Consonantsare pronounced like the English letter sound, except for ‘R’ which is pronounced between an 'L’ and an 'R’.
Double vowels (aa, ii, uu, ee, oo) are pronounced twice as long as the single vowel.
Don’t say the characters in your head, say them out loud so you can get more speaking practice.
Memorizethe Kana symbols with vivid pictures. For instance; き “ki” looks and sounds similar to “key”.
If you’re going to Japan, take some time out to learn about their body/hand gestures too! Actions speak louder than words and some body/hand gestures that are okay in your country may not be okay or polite in Japan. If you do something that does offend someone, just apologize to them.
HIRAGANA NOTES:
The hiragana syllabary is used to write word endings and Japanese words, replacing the kanji if the kanji is not widely known or the readers are children. It can also be used alongside kanji to indicate its pronunciation.
When there is a “little tsu”(つ) inside a word (ie.きった), it means that the consonant of the next syllable is doubled. For instance, きった iskitta(“keet-tah”) and means “cut” as in “cut the cake”, whereas きた iskita(“keetah”) and means “north”.
The vowels i and u are often silent or barely pronouncedin most Japanese words, especially when they are located at the end of certain verbs. It is also the case of the vowel “u” that follows the consonant “s”. For example,“arimasu” (there is) is pronounced “ah-ree-mas”, “deshita” (was) is pronounced “deh-shtah”, and “suki” (to like) is pronounced “skee”.
Romanized Japanese words with ō translate as ou, or おう
Whenは,をandへ are used as sentence particles, they are respectively pronouncedwa (“wah”), o (“oh”) and e (“eh”)…particle lessons later (stay focused on your current task)
KATAKANA NOTES:
The katakana syllabary is used to write a word borrowed from a foreign language, as well as all foreign names and onomatopoeia. It can also be use for emphasis, similar to using bold or italic text in English.
In katakana, the character (ー) is used to double the vowel of the preceding character. For instance, the word “game” uses katakana characters for being a foreign word, and is written “ゲーム" : "geehmu” (the final u is barely pronounced).
{Here is a guide to difficult pinyin pronunciation I found in a book on the Chinese government that I will work cite at the end of the post}
As many know, Chinese characters are one syllable long, made up of an ‘initial’ letter and ‘final’ letter that dictates that overall sound of the syllable. With that in mind, here are two tables cover the harder pronunciations in pinyin for ‘initial’ and ‘final’ letters.
Initials:
Pinyin English (pronunciation)
c ts
qi cheek
x hs
z dz
zh jack
Finals:
Pinyin English (pronunciation)
a father
ai bye
ao now
e but
i see (note: after initials ‘ch’, ‘sh’ & ‘zh’,it’s pronounced as ‘r’)
iu yo
ou so
u loot
ua trois (french for “three”)
(note: italicized is equivalent in sound that pinyin makes)
Combination Examples
Pinyin English (pronunciation)
zhou jyo
xi hsee
zao dzow
Work Cited
Lieberthal, Kenneth. “Pinyin Pronunciation Table.” Governing China: from Revolution through Reform, W.W. Norton, 2004.
A/N: If you have any questions, feel free to drop them on me!
edit: as it’s been brought up, the table’s representation of how to pronounce ‘qi’ is slightly off. A slight ‘t’ in front makes it more authentic and correct. I believe the book compared it to “chee” in cheek because that is the closest representation in English. Nevertheless, ‘tchee’ is more accurate.
I don’t need, nor really want, a fully voiced game, as it would take away some of AA’s charm. Yet I’d like to hear how Barok pronounces his name.
I think it would probably sound quite endearing as he’s struggling to properly say it. But then again, maybe he didn’t have issues saying it, because ten years ago he has had a friend who has taught him a few things here and there; even Ryuu pointed out that Barok is somewhat familiar with certain customs/aspects from his home country.
Either way, that’s one of the few instances where I would welcome being able to hear a character’s voice. I actually think that the game could have benefitted from including very, very limited voice acting. I know there is limited voice acting in the game, but the unused voice clips we do have of the characters are magnificent and could have been included. :)
I think about this a lot tbh. Like, Natsume Souseki isn’t a terribly difficult name to pronounce but I want to know if he can say Ryuunosuke’s name, because I’m willing to bet he flubs it adorably.
