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+--- Thread: Pronunciation assessment anyone? (/thread-2693.html)
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-08
Smackle Wrote:Duh, I can't even read Japanese right!!!masaman Wrote:http://hisazin-up.dyndns.org/up/src/90334.mp3You actually said 僕の世界 instead of 俺の生活
But do I sound foreign? My acquaintance (who is not Japanese) said a while ago that I sounded "really American."
Honestly, You don't sound "really American". People whose native language is English usually sound a lot more foreign than you do. Pronunciation(sound of the words) wise, I really don't find anything foreign.
My American friend who spent 7 years in Japan and have a Japanese wife sounds almost like you do, but hardcore Japanese people who've never heard a non-Japanese person speaking Japanese would probably find you foreign sounding though, and that's mostly because of your pitch. I've never thought about it but I now started to think that we may have several pitch patterns and applying one of them to each word. I know which word has which pitch pattern and unless it is pronounced with the right pitch pattern, I for some reason feel it is "incorrect".
I speak English so I should be better in picking up the difference in pronunciation than 99% of Japanese, but when pronunciation is a little off in Japanese, I feel it is more like how people talk than it is incorrect, unless it is to the point it sounds like a different word.
Anyways, your voice sounds a lot better than mine, and I'm sure people want to listen to you than me, so I wouldn't worry about it too much.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-08
He was learning Japanese in college, and he said he sounded better than me (but he never let me hear him). I guess I should work more on making my pitches more normal. But I'm curious, do I sound worse, about the same, or better than
melody.
伊藤由奈
Leah Dizon
So I know where I am at. (I do not like how melody. talks for some reason)
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-09
Smackle Wrote:He was learning Japanese in college, and he said he sounded better than me (but he never let me hear him). I guess I should work more on making my pitches more normal. But I'm curious, do I sound worse, about the same, or better thanMelody and 伊藤由奈 sound like native Japanese who is bilingual. They are speaking pretty much perfect「標準語」. Leah Dizon sounds really good too though she made about 3 pitch mistakes and her ability to speak Japanese seems to be very limited in other areas.
melody.
伊藤由奈
Leah Dizon
So I know where I am at. (I do not like how melody. talks for some reason)
It's just about pitch and rhythm. Say Leah Dizon pronounced 5 words with wrong pitch and you did 3, I would think you are more "correct", so it kind of depends on the sentence I guess. It's not really about sounding good or bad, I think you sound really good.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-09
And from hearing your clips, I think it wouldn't be so hard to make your clips sound almost like a native Japanese's. Possibly just 30 min or 1 hour if you get a native Japanese to really pick on and correct you face to face.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
I wish it was easier to determine pitch so I could take note and practice them. I suppose I will just have to mimic a lot of 標準語 speakers. I'm curious as to how iSoron puts pitch in his cards. I can sort of determine what pitches there are based on dictionaries on a word to word basis, but it is still hard for me.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-09
I'm not sure how Japanese learner's dictionaries look like, but my gut feeling is telling me there are only several or a dozen patterns at most. Leah Dizon's Japanese is really rudimentary and she still sounds pretty natural, so it shouldn't be that hard once you get the patterns.
wow past midnight again. good night!
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
I actually use Japanese dictionaries for Japanese people. Dictionaries for Japanese learners tend to be very bad.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - iSoron - 2009-03-09
masaman Wrote:Many thanks, masaman!iSoron Wrote:I'll give it a try.You did get most of the tone right on the top one. There are couple of places though, 三姉妹 and 3メーター are like this.
http://hisazin-up.dyndns.org/up/src/90332.mp3
you can use it on a lot of other words, like 郵便局、冷蔵庫、洗濯機 are pretty much the same pattern.
Smackle Wrote:I'm curious as to how iSoron puts pitch in his cards.Here's what my cards look like.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
Does the part in a different color indicate where it rises?
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - iSoron - 2009-03-09
Smackle Wrote:Does the part in a different color indicate where it rises?It indicates the accented mora. You can read more about it here.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
iSoron Wrote:Where did you get the information for the pitch? Yahoo's dictionary has a 50 next to it which I think means it isSmackle Wrote:Does the part in a different color indicate where it rises?It indicates the accented mora. You can read more about it here.
いあわせる
と
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - LordGolem - 2009-03-09
I've found a nice page that could be useful.
http://www.italki.com/knowledge/wiki-Japanese%20Introduction%20Pitch%20accent.htm
I also wonder if those anchorman dictionaries are useful... Like the NHK one (NHK日本語発音アクセント辞典). There's also a cd-rom version.
Edit: This page is even better: http://everything2.com/e2node/Pitch%2520accent%2520in%2520the%2520Japanese%2520language
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - nac_est - 2009-03-09
Masaman it looks like you're working full time on this thread... we're gonna have to pay you! no, thanks for the help, really.
iSoron: that's some damn good looking fonts you have! Are you on ubuntu by any chance?
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - iSoron - 2009-03-09
Smackle Wrote:Where did you get the information for the pitch? Yahoo's dictionary has a 50 next to it which I think means it isYou've missed a mora in your example, but that's right, the number indicates the pitch.
