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Post by Tom K. (ianflaer) on Mar 6, 2009 2:42:14 GMT
2. clip those vowels. if you ever hear a Japanese person try to sound like a westerner they almost always over-extend their vowels resulting in rediculously elongated sounds. this is because that's how we sound to them. so to sound more like a Japanese native speaker us westerners must say our vowels more quickly. how much is up for debate but I find that Japanese vowels feel like they are held for about half the time of the typical mid-western USA vowel, maybe a little less, even leaning towards 1/3. to us this will make the language feel rather clipped and stucatto. If a vowel is between two non-voiced consonants, then it can be "clipped". I think they call it elision or something. Sure, but that's clipped by Japanese standards. to a western, English-speaking ear pretty much ALL Japanese vowels sound clipped. again this is my opinion and interpratation and certainly not any sort of hard fact.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2009 5:30:16 GMT
For some reason I find it easier to pronounce some Japanese words when I put myself in Spanish speaking mode. Tsu to me would sound like T-Sue when I think in Spanish, but knowing that in the Japanese language the T is silent in this one, I just pronounce Sue. Does that makes sense? ;D
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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2009 11:19:15 GMT
the trick is that sometimes it is so soft and/or so quick that our westernears miss it. there's a little more flexibility in this rule than the last one but for the most part it's true. Spot on. Another good one is ryu, more than often it is just reiterated as 'roo'. When the 'y' is always there, it is just sort of dropped to the throat when saying it. ...or to open another can of worms, tsuki. ;D
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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2009 12:02:52 GMT
well I pronounce ryu
I pronounce it something like ree-yu but the ree is somewhere between an r and a l and is a somewhat soft sound.
Tsuka, tsuki these are harder to put into a phonetic type there is a soft sound that burrs the edge of the su that is hard to describe but is a sound the english language doesn't actually have.
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Post by Tom K. (ianflaer) on Mar 6, 2009 12:39:31 GMT
For some reason I find it easier to pronounce some Japanese words when I put myself in Spanish speaking mode. Tsu to me would sound like T-Sue when I think in Spanish, but knowing that in the Japanese language the T is silent in this one, I just pronounce Sue. Does that makes sense? ;D not to pick on you Charliegone but there's really no such thing as a silent letter in Japansese. some letters are spoken softly from time to time, but in this case it is not true. TSU is not promounced "su" the T is there. the Japanese don't see TSU as "T-S-U" (spelling). In Japanese "TSU" is one "letter" here's a good way for westerners to get the "TS" part of tsu: say "rats" without emphasis and fairly quickly. say it 4 or 5 times and then say it again but only say the "TS" sound at the end. now say it one more time using only the TS and add the Japanese U (sounds like "oo" but only said for about 1/3 to 1/4 of the time you want to normally) at the end as for Ryu it isn't isn't "riyuu" or "roo" it really is "ryu" the trick is that you have to know how to pronounce the Japanese R. oh boy this is a tough one. the best I can describe it as is half way in between an english R and L and it "flaps" for a rather staccato sound. the same sound is achieved by the Scottish when they roll their R's. if you think of a rolled R as being 3 to 5 R's jamed up against each other the Japanese R sounds like the R in the middle of the roll. this is because the tongue is flapping through the R. that's how the Japanese R sound is made. it's hard to get used to and even the Japanese use it to different degrees but they never say it as soft as we do. this is why to the eastern ear the English R and L are almost the same exact thing. I know this is hard to describe and understand this way.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2009 18:16:40 GMT
If a vowel is between two non-voiced consonants, then it can be "clipped". I think they call it elision or something. Sure, but that's clipped by Japanese standards. to a western, English-speaking ear pretty much ALL Japanese vowels sound clipped. again this is my opinion and interpratation and certainly not any sort of hard fact. It would not be correct to clip every vowel. If you are trying to speak Japanese correctly.
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Post by jasmineleaf on Mar 7, 2009 0:40:51 GMT
To follow up on what Ianflaer said about "tsu" being one "letter," if you study Japanese, then you would know that "tsu" has its own character in Hiragana. Meaning that it, in itself, is a single "letter" / sound, much like what: "ka" would be.
The Hiragana for "tsu," even though it's 3 letters when in Roumaji, is: つ
To us, even though it looks like a combination of 2 sounds, it's recognized as "one."
