Honorifics

Hello, and welcome to the first installment of Learn Japanese! Today, we'll be learning about honorifics. In English, these are salutations like "Mr." or "Mrs." Japan's honorifics are very unique, but they make a lot of sense when you stop to think about them. You see, Japan is a country very concerned with social status and groups, and their language reflects this. You call people different things depending on how high or low their status in society is compared to yours. Here's a simple table with some honorifics:

san	The catch-all honorific. Functions as Mr., Mrs., Miss, etc.
kun	Used amongst boys for their friends, and older people to young boys. Girls can also use the kun honorific when talking about boys.
chan	Used amongst girls for their friends, and for all very young children.
sama	Used only for those worthy of utmost respect. Equivalent to "lord," or "lady."
sempai	Used for someone older who you respect as someone with a lot of experience in life.
sensei	Used for teachers.

All honorifics are added at the end of names. How about some examples? Let's use someone named Kaeko for the feminine honorifics and Kesuke for the masculine ones.

san	Kaeko-san and Kesuke-san	The honorific can be used for both genders. In this example, Kaeko and Kesuke are probably older than us, and we don't know them all that well.
kun	Kesuke-kun	Here, we can only use Kesuke. This is because this is a masculine honorific. Kesuke is probably around the same age as us, and we're all boys.
chan	Kaeko-chan	Kaeko is around our age, and now we're all girls! Kaeko could also be a young child.
	Kesuke-chan	Kesuke would have to be a young child, because he's certainly not a girl our age!
sama	Kaeko-sama and Kesuke-sama	Well, we've just been completely outclassed. Kaeko and Kesuke are now VIPs, and we owe them the utmost respect.
sempai	Kaeko-sempai and Kesuke-sempai	We like Kaeko and Kesuke, now. So much so that we've idolised them. If you had a really awesome older brother or sister, this is what you'd call them.
sensei	Kaeko-sensei and Kesuke-sensei	Kaeko and Kesuke are our teachers. The only opportunity to call someone sensei is if they are your teacher, otherwise it just doesn't fit.

*Note: sempai and sensei can be used as nouns, without a name at the front. They still carry the same meanings, though.