A look at Japanese Kansai dialect

Japanese language has a number of dialects in it, but one of the most famous and most difficult for non-Japanese to learn is the Kansai Dialect. Kansai Dialect is a common dialect used for comedians for example, since Osaka tends to produce a lot of comedians, so when you see Japanese comedians on TV, chances are they’re speaking Kansai Dialect. Of course, this is not always the case, just a trend I noticed, and my wife confirmed.

My first real encounter with Kansai Dialect, which is pretty different than “standard Japanese” happened long ago with a friend I knew in Seattle. He was actually North Korean, but his family have moved to Japan a long time ago, and grew up in Osaka. So, although he still had a North Korean passport, by all accounts he was Japanese, and a real Osaka guy: forthright and funny, compared to more “reserved” Tokyo people. I was just dating my wife at the time and my Japanese was even worse then than it is now. I was really a beginner, and I could barely understand a word he said because his Japanese was Kansai Dialect, not to mention he used very masculine Japanese compared to my wife’s feminine Japanese that I was accustomed to hearing. Sadly, he died a few years later in a car accident, but to me when I think of Kansai Dialect, I still think of his hilarious, drunken tirades from college.

Wikipedia has a nice thorough article about Kansai Dialect, and Pool of Zen has a nice summary of some key features of the dialect as well. In addition to changes in verb form, another feature of the dialect is the large set of vocabulary not found in standard Japanese. Some of these words, like mecha and aho are now found among mainstream language, and the younger generation, while others like honma or ~yan are a dead-giveaway that someone is speaking Kansai Dialect.

Interestingly, Kansai Dialect is actually more like a family of dialects. For example, Osaka speech tends to have an image of loud, forthright speakers, while nearby Kyoto speech tends to have an image of being more soft-spoken. Also, in Kyoto language, people say dosu rather than say desu, which is uniquely Kyoto. Even within Kyoto, the Gion Geisha district has its own unique dialect which is both archaic, and very artistic as well. When I wrote about Mineko Iwasaki, the famous geisha, she mentioned that as an apprentice maiko she frequently struggled to remember to use the Gion-district dialect. What most people think of Kansai Dialect is really Osaka speech, which is the most visible in Japanese entertainment. Among my favorite comedians are the pair from Ninety-nine: Takashi Okamura and Hiroyuki Yabe, who are both Kansai-speakers and are very popular.

There are many other dialects in Japanese too,¹ but chances are this is the first one you will encounter in your experiences with Japan.

¹ My father in law and his relations speak a slightly different dialect from their part of Kanagawa prefecture, near Atsugi. It’s kind of a rural dialect, and for a long time I couldn’t for example that ~ danbe was just another way of saying ~ da ne?. Subtle difference, but if you’re not experienced with Japanese language that can throw you off. Also, my wife has family up on Tochigi Prefecture too, and I also struggle to understand their Japanese as well just because the tones are different (and my listening is not that good yet).