I prefer Hiragana.

I am yet to meet a foreigner who likes katakana. Either because it's harder to read (シ vs ツ, カ-kana vs 力-kanji, etc.) or because the Japanese use it to mutilate their precious English words. Personally I don't care. Sure, I find all-katakana texts harder to read than all-hiragana ones and I occasionally forget how to write some syllables in katakana (when I write by hand I always forget ネ for some reason), but that's mostly due to a lack of exposure/practice rather than dislike. I think both look cool, in their own way.

Hiragana. It's more interesting aesthetically. Katakana is just like kanji-lite.

I've been using my OS in Japanese for three years now, so I think I'm sufficiently exposed to katakana but I still prefer the hiragana. I can quickly scan the well known menus in my softwares, but when I stumble across a katakana word while reading some regular text it still slows me down and I'm apt to misread it.

nadiatims Wrote:Katakana is just like kanji-lite.

Then hiragana is cursive-kanji-lite.

変体仮名<3

Hiragana. Hiragana are more cute.

Hiragana by a long shot. It just looks so much better.

Tori-kun Wrote:変体仮名<3

Isn't that both?

The murder of the english language that is the primary use of katakana makes it impossible for me to like it. The script itself looks kinda cool though.

The question is kinda like asking me what my favourite letter of the alphabet is though... can't say i've put much thought into it.

I think katakana is easier to write, but I think hiragana is easier to read. I think they both look cool though :-).

Hiragana absolutely. I found Katakana much harder to remember as they pretty much have about one stroke or less per character. Hiragana seemed much more pleasing.

Katakana is irritating, especially when the english word they have used doesn't mean what it sounds like. e.g. mansion.

Definitely prefer hiragana, for clarity and looks better.

I like hiragana better because they are prettier and because I learned them first. I was really reluctant to learn Katana at first but I don't mind them anymore; I actually think they are, apart from a few exceptions, easier to remember than Hiragana.

Tori-kun Wrote:変体仮名<3

Ugh no. I'm just glad I don't have to do too much 崩し字 for my research...

As someone with very little vocabulary, I like katakana more just because I'm more likely to be able to understand any random loan word more than any random native word. This will change of course . I also think it looks cooler.

I have this above-average borderline obsessive fascination with Katakana. I love how it looks, I love how it's used, I just really love it. I would read a book on katakana. I've looked for them, but they don't seem to exist. Looks like I'm going to have to write one myself.

...I'm the minority here, I see.

Teaish, try 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (村上春樹). It has several long passages (the lines of some dyslexic girl, I think) with all the kanji replaced with katakana. I hated it and only read half of the first book, though.

temporary Wrote:Teaish, try 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (村上春樹). It has several long passages (the lines of some dyslexic girl, I think) with all the kanji replaced with katakana. I hated it and only read half of the first book, though.

Oh, dear. As much as I love katakana, I don't think I could stand reading long strings of it with no spaces...

Teaish Wrote:I have this above-average borderline obsessive fascination with Katakana. I love how it looks, I love how it's used, I just really love it. I would read a book on katakana. I've looked for them, but they don't seem to exist. Looks like I'm going to have to write one myself.

...I'm the minority here, I see.

Fun fact, pretty much every imperial Japanese army manual is written in all katakana.

So the mildly illiterate soldiers can read it.

Well, that was also because katakana was often associated with men and learning (due to its Buddhist origins). This survived quite a while; even a Genji book that I use from the 1950's has its introduction all in katakana and kanji.

Yes and katakana was banned by the GHQ after the war due to it's association with men and militarism. Which is a big reason why verb inflections are written in hiragana today, AFAIK.

But the main reason the books were in all katakana because most Japanese soldiers couldn't read kanji. And yea, hiragana was for the ladies.