Beginner Japanese/Introduction to the Japanese Language

Reading

 * Japanese Phrasebook — Greetings and farewell.
 * introduction to the Japanese language.

Words to know

 * Chinese ideographic characters.
 * Kana: The syllabaries used to write Japanese words and particles using characters that represent syllables. The two syllabaries are called hiragana and katakana.
 * Romanized Japanese.

Quiz
Please write all answers in lowercase and rōmaji, where applicable.

{  How would you write, "Cats eat mice" in Japanese? { neko wa nezumi o kuu|neko wa nezumi wo kuu }
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{ English is an SVO (Subject Verb Object) language. What kind of language is Japanese? (Answer is possible with three letters or all written.) { sov|subject object verb|subject-object-verb }
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{ What is the name for people of higher status and lower status (comma separated) { meue, meshita|meshita, meue }
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{ How many general-use characters set forth by the Ministry of Education should one know in order to be literate in Japanese? { 2136 }
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{ What is the name of the group of general-use characters set forth by the Ministry of Education one should know in order to be literate in Japanese? { jouyou kanji|jōyō kanji|jouyou }
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{ What are the names of the two syllabaries that make up the writing form Kana (comma separated)? { hiragana, katakana|katakana, hiragana }
 * type="{}"}

Learning Activites

 * Research more about the Japanese language and improve the Wikipedia entry on the Japanese language
 * Add more questions to the above quiz