Learning Japanese: Romaji and Other Useful Things

i said that i should get some of this in here. probably should have thought about it earlier, but oh well. it's long, but it's about three classes and several years of correction worth of information here. feel free to skim. i've tried to make it skim friendly with bolding, headings, paragraph breaks, and colors. at the end in a set of words and how to get easy sound bites for demonstration.

Writing and Pronunciation

so, about, these words that i keep writing in these glyphs (mostly because i like playing with my keyboard) and then have to "subtitle" with pronunciation, a lot of those pronunciation guides are retarded approximations of the word. and they're annoying to write and look at.

as it happens, there is a systematic and standardized representation of japanese words in characters that western speakers can read. this system uses a "kana" called "romaji."

from now on, i want to write my japanese pronunciations in romaji rather than these bad pronunciation guides.

there are four ways to represent words in japanese. i will use some "romaji" in my explanations, but i will explain romaji in and of itself soon enough. (you can skip the first three if you like.)

Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji:

- the first is a syllibary called ひらがな (hiragana). it has about 45 characters, each representing what we would call a vowel or a consonant-vowel combination. the first "line" is あ い う え お, pronounced "a, i, u, e, o." the second "line" is か き く け こ representing "ka, ki, ku, ke, and ko." it continues like this. these characters are used for native japanese words, or sometimes adopted chinese words old enough to be considered "native" japanese.

- the second is カタカナ (katakana). this also has about 45 characters representing proximately the same syllables. アイウエオ are similar to, if not the same as the aforementioned "a, i, u, e, o."カ キ ク ケ コ are respectively "ka, ki, ku, ke, and ko." these characters are used to represent sounds not always necessarily words. what does this mean? basically, they represent pronunciations, sound effects/some onomonopia, and in this case foreign words adopted into japanese, but aren't considered native. katakana spellings of foreign words are often approximated pronunciations, but for some reason, truely adopted words like コンピューター (computer) have acquired "standard" spellings. it has also become common to spell native japanese words in katakana for marketing and advertising purposes like in brand and store names, just because it's "cool," similar to the American convention of spelling things like "kwik/quik" (quick) or "EZ" (easy). the sound and meaning are the same, but it's note really that word.

- the third is 漢字 (kanji). these are pictographs/characters with varying pronunciations that represent meanings and concepts stolen from chinese writing. this is the most educated form of writing, but they are often combined with other kanji and/or hiragana for grammatical purposes. for example, the kanji 大 has the general meaning "big." as an adjective, it is written 大きい and pronounced "oo" (not "oo" as in "food" but a very long/strong sounding "o" as in "abode") in "oo-kii." it can also be combined with the character 学 (school/study/learning) to become 大学 meaning "big school" or more properly "university/college" and pronounced "dai." the whole word is pronounced "dai-gaku." it becomes very complex and difficult. i think it's said that you need to know about 500 of these characters to read a newspaper, 2000? for a novel, and there are over 5000 used in japanese. i think the chinese have something like 20,ooo of them. i don't believe i've used any kanji in my blogs yet.

(skipping people, pay attention now.)

Romaji:

the fourth, is romaji. this is what i really want to talk about. romaji is the standardized usage of roman characters to represent japanese sounds. lucky us, unlike the western attempt at representing chinese sounds, this one usually works pretty well. for those who don't know, roman characters, for our purposes, are basically the english alphabet abc...xyz. i believe the system is based off of english spelling anyway.

japanese pronunciation consists of a few main features:

• vowels (pure vowels similar to spanish),
• diphthongs and vowel blends,
• hard consonants,
• long vowels,
• long consonants,
• and consonant blends.

these are reflected in romaji representation of japanese. most of these conventions are reflections of the hiragana used spell the japanese pronunciation.

vowels:
(i'm taking alot of the next part from the Langenscheidt Pocket Dictionary Japanese.)

the vowels are pure vowels pretty close to the ones used in singing or spanish.

