2 ms·

That's interesting. From an English perspective katakana (a system for writing words foreign to Japan, which can't write English very well) seems broken, but I

• sdrothrock 2y ago
  It may be "broken" in the sense that it's not accurate to the original language in orthography or pronunciation, but it's great because it's internally consistent for speakers of Japanese. I can look at any foreign word in katakana and instantly know how to pronounce it in a way that is intelligible to other people in the language I'm speaking: Japanese. Even with the way English does it for other languages that use the same alphabet, while the orthography may be similar, the pronunciation is generally just left to luck and the speaker's/listener's perception of the word's original language.
  • ajb 2y ago
    Fair - English's orthography is definitely worse.