in modern times usually consist of a
family name (
surname), followed by a
given name.
Middle names are not generally used. Japanese names are usually written in
kanji, which are characters usually
Chinese in origin but
Japanese in pronunciation. The
kanji for a name may have a variety of possible Japanese pronunciations, but parents might use
hiragana or
katakana when giving a birth name to their newborn child. Names written in
hiragana or
katakana are phonetic renderings, and so lack the visual meaning of names expressed in the logographic
kanji.