Come to think of it, I wish they’d given us an example of how Barok’s name is pronounced in the English version. I’ve always assumed it was the same as in the Japanese, like Baroque, but it seems that nearly every other English speaker I’ve talked to says it like “Bah-rock”. Like… I don’t want to think of our former president when I’m simping… WHICH IS IT??
I personally pronounce it like the dutch word “Barok” like “bah-row-k” or /ba:ɾo:k/ with slightly tapping the tongue against the back of the front teeth for the r (like when you say ‘little” really fast). Imma just flex my knowledge of the IPA, I can’t resist lmaooo I guess TL:DR, make the vowels long so I don’t simp for a former US President lmao XD
But “baroque” is pronounced like “ba-rock” in British English!
According to Wikipedia (UK: /bəˈrɒk/, US: /bəˈroʊk/; French: [baʁɔk]). Unfortunately I’m not @ultraviolet-ink so I can’t understand the symbols. Checking pronunciations on dictionary sites suggests it’s “ba-rock” in British English versus “bah-oak” in American. Which makes me twitch badly, because it’s very unlike the French.
So I would pronounce Barok like Baroque, which is “ba-rock”! I didn’t even know that Americans said it differently until literally just now.
I’m not a native speaker, so of course my Korean pronunciation isn’t perfect, but whenever I speak to Koreans, they usually mention that my pronunciation is good. But I think as long as they can understand what you’re saying, they considered it good haha…
Anyway, when I studied linguistics in college, phonetics and phonology was one of my favorite subjects, so I learned the pronunciation rules of Korean from a linguistic perspective. It’s just a lot easier for me to remember these rules when I know the linguistic reasons why they exist.
When reading 한글 (and speaking Korean in general), if you know the standard pronunciation rules, it’ll get you pretty far. But there are a few sounds that can be pronounced differently, depending on the sounds that come before or after.
ㅎ is one of these sounds. (In Korean, the letter is called 히읗).
THE STANDARD RULE
The standard rule when you learn 한글 can be heard from from the name of the letter itself 히읗. When it is comes before a vowel, it’s pronounced like “h” and when it’s a final consonant, it’s pronounced like “d.”
FINER RULE #1: NOT PRONOUNCED
Sometimes, the more natural way to say ㅎ is to not say it at all. The word where you will hear this the most 안녕하세요 and 안녕하십니까. Although there’s a ㅎ in there, the pronunciation actually sounds closer to 안녕아세요.
Another example is when ㅎ is a 받침 (final consonant) but followed by a vowel, like in 넣어요 (pr: 너어요), 넣으면 (pr: 너으면), 좋아요 (pr: 조아요), 놓아요 (pr: 노아요).
Lastly, before ㄹ, ㅎ isn’t pronounced, as in 말하다 (sounds more like 마라다).
FINER RULE #2: MERGES
In this case, instead of pronouncing ㅎ exactly like an “h” sound, the “h” sound merges with the consonant before or after, which changes the pronunciation of BOTH sounds.
This only applies to 4 consonants: ㅂ, ㅈ, ㄷ, ㄱ. When ㅎ comes before or after one of these consonants, both sounds merge and become the voiceless aspirated version (i.e. ㅂ -> ㅍ, ㅈ -> ㅊ, ㄷ&ㅅ -> ㅌ, ㄱ -> ㅋ). ㅅ is also turned into ㅌ because it sounds like ㄷ as a 받침 (final consonant).
It’s easier to see what I mean with examples, so I’ll just get straight to them.
ㄱ:
익숙하다 –> 익수카다
행복하다 –> 행보카다
식히다 -> 시키다
ㅈ:
젖히다 (bend back) –> 저치다
ㄷ,ㅅ:
좋다 -> 조타
못하다 -> 모타다
ㅂ:
괴롭히다 -> 괴로피다
졸업하다 -> 조러파다
But there’s another special case: 닫히다. Why is it pronounced like 다치다 instead of 다티다? Well, you know how whenever the 이 sound comes after ㅅ, it’s pronounced like “she” instead “see?” For example, 식사 is pronounced like “sheek-sa” not “seek-sa.”
Well, it’s the same sort of thing. There’s something about the 이 sound in Korean that makes them want to pronounce certain sounds further back in the mouth. ㄷ is said like ㅊ after 히; ㅌ is said like ㅊ after 이; ㄷ is said like ㅈ after 이. This is why 같이 is pronounced like 가치 and 굳이 is pronounced like 구지.