• -あ "a" is pronounced "ah" like the "a" in "father"
• -え "e" "eh" like the "e" in "get" (except i think it has more of the element of a long "a" like the last sound in the name "Renee´" or the spanish word "grande")
• -い "i" "ee" as in "heat" (but shorter)
• -お "o" somewhat of a long "o" as in "port" (but shorter)
• -う "u" as in "put" (but sometimes more "oo" as in "food")

diphthongs (and vowel blends):
(some of this is stolen too)

• -あい ai as in "Thai" (or the spanish "bailar"):
• -あえ ae pronounced "ah-eh"
• -いえ ie pronounced "ee-eh"
• -うえ ue pronounced "oo-eh"

(most japanese double vowels like this usually emphasize both vowels. the vowel sound doesn't usually change, though sometimes they can get "mushed" due to the speed of speech.)

special consonants:
(the framework for this is stolen too, but a lot has been added)

the consonants are pretty much the same, but a few conventions need to be talked about:

• - "c" and "x" aren't usually used.
• - "g" is always hard regardless of the vowel that comes after it, like the g in "go," "girl," or "get," even when "ge" or "gi"
• - "j" (or soft "g") sound is represented with a "j" like in "jar." however, often there is a trick to the "j" because of the sound in japanese is often a variation on "shi" or sometimes "tsu"
• -"s" is always hard like in "sit," never "z" like "jars." this will always be represented with "z."
• - "y" is always a consonant like in "yet," never a vowel like "fly" or "myst." this one may also end up a little tricky sometimes because of it's usage in japanese blends.
• - "sh" is like "she." this will usually be "shi" because sha, shu, and sho are usually blends (shya, shyu, shyo) and "she" (with a short "e" as in my last name) doesn't really exist.
• - "ch" is like "cheeze." this will usually be "chi" for the same reasons "sh" is usually "shi."
• - also, in japanese, there is a character す "su," but sometimes especially at the end of a word or sentences, most commonly in the word です "desu" and verb forms ending in ~ます "~masu," this "su" is shortened to "des/dess" or "~mas/~mass." so far i've been writing these as "des'" and "~mas'," but from now, i will write them as "desu" and "~masu" because there are times that another word comming after it will change the pronunciation back to standard, such as ですよ "desuyo." so for consistency, i won't use the apostrophe anymore. the same kind of thing also tends to happen to the characters つ tsu, ち chi, し shi, and じ ji.

double and long vowels:

sometimes in japanese, two of the same or similar vowels are used next to one another. these produce the same sound, but twice as long. some examples are: ああ aa, えい ei, ええ ee, いい ii, おう ou, おお oo, うう uu.

in cases where the vowels are different, the first vowel's sound is dominant. however, the aforementioned あい ai, あえ ae, いえ ie, and うえ ue are not in this category. neither is おあ oa, あお ao, あう au, and others; these are vowel blends. this really only happens with えい ei, and おう ou.

what exatly does a "long" japanese vowel sound like? (skimming people can just check out the listening part and try to hear the difference.)

exercise:
try this. we'll use the sound よう "you" (a long "o" not the english pronoun "you"). this is actually a two syllable word よ "yo" and う "u." hold up one finger and say よ "yo," kind of short like a rapper, pointing to the finger. now hold up two fingers and say よう "yo-o" pointing to the first on よ "yo" and the second on (う)お "o."

the same can be done for へい "hei." point to one finger and say へ "heh" like a short laugh. now two, saying へい "he-e" like a greeting to a friend you've been thinking about lately.

you can try these too: さあ saa, ねえ nee,きい kii, ゆう yuu, けいこ keiko, きいて kiite*, おおきいookii

*meaning "listening" as opposed to きて kite meaning "cutting"

also, as a last note, katakana has a separate character for this, ー indicating to hold the previous vowel sound longer such as in コンピューター konpyuutaa, computer.

double consonants/long consonants:

in japanese, there is a character termed a "small tsu." it is literally a smaller rendition of the character つ/ツ "tsu" but it it pronounced as a "long consonant." in romaji, it is represented by two of the consonant following it. this is a little difficult to describe in writting. basically, to an english speaker, it comes off as kind of a 'silent syllable.' this can be illustrated in the same way as the long vowel pausing for a bit between the first syllable and the second. it may be best to check out the listening section and try to hear the difference.

some examples:

(hiragana; romaji; meaning)

• けこ; keko (plain vowels); a flower/plate used in flower scattering rituals
• けいこ; keiko (long vowel); a girl's name
• けっこう; kekkou (long consonant then long vowel); used in the phrase けっこうです kekkodesu meaning "no thank you" "i'm fine" or literally "that's fine"
• けっこん; kekkon (long consonant); pronunciation of 結婚 meaning "marriage;" also a root for mariage related words

• にっぽん; nippon; a pronunciation of "日本," a name for japan
• にぽん; nipon; not a word (as far as i know)

