20857
I was wondering why fruits, vegetables, animals and plants, are written in
_katakana_? Often, there exist _kanjis_ for those, so why aren't they written
with those _kanjis_ instead? For example:

  * カマキリ instead of 蟷螂
  * ヒマワリ instead of 向日葵
  * シイタケ instead of 椎茸
  * バナナ instead of 甘蕉
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2014-12-11T18:31:32.200
20840
2021-01-22T12:31:25.677
2014-12-11T20:31:49.110
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question
words katakana food
Why are the names of plants and animals often written in katakana?
I think it has more to do with style.

Legibility - There are times where it is easier to read or glance at when
written in hiragana/katakana.

Kanji difficulty - For example, 豌豆{えんどう} is a very difficult kanji to begin
with. Simplifying to hiragana/katakana would make it easier to understand.

Aesthetics - Perhaps it lends itself better to the presentation of the
document.

Word origin - For example, pumpkin is written in kanji as 南瓜{かぼちゃ}. It uses
熟字訓 by applying an existing Japanese pronunciation to an existing set of kanji
of Chinese origin, but may not always be intuitive or recognizable. This is
opposed to, for example, 大根{だいこん} where almost everyone recognizes this
because it is read naturally and the kanji matches the pronunciation of the
word.
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2014-12-11T18:43:17.093
20842
2018-02-06T19:35:48.557
2018-02-06T19:35:48.557
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If explained within the framework of [Tinbergen's four
questions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinbergen%27s_four_questions): (don't
take it too seriously)

The proximate explanation is, because _it's a convention in the biological
society_. In academic field, every creature's name is written in katakana when
it refers to a equivalent of a scientific name. It once was even required by
[law](http://www.bunka.go.jp/kokugo_nihongo/joho/kakuki/syusen/tosin02/index.html)
(though it didn't state explicitly to use katakana). Today, the practice is
getting more and more popular, which I think is because we do it so
extensively in the science class that even people unrelated to biology prefer
katakana for any plant or animal name.

The ultimate explanation is, _it stands out in the text_. The original reason
why biologists started to write them in kana, I guess, was they wanted to
distinguish them from ordinary words, as Japanese writing doesn't have
_italics_ or Capital Letters. Interestingly, in the pre-WWII ages academic
documents were commonly written in a mixture of kanji and katakana, so they
used _hiragana_ to render those terms. Nowadays we use hiragana for standard
orthography, and katakana for foreign words. Since many plants and animals are
innately written in katakana, it may feel consistent to write all of them in
the same way.

Note that not every situation is appropriate for katakana. Vegetables, meats
and fishes in the store (as well as woods) are less likely to be seen written
in katakana. Generic words ( _fish_ , _bird_ , _mammal_ , or _bear_ when
you're talking about many bear species) are often left in hiragana or kanji.
Advertisers prefer kanji, especially when they want the advertisement to look
classy.
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2014-12-12T02:09:32.097
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This depends on the type of the words.

  * As for easy and common words, such as 桜, 犬, 蚊, they are usually written _in kanji_. These are written in katakana only in biological contexts. 常用漢字表 generally tells us what is considered easy and standard in modern Japanese. If you wrote "東京はサクラがきれいです" or "イヌを飼いたいと思う", that would look unnatural.

  * Relatively difficult words whose kanji are not listed in 常用漢字表, such as 薔薇, 豹, 蜻蛉, are usually written in katakana or hiragana in newspapers and official documents. People can generally read these kanji, but don't remember how to write them with confidence, because they are not something we learn at school. Using kanji for those words (with the aid of IME) is generally safe, but that may look too stiff or literary. Whether to use katakana or hiragana is up to the writer's taste. Katakana may look a bit technical, but it does stand out in the sentence, which will help us read smoothly.

  * There are hundreds of plants/animal names whose kanji are simply too difficult. I think majority of the Japanese population do not know (and do not want to know) how to read 紫萁, 臘虎 and 蟷螂. We have no choice but to use either hiragana or katakana in these cases.

  * Loanwords such as バナナ, チンパンジー, ピラニア must almost always be written in katakana. This is not surprising, is it? There may be 当て字 or corresponding Chinese names (香蕉, 黒猩々, ...) but they are only for kanji maniacs.
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2014-12-12T12:37:14.760
20857
2014-12-12T12:37:14.760
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answer