Japanese Onomatopoeia: How To Add Color To Your Japanese Vocabulary

Japanese onomatopoeia, also known as “giongo” and “gitaigo”, are words that imitate or describe the sounds of objects, actions, emotions, and situations in everyday life. These words are very common in the Japanese language and are used in everyday conversation, in the media, and in literature.

In Spanish they would be words like ¡din don! for the ringing of the bells, quiquiriquí! like the crow of the rooster, ahem, ahem! like a throat clearing, to name a few.

Japanese onomatopoeia fall into two main categories: giongo and gitaigo. Giongo refers to words that imitate the sounds of things, such as “pika pika” for the sound of a spark, “gacha gacha” for the sound of something repeatedly opening and closing, or “baku baku.” for the sound of eating voraciously.

On the other hand, gitaigo refers to words that describe actions and situations, such as “kirakira” for something that shines brightly, “zawazawa” for an awkward or nervous situation, or “nikoniko” for a kind smile.

In addition, in the Japanese language, there are also onomatopoeias that describe emotions, such as “yay” for joy or “gusu gusu” for crying, and onomatopoeias that describe the environment, such as “shizuka” for a calm environment or “gouin” for a noisy environment.

It is said that the Japanese language is rich in these types of words to indicate not only movements or songs of animals, but also for actions, emotions and feelings.

Onomatopoeia have so much power in Japanese that there are even onomatopoeia dictionaries with around 4,500 words.

If you like anime and manga, you may have noticed the regular use of these words.

Although its tone is rather informal, with onomatopoeia you can say more in less time . You can even communicate more easily by just saying two words (kan kan, shin shin, en en) instead of explaining and having to use more words (sometimes difficult words) to finally say what you want. Sometimes we don’t know the verb to use, and if we happen to know the onomatopoeia we can use it.

Japanese onomatopoeia are an important part of Japanese language and culture, and using them can help improve communication and understanding in everyday conversation.