Musical language
Japanese is a musical language. What do I mean by that? I mean that higher or lower pitch matters in Japanese. For example, a word made of two sounds - 'ha' and 'shi'. Depending on which half you pronounce higher, the meaning is different.
The chopsticks Ha shi is high-low, and the bridge Ha shi is low-high. When you say the Chopsticks Ha shi, you say Ha slightly higher than average, then say shi as average. For the bridge Ha shi, you say Ha slightly lower, then shi as average.
In an English word, you make an accent by stressing a part of the word. It’s called stress accent. For example, the stored information is REcord (you say RE part stronger), but to capture sound or video, etc, is reCORD. In Japanese, you make an accent by changing the pitch. It’s called pitch accent.
You may not familiar with the pitch accent. I have made a quiz for you on Wordwall.
High-Low or Low-High?
Consistent pace
The rhythm of Japanese is even pace.
After the end of the Samurai era, when a Westerner heard Japanese for the first time, he described the sound as a 'puffing steamboat.' It was something like this:
I hope you have some idea of 'even pace'.
Words are made of small sound units. For example, 'banana' has three small sound units:
ba-na-na
In English, the middle 'na' is much longer than 'ba' or the last 'na'. In Japanese, the banana's pronunciation is:
Do you see that each small sound unit is more or less equal in length? If you want to speak Japanese like a Japanese native speaker, you need to practice saying each small sound unit at an equal length. When you speak faster, the units are shorter. When you speak slower, they are longer. I give you an example of a longer word (average/slower/faster):
Long sound
What happens if you pronounce one small sound unit twice as long? It would make two sound units. I give you an example:
With English ears, these two may be the same words, but with Japanese ears, they are two different words. In b), the ‘ba’ part is twice as long, and it makes two sound units. Meaning wise, a) means middle-aged woman and b) older woman. A lady who thinks she is a) would not be happy if she is described by b). You may want to ask: ‘How about three times longer?’ I do not know any examples except making the part stand out.
Many English speakers find the long sound a little challenging, so I have made an activity to practice it(*If Wordwall is new to you, you may have to register. You should use your school email address for that) :
Which has the right amount of sound units?
Silence counts
There is a unique small sound unit in Japanese. It is a small sound unit with no sound. A silent unit is counted as one unit. Here is an example:
We have learnt that every small sound unit has the same time length in Japanese. When silence continues for one unit length, it is taken as one unit. The two words above are different words because there is one unit of silence in the second word. The first example means slope and the second example means author.
How to make a silent unit
After pronouncing the first unit, you prepare to pronounce the unit after the silent unit, then hold it for one sound unit length. In the second word in the example, I pronounced 'sa', then immediately I prepared to pronounce 'ka', but I held it for one unit length, then pronounced the 'ka'. In a case such as the 'sa' sound waiting after the silent unit, you can hear weak 's' during the silent unit, but it works as a silent unit.
Here is a Quiz to practise hearing a silent unit.
Is there a silent unit?
The 'R' sound
Many English speakers pronounce the Japanese 'R' incorrectly. Before you learn a bad habit, I want to practice it with you.
Japanese 'R' is like a Spanish 'R', or I should say Scottish 'R' (I love Scotland). When you are cold, you say 'Brrr'. This 'r' is the one we are after. The tip of your tongue touches the upper jaw once, not multiple times like the Spanish 'rr'. Here are basic five sounds with 'r':
The 'Rs' in the next example are bad:
If you find the Japanese 'R' challenging, go for 'L' rather than do bad 'R'.
The tallest mountain in Japan is Huji, not Fuji
There is no single 'F' sound in Japanese. The mountain usually spelt Mt Fuji, is wrong, as no Japanese person pronounces it with an F sound. It is an 'H' sound. It should be spelt as Huji, but unfortunately, the incorrect spelling is used worldwide. Here is my pronunciation of 'Hu' followed by 'Hu-ji-sa-n', which is correct.