What is the difference between 点字 and 点字表記?


I have a picture for 点字表記, but I don't know what it means and how it is
different from 点字.

![braille dictionary](https://best1x.com/wp-
content/uploads/2016/12/61thFy3upoL._SX349_BO1204203200_.jpg)




点字 (lit. "dot character") means braille, and 表記 means orthography/notation.

Japanese is a language which normally uses tons of characters which include
hiragana, katakana and kanji. Mixtures of these are surely difficult for
learners, but once you get used to it, they also help us write and read
sentences smoothly without spaces at all. We can instantly tell the word
boundaries of sentences thanks to these three types of characters.

However, the Japanese 点字 system are very different from ordinary Japanese. We
also use the 2×3 matrix for each "character" , but theoretically there are
only 63 possible patterns (excluding the blank/space), which is enough for
Latin languages but not for Japanese. See [this
chart](http://www.yoihari.net/tenji/omotegazo.html) for the Japanese braille
system. Simply put, writing Japanese in braille is like having to write
everything only in hiragana and spaces, which is often confusing because there
are many compound words and words that share the same hiragana spelling.

That's where this dictionary, 点字「表記」辞典 (braille _orthography_ dictionary),
comes in. If we look at its [sample
(PDF)](http://www.siencenter.or.jp/tosho/dl/hyoki-page.pdf), we'll soon notice
that this dictionary does not explain the meaning of words at all. Instead,
this dictionary tries to standardize how to "write" certain difficult and/or
complicated words. For example, this dictionary says 曖昧模糊 should be written as
`あいまい□もこ` (where □ represents a space), but 青二才 should be written as `あおにさい`
without any space. This surely helps professional 点字 users.

If this book were called 点字辞典, it might look like an ordinary dictionary
(i.e., giving the meaning of words) written in braille. That's not the purpose
of this book.

Reference: [点字は誰のもの？](http://www.yoihari.net/tenji/theory.htm) (written in
Japanese)

