Hi, why do some native japanese people choose to write their name in katakana? I thought katakana was for foreign names and words.
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It depends on what situation you mean. Katakana kinda has a bit of a “cool” vibe to it, so in media a lot of characters are named in katakana even if they aren’t given foreign names. In real life, some authors do the same thing and choose to omit their kanji and just write their pen names in katakana. I’ve never personally encountered anyone doing this outside of authors, though, but maybe that’s a thing? Unless they just want you to know how to read their name.
But there are some parents that just choose katakana because it avoids confusions related to how to read the name. Hiragana is popular for girls names, but less so for guys names. So they use katakana.
Another trend that is not super popular but does exist is how when Japanese parents are choosing a name for their children, the kanji selection for that name is supposed to be “choosing the life” for the kids, in a way. Some parents want to let their kids choose their own future, so to say, and so they name their kids Japanese names spelled with katakana.
But yeah, katakana’s primary purpose is for loan-words but it has many uses outside of that, too. Onomatopoeia are also generally written in katakana.
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Katakana has a very long history that predates its contemporary usage by about a thousand years. Hiragana was not adopted as the de facto japanese syllabary until after world war 2. Prior to that, all official documents used katakana and kanji. So, that’s just a bit of context for why you may see japanese writing using katakana in a way that does not conform to your expectation of foreign sounds and loan words.