Using a question mark

Sakura

Normally, questions in Japanese end with か ka. For example:

田中さんは学生ですか。Tanaka san wa gakusee desu ka. - Is Mr. Tanaka a student?
これはいくらですか。 Kore wa ikura desu ka. - How much is this?
どこに行きますか。 Doko ni ikimasu ka. - Where are you going?
どんな本を読みますか。Donna hon o yomimasu ka. - What kind of books do you read?

You probably noticed that there is no question mark at the end of each of the above questions. A question mark is not part of the formal Japanese writing system.

However, in casual every-day writing (email, Facebook, etc), people often use question marks. There are cases where it’s optional and cases where it’s necessary. Let me elaborate on this.

Whenever a question ends with かka (such as the examples mentioned above), a question mark is optional in informal writing.

However, when you speak informally, sometimes a question ends without か ka. When that happens, you need to use a question mark to indicate that it is a question.

For example:

大丈夫？ Daijoobu? - (Are you) all right?
元気？ Genki? - (Are you) well?
何？ Nani? - What?
どうして？ Dooshite? - Why?
今日は仕事に行く？Kyoo wa shigoto ni iku? - Are you going to work today?
今日は忙しいよね？Kyoo wa isogashii yo ne? - You’re busy today, right?
映画に行くの？ Eega ni iku no? - Are you going to a movie?

Notice that none of the questions above has か ka. 

Marii

That is good to know. I am curious, how did the Japanese handle those situations before western influence brought over western punctuation, such as question marks?

Sakura

Thanks for the question. Note that these examples I provided are modern colloquial Japanese. In old times, there was no need to use any question mark; there were some specific ending forms that indicate questions, "ka" being one of those marks. Even now, the Japanese language doesn't officially employ a question mark. We only use it when we need to reflect our colloquial speech style in writing, such as in email, texting, Facebook, etc.