Hi

I'm still working my way through RTK. I don't want to get into sentences until I finish RTK, but I'd like to work on reading Kana. I did Heisig's Remembering the Kana when I first started out and I have the basic katakana and hirigana down but actually reading words is still difficult.

When I Google for hirigana and katakana practice or look for Anki decks, most of what I can find is just each character individually. This isn't much of a help to me at this point.

I basically have two issues: one is that compounds and still throw me off (things like [きょう], and the other is the pronunciation.

For example, with something like [がくせい], I want to emphasis the "u" part of ku, giving it three syllables, but when listening to the pronunciation on Tae Kim it is hardly distinguishable and sounds to be only two syllables.

Basically looking for more examples like this, maybe an Anki deck or website, of katakana and/or hirigana words with accompanying pronunciation.

I know I can find plenty of katakana and hirigana on their own, but hoping for something with either the pronunciation and/or romaji so I can check myself.

But...がくせい has four "syllables"...hasn't it?

What I did, was opening random websites and scan for katakana (I started with that almost a year before I properly started studying Japanese) and then did the same for hiragana.

[Zgarbas]

がくせい has 3 syllables because the いis just an extension of the え in せ.

OP, many times the syllables in the う row will have it spoken very softly, thus sounding as if it is not there. Kind of how です is pronounced without the final u. It varies from word to word, though.

Core 2k words are mostly hiragana/katakana and have pronounciation attached. You can find a deck on anki =). (if you don't want any kanjis at all, you can just have the cards show the reading only...

Oh great, double thanks! One for the pronunciation tip and another for the deck idea. Regarding the web scan, I've tried that on sites such as kids.yahoo.co.jp and it is helpful, but I still am not confident enough to know if I am getting everything right. It's kind of a pain to look it up every time and I wanted something that lets me easily check myself with either audio or romaji pronunciation, so this deck idea is right on the money!

I guess pronunciation will just come with practice, and that is precisely why I wanted some katakana and hirigana practice with audio. My main focus is still on finishing RTK but sometimes I want to do a little more after I reach my daily goal, especially to reinforce the hirigana and katakana since they really don't show up at all during RTK.

I hadn't thought to look at the core decks because I'm not at that stage in my study yet, but modifying the deck as you suggest to only show hirigana or katakana is a really useful suggestion!

Thanks again!

Stian Wrote:But...がくせい has four "syllables"...hasn't it?

"Syllables" is a tough word to use for Japanese and the typical term for each sound is "mora" (I believe that linguistically, せい is 1 syllable but 2 mora).

In any case, がくせい is 4 mora. Two things make this hard to hear for a beginning learner:
1) The "u" in the く syllable will be "whispered" and it will almost sound like "gaksei".
2) It is very hard for (many) English native speakers to hear the difference between long and short vowels; i.e. between せい and せ.

(There are rules for when the vowel is whispered/omitted; IIRC it's that an "i" or "u" coming between two voiceless consonants or at the end of a sentence following a voiceless consonant is whispered. If that sounds like gibberish to you don't worry; you can pick this up by listening carefully and being aware that the idea exists.)

^ Are you aware of how much focus 拍 or モーラ students are exposed to in, say, their 国語の授業? It would be interesting to have some idea of how much of this subject is instruction learners of the language as a secondary language pick up and how much of this aspect of Japanese is purely acquired as a native Japanese speaker growing up in their language environment.

Not the production aspect, I mean, the awareness of the mechanics behind it, that is.

[Zgarbas]

Given how they'd probably run across this issue when learning about their first haiku/tanka I think they'd be exposed to the issue pretty quickly.

It's not something they really have to teach excessively though; even Japanese children have an awareness of that issue though they might not be able to explain it. But ここ vs. 高校 (to use one example) isn't something that Japanese children have to explicitly be taught. ゆき is a girl's name and ゆうき is a guy's name. 待て is forceful and sometimes rude whereas 待って is merely casual. There are so many examples like this that are just in basic, everyday Japanese that it's hard to believe even small children have any trouble with it.

EDIT: As for the explicit mechanics I'm not sure; it's probably discussed at some point but I doubt it's something that they have to spend much time on. It's one of those "You already know this perfectly, here's the terms you can use to talk about it" issues that you get a lot in teaching children their native language.

Fair enough, thanks for the added explanation.

I am currently studying this book and can highly recommend it to beginners for learning how to read, write, and build vocab with more than 1500 words in カタカナ. (Personally, I had no idea there were so many loanwords, and from so many languages other than English!)

Easy Katakana - How to Read English Loanwords in Japanese
By Tina Wells and Aoi Yokouchi,
Yohan Publications, Inc 1986, 1990

Re pronunciation, I was taught that since Japanese is not a stress accent language, every syllable is pronounced equally. But that’s not how I hear it, and this book contains useful pronunciation rules which have helped me make sense of what I knew I was actually hearing (like that whispered, almost silent /u/ in がくせい).

