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Pronounciation

If there are other Japanese words you'd like to know how to pronounce, please add them to the list. For now I want to know how to pronounce the following words:

Can anybody tell me? Is the "y" a vowel?

How about terms like

  • Gote
  • Hane

Are they one syllable or two?

two - go-te, ha-ne

Chris Hayashida: This might help, but only if you speak English:

  • dan - pronounced like "dawn."
  • kyu - pronounced like the letter Q.

I don't know a good way to write how to pronounce moyo. I think I'd write it like "moi-yoh." I don't know if that helps.

kokiri - writing down pronounciations, especially in a situation like here, where there are people from differnet backgrounds with different accents is a bit of a minefield, perhaps the best way is to look at something like [ext] http://www.sf.airnet.ne.jp/~ts/japanese/ and listen to the real thing...

Fhayashi: A simple guideline is that there are hardly any long vowel sounds in Japanese (unless the word has the ~ or - following the characters. And the only consonant ending is "n" or "m". Each syllable breaks down into consonant and vowel combinations.

  • Dan - not long like dawn, but shorter like "done"
  • Kyu - like kew, or "Q" like above
  • Moyo - moh-yo, with emphasis even on both syllables, not MOH-yo or moh-YO
  • Gote - goh-teh, not emphasizing either syllable
  • Hane - hah-neh, again with even emphasis

Bob McGuigan: Not to be pedantic but these pronunciations ignore the long vowel occurences in Japanese. For example it should be kyuu, two syllables kyu-u, and moyou, three syllables. You can find this elongation in any standard romaji Japanese-English dictionary such as Kenkyusha's, or from the kana versions.


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