いわせる
と
い あ わ せ
と る
１ ２ ３ ４ ５ ６
Two or more numbers indicates that there are two or more ways of reading it, I think. Zero means that the word is flat (the first mora is low-pitched and the remaining are high-pitched).
nac_est Wrote:iSoron: that's some damn good fonts you have? Are you on ubuntu by any chance?いいえ, Gentoo Linux. The fonts are from Epson. You can get them (and a bunch of others fonts) here.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
iSoron Wrote:Two or more numbers indicates that there are two or more ways of reading it, I think.Oh, that makes so much more sense now. I think I can read the dictionary pitch numbers better now.
Here is a test of my skills:
あ の と ざいま
るひ こ でご す
Right?
http://www.snapvine.com/bp/x1osegygEd6TTAAwSFxxvg
Yet another clip of me trying out my pitches. I do not really have a lot of control over my voice.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-09
nac_est Wrote:Masaman it looks like you're working full time on this thread...I know! I'm like hogging the whole topic! I should chill a bit. I did get paid by the comments on my English though, thanks to everyone.
Smackle Wrote:There you go! On the first part, You pronounced こと flat, but that's OK, I do that too and it's pretty common. Though, 助詞（の で が etc.）usually goes down if the preceding word has an accent. so it should beiSoron Wrote:Two or more numbers indicates that there are two or more ways of reading it, I think.Oh, that makes so much more sense now. I think I can read the dictionary pitch numbers better now.
Here is a test of my skills:
あ の と ざいま
るひ こ でご す
Right?
http://www.snapvine.com/topic/create/a0cac9640ad611de94980030485b0f88
Yet another clip of me trying out my pitches. I do not really have a lot of control over my voice.
こと
で
Other than that, you nailed the pitch.
By the way, you can make 助詞 higher like you did in the second half, if you want to emphasize the word. Some girls even exclusively use this form with the end of sentences going up like a question.
あ の とで ざいます
る こ ご
ひ
This is a little too much, but is natural for a young girl so you'll probably hear it a lot.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-09
Hm, I think I can add pitch to my cards now that I can better read dictionaries.
But I do not know how verb inflections work.
If できる is
き
で る
And ない is
な
い
Is できない
きな
で い
?
Also if たべる is
べ
た る
And させる is
せる
さ
Is たべさせる
べ せる
た さ
?
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-11
Smackle Wrote:But I do not know how verb inflections work.I think when the word has an accent, させる's せ and the character immediately before ない will have the accent.
き きさせ き
で る で る（strange grammar) で な
い
か えさせ えさ
え か る か な
す い
たづけ たづけさせ たづけ
か る か る か な
い
If it does not, then flat.
る らせる らない
や や や
ずる ずらせる ずらない
け け け
This is just off the top of my head and there probably are more rules, but this pattern matched 20 or so random verbs I came up with.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - igordesu - 2009-03-11
@masaman: Okay, I don't want to hijack the topic here or anything, but I just had an idea. I know this has been the subject of a bit/lot of debate in this forum, so I thought maybe you could "settle" the debate (I use that term loosely--I don't wanna start another debate, lol...). Seeing as you've been such a great help with evaluating everyone's Japanese as far as pitch and all that, maybe you could evaluate Khatzumoto's Japanese?
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/勝元s日本語初ビデオだよコノヤロー／khatzumoto-japanese-video-debut
I know everyone here would be very thankful input on that. Both you and Khatzumoto seem to be very trusted people around here, so you'd be doing everyone a HUGE favor.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-11
igordesu,
To me, he sounds REALLY natural. He doesn't pass as a native just yet, which may be a lot harder in Japan as Japan isn't as diverse as, say US, but he makes very little mistakes, and most notably he doesn't sound foreign. If I didn't read his blog, I would have thought he had gone to Jr. high and high school in Japan cause his Japanese sounds too natural for a person who started learning Japanese as an adult.
And he's funny too. プチトラウマ cracked me up :lol:
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - igordesu - 2009-03-11
Wow, thank you so much. Your input is much, much appreciated. That's really great to hear. I've heard other people say this and that about his Japanese, but I know I can trust you
That's awesome. I didn't have that many doubts about his Japanese, but...that's good to know. Thanks 
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - masaman - 2009-03-11
You're very welcome
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Smackle - 2009-03-11
Nukemarine Wrote:Wonder if I should try posting me singing "明日晴れるかな". There is that karaoke site that has 15000 songs.Kind of late, but you should definitely try singing that song. We should all sing that song for fun to see our Japanese singing voices.
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - Nukemarine - 2009-03-12
Smackle Wrote:Why is it late? Here you go, but it's not good. My computer is not a karaoke machine.Nukemarine Wrote:Wonder if I should try posting me singing "明日晴れるかな". There is that karaoke site that has 15000 songs.Kind of late, but you should definitely try singing that song. We should all sing that song for fun to see our Japanese singing voices.
http://www.snapvine.com/sb/3d9e377e0ed511deae4f0030485c72b4
Pronunciation assessment anyone? - captal - 2009-03-12
masaman Wrote:igordesu,Good to hear, but a quick question... if he doesn't pass as native, but he doesn't sound foreign, where does that put him?
To me, he sounds REALLY natural. He doesn't pass as a native just yet, which may be a lot harder in Japan as Japan isn't as diverse as, say US, but he makes very little mistakes, and most notably he doesn't sound foreign. If I didn't read his blog, I would have thought he had gone to Jr. high and high school in Japan cause his Japanese sounds too natural for a person who started learning Japanese as an adult.
And he's funny too. プチトラウマ cracked me up :lol:
