148-458: Love Hina ( Japanese : ラブ ひな , Hepburn : Rabu Hina ) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Ken Akamatsu . It was serialized in Kodansha 's Weekly Shōnen Magazine from October 1998 to October 2001, with the chapters collected into 14 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha . The series tells the story of Keitarō Urashima and his attempts to find the girl with whom he made
296-402: A Kansai dialect . In the manga (Volume 4) Kitsune's bedroom walls are densely lined with bottles of alcoholic drinks. She is also the one who taught Kaolla Japanese. Kitsune is more flirtatious, especially with Keitaro, than any of the other residents. Mostly this is to tease him; however, she does develop a strong crush on him; eventually she shows little serious romantic interest in him. She
444-453: A CD single, which debuted on the Oricon charts at Number 7. A bonus 25th episode was later created and released as a DVD extra. The series and bonus episode were directed by Yoshiaki Iwasaki, written by Shō Aikawa and featured character designs by Makoto Uno. In Japan, the television series was released on nine DVDs by Starchild Records between August 3, 2000, and April 2, 2001. Love Hina
592-474: A bad start with Keitaro, develops a crush on him. Shinobu is a boarder at the Hinata Inn, in room 201. In the anime, she is introduced as a grieving girl who has run away from home due to domestic turmoil. However, in the manga, she is already at the Hinata Inn when Keitaro arrives, and her parents are still together. Shinobu is quite skilled in cooking and household chores, so she becomes the resident cook (in
740-637: A benefit from the in-group to the out-group) means "[I/we] explained [it] to [him/her/them]". Such beneficiary auxiliary verbs thus serve a function comparable to that of pronouns and prepositions in Indo-European languages to indicate the actor and the recipient of an action. Japanese "pronouns" also function differently from most modern Indo-European pronouns (and more like nouns) in that they can take modifiers as any other noun may. For instance, one does not say in English: The amazed he ran down
888-493: A box to hold the other singles. There have been several Love Hina soundtracks released. Love Hina Original Sound File was released on September 21, 2000, and contains all of the background music for the series as well as many vocal songs. Love Hina — Winter Special Soundtrack was released on January 24, 2001, and was followed by Love Hina — Spring Special Soundtrack on June 6, 2001. Love Hina Again Soundtrack
1036-412: A boxset on May 14, 2007. In Australia and New Zealand the series is licensed by Madman Entertainment , who also released the series across six DVDs between September 18, 2002, and February 11, 2003. A box set was released on December 3, 2003. After the television series was completed, a Christmas special, Love Hina Xmas Eve: Silent Night , was produced and shown on December 25, 2000, on TV Tokyo . A DVD
1184-423: A brief vacation after the three of them failed on their Todai entrance exam. Keitaro and Mutsumi failed for a third successive time, and Naru failed for the first time. Despite her ditziness, she is very intelligent and empathetic . Mutsumi also has anemia which caused all sorts of situations, but she is actually extremely resilient, having a strong vice-like grip even when she first appeared and just like Keitaro
1332-403: A call from his grandmother. As a result, he travels to "Hinata Inn", a hotel owned by his grandmother, to find a place to stay and study. Following a misunderstanding where the residents believe him to be a burglar and a peeping tom, Keitaro discovers the hotel is now a female-only dormitory. To compound the confusion, Keitaro's Aunt Haruka mistakenly assumes he has passed the entrance exams and
1480-760: A childhood promise to enter the University of Tokyo . The manga was licensed for an English-language release in North America and the United Kingdom by Tokyopop , in Australia by Madman Entertainment , and in Singapore by Chuang Yi . Two novelizations of Love Hina , written by two anime series screenwriters, were also released in Japan by Kodansha. Both novels were later released in North America and
1628-496: A cigarette. Like Naru, she has a fiery temper (and great physical prowess to match), which she hides under a calm, detached exterior. Having traveled the world with Seta and Sara's mom, and it is hinted that a love triangle existed between the three at one point (or at least that Haruka and Seta were romantically involved); this is explored more fully in the manga, to the point that Haruka and Seta get married. Haruka's skills in martial arts rival Seta's and can even surpass his when she
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#17327915309101776-412: A combination of her first and last names, and the fact that she hardly ever fully opens both eyes at the same time (mostly when she is surprised). As a result, she has a perpetually fox-like, vulpine expression. She's a practical joker and troublemaker; her mission in life seems to be to ensure that things never get too dull or those around her too complacent. She is also seen drinking a lot. She speaks with
1924-414: A distinct language of its own that has absorbed various aspects from neighboring languages. Japanese has five vowels, and vowel length is phonemic, with each having both a short and a long version. Elongated vowels are usually denoted with a line over the vowel (a macron ) in rōmaji , a repeated vowel character in hiragana , or a chōonpu succeeding the vowel in katakana . /u/ ( listen )
2072-617: A distraction. In the anime television series, Motoko is voiced by Yū Asakawa in Japanese and Mona Marshall in English. Kaolla Su ( カオラ・スゥ , Kaora Sū ) is a 13-year-old foreign transfer student. She is also a boarder at the Hinata Inn, in room 301. Su is the princess of Molmol, a fictional island nation located near the International Date Line . The dot on her forehead seems to have something to do with
2220-472: A former hot springs resort that is converted to an all-girls dormitory managed by Keitaro Urashima, the sole male resident. Keitaro Urashima ( 浦島 景太郎 , Urashima Keitarō ) is a 19-year-old second-year ronin studying to enter Tokyo University (abbreviated as "Todai"). As a child, Keitaro made a promise to a girl, based on a story the children overheard, that two people who love each other will live "happily ever after" if they enter 'Todai'. Keitaro
2368-484: A funny series, though finding the 16+ rating appropriate due to the number of jokes involving sexual innuendo . He praised the beautiful artwork, feeling the "sexy and cute" female designs were perfect for the series and that Keitarō's design fit his dorky personality. Chen found Naru's regularly catching Keitarō making a mistake and calling him a pervert redundant and annoying. Eric Luce of Ex.org notes an increased character development over other love comedies, and describes
2516-507: A game of rock-paper-scissors to decide which of them would become Keitaro's wife (deliberately losing a game of rock-paper-scissors is something she would do a second time in the manga during the mock wedding started to help her regain her memory after falling from a tree while she was trying to help Naru down from the tree), although she (Mutsumi) loved Keitaro (and admits that she still loves him to Naru). But even after that Naru had forgotten all about her promise to Keitaro, Mutsumi then made
2664-419: A glide /j/ and either the first part of a geminate consonant ( っ / ッ , represented as Q) or a moraic nasal in the coda ( ん / ン , represented as N). The nasal is sensitive to its phonetic environment and assimilates to the following phoneme, with pronunciations including [ɴ, m, n, ɲ, ŋ, ɰ̃] . Onset-glide clusters only occur at the start of syllables but clusters across syllables are allowed as long as
2812-427: A habit of writing trashy romance stories involving the two of them, often involuntarily. Motoko has an older sister, Tsuruko, who gave up the life of the sword to marry. Tsuruko is far stronger at kendo than Motoko; Motoko both greatly admires and fears her older sister. However, Tsuruko believes that Motoko has more potential than she herself does, and that Motoko lost her drive to improve when Tsuruko married. Motoko
