There is quite a lot of differences between male and female speech in Japanese so it's hard to give any direct rules.

First there are the "femaleish" stuff like かしら, あら and わ. But there's also a bit more subtle stuff. For example, not using だ after nouns and na-adjectives. Such as "彼は変よ". It's also considered feminine to speak more formal than is considered "usual" in a situation. Also, Japanese people might find the use of わたし a bit feminine, even though it's usually called neutral.

Of course, it depends on where in Japan you are as well.

If you were told that your message was written in a girly manner, the most likely culprits are two things tobberoth mentioned -- either language that was too polite, or using よ without だ after a noun (or na-adjective).  But if you post your note we might be able to tell you what she thought was feminine about it.

In contemporary Japanese there are very few specifically "feminine" or "masculine" words (the things like かしら and the feminine わ are becoming less often used); the typical ways in which language is "feminine" is through vocal intonation and avoidance of certain patterns or words that are felt to be too blunt/masculine (e.g. sentence-ending だろう and だ, the 行こう type of conjugation, etc.)  This certainly does not mean that you will never hear women use these expressions, just that if you had to say what "average" female speech is, it would be less likely to have those features.

Just as an interesting point, I hear 僕 used by females in songs all the time. I'm not saying that means you're going to hear it in normal conversation, but it's an interesting point. I even heard a female use 俺 in a drama once, but she was suffering from multiple personality syndrome

Also, I hear guys use わ all the time in TV shows, it's barely a female only thing now.

Last edited by thecite (2010 January 29, 8:30 pm)

yudantaiteki wrote:

(I have suspected before that ぼく is used in songs a lot by women because it is only two syllables and fits the meter better, but this is just a guess.  I have never heard a grown woman in real life use 僕.)

I realised this aswell. Listen to any song where a girl says 僕 and try and fit 私 in there. It just can't work like 2 syllables does. Again same thing for 君　対　あなた though that isn't so odd, just saying.

@Siibillam: Can we see the note??

The watashi/boku/ore issue is very difficult for males (even native Japanese have trouble with this sometimes); I've gotten completely contradictory answers from different native speakers on which one should be used when.  Some people do feel like "watashi", particularly when used in non-formal situations, is feminine.  But it's confusing because no matter which one you pick to use, someone can say something bad about it.  Watashi is feminine/too polite, boku is childish, and ore is too rough.

の at the end of a sentence generally sounds pretty feminine, but you can get away with it if you want to sound a bit more gentle like 「どうしたの？」. Adding particles like よ and ね, however, is unequivocally girly 「素敵なのよね」. The only guy I've heard use this sort of sentence ending was gay, and the kind of gay who makes a point about being gay, so I'd watch out for that one. I wouldn't worry too much though, this sort of thing is surprisingly easy to pick up with enough exposure.

よandね are used all the time by men.

Last edited by thistime (2010 February 01, 6:05 pm)