A few examples:
"When followed by t, k, h, p, or silence, ス　is pronounced /s'/. e.g. ストレス　＝　sutoresu, where the /su/ is pronounced /s'/.
The /u/ in ク is usually whispered when t, s, h, or p follows, or when it occurs at the end of a phrase. /k’/ e.g. タクシー　＝　takushii, where the /ku/ is pronounced /k'/.
ン　 = 　/m/ as in 'import' or 'imbalance' when followed by p, b, or　 m; otherwise, n as in 'income'..."


As a way of studying the book, I am at the same time in the process of making an Anki deck containing the 1500 words, places and names, so that I can become familiar with recognising カタカナ words quickly and not just the individual syllables/モラ.　　It’s taking me a while though, so I don’t know when I’ll be finished – and it won’t include audio. (But I am including the relevant pronunciation guides on each card.)

Thank you all very much for the replies. I'm still very much a newbie and these tips and explanations are extremely helpful. It's great that you all are willing to help with even the most basic stuff like this. It is also good for my sanity to know that there really is something going on with that 'u' sound in the first place and it isn't just me

Hopefully someday I can 'pay forward' these favors to other people once I gain enough knowledge to be helpful like this!

scarby dancer Wrote:(Personally, I had no idea there were so many loanwords, and from so many languages other than English!)

There are over some 50,000 of them. China of course had a massive influence on the language, and a lot of which filtered through Korea; the early Dutch presence helped the back and forth of foreign learning and adapting of words, at least in the academic realm; there was a fair bit of interest earlier on by wealthy English setting up trade within Japan, plus the new migration out of Japan by some of the more worldly Japanese, bringing back with them different insights into European culture, much of which was still alien at the time. Then there is of involvement of the Americans (and Soviets to an extent) and the rest is history.

That and there is apparently a rising trend of what are referred to as "younger generations" (teenagers, I guess?) becoming more and more prone to scatter their speech with more and more loan words. It was in some report I read not all that long ago. The tone was a little amusing, as though somehow this represents a downfall of the language. Then again, the conservative aspects of most societies pretty much say the same thing about foreign influence, year after year.


I don't know who I feel for more sometimes: older generations of Japanese or newer generations of Japanese learners, lol.

Zgarbas Wrote:Kind of how です is pronounced without the final u.

You should have heard how the actress who reads texts from "Read Real Japanese - Essays" reads:
終わりそうもないのです。

If I were to write this phonetically it would look like:
おわりそうもないのですうう

In short, the final う in です can be devoiced or not. I don't think there is any rule for that.

EDIT: Just checked the book, in the text it's actually:
終わりそうもないのですー。

But it just shows that not devoicing う is perfectly fine.

[Zgarbas]

Voicing the う　in す is typical to certain non-standard types of speech. In Standard Japanese the う is devoiced.

As far as I know (I may be wrong about this), mainly extremely feminine ones(pitch on the す） or yakuza/delinquent speech （where it becomes っす）, and a few other non-standard variations. Of course, certain tones will drag it out intentionally (そうなんですー＝is that soooo...） even in 標準語、but again, those are exceptional cases rather than the norm. I think some forms 関西弁 also voice the す? I'm not sure about that. I'm not that good with phonetics and dialects, unfortunately.

Pronouncing です as ですー on a regular basis is strange for standard Tokyo Japanese.

Everyone who I've ever met in Kansai that pronounces the う in です is a middle aged woman, usually who is overly-polite all the time.

It's not really optional; you should devoice the u or you'll sound funky.

Tzadeck Wrote:Everyone who I've ever met in Kansai that pronounces the う in です is a middle aged woman, usually who is overly-polite all the time.

It's not really optional; you should devoice the u or you'll sound funky.

That depends how much it is an issue to you. There are probably thousands upon thousands of Australians who pronounce certain words and voice certain sounds "odd". A lot of those are "ethnic", or whatever you want to call it, while others are lazy with their speech and tend to slop certain sounds about (often labeling those who don't as "snobby cunts"- but that's a different issue).

While it is probably something helpful to be aware of (if for whatever reason it becomes something which an issue with work or something -???), but at least for those whom cannot hold a conversation "fluently", I'd hardly call this aspect of pronunciation something which would be classed as "not really optional".

Being able to properly handle producing つ、す、ず、る、りゅ、etc. in a manner in which others can understand the difference in sounds, is probably more important that something which most people will understand, such as です and ですう copula expression. For learners at least, speech which is clearly comprehensible to others/native might take a far higher priority than whether or not one sounds a little "funky".

In the Japanese company I was working for I often heard staff say ですう when speaking to bosses and sometimes when calling me on the phone. Also in things like Xと申しますう。 I actually caught myself doing it on occasions without really noticing (and also using ～ますので、ですので in the middle of sentences but that's a different kettle of fish). But I agree that it does remind me of a 40/50 something y.o. おかあさん。 Luckily I've since stopped saying that because I am a 20-something y.o. guy... :|

On the phone I heard people saying すみませんです～ all the time; I think lengthening desu on the phone is normal for some reason.

yudantaiteki Wrote:On the phone I heard people saying すみませんです～ all the time; I think lengthening desu on the phone is normal for some reason.

Agreed. If they weren't talking to the boss then nine times out of ten when I heard it, it was on the phone.