2960-429: A listener depending on the listener's relative social position and the degree of familiarity between the speaker and the listener. When used in different social relationships, the same word may have positive (intimate or respectful) or negative (distant or disrespectful) connotations. Japanese often use titles of the person referred to where pronouns would be used in English. For example, when speaking to one's teacher, it
3108-446: A more adult version of herself on a single night every year, when the moon glows red. In the anime, she admitted having fallen in love with Keitaro while she was in this form, despite her transformation just last a few seconds because there was no red moon. Though this is not explicitly stated in the manga, it is implied extremely heavily, with the adult Su even kissing Keitaro and proclaiming herself his girlfriend afterwards. Her room in
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#17327915309103256-409: A number of unusual abilities, such as being able to speak "turtlese", which she uses to communicate with her turtles, namely Tama; the extreme habit of putting others' happiness before her own; a very strong propensity for watermelons ; and sleepwalking on a few rare occasions (which led her into trouble once as she sleepwalked out of her window and was hit by a car). Despite her many eccentricities, she
3404-473: A pleasing combination". She found the music "incredibly cute" and felt it was used in a way which contributed to many of the dramatic effects in the anime. In The Anime Encyclopedia: A Guide to Japanese Animation Since 1917 , Jonathan Clements and Helen McCarthy felt the female characters were a "standard rack of female anime archetypes" and that the series as a whole was a "culmination of a decade of geek-centered anime". Kenneth Lee, writing for Ex.org, praised
3552-408: A sentence need not be stated and pronouns may be omitted if they can be inferred from context. In the example above, hana ga nagai would mean "[their] noses are long", while nagai by itself would mean "[they] are long." A single verb can be a complete sentence: Yatta! ( やった! ) "[I / we / they / etc] did [it]!". In addition, since adjectives can form the predicate in a Japanese sentence (below),
3700-592: A series of "banked images", which were basic line drawings of locations, such as a characters room. Instead of redrawing a location from scratch every time it was used, these banked images could be used as a base, and extra detail added to them depending on the requirements for the scene. Both of these techniques lead to characters having white outlines when copied digitally onto the scene. Parts of Hinata Inn and other locations used were inspired by real life locations and designed from photographs collected during research. Written and illustrated by Ken Akamatsu , Love Hina
3848-425: A similar appearance to Forty Namba from A.I. Love You . Throughout the run of the manga, the series used digital editing processes. After a rough sketch of a page was created, the page layout and basic detail were drawn and scanned into an Apple Macintosh . The major page elements were then shaded or filled with patterns, and elements that were drawn separately were added digitally to the page. The manga also used
3996-428: A single adjective can be a complete sentence: Urayamashii! ( 羨ましい! ) "[I'm] jealous [about it]!". While the language has some words that are typically translated as pronouns, these are not used as frequently as pronouns in some Indo-European languages, and function differently. In some cases, Japanese relies on special verb forms and auxiliary verbs to indicate the direction of benefit of an action: "down" to indicate
4144-492: A six-color-page Love Hina one-shot . A crossover one-shot with Aho Girl was released on August 27, 2014. Love Hina was adapted into a 24-episode anime television series by Xebec , a division of Production I.G . The series aired on TV Tokyo April 19 through September 27, 2000. The opening theme was Sakura Saku and the closing theme was Kimi Sae Ireba . Both songs were written by Ritsuko Okazaki and performed by Megumi Hayashibara . The two themes were released as
4292-465: A small island off the west coast of Okinawa 's main island city Naha with her parents and seven younger siblings before moving closer to the Hinata herself. Over the course of the manga she gradually gets over her anemia to the point that in the latter parts it has left her. Both beautiful and kind-hearted, Mutsumi shows superlative optimism when faced with even the most difficult of situations. She has
4440-555: A subsequent promise with Naru that both of them would later go to Tokyo University so Naru would remember the promise made to Keitaro. Before leaving Hinata, she gave Naru her Liddo-kun doll in memory of their friendship. She eventually moves to an apartment very close to the Hinata Inn and starts working at the Hinata Teashop for Haruka Urashima, even staying in a spare room at Haruka's Teashop after her apartment burnt down on New Year's Eve. Like Keitaro and Naru, she finally passes
4588-549: A tendency to snuggle against a person while she is sleeping, and usually crushes them while doing it. Molmol is a kingdom where the moon sometimes appears red. It also uses a western naming order, although the Hinata Inn residents never seem to pick this up until later: Su is actually Kaolla Su's family name. Su likes all the other residents in the Hinata Apartments and gets along well with them, though they have difficulty keeping up with her hyperactive tendencies; only
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4736-480: A total pervert that has no redeeming qualities whatsoever!". She also says to Kanako she would spy on him or sabotage any dates he did get but finds the idea of dating him herself disgusting. This comment and similar situations are played for laughs. When they do date, she hits Keitaro occasionally. Like Keitaro, she strives to get into Tokyo University for two reasons: the first is a promise she made to her one-time tutor (and object of an enormous crush) Noriyasu Seta, and
4884-444: A very young child. Of all the girls at the Hinata Inn, she is most often the unwilling and unwitting victim of Keitaro's clumsiness, which often results in her ending up naked, partially clothed, or placed in any number of compromising positions. Keitaro invariably suffers as a result. Despite initially taking a (literally) violent dislike of Keitaro, she comes to develop very strong feelings for him. The main part of her character arc
5032-624: Is compressed rather than protruded , or simply unrounded. Some Japanese consonants have several allophones , which may give the impression of a larger inventory of sounds. However, some of these allophones have since become phonemic. For example, in the Japanese language up to and including the first half of the 20th century, the phonemic sequence /ti/ was palatalized and realized phonetically as [tɕi] , approximately chi ( listen ) ; however, now [ti] and [tɕi] are distinct, as evidenced by words like tī [tiː] "Western-style tea" and chii [tɕii] "social status". The "r" of
5180-422: Is extremely intelligent, scoring full marks in the practice exams. Yet, she still fails to get into Tokyo University because, among other things, she forgets to write her name on the test paper, causing her to obtain a grade of Z, or fainting from her anemia. In both manga and the anime, Mutsumi is very intuitive and has a keen eye for details, noticing things her friends do not, such as, but not limited to, being
5328-421: Is topic–comment . Sentence-final particles are used to add emotional or emphatic impact, or form questions. Nouns have no grammatical number or gender , and there are no articles . Verbs are conjugated , primarily for tense and voice , but not person . Japanese adjectives are also conjugated. Japanese has a complex system of honorifics , with verb forms and vocabulary to indicate the relative status of
5476-442: Is Keitarō's promised girl, but Mutsumi states that she made a childhood promise with Naru, not Keitarō. During the next round of university exams, Keitarō believes he has failed them once again and runs away before finding out his results. After learning of this, Naru chases after him without checking her exam results either, and they are followed by the rest of the residents of Hinata House who announce that Keitarō and Naru both passed
