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Kana are written in large and small versions with different pronunciations in
the composition of words but I am not able to determine if all kana can be
used in this way. Thank you.
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2017-03-12T12:38:46.633
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2017-03-21T14:14:51.223
2017-03-21T14:14:51.223
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question
words
Do all kana have a large and small reading?
There are no such things as "lowercase" katakana in Japanese. If you mean `ッ`
as opposed to `ツ`, and such, please call them _small_ katakana. I assume you
mean this.

Not all katakana have small versions. Here is the full list of small katakana
characters defined in the Japanese character set.

```

    ァ ィ ゥ ェ ォ
    ヵ ㇰ ヶ ㇱ ㇲ ッ ㇳ
    ㇴ ㇵ ㇶ ㇷ ㇷ゚ ㇸ ㇹ ㇺ
    ャ ュ ョ ㇻ ㇼ ㇽ ㇾ ㇿ ヮ
    
```

Very common ones are `ャ ュ ョ ッ`. I think you already know how to use these. If
not, consult the easiest textbook you have.

The character `ヶ` is also common but has a different usage from others (see
[this](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/352/5010)). `ヵ` is for the same
purpose, but much rarer.

`ァ ィ ゥ ェ ォ ヮ` are relatively less common, but you will find them often used to
approximate foreign sounds or old Japanese sounds (eg. ドゥ, フェ, グヮ).

The others are very rare special katakana used to write Ainu words (see:
[Special katakana for the Ainu
language](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ainu_language#Special_katakana_for_the_Ainu_language))
and sometimes Korean words. You can safely forget them.

There are of course small hiragana, too. But the number is much smaller
because we don't use hiragana to represent foreign words.

```

    ぁ ぃ ぅ ぇ ぉ っ ゃ ゅ ょ ゎ
    
```

These small vowels are mainly used to represent long vowels in native Japanese
words (see [this](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/15062/5010)).
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2017-03-12T13:58:49.583
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2017-03-12T14:24:28.673
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answer