Basic Rules and Common Mistakes in JAPANESE WORDS PRONUNCIATION

As we know, Japanese language is totally different from English, the syllables are totally different, so too the pronunciations. Therefore, we cannot just bring English pronunciation rule into Japanese. And so in order to help you in learning Japanese words pronunciation, we would like to explain the basic Japanese words pronunciation, and make clear some common mistakes when pronounce Japanese words.

Read more: How to say i love you in Japanese                                                                                            How to say good morning in Japanese                                                                                     Japanese Kanji

1 - Basic rules in Japanese words Pronunciation

     a) Vowels and Consonants

In Japanese, there are 5 vowels (a, e, i, o, u) and 14 consonants (k, s, t, n, h, m, y, r, w, g, z, d, b, p), and of course, they differ from English pronunciation. Let's take the 5 vowels for example, for easier visualization, we will compare the sound to English:

• "a" - similar to "ah"
• "i" - similar to "we"
• "u" - best to describe it like "urg"/"uh"/"um"
• "e" - somewhere between "a" and "e" (in "pet")
• "o" - similar to "oh"

Combining vowels with consonants, we will have the sounds of syllables, for example: "k" + "a" = "ka" (similar to "car"). However, since it is pronunciation we are talking about, it is suggested to listen to the Japanese Hiragana syllables.

     b) Stress

So, you are non-native English speakers and you are proud of your excellent English words intonation (or stress). Then sadly, in Japanese words pronunciation they don't have such intonation. Of course in different situation people need to stress important words, but for the most part, Japanese words are spoken in the same length and strength. Let's compare:

• In English: the word "interesting", the intonation is in "int", IN - teresting.
• In Japanese: the word "interesting" is "omoshiroi" and there is no intonation, just "o - mo - shi - roi".

This means if you try to put intonation into Japanese words, it would sound weird. You can test this by pronouncing a Japanese word by putting intonation into it, take "omoshiroi" as example, and then compare the pronunciation to the one spoken by native Japanese speaker. You will see the difference.

     c) Long vowel

Long vowels are comprised of 2 syllables, and so when we pronounce long vowels, normally we will have to lengthen vowel's sound. For example, long "a" would be "ahhh". In some cases, the pronunciation can be different, but that will be another story.

2 - Some common mistakes in Japanese words pronunciation

     a) Shortening the long vowel

This mistake involves in the long vowel we mentioned earlier. In this case, the sound is shortened, or cut down, and sadly the meaning of the word can be changed as it becomes a different word. For example:

• The word "obaasan" (grandmother) - will be "oh - BAHH - san".
• If shortened, "obaasan" will be "oh - BA - san" (the vowel "baa" ends much quicker), and it will become the word "aunt".

So in this case, this mistake will bring misunderstanding as people will understand the word in different meaning.

     b) Overstressing

This is most likely the influence from speaking English. As in English, each word has its own intonation, however, as we discussed, in a Japanese sentence, people will only stressed the important word which implies the information they want to deliver, other words will be spoken in equal length and strength. So what will be the effect of this mistake? People may overstress all the words within a sentence, or, stress the words indiscriminately. So sometimes we may hear people say like: "wahh - ta - shi waa daiii - ga - ku e iii - ki - ma - su", and actually it should be "watashi wa daigaku e ikimasu" (I go to University).

     c) Speaking katakana words like English

Japanese people are told to be not really good in speaking English, and the amusing thing about Japanese is that they use lots of borrowed words from English. These borrowed English words are converted into Katakana version and they sound much different from original English version. So this is where trouble starts, some people "prefer" to speak those Katakana words in English because... they are borrowed from English! But here is the thing, it is speaking Japanese we are talking about so we cannot just speak Katakana words with English because the pronunciations are so different that many native Japanese speaker may not understand (not to mention it sounds so weird in Japanese standard). Also it can affect a lot in the way we learn Japanese speaking skill (this one is already mentioned in another article).

And that's it! Some basic rules and common mistakes made by Japanese learners in term of Japanese words pronunciation. Stay tune, good luck and have fun in your Japanese learning journey!

Source: blog.akirademy.com