5624-459: Is a list of fictional characters in the anime and manga series Love Hina created by Ken Akamatsu . The character names are listed in Western order, with the given name before the family name . Note because the story spans over several years, any characters age mentioned below describes their age at the point of their introduction. The main characters are residents of the Hinata Inn,
5772-449: Is already a Todai student; consequently, the residents agree to let him stay. When he fails to correct her, and they discover that he is lying, Keitaro is forced to leave until Haruka announces that his grandmother has transferred the ownership of the inn to him. Keitaro, thus, becomes the new landlord. In the anime television series, Keitaro is voiced by Yūji Ueda in Japanese and Derek Stephen Prince in English. Keitaro's name
5920-448: Is also seen in o-medetō "congratulations", from medetaku ). Late Middle Japanese has the first loanwords from European languages – now-common words borrowed into Japanese in this period include pan ("bread") and tabako ("tobacco", now "cigarette"), both from Portuguese . Modern Japanese is considered to begin with the Edo period (which spanned from 1603 to 1867). Since Old Japanese,
6068-482: Is also the bustiest in the household, her bust being second only to Mutsumi Otohime in size, and is unafraid of using her charms to get what she wants, whatever it might be. Her relationship with Keitaro eventually develops into a "little brother/big sister" connection (though Keitaro is actually older than she is). She also is a bit greedy, as seen in a flashback sequence when she tells Keitaro about how much Naru's innocence ended up dismissing possible boyfriends; Kitsune
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6216-538: Is also the next in line to inherit the Aoyama family's Kyoto dojo, as she is not married. It is notable that Tsuruko is actually Motoko's biological sister, as they are two of the few characters in the series who are siblings by blood relation (the second siblings couple is presented by Kaolla and Amalla Su). Motoko has only two serious fears in the world: Tsuruko and, for some unspecified reason, turtles (even though Tsuruko correlates it to her intense dislike for men). In
6364-527: Is also used in a limited fashion (such as for imported acronyms) in Japanese writing. The numeral system uses mostly Arabic numerals , but also traditional Chinese numerals . Proto-Japonic , the common ancestor of the Japanese and Ryukyuan languages , is thought to have been brought to Japan by settlers coming from the Korean peninsula sometime in the early- to mid-4th century BC (the Yayoi period ), replacing
6512-654: Is an intense 15-year-old school girl, who practices the martial art of kendo , as well as being a member of the Shinmei-ryū sword school (which is also referred to in Akamatsu's later work Mahou Sensei Negima, as the school of the character Setsuna). Motoko is a resident at the Hinata Inn, living in room 302. She has difficulty relating to other people, especially men, whom she finds to be a distraction that keeps her from being able to concentrate fully on her studies and practice. She also dislikes men because her sister left
6660-440: Is appropriate to use sensei ( 先生 , "teacher"), but inappropriate to use anata . This is because anata is used to refer to people of equal or lower status, and one's teacher has higher status. Japanese nouns have no grammatical number, gender or article aspect. The noun hon ( 本 ) may refer to a single book or several books; hito ( 人 ) can mean "person" or "people", and ki ( 木 ) can be "tree" or "trees". Where number
6808-701: Is associated with comedy (see Kansai dialect ). Dialects of Tōhoku and North Kantō are associated with typical farmers. The Ryūkyūan languages, spoken in Okinawa and the Amami Islands (administratively part of Kagoshima ), are distinct enough to be considered a separate branch of the Japonic family; not only is each language unintelligible to Japanese speakers, but most are unintelligible to those who speak other Ryūkyūan languages. However, in contrast to linguists, many ordinary Japanese people tend to consider
6956-466: Is better documentation of Late Middle Japanese phonology than for previous forms (for instance, the Arte da Lingoa de Iapam ). Among other sound changes, the sequence /au/ merges to /ɔː/ , in contrast with /oː/ ; /p/ is reintroduced from Chinese; and /we/ merges with /je/ . Some forms rather more familiar to Modern Japanese speakers begin to appear – the continuative ending - te begins to reduce onto
7104-509: Is correlated with the sex of the speaker and the social situation in which they are spoken: men and women alike in a formal situation generally refer to themselves as watashi ( 私 , literally "private") or watakushi (also 私 , hyper-polite form), while men in rougher or intimate conversation are much more likely to use the word ore ( 俺 "oneself", "myself") or boku . Similarly, different words such as anata , kimi , and omae ( お前 , more formally 御前 "the one before me") may refer to
7252-550: Is credited with being one of the first anime series to be available unofficially as a digitally produced fansub , with multiple groups working on the series. The popularity and widespread availability of the series in this form meant that several potential licensors of the series such as ADV Films had concerns over licensing the series. The series was later licensed in North America by Bandai Entertainment , who released six DVDs between February 19 and November 19, 2002. In July 2007, Funimation Entertainment announced they had acquired
7400-554: Is frequently drunk and seems to enjoy teasing Keitaro at every opportunity. Kitsune is also a boarder at the Hinata Inn, in room 205. She rarely pays any rent or contributes and has had a number of low paying jobs. Despite this she has never been evicted from the lodge. Her best friend is Naru. Although Naru is the more intellectual of the two, Kitsune is often the one to see things sensibly (although often she will encourage madness out of boredom), though she usually tries to reason when things are really out of control. Her nickname comes from
7548-417: Is important, it can be indicated by providing a quantity (often with a counter word ) or (rarely) by adding a suffix, or sometimes by duplication (e.g. 人人 , hitobito , usually written with an iteration mark as 人々 ). Words for people are usually understood as singular. Thus Tanaka-san usually means Mx Tanaka . Words that refer to people and animals can be made to indicate a group of individuals through
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#17327915309107696-755: Is less common. In terms of mutual intelligibility , a survey in 1967 found that the four most unintelligible dialects (excluding Ryūkyūan languages and Tōhoku dialects ) to students from Greater Tokyo were the Kiso dialect (in the deep mountains of Nagano Prefecture ), the Himi dialect (in Toyama Prefecture ), the Kagoshima dialect and the Maniwa dialect (in Okayama Prefecture ). The survey
7844-420: Is often called a topic-prominent language , which means it has a strong tendency to indicate the topic separately from the subject, and that the two do not always coincide. The sentence Zō wa hana ga nagai ( 象は鼻が長い ) literally means, "As for elephant(s), (the) nose(s) (is/are) long". The topic is zō "elephant", and the subject is hana "nose". Japanese grammar tends toward brevity; the subject or object of
7992-404: Is popular and beautiful, but constantly tries to hide this as she studies to gain entrance to Todai. However, she has an extremely fiery temper and tends to inflict violent physical punishment (mostly on Keitaro). She arrived at the Hinata Inn as a result (she believes) of her friendship with Kitsune, who introduced her to Granny Hina. At that stage, she does not remember staying at the Hinata Inn as
8140-498: Is preserved in words such as matsuge ("eyelash", lit. "hair of the eye"); modern mieru ("to be visible") and kikoeru ("to be audible") retain a mediopassive suffix - yu(ru) ( kikoyu → kikoyuru (the attributive form, which slowly replaced the plain form starting in the late Heian period) → kikoeru (all verbs with the shimo-nidan conjugation pattern underwent this same shift in Early Modern Japanese )); and
8288-455: Is revealed in volume 10 that as a young child, Mutsumi spent some time living at the Hinata inn. She had learned of the stories of how if a couple was to attend Tokyo U together, they will find happiness and in turn told Keitaro of the story because she (Mutsumi) wanted to go to Tokyo U with Keitaro. She then played matchmaker for Naru and Keitaro after it became clear that Naru liked Keitaro. Mutsumi let him go for Naru's sake by deliberately losing
