A comprehensive, communicative, and practical guide to using Japanese, Kodansha's Furigana English-Japanese Dictionary is an invaluable reference tool for anyone with an interest in the Japanese language. It has been edited with the needs of English-speaking users in mind students, teachers, business people, and casual linguists. What is furigana and why is it so important? Furigana refers to the small kana that are printed above or alongside kanji to show the pronunciation of the Chinese character. With furigana superscripts, the beginner who is familiar with hiragana and katakana is able to read even the most difficult and obscure kanji at a glance. Other dictionaries either provide little