Session 2 Understanding Japanese Phonetics
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Transcript of Session 2 Understanding Japanese Phonetics
Introduction
- Japanese Phonetics
- 5 Basic Vowels, 9 simple consonants
- Voiced Consonants and ‘P’
- Basic Greetings
Understanding Japanese Phonetics
- Need to understand how Japanese sounds are represented using Roman letters (romaji)
- Japanese has 5 basic vowels (a,i,u,e,o) and 9 basic consonants (k,s,t,n,h,m,y,r,w)
- A syllable is usually consist of a consonant and a vowel
(e.g. a syllable か is consist of a consonant ‘k’
and a vowel ‘a’, we speak a syllable ‘ka’)
5 Basic Vowels
Roman Letter
a
i
u
e
o
Sounds like
ah as in father
ee as in see
oo as in zoo
eh as in men
oh as in boat
Examples
akai (red)
isu (chair)
uma (horse)
eiga (cinema)
otoko (man)
Hiragana Table
Activity; Romanize Japanese
1. にほん 2. せいと
3. せかい 4. ほん
5. つくえ 6. いす
7. ねこ 8. いぬ
9. きりん 10. らいおん
Activity; Romanize Japanese
1. nihon (Japan) 2. seito (student)
3. sekai (world) 4. hon (book)
5. tsukue (desk) 6. isu (chair)
7. neko (cat) 8. inu (dog)
9. kirin (giraffe) 10. raion (lion)
Double/Long Vowels
- The meaning of Japanese words can change by the length of the syllables in the word
Roman Letter
ie
iie
obasan
obaasan
Meanings
house
no
aunt
grandmother
Derivative Letters
- Adding marks to make a letter sound differently
- Adding two marks (“ten ten”) makes K,S,T or H sounds to G,Z,D or B sounds
- Adding a small circle (“maru”) makes H sound to P sound.
Voiced Consonants and ‘P’
GU
GE
ZADA
BO
BE
BU
BI
BAPA
PI
PU
PE
PO
JIDZIZUDZU
DE
DO GO
JI
ZU
ZE
ZO
GI
GA
Activity; Basic Greetings
Romanized Japanese
1. konnichiwa
2. ohayou
3. konbanwa
4. arigatou
5. sayounara
6. hajimemashite
Meanings
1. Hello
2. Good morning
3. Good evening
4. Thank you
5. Good bye
6. Nice to meet you
Practice the Sound of