8436-503: Is seemingly able to recover quickly. Naru notices in both the manga and anime the similarities between Keitaro and Mutsumi many times. One such notable time was when they believed they first met Mutsumi (they are actually all friends from childhood) on Naru and Keitaro's trip to Kyoto. She has a very sweet and generous personality. Being very empathetic to others, Mutsumi often puts others happiness before herself. She can also be comically clumsy at times, another trait like Keitaro. She lives on
8584-422: Is set on gaining entrance to Todai to fulfill the promise he made to his childhood friend, even though he cannot recall her name or her face. Later, in volume 13, it is revealed that Todai may not even refer to Tokyo University after all. After failing to pass the entrance exams on his second attempt, Keitaro's parents seem unwilling and/or unable to let him continue living at home while he studies. He then receives
8732-411: Is similar to Saati Namba from A.I. Love You . Mitsune "Kitsune" Konno 's money-grubbing nature and her older, jaded, and more mature personality were originally intended to be used for Kaolla Su . Shinobu Maehara 's nature was settled on from the beginning of the series, however her physical appearance and age were extensively redesigned as the series concept was shaped. In her early design, Shinobu had
8880-411: Is supposedly taken from manga artist Keitarō Arima . It is also believed to be a pun on the Japanese myth of fisherman Urashima Tarō . Naru Narusegawa ( 成瀬川 なる , Narusegawa Naru ) is a 17-year-old resident of the Hinata Inn, who is about to graduate from high school. She is very intelligent, having placed top in the nation in the college practice entrance exams at their cram school . She
9028-476: Is that she has great difficulty in admitting these feelings, both to herself, to the hopeless Keitaro, and the world in general. Due to this, she often becomes annoyed or irritated with Keitaro when she believes he is not taking things seriously. Naru had repeatedly denied having feelings for Keitaro even when asked. Naru while speaking to Mutsumi said, "What could you possibly see in a guy like that? You probably don't know this Mutsumi-san, but he's clumsy, stupid, and
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#17327915309109176-422: Is the biggest of all the girls, which is used for comical effect and fan service many times throughout the anime/manga series. Tokyopop sometimes misspells her name as "Mitsumi" or "Matsumi". In the anime television series, Mutsumi is voiced by Satsuki Yukino in Japanese and Julie Ann Taylor in English. Shinobu Maehara ( 前原 しのぶ , Maehara Shinobu ) is a 13-year-old schoolgirl who, after getting off to
9324-654: Is the girl of Keitarō's promise. Three years later, a wedding ceremony (with a new girl, Ema Maeda, presented) is held at Hinata House for Naru and Keitarō as they finally fulfill their childhood promise to each other. Initial sketches for the series were created between September and December 1997, after the completion of A.I. Love You . Early storyboards with initial character designs were created between December 1997 and January 1998, and further character designs and location sketches followed between January and April 1998. The last storyboards before serialization were created between April and August 1998. Around six months before
9472-665: Is the principal language of the Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people . It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan , the only country where it is the national language , and within the Japanese diaspora worldwide. The Japonic family also includes the Ryukyuan languages and the variously classified Hachijō language . There have been many attempts to group the Japonic languages with other families such as
9620-402: Is the version of Japanese discussed in this article. Formerly, standard Japanese in writing ( 文語 , bungo , "literary language") was different from colloquial language ( 口語 , kōgo ) . The two systems have different rules of grammar and some variance in vocabulary. Bungo was the main method of writing Japanese until about 1900; since then kōgo gradually extended its influence and
9768-471: Is used for the present and the future. For verbs that represent an ongoing process, the -te iru form indicates a continuous (or progressive) aspect , similar to the suffix ing in English. For others that represent a change of state, the -te iru form indicates a perfect aspect. For example, kite iru means "They have come (and are still here)", but tabete iru means "They are eating". Questions (both with an interrogative pronoun and yes/no questions) have
9916-405: Is why some linguists do not classify Japanese "pronouns" as pronouns, but rather as referential nouns, much like Spanish usted (contracted from vuestra merced , "your ( majestic plural ) grace") or Portuguese você (from vossa mercê ). Japanese personal pronouns are generally used only in situations requiring special emphasis as to who is doing what to whom. The choice of words used as pronouns
10064-563: The Ainu , Austronesian , Koreanic , and the now-discredited Altaic , but none of these proposals have gained any widespread acceptance. Little is known of the language's prehistory, or when it first appeared in Japan. Chinese documents from the 3rd century AD recorded a few Japanese words, but substantial Old Japanese texts did not appear until the 8th century. From the Heian period (794–1185), extensive waves of Sino-Japanese vocabulary entered
10212-462: The Japonic language family, which also includes the Ryukyuan languages spoken in the Ryukyu Islands . As these closely related languages are commonly treated as dialects of the same language, Japanese is sometimes called a language isolate . According to Martine Irma Robbeets , Japanese has been subject to more attempts to show its relation to other languages than any other language in
10360-514: The Philippines , and various Pacific islands, locals in those countries learned Japanese as the language of the empire. As a result, many elderly people in these countries can still speak Japanese. Japanese emigrant communities (the largest of which are to be found in Brazil , with 1.4 million to 1.5 million Japanese immigrants and descendants, according to Brazilian IBGE data, more than
10508-738: The United States (notably in Hawaii , where 16.7% of the population has Japanese ancestry, and California ), and the Philippines (particularly in Davao Region and the Province of Laguna ). Japanese has no official status in Japan, but is the de facto national language of the country. There is a form of the language considered standard : hyōjungo ( 標準語 ) , meaning "standard Japanese", or kyōtsūgo ( 共通語 ) , "common language", or even "Tokyo dialect" at times. The meanings of
10656-806: The de facto standard Japanese had been the Kansai dialect , especially that of Kyoto . However, during the Edo period, Edo (now Tokyo) developed into the largest city in Japan, and the Edo-area dialect became standard Japanese. Since the end of Japan's self-imposed isolation in 1853, the flow of loanwords from European languages has increased significantly. The period since 1945 has seen many words borrowed from other languages—such as German, Portuguese and English. Many English loan words especially relate to technology—for example, pasokon (short for "personal computer"), intānetto ("internet"), and kamera ("camera"). Due to
10804-527: The 1.2 million of the United States ) sometimes employ Japanese as their primary language. Approximately 12% of Hawaii residents speak Japanese, with an estimated 12.6% of the population of Japanese ancestry in 2008. Japanese emigrants can also be found in Peru , Argentina , Australia (especially in the eastern states), Canada (especially in Vancouver , where 1.4% of the population has Japanese ancestry),
10952-469: The 2002 and 2004 Anime Expo conventions. In 2003, the title was among the top ten graphic novels on Nielsen BookScan 's list and one of the first graphic novels to ever appear in the general trade paperback list. The popular culture|pop culture website ICv2 voted Love Hina "Anime Product of the Year" in 2002. The series was well received by critics. Tony Chen, of Anime News Network (ANN), found it to be
