HSC Japanese Continuers (NSW) key terms

The system of honorific Japanese used to show respect or politeness. It includes respectful sonkeigo, humble kenjōgo and polite teineigo forms, and is expected when addressing teachers, employers, customers or strangers in formal situations.

Respectful language that raises the person being spoken about, such as いらっしゃる for 行く・来る・いる or おっしゃる for 言う. Used for superiors, customers and people outside one's own group.

Humble language that lowers the speaker's own actions to show respect to the listener or a third party, for example 伺う for 行く・聞く or いたす for する. Common in business self-introductions and emails.

Polite speech marked by です・ます and ございます, showing courtesy to the listener without raising or lowering anyone specifically. It forms the baseline register for interviews, announcements and letters.

Fixed social greetings and set phrases such as おはようございます, いただきます or お世話になっております. Knowing when each is appropriate reveals understanding of Japanese social relationships and hierarchy.

The distinction between one's in-group (family, own company) and outsiders. Insiders are spoken of humbly and outsiders respectfully, which explains why a worker calls a colleague's boss そちらの部長 but refers to their own boss humbly.

A business card exchanged at meetings. It is offered and received with both hands, read carefully, and never written on in the presence of the giver; the ritual signals professional courtesy.

The job-hunting process, often shortened to 就活. Japanese university students typically start a year before graduation, attending company briefings, submitting entry sheets and sitting several rounds of interviews in a coordinated schedule.

The practice of hiring new graduates all at once each spring and training them inside the company. It shapes recruitment timetables and is often contrasted with mid-career hiring.

The traditional expectation that an employee stays with one company until retirement. It is now less guaranteed, and texts often discuss its decline alongside restructuring and changing career expectations.

Restructuring, especially reducing staff numbers. Borrowed from English but narrowed in Japanese to mean corporate downsizing, it appears in discussions of job insecurity and its effects on families.

Death from overwork, such as a heart attack or stroke caused by extreme hours. The word is central to debates about long working hours, unpaid overtime and workplace health in Japan.

Overtime work beyond contracted hours. Listening and reading passages often involve negotiating overtime, claiming overtime pay, or a worker being asked to stay late.

Paid annual leave to which employees are legally entitled. Texts may mention how few days Japanese workers actually take and why, linking to workplace culture.

Work–life balance: the aim of balancing paid work with family, rest and personal interests. It appears in company policy descriptions, job advertisements and opinion pieces about reform.

Childcare leave taken after the birth of a child. Passages often compare the high take-up by mothers with the low take-up by fathers and discuss the career consequences.

A job interview. Candidates should recognise typical questions such as 自己PRをお願いします and 長所と短所を教えてください, plus the polite formulas used to enter, answer and leave.

An application form used in Japanese graduate recruitment, asking for self-promotion, reasons for applying and student-life achievements. Its set structure and formal style appear in reading tasks.

A part-time job, typically taken by students or as a side income. Passages commonly involve shift requests, hourly wages, workplace rules and balancing work with study.

The combined trend of fewer births and a rising elderly population. It is cited as a cause of labour shortages, pension strain and the need for overseas workers or automation.

The falling number of children being born, measured by a declining birth rate. It affects school closures, family policy, childcare leave and debates about immigration.

The growing proportion of elderly people in a population. Related issues in texts include caregiving, pensions, age-friendly housing and the isolation of older residents.

The care of elderly or disabled people, often provided by family members. Reading passages may describe the burden on working carers and the availability of day services or nursing homes.

Living alone. It appears in discussions of young people moving to cities, elderly isolation and the practical tasks of cooking, paying bills and managing a household independently.

Sorting rubbish into categories such as burnable, non-burnable, recyclable and oversized waste on designated days. It is a standard example of community rules newcomers must learn.

A neighbourhood association that organises festivals, clean-ups and disaster drills and circulates notices. Joining shows participation in local society and is often mentioned in texts about moving house.

Unpaid voluntary work such as helping at a festival, cleaning a park or assisting after a disaster. Texts discuss motivation, time commitment and what volunteers gain.

Bullying, including exclusion, teasing and online harassment at school. Related passages may describe a victim's feelings, a teacher's response or a school's anti-bullying policy.

A pupil's prolonged refusal to attend school, often linked to bullying, anxiety or family circumstances. Texts may present support options such as free schools or counselling.

A short internship giving students work experience at a company. It appears in career-planning passages, often as a chance to test whether an industry suits the student.

To take notes while listening, for example recording times, prices, names or instructions. In listening tasks, candidates must catch details and write them accurately while the audio continues.

To ask the speaker to repeat or clarify something, using phrases such as すみません、もう一度お願いします. Recognising these repair phrases helps candidates follow dialogues and infer what was misunderstood.

The main point or gist of a passage. Questions often ask for the speaker's overall opinion or purpose rather than a single detail, so candidates must separate key claims from examples.

The writer's opinion in an article or essay. It is usually signalled by expressions such as ～べきだ, ～のではないだろうか or 確かに～しかし, which mark conclusion and concession.

Conjunctions such as しかし, だから, つまり and また that link ideas and signal contrast, cause, restatement or addition. Tracking them helps readers follow an argument's direction.

Referring words such as これ, それ, その and こうした that point back to earlier content. Reading questions often ask what a pronoun refers to, requiring careful tracking of the preceding sentence.

The conventions of Japanese letters: a seasonal opening, a greeting to the recipient, news about oneself, a closing wish for the reader's health, and the date and sender's name. Appropriate for writing tasks.

Manuscript paper with grid squares used for Japanese compositions. Rules include starting paragraphs with an indent, one character per square, and placing punctuation in its own square.

A paragraph. In Japanese writing each new paragraph begins with a one-square indent, and a well-organised response moves from introduction through examples to conclusion across clear paragraphs.