U (kana)
Character of the Japanese writing system / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about U (kana)?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
U (hiragana: う, katakana: ウ) is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one mora. In the modern Japanese system of alphabetical order, they occupy the third place in the modern Gojūon (五十音) system of collating kana. In the Iroha, they occupied the 24th position, between む and ゐ. In the Gojūon chart (ordered by columns, from right to left), う lies in the first column (あ行, "column A") and the third row (う段, "row U"). Both represent the sound [ɯ]. In the Ainu language, the small katakana ゥ represents a diphthong, and is written as w in the Latin alphabet.
Other additional forms | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
u | |||
---|---|---|---|
| |||
transliteration | u | ||
hiragana origin | 宇 | ||
katakana origin | 宇 | ||
Man'yōgana | 宇 羽 于 有 卯 烏 得 | ||
spelling kana | 上野のウ (Ueno no "u") | ||
pronunciation |
The hiragana form with dakuten, ゔ, representing the sound "v", is rarely seen in older words, since the sound does not occur in native Japanese words. However, it is becoming more common with Western influences.[citation needed]