11100-401: The 3 parts together on one disc and were released on September 2, 2003, and January 7, 2008, respectively. After the end of the television series, Love Hina Final Selection was released, containing a summary of the series and "Love Live Hina", a live concert featuring all of the main cast members. The anime was later used as the source for a film comic , Love Hina Anime Comics , which told
11248-503: The 3-eyed symbol of Molmol. She is often barefoot and dressed in nothing else except her heavily altered school uniform in almost every anime episode and manga chapter, or some otherwise scant costume. To top her personality, she is above all extremely hyperactive, usually hugging (or, in Keitaro's case, kicking) someone, trying to eat something, especially bananas and Tama-chan, or inventing some potentially dangerous new device. She also has
11396-649: The Christmas special, noting that it was "several notches above the TV series" but found that while the Spring Special had amusing moments, it was rushed with bad plotting. The Love Hina Again OVA received more mixed reviews, with ANN's Zac Bertschy feeling it reversed part of the plot of the main anime series and never reached the same entertainment level as the television series. The character of Kanako, Keitarō's sister,
11544-482: The Hinata Inn because of the marital problems between her father and her mother, whose names are never mentioned (in the anime). Their marital problems lead to their divorce. Shinobu's parents arrive at the Hinata Inn and argue over whom Shinobu should live with. However, Shinobu decides to remain at the Hinata Inn, which her mother is against as she believes the Hinata Inn is a bad place full of rowdy young girls. They eventually concede, allowing Shinobu to remain living at
11692-458: The Hinata Inn is a faithful recreation of Molmol's natural habitat, complete with banana trees, a waterfall, and a small lake, along with a high-tech laboratory. In the anime television series, Su is voiced by Reiko Takagi in Japanese and Wendee Lee in English. Mitsune Konno ( 紺野 みつね , Konno Mitsune ) , also known as Kitsune , which means "fox" in Japanese, is a 19-year-old freelance writer (who never seems to write anything). She
11840-427: The Hinata apartments (including Sarah, who was sent there for a short period of time), it is apparent that Kaolla shares a much deeper relationship with Sarah and Motoko as compared to the other residents. Her ambition is to return to her homeland to start a computing school and transform her country into a technological power that will rival, and eventually conquer, Japan. Su also possesses the ability to transform into
11988-508: The Inn. Four years later (in the epilogue), she has since grown her hair out and has become more mature, though she retains her sincere personality. She still has a crush on Keitaro and hasn't given up on her dream of becoming his girlfriend (even though Keitaro is set to marry Naru). In the anime television series, Shinobu is voiced by Masayo Kurata in Japanese and Ellen Arden in English. Motoko Aoyama ( 青山 素子 , Aoyama Motoko )
12136-567: The Japanese cast members. The Tokyo Bay performance was bundled on DVD with Love Hina Final Selection , and the Osaka Performance was available separately. The first 11 volumes sold over 6 million copies in Japan by October 2001. By 2022, the manga had over 20 million copies in circulation. Love Hina won the Kodansha Manga Award for best shōnen title in 2001. It was selected as the "Best Manga, USA Release" at both
12284-486: The Japanese language is of particular interest, ranging between an apical central tap and a lateral approximant . The "g" is also notable; unless it starts a sentence, it may be pronounced [ ŋ ] , in the Kanto prestige dialect and in other eastern dialects. The phonotactics of Japanese are relatively simple. The syllable structure is (C)(G)V(C), that is, a core vowel surrounded by an optional onset consonant,
12432-736: The Old Japanese sections are written in Man'yōgana , which uses kanji for their phonetic as well as semantic values. Based on the Man'yōgana system, Old Japanese can be reconstructed as having 88 distinct morae . Texts written with Man'yōgana use two different sets of kanji for each of the morae now pronounced き (ki), ひ (hi), み (mi), け (ke), へ (he), め (me), こ (ko), そ (so), と (to), の (no), も (mo), よ (yo) and ろ (ro). (The Kojiki has 88, but all later texts have 87. The distinction between mo 1 and mo 2 apparently
12580-488: The Ryūkyūan languages as dialects of Japanese. The imperial court also seems to have spoken an unusual variant of the Japanese of the time, most likely the spoken form of Classical Japanese , a writing style that was prevalent during the Heian period , but began to decline during the late Meiji period . The Ryūkyūan languages are classified by UNESCO as 'endangered', as young people mostly use Japanese and cannot understand
12728-521: The Todai entrance exam, discovering her result just before setting off to rescue Keitaro from the island of Pararakelse. She studies at Todai, and later is the only one of the group to enter a graduate school. At the end of the manga, she helps out in organizing Keitaro and Naru's wedding, and she brings a plethora of watermelons. Mutsumi is skilled at cooking and like Keitaro is exceptional at baking cakes and other confectioneries. Tamago or Tama for short
12876-502: The United Kingdom by Tokyopop , which released the 14 volumes between May 21, 2002, and September 16, 2003. The English release was one of Tokyopop's first releases in the "Authentic Manga" lineup of titles using the Japanese right to left reading style. In doing so the artwork remained unchanged from the original. The series appeared consistently in Tokyopop's top five selling manga and has been reprinted several times. In August 2009, it
13024-441: The United Kingdom by Tokyopop. A twenty-four episode anime adaptation of the manga series, produced by Xebec , aired in Japan from April to September 2000. It was followed by a bonus DVD episode, Christmas and Spring television specials, and a three episode original video animation (OVA) entitled Love Hina Again . The anime series, special, and OVA were licensed for release in North America by Bandai Entertainment . In July 2007,
13172-543: The addition of a collective suffix (a noun suffix that indicates a group), such as -tachi , but this is not a true plural: the meaning is closer to the English phrase "and company". A group described as Tanaka-san-tachi may include people not named Tanaka. Some Japanese nouns are effectively plural, such as hitobito "people" and wareware "we/us", while the word tomodachi "friend" is considered singular, although plural in form. Verbs are conjugated to show tenses, of which there are two: past and present (or non-past) which
13320-466: The anime story in comic form using stills from the show as the comic panels. The anime Comics series follows the story of the television series, unaired 25th episode, and the Xmas and Spring specials and each volume contains 3 exclusive trading cards. The film comics also contain anime production info. Two novels have been written by the anime screenwriters and illustrated by Ken Akamatsu as side stories of
13468-459: The anime, Motoko is popular at her school for her kendo skills. She frequently spends time with Sachiyo Matsumoto ( 松本 幸代 , Matsumoto Sachiyo ) , Emi Ichikawa ( 市川 えみ , Ichikawa Emi ) and Kikuko Onoue ( 尾上 菊子 , Onoue Kikuko ) , who are all fans of her. Kikuko is especially protective of Motoko and has criticised Motoko's change in personality and decline in kendo skills since Keitaro began living at Hinata Inn, referring to him as
13616-447: The anime, her family once owned a restaurant in town before their divorce). Quiet and shy, she contributes to her emotional frailty. She is the first girl to fall for Keitaro, and in the manga, she attempts to avoid him because of this. In both the anime and manga, she holds Keitaro in high regard and is often on the verge of tears when Shinobu believes that he is in trouble or likes someone else. Shinobu decides to leave home and live at
13764-409: The athletic Motoko seems to be able to tolerate and keep up with her. Her like for Keitaro stems from the fact that he reminds her of the person she refers to as her older brother (actually her cousin, whom she grew up with). However, it can be inferred that she eventually comes to care about Keitaro as much as and perhaps even more than her older brother. While she has stated that she likes everyone in