• いっぽん; ippon; one (of something); one cylindrical object

there is one kind of double consonant that does not use a small つ tsu, and that is "nn." instead, this uses the character ん/ン "n" (the only character in japanese without a vowel) in front of a character front the "na" line (な, に, ぬ, ね, の; na, ni, nu, ne, no). this isn't truly in the same category as "long consonant" but both sounds must be pronounced, making the "nn" sound longer.

example:
どんな donna which; what kind


as you can see, though many english speakers at first can't hear or even pronounce the difference in these sounds, the distinction is very important, especially in writting.


consonant blends:

this probably isn't difficult to pronounce, but i feel the need to draw attention to it. structures like きゃ kya, きゅ kyu, and きょ kyo. this structure is created by using characters unding in the い/イ"i" sound like き/ぎ ki/gi, し/じ shi/ji, ひ hi, ち chi, に ni, etc. followed by a "small" や ya, ゆ yu, or よ yo (there is no yi, or ye). this results in blends like きゃ kya, ぎゅ gyu, しょ shyo, ひゃ hya, じゅ jyu, ちゃ chya, etc.

closing words:

that's pretty much it. pure vowels, vowel blends, hard consonants, long vowels, long consonants, and consonant blends. it is quite long and wordy, but these are things that we learn over two or three days of classes and still get corrected on them. i hope this has been more helpful (and possibly interesting) that long and time consuming.

Listening:

here's some interesting words an pronunciations to try. you can copy and paste the terms in green to this site* for pronunciation sound bites. i've checked them, and they should come up as the first result from the search. the "" icon will give you a little sound bite. have fun.

*Jim Breen's WWWJDIC: Online Japanese Dictionary Service;
http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-bin/wwwjdic.cgi?1C

(vowels)

• 亜 (あ a),
  
• 位 (い i),
  
• 卯 (う u),
• 柄 (え e),
• 緒 (お o)
  

• 枝豆; えだまめ; edamame; green soybeens (a food); (illustrates several plain vowels and consonants; a fun word)

• 名古屋; なごや; nagoya; Nagoya (city) (where i live); (plain vowels and consonants)
• 日記 ; にっき; nikki; diary, journal (long consonant; used in the name of my blog)

• 学校; がっこう; gakkou; school (in a general sense) (LC (long consonant); LV (long vowel))
• 従業; じゅうぎょう; jyuugyou; employment (LV, CB (consonant blend))
• 授業; じ ゅぎょう; jyugyou; class, lesson (academic class); (LV; and SV (short vowel) used for contrast)

• 会いたい; あいたい; aitai; a for of the verb 会う/あう au meaning "to meet (with)/to come together," this form means "to want to meet" as in: 家族に会いたい; かぞくにあいたい kazoku ni aitai; i want to meet with my family. ^.^ (vowel blend/diphthong)
• 愛; あい; ai; love (romantic/married); (vowel blend/diphthong)

• 百; ひゃく; hyaku; hundred (100) (CB)
• お客; さん; おきゃくさん; okyaku-san a formal term for a customer or guest (CB)

• 一本; いっぽん; ippon; one (of something); one cylindrical object (LC)

• 大きい; おおきい; ookii; big, large (LV)

(this group of words are used for comparison)

• 蹴込み; けこみ; kekomi; riser; footboard (plain sounds)
• 稽古; けいこ; keiko; training, practice, etc. (LV)
• 結構; けっこう; kekkou; used in the phrase けっこです kekkoudesu meaning "no thank you" "i'm fine" or literally "that's fine" (LC; LV)
• 結婚; けっこん; kekkon; pronunciation of 結婚 meaning "marriage;" also a root for marriage related words (LC)

• どんな; donna; which, what kind (LC, specifically ん/ン n)

• へい; hei; has several meanings depending on kanji, but you can plug it into the search engine for demonstrative purposes. you can listen to several different words to demonstrate intonation, which i have not gone over here. (LV; intonation)

(another group of words used for comparison)

よ　YO

• よ; yo; (a sentence particle used for emphasis)
• 世; よ; yo; world, society, generation, etc.
• 夜; よる; yoru; night
• 良く; よく; yoku; well (adv.)

よう　YOU

• 陽; よう; you; meaning: yang
• 用; よう; you; task, business, study
• 漸く; ようやく; youyaku; same as "hei"