Deck for Japanese Family Names

Bunpro
#1

This is probably a very niche request, and I’m sure there are plenty of things that are much higher priority, but I’ve been thinking about it for a while, and the best way to not have a request granted is to not ask. :hugs:

So! Would anyone be interested in a vocabulary deck for common Japanese names and family names? I can easily recognize some of the simpler ones (山田、田中、山本) but I would love to practice some of the ones I have difficulty recognizing when I see them in practice sentences like 鈴木、木村、小林、高橋.

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#2

Probably not on the top priority list, but I think custom decks is, so you might soon be able to make your own.

Alternatively there’re several Anki decks focusing on japanese names and the Yomitan extension includes a name dictionary I think.

https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2356446605
https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/204920277

7 Likes
#3

https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/866711563

This one is pretty good.

I know you didn’t ask for advice but if you live in Japan or have a lot of Japanese friends then I would suggest starting by learning the names of those around you as they will have more meaning and be easier to remember. As LagonKa mentioned, there is a yomitan comaptible dict for names, it is listed here and called JMnedict. Assuming the readings aren’t too rare then learning names from books is also an easy way to start picking them up.

I actually also have recently been thinking about getting better with names, specifically first names, as they can be extremely difficult sometimes. Luckily last names are somewhat more regular.

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#4

We’ve actually already got this in the works. We started making it like a year and a half ago but held off on publishing it :upside_down_face:.

We have 100 names each for N5, N4, N3, N2 and N1.

They probably won’t have example sentences though, perhaps just one that will be repeated for all names, as really the only important thing for names is recognizing that they are names (I’m sure we’ve all read nakamura at some point as beginners and thought ‘what does this sentence have to do with the middle of a village’ :thinking:). Thankfully this shouldn’t be a problem though, as the kanji used in names are extremely predictable after a while, including the way they’re read.

38 Likes
#5

Might be fun to have a randomized name generator, family + personal, based on which names the user has studied. Or, basically, whatever Name cards are in the user’s Review queue. Just an idea that popped into my head.

Also might be useful to somehow have the system test the user’s knowledge of male vs. female names (and I guess also for names that can be both). But I don’t have any ideas of how to do that off the top of my head.

3 Likes
#6

That’s AWESOME! For my purposes, I was just looking to have it be a deck like the other vocabulary ones, I don’t think I’d need example sentences. I HAVE seen names come up in example sentences and had trouble reading them, and that’s where I got the idea for a name deck.

@JamesBunpro even if I did not ask for advice specifically, I do appreciate it. I don’t live in Japan or have very many friends (Japanese or otherwise) so most of the names I’ve learned or tried to learn belong to members of musical groups or voice actors. :laughing:

@LagonKa thanks for the tip! I played around with Anki before I got my BunPro subscription. I ended up spending more time trying to get it set up the way I wanted than actually using it to study, so I prefer just having everything all in one place. BunPro is my one stop shop. :hugs:

3 Likes
#7

Hi!

This is a pretty good idea, the perfect practice system for a Family Names Deck. :clap:t2:
It would be a real nice add-on to the Decks.

1 Like
#8

I presume you mean for first names? We were only going to be doing surnames, as that encompasses most of what people will see in day to day life, including place names which for the most part are the same as surnames.

First names presents a whole new challenge, as the sheer variety of kanji that can be used for the same name is crazy, unlike surnames.

Example -
Risa = 理沙、梨沙、里沙、理佐 etc
Haruna = 暖奈、榛名、春奈、春名 etc

Some are of course more common than others, but arranging the decks if we did first names would be a bit weird. Frequency of name with subdivision of frequency of kanji or something 🤷.

6 Likes
#9

Place names would be great too!

I figure they have some similar features with people’s names, especially making some sentences incomprehensible at first.

EDIT: Just seen that Asher has already mentioned this above :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

3 Likes
#10

YES! I only know the 3 or 4 I learned on WaniKani like 鹿児島 and 愛媛県.

And of course, 東京 and 京東 and 大阪、広島 that everyone learns right away.

2 Likes
#11

Ah I’m looking forward to this so much!

Even though my students have their names written on their desks, the amount of times I’ve thought it’s read one way, only to hear someone saying a different thing is crazy.

Often I’ll just try and memorise their first names anyway but it’ll still be useful in general Japanese life.

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