13912-511: The dojo to marry. Her relationship with Keitaro initially resembles Naru's relationship with him in some ways; all too often he finds himself on the receiving end of various attacks as a result of his frequent mishaps or simply bad luck. She eventually warms up to him somewhat and eventually finds herself developing strong feelings for him, which she vehemently denies until near the end of the series. On two occasions, this causes severe problems for both Motoko and Keitaro. In later volumes, she develops
14060-578: The effect of changing Japanese into a mora-timed language. Late Middle Japanese covers the years from 1185 to 1600, and is normally divided into two sections, roughly equivalent to the Kamakura period and the Muromachi period , respectively. The later forms of Late Middle Japanese are the first to be described by non-native sources, in this case the Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries; and thus there
14208-630: The exams along with Mutsumi. Unfortunately for him, Keitarō has an accident at the University of Tokyo opening ceremony and is unable to attend classes for three months. After recovering from his injuries, Keitarō decides to study overseas with Noriyasu Seta . As Keitarō is about to leave, Naru finally confesses her feelings to him at the airport and decides to wait for him to return. When Keitarō returns, he and Naru finally begin to express their feelings for each other. After they deal with new obstacles, Grandma Hina returns to Hinata House and reveals Naru
14356-457: The exams. The pair then have an argument and independently run off to Kyoto to clear their heads. While on their trip they settle their differences and meet Mutsumi Otohime , who lives in Okinawa and is also studying for the university exams. After returning from Kyoto, Keitarō and Naru decide to retake the exams. After a while, Mutsumi moves to Tokyo, and the three begin to study together. During this period, Naru becomes convinced that Mutsumi
14504-413: The face when she is referred to as and corrects him by saying "its Haruka-san" (san being a respectful term to your elder in most cases) Haruka Urashima is the only child of Hinata Urashima's eldest daughter, Yoko Urashima; her second daughter was Keitaro's mother. After the death of Yoko, Hinata adopted her granddaughter. Therefore, Haruka is Keitaro's legal aunt in addition to being his actual cousin. It
14652-417: The first seven volumes of the manga. Love Hina Mugendai ( ラブひな∞ ) was released on July 17, 2002, and contains character profiles, a timeline, artwork, interviews and production info. A large section is dedicated to early production sketches and handwritten development notes. Two reference books have also been released for the anime series. Ani-Hina Ver.1 was released on August 4, 2000, and Ani-Hina Ver.2
14800-455: The flow of loanwords from European languages increased significantly, and words from English roots have proliferated. Japanese is an agglutinative , mora -timed language with relatively simple phonotactics , a pure vowel system, phonemic vowel and consonant length, and a lexically significant pitch-accent . Word order is normally subject–object–verb with particles marking the grammatical function of words, and sentence structure
14948-609: The genitive particle ga remains in intentionally archaic speech. Early Middle Japanese is the Japanese of the Heian period , from 794 to 1185. It formed the basis for the literary standard of Classical Japanese , which remained in common use until the early 20th century. During this time, Japanese underwent numerous phonological developments, in many cases instigated by an influx of Chinese loanwords . These included phonemic length distinction for both consonants and vowels , palatal consonants (e.g. kya ) and labial consonant clusters (e.g. kwa ), and closed syllables . This had
15096-434: The girl he made the promise to and hopes to be accepted into the university in order to find her. Having failed the entrance exam twice and with his parents no longer willing to support him, he goes to stay at his grandmother's hotel , only to find out that it has been converted into a female-only apartment ( Dormitory ). The tenants are about to kick him out when his aunt appears and announces that his grandmother has given him
15244-430: The language, affecting the phonology of Early Middle Japanese . Late Middle Japanese (1185–1600) saw extensive grammatical changes and the first appearance of European loanwords . The basis of the standard dialect moved from the Kansai region to the Edo region (modern Tokyo ) in the Early Modern Japanese period (early 17th century–mid 19th century). Following the end of Japan's self-imposed isolation in 1853,
15392-458: The languages of the original Jōmon inhabitants, including the ancestor of the modern Ainu language . Because writing had yet to be introduced from China, there is no direct evidence, and anything that can be discerned about this period must be based on internal reconstruction from Old Japanese , or comparison with the Ryukyuan languages and Japanese dialects . The Chinese writing system
15540-449: The languages. Okinawan Japanese is a variant of Standard Japanese influenced by the Ryūkyūan languages, and is the primary dialect spoken among young people in the Ryukyu Islands . Modern Japanese has become prevalent nationwide (including the Ryūkyū islands) due to education , mass media , and an increase in mobility within Japan, as well as economic integration. Japanese is a member of
15688-427: The large quantity of English loanwords, modern Japanese has developed a distinction between [tɕi] and [ti] , and [dʑi] and [di] , with the latter in each pair only found in loanwords. Although Japanese is spoken almost exclusively in Japan, it has also been spoken outside of the country. Before and during World War II , through Japanese annexation of Taiwan and Korea , as well as partial occupation of China ,
15836-400: The license to the series after Bandai's license had expired. A new boxset of the television series across 4 discs was released by Funimation on February 24, 2009. It was then re-released as part of Funimation's Viridian Collection on July 27, 2010. In the United Kingdom, the series is licensed by MVM Films , who released the series on six DVDs between September 6, 2004, and March 7, 2005, and as
15984-488: The license was acquired by Funimation , who released a boxset of the television series in February 2009. The series is also licensed in Australia by Madman Entertainment and in the United Kingdom by MVM Films . The series has proved extremely popular around the world, both commercially and critically. In Japan, the manga had 20 million copies in circulation; over 1 million anime DVDs were also sold. The English release of
16132-477: The look and quality of the animation, highlighting the benefits of the digital creation of the adaption over traditional cel animation. Lee recognised elements from other series such as Maison Ikkoku and Kimagure Orange Road , and summarised the series as "simply wonderful". Chris Beveridge, of AnimeOnDVD.com, noted the first anime DVD volume was "really well put together", but also felt the manga did not translate into an anime series particularly well. He praised
16280-478: The main series. Love Hina: Mystery Guests at Hinata Hotel was written by Shō Aikawa under the pen name "Kurō Hazuki", was published in Japan by Kodansha on May 17, 2001. It was rereleased in a bilingual edition (English and Japanese) in December 2001. The second novel, Love Hina: Secrets at Hinata Hotel was written by Hiroyuki Kawasaki and released in Japan on February 15, 2002, with a bilingual edition released
16428-475: The manga has been reprinted many times. Both anime and manga have received numerous industry awards in Japan and North America, as well as praise from critics. The series takes place in the Kanagawa Prefecture , and centers on Keitarō Urashima and his attempts to fulfill a childhood promise that he made with a girl to enter the University of Tokyo together. However, he has forgotten the name of
16576-407: The only one to know that Pararakelse island was on the opposite side of the international dateline which meant Keitaro would still be able to send his letter in time to Tokyo U and thus finally be able to attend. In the anime, she is the only one who could instinctively tell Keitaro and Kaolla Su's brother (cousin) apart and knew which was which at all times, excluding Keitaro and Lamba themselves. It
16724-425: The only strict rule of word order is that the verb must be placed at the end of a sentence (possibly followed by sentence-end particles). This is because Japanese sentence elements are marked with particles that identify their grammatical functions. The basic sentence structure is topic–comment . For example, Kochira wa Tanaka-san desu ( こちらは田中さんです ). kochira ("this") is the topic of the sentence, indicated by
16872-470: The out-group gives a benefit to the in-group, and "up" to indicate the in-group gives a benefit to the out-group. Here, the in-group includes the speaker and the out-group does not, and their boundary depends on context. For example, oshiete moratta ( 教えてもらった ) (literally, "explaining got" with a benefit from the out-group to the in-group) means "[he/she/they] explained [it] to [me/us]". Similarly, oshiete ageta ( 教えてあげた ) (literally, "explaining gave" with
17020-415: The particle wa . The verb desu is a copula , commonly translated as "to be" or "it is" (though there are other verbs that can be translated as "to be"), though technically it holds no meaning and is used to give a sentence 'politeness'. As a phrase, Tanaka-san desu is the comment. This sentence literally translates to "As for this person, (it) is Mx Tanaka." Thus Japanese, like many other Asian languages,
17168-481: The proposed larger Altaic family, or to various Southeast Asian languages , especially Austronesian . None of these proposals have gained wide acceptance (and the Altaic family itself is now considered controversial). As it stands, only the link to Ryukyuan has wide support. Other theories view the Japanese language as an early creole language formed through inputs from at least two distinct language groups, or as
17316-520: The same month. Tokyopop licensed both novels for an English-language distribution in North America, releasing the first novel under the title Love Hina: The Novel, Volume 1 on April 11, 2006, and the second novel under the title Love Hina: The Novel, Volume 2 on August 8, 2006. Two reference books for the manga series have been released for fans of the series. Love Hina 0 was released on July 17, 2002, and contains character profiles, interviews and production info as well as other supporting materials for
17464-459: The same structure as affirmative sentences, but with intonation rising at the end. In the formal register, the question particle -ka is added. For example, ii desu ( いいです ) "It is OK" becomes ii desu-ka ( いいですか。 ) "Is it OK?". In a more informal tone sometimes the particle -no ( の ) is added instead to show a personal interest of the speaker: Dōshite konai-no? "Why aren't (you) coming?". Some simple queries are formed simply by mentioning
17612-408: The second is the dimly recalled promise made to someone whose name and face she cannot remember. In the anime television series, Naru is voiced by Yui Horie in Japanese and Dorothy Melendrez in English. Mutsumi Otohime ( 乙姫 むつみ , Otohime Mutsumi ) is a very sweet, gentle, kind, and soft-spoken 20-year-old girl. Naru and Keitaro first encounter her while taking some time off for
17760-449: The series as "nothing if not whimsical". In Japan, the television series DVDs sold over 1 million copies. The release of the second and third DVDs in Japan was only the second time that an anime series had consecutive number 1 chart positions. This would not occur again until over 15 years later with Mr. Osomatsu . ANN's Bamboo Dong praised the anime adaptation for being very intriguing and mixing "drama, romance, and slapstick comedy in
17908-439: The speaker, the listener, and persons mentioned. The Japanese writing system combines Chinese characters , known as kanji ( 漢字 , ' Han characters') , with two unique syllabaries (or moraic scripts) derived by the Japanese from the more complex Chinese characters: hiragana ( ひらがな or 平仮名 , 'simple characters') and katakana ( カタカナ or 片仮名 , 'partial characters'). Latin script ( rōmaji ローマ字 )
18056-433: The start and the finish Kitsune held two other jobs. Her name is derived from the name of manga artist Mitsune Ayasaka . In the anime television series, Kitsune is voiced by Junko Noda in Japanese and Barbara Goodson in English. Haruka Urashima ( 浦島 はるか , Urashima Haruka ) is Keitaro Urashima's "aunt" (actually his cousin). In the anime, she dislikes being called aunt by Keitaro and often smashes him in
18204-443: The start of serialization, character designs were still going through several revisions before being settled upon. Several characters underwent complete redesigns and name changes. At one stage the character Naru was named Midori, and she was supposed to fall through a hole in the floor naked, bump her head on Keitaro and lose her memory. Naru's name was changed many times before the author settled on Naru Narusegawa, and her final design
18352-406: The start of the anime, several image songs were recorded by the anime cast members. Several maxi singles were released featuring some of these image songs as well as drama tracks, also performed by the anime cast. "I Love Hina" was released on April 26, 2000, and followed by Love Hina 1 on June 26, 2000, Love Hina 2 on July 26, 2000, and Love Hina 3 on August 23, 2000. Love Hina 1 came with
18500-817: The state as at the time the constitution was written, many of the elders participating in the process had been educated in Japanese during the South Seas Mandate over the island shown by the 1958 census of the Trust Territory of the Pacific that found that 89% of Palauans born between 1914 and 1933 could speak and read Japanese, but as of the 2005 Palau census there were no residents of Angaur that spoke Japanese at home. Japanese dialects typically differ in terms of pitch accent , inflectional morphology , vocabulary , and particle usage. Some even differ in vowel and consonant inventories, although this
18648-481: The street. (grammatically incorrect insertion of a pronoun) But one can grammatically say essentially the same thing in Japanese: 驚いた彼は道を走っていった。 Transliteration: Odoroita kare wa michi o hashitte itta. (grammatically correct) This is partly because these words evolved from regular nouns, such as kimi "you" ( 君 "lord"), anata "you" ( あなた "that side, yonder"), and boku "I" ( 僕 "servant"). This
18796-438: The title to the apartments. Much to their dismay Keitarō becomes the new manager of the family-owned girls' dorm Hinata House and must now balance his new responsibilities in addition to studying for the university entrance exam. At Hinata House, Keitarō meets Naru Narusegawa , who is also studying to enter the university. Naru ranks first in the whole of Japan on the practice exams, and Keitarō convinces her to help him study. As
18944-569: The topic with an interrogative intonation to call for the hearer's attention: Kore wa? "(What about) this?"; O-namae wa? ( お名前は？ ) "(What's your) name?". Negatives are formed by inflecting the verb. For example, Pan o taberu ( パンを食べる。 ) "I will eat bread" or "I eat bread" becomes Pan o tabenai ( パンを食べない。 ) "I will not eat bread" or "I do not eat bread". Plain negative forms are i -adjectives (see below) and inflect as such, e.g. Pan o tabenakatta ( パンを食べなかった。 ) "I did not eat bread". List of Love Hina characters#Noriyasu Seta This
19092-419: The two consonants are the moraic nasal followed by a homorganic consonant. Japanese also includes a pitch accent , which is not represented in moraic writing; for example [haꜜ.ɕi] ("chopsticks") and [ha.ɕiꜜ] ("bridge") are both spelled はし ( hashi ) , and are only differentiated by the tone contour. Japanese word order is classified as subject–object–verb . Unlike many Indo-European languages ,
19240-577: The two methods were both used in writing until the 1940s. Bungo still has some relevance for historians, literary scholars, and lawyers (many Japanese laws that survived World War II are still written in bungo , although there are ongoing efforts to modernize their language). Kōgo is the dominant method of both speaking and writing Japanese today, although bungo grammar and vocabulary are occasionally used in modern Japanese for effect. The 1982 state constitution of Angaur , Palau , names Japanese along with Palauan and English as an official language of
19388-408: The two of them grow closer through their studies, and after Keitarō accidentally reads a small section of Naru's diary, he becomes increasingly convinced that Naru may be the girl with whom he made the promise. On the second day of the university exam, Keitarō asks Naru about the promise and is stunned when she tells him he is mistaken. Despite their studying, and Naru's mock exam results, they both fail
