The small ke is a Japanese character, typographically a small form of the katakana character ke. While identical in shape to a small, is actually an abbreviation for the kanji, specifically by writing half of the bamboo radical ., alternatively written as , is a common Japanese counter word. is also as an abbreviation for the Japanese conjunctive particle. It is unrelated to the katakana character but is sometimes written as a large character. Although it resembles the katakana character ke, it is pronouncedka when it specifies a counter, but not ke. When used as a counter, the katakana or are sometimes used instead. When used as a counter but pronounced ko, the katakana is sometimes used instead. However, is not used as a general abbreviation for or. For example, kojin, "individual" will not be written as . Note that is used in various words, but is generally only used as a counter, or as a variant of. The most familiar example as a counter is for counting months, as in where it is pronounced ka. Other common examples are places and countries . An example where it is pronounced as ko is when counting small objects, such as pieces of fruit or candy, where one may write , rather than the more formal ; this is particularly common in hand-written signs at shops, though is also common. When used as the conjunction ', it has the same meaning as ' which is more common in modern Japanese and is commonly used in place names, though rare in everyday words. One relatively common word using is karigane. In place names, it is generally a conjunction, and hence pronounced ga, particularly as "field of...", as in . It may also be a counter, where it will generally be pronounced ka, as in . In some cases both and are used to write a place name, depending on the specific place with a given name or usage. This may have also changedover time, so older documents may use a different form, and older institutions may use an outdated spelling. The most conspicuous example is Jiyūgaoka, which refers to a number of places throughout Japan, some of which officially use,, or. The best-known of these is a popular neighborhood in Tokyo, whose official form is, but it was formerly, changing in 1965, and some businesses use the older form. The hiragana version of the character exists as, but it is virtually unused.