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Post by wiwingti on Mar 7, 2009 1:06:57 GMT
ok my turn to add something. depending of regions, the tsuka is a bit more like a tska but with the u almost not pronounced if you know what i mean,,,very sillent u so,,that comes from there that some people will say that it is pronounced tska instead of tsooka. yup i read a lot and have something like a (pronounciation dictionary) and depending of what letters are used with,,the pronounciation changes and depending of the region,,,another pronounciation comes with that so, there are so many kind of pronounciations and region that saying that this pronounciation is better than that one or ect,, i think it is the same as comparing australian fron american of england,,ect... ask an american, an australian and name who ever you want from another culture to pronounce the word( exemple cake) you would be surprised.and no one of them are wrong. it is in their culture. sorry i had to say what i think. no i am not learning japanese but, sometimes,,,there are things that i read that make me angry and seing people(some i mean) deciding how it is pronounced from here or youtube,,,i think it is a bit too much. american don't speak better than australian ect,,, everyone have their own way to talk that's it. just hope i explained enough well to be understand.
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Post by randomnobody on Mar 7, 2009 1:11:14 GMT
Marc has a point. Either way works. Speaking of which, how do you folks pronounce "either," eh?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2009 2:06:04 GMT
I see now. Errrr my head hurts now! It's a little tricky to get that t in there. like e-the-er. Ether for example sounds to me like e-thur, like Chingy would say it. ;D
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Post by MichaelRS on Nov 4, 2022 0:27:33 GMT
What I have noticed is a lot of English speakers, or some european language speakers speaking English while trying to pronouncing this, really want to pronounce that T, mostly as a hard T. And of course that really messes up the word.
If you're an English speaker having trouble with this the real quick fix is to simply drop the T. That will bring it much closer to the actual pronunciation.
I doubt anybody is going to notice or be upset about it to the point that it amounts to hill of beans. If one was a native Japanese speaker and they dropped the T sound it would probably just be considered a regional accent.
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Yagoro
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Post by Yagoro on Nov 4, 2022 4:47:29 GMT
What I have noticed is a lot of English speakers, or some european language speakers speaking English while trying to pronouncing this, really want to pronounce that T, mostly as a hard T. And of course that really messes up the word. If you're an English speaker having trouble with this the real quick fix is to simply drop the T. That will bring it much closer to the actual pronunciation. I doubt anybody is going to notice or be upset about it to the point that it amounts to hill of beans. If one was a native Japanese speaker and they dropped the T sound it would probably just be considered a regional accent. The thing is dropping to t altogether makes the word "suka", which means to vomit
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Post by randomnobody on Nov 4, 2022 6:58:03 GMT
Wow, this thread is 13 years old.
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Post by jckang on Nov 4, 2022 14:50:50 GMT
What I have noticed is a lot of English speakers, or some european language speakers speaking English while trying to pronouncing this, really want to pronounce that T, mostly as a hard T. And of course that really messes up the word. If you're an English speaker having trouble with this the real quick fix is to simply drop the T. That will bring it much closer to the actual pronunciation. I doubt anybody is going to notice or be upset about it to the point that it amounts to hill of beans. If one was a native Japanese speaker and they dropped the T sound it would probably just be considered a regional accent. The thing is dropping to t altogether makes the word "suka", which means to vomit what makes me cringe is how so many English speakers pronounce hamon.
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AJGBlack
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Post by AJGBlack on Nov 4, 2022 15:29:28 GMT
The thing is dropping to t altogether makes the word "suka", which means to vomit what makes me cringe is how so many English speakers pronounce hamon. Like it rhymes with "Shamone" in a Michael Jackson song. That's one that hurts me too. I remember calling up Bugei back in the late 90's to talk about what hamon they offer and whoever I spoke to pronounced it like that.
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Post by MichaelRS on Nov 5, 2022 3:58:58 GMT
Wow, this thread is 13 years old. Well what brought it to the forefront of my mind, and then I just happened to run across this thread, was this Norwegian guy who was having a heck of a time with those two words. In this video, starting at about the 4:30 mark, you'll see what I'm talking about when he tries to say tsuba. And then somewhere else in there he was having a heck of a time with tsuka.
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Post by jester on Nov 5, 2022 9:05:32 GMT
"Handle". Sorted.
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Post by AndiTheBarvarian on Nov 5, 2022 9:22:43 GMT
In German Tsuka is pronounced "Tsuka".
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Post by Arlequin on Nov 5, 2022 9:27:29 GMT
In German Tsuka is pronounced "Tsuka". I prefer the russian pronunciation, cyka 🙃
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Post by JH Lee on Nov 5, 2022 16:13:22 GMT
In German Tsuka is pronounced "Tsuka". 8-| I prefer the russian pronunciation, cyka 🙃 Obligatory:
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