19536-480: The two terms (''hyōjungo'' and ''kyōtsūgo'') are almost the same. Hyōjungo or kyōtsūgo is a conception that forms the counterpart of dialect. This normative language was born after the Meiji Restoration ( 明治維新 , meiji ishin , 1868) from the language spoken in the higher-class areas of Tokyo (see Yamanote ). Hyōjungo is taught in schools and used on television and in official communications. It
19684-407: The verb (e.g. yonde for earlier yomite ), the -k- in the final mora of adjectives drops out ( shiroi for earlier shiroki ); and some forms exist where modern standard Japanese has retained the earlier form (e.g. hayaku > hayau > hayɔɔ , where modern Japanese just has hayaku , though the alternative form is preserved in the standard greeting o-hayō gozaimasu "good morning"; this ending
19832-548: The world. Since Japanese first gained the consideration of linguists in the late 19th century, attempts have been made to show its genealogical relation to languages or language families such as Ainu , Korean , Chinese , Tibeto-Burman , Uralic , Altaic (or Ural-Altaic ), Austroasiatic , Austronesian and Dravidian . At the fringe, some linguists have even suggested a link to Indo-European languages , including Greek , or to Sumerian . Main modern theories try to link Japanese either to northern Asian languages, like Korean or
19980-591: Was as a teenager that, while working at the inn, she was first called "Aunty Haruka" by her baby cousin Keitaro ;– the same time that Keitaro first met both Mutsumi and Naru. Haruka is the ryōbo ("house-mother") of the Joshi Senyō Ryō Hinata-sō ("Women's Only Dormitory, Hinata House") and runs the Wafū Chabō Hinata ("Traditional Japanese Tea-Room Hinata"). Haruka is constantly seen smoking
20128-539: Was based on 12- to 20-second-long recordings of 135 to 244 phonemes , which 42 students listened to and translated word-for-word. The listeners were all Keio University students who grew up in the Kanto region . There are some language islands in mountain villages or isolated islands such as Hachijō-jima island , whose dialects are descended from Eastern Old Japanese . Dialects of the Kansai region are spoken or known by many Japanese, and Osaka dialect in particular
20276-405: Was heavily criticized for being "one of the most annoying characters ever created even though she would have been better for Keitaro than Naru." Beveridge praised the fun and comedy as well as the fan service, but also noted that one's enjoyment would depend on whether they still cared for the characters. Japanese language Japanese ( 日本語 , Nihongo , [ɲihoŋɡo] )
20424-735: Was imported to Japan from Baekje around the start of the fifth century, alongside Buddhism. The earliest texts were written in Classical Chinese , although some of these were likely intended to be read as Japanese using the kanbun method, and show influences of Japanese grammar such as Japanese word order. The earliest text, the Kojiki , dates to the early eighth century, and was written entirely in Chinese characters, which are used to represent, at different times, Chinese, kanbun , and Old Japanese. As in other texts from this period,
20572-474: Was lost immediately following its composition.) This set of morae shrank to 67 in Early Middle Japanese , though some were added through Chinese influence. Man'yōgana also has a symbol for /je/ , which merges with /e/ before the end of the period. Several fossilizations of Old Japanese grammatical elements remain in the modern language – the genitive particle tsu (superseded by modern no )
20720-513: Was originally Mutsumi's pet turtle, That she gives to Naru after she and Keitaro help her get back to her home in Okinawa. But Tama's friendship with her is as strong as ever. Mutsumi is also the only one of the girls to never intentionally cause physical harm to Keitaro. She enjoys collecting photo stickers, a hobby she and Keitaro share. Mutsumi is stated as being very well-endowed, even though her clothes downplay her hourglass figure. Her bust
20868-487: Was released by Kodansha between June and December 2014. Kodansha published a bilingual English and Japanese edition under the Kodansha Bilingual Comics label. Eight volumes were produced under the bilingual format between October 2000 and July 2001. The edition was removed from sale after the series was licensed by Tokyopop. The series was licensed for an English-language release in North America and
21016-498: Was released in Japan on July 4, 2001. It was then released in North America on December 3, 2002, and in the United Kingdom on November 7, 2005. The Spring Special Love Hina Spring Special: I Wish Your Dream was also shown on TV Tokyo on April 2, 2001. The DVD was released in Japan on August 1, 2001, in North American on March 18, 2003, and in the United Kingdom on May 16, 2005. Finally, an OVA series called Love Hina Again
21164-484: Was released on April 3, 2002. Two collections of vocal songs featuring the female cast members were released: Love Hina – Hinata Girls Song Best was released on March 16, 2001, and Love Hina – Hinata Girls Song Best 2 was released on October 3, 2001. Many of the songs featured on these two albums were written by Ritsuko Okazaki , who released the self cover album Love Hina Okazaki Collection on December 16, 2001. Two live concerts called Love Live Hina were performed by
21312-401: Was released on DVD in Japan in 3 parts between January 26 and March 27, 2002. A CD single featuring the opening theme "Kirari Takaramono" and the ending theme "Be for Me, Be for You" was released on February 28, 2002. A solo version was used for the first episode, and a duet with Yūji Ueda was used for the third episode. The North American and United Kingdom releases of Love Hina Again grouped
21460-890: Was released on November 9, 2000. Each book contains character profiles, episode summaries, production sketches and details as well as interviews and information on the voice actors; each covers half of the anime series. The series has seen several video games released across several platforms. The Game Boy Color received Love Hina Pocket on August 4, 2000, and Love Hina Party on January 26, 2001. The Game Boy Advance received Love Hina Advance on September 7, 2001. The Sega Dreamcast received Love Hina: Totsuzen no Engeji Happening on September 28, 2000, and Love Hina: Smile Again on March 29, 2001. The Sony PlayStation received Love Hina 1: Ai wa Kotoba no Naka ni on September 28, 2000, and Love Hina 2: Kotoba wa Konayuki no Yō ni on November 30, 2000. The Sony PlayStation 2 received Love Hina: Gojasu Chiratto Happening on May 22, 2003. Prior to
21608-1329: Was revealed that Tokyopop's license had been left to expire by Kodansha and would not be renewed. Kodansha Comics licensed the series with a new translation. This omnibus edition was released as 5 volumes between October 2011 and March 2013. The series is also licensed for an English-language release in Singapore by Chuang Yi and for regional language releases in France and Québec by Pika Édition, in Spain by Glénat , in Brazil by Editora JBC , in Mexico by Grupo Editorial Vid , in Poland by Waneko, in Greece by Compupress , in Germany in German, in Norway by Schibsted Forlag, in Sweden by Bonnier Carlsen and in Denmark by Egmont Manga & Anime . The September 1, 2010, issue of Weekly Shōnen Magazine included
21756-433: Was serialized in Kodansha 's shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Magazine , between October 21, 1998, to October 31, 2001. Its chapters were collected in 14 tankōbon volumes, released from March 17, 1999, to January 17, 2002. The series was later released in a partially colored format known as the "Iro Hina version". The 14 Iro Hina volumes were released between July 2001 and April 2004. A new seven-volume edition
21904-525: Was shown to encourage her to date a rich boy just because of his wealth. Also, when the girls are traveling to Molmol to try to bring Keitaro back to Hinata Inn, the only thing she thinks of is the inheritance that will be left to him and the girl that he chooses whenever Hina returns, even though, later on, Kitsune lets him stay with Naru. She eventually takes over the Hinata Tea House when Haruka leaves and picks up Haruka's habit of smoking. Between
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