this advertisment:
"カッコイイ" which means stylish or cool is usually written in hiragana. However, since it appeared on this advertisment, people just want to emphasize the coolness of the drink they are trying to sell, they used katakana to emphasis the word "かっこいい". People might wondering why katakana can emphasize the word but hiragana doesn't. My guess is katakana is easier to pick out because it has simpler(less stokes than hiragana) and sharper stokes. The use of katakana in advertisements can also help the companies gain reputation among consumers by emphasizing their products are internationally traded, since katakana is generally used for foreign words.
Finally, in Japanese, words are written in katakana if they are
onomatopoeia words. Such as the word "パツ" that used in the "Dragon Ball"
manga below:
In this case, jumping is given a sound effect represented as "パツ". It gives us a sense that the object jumps so fast that you can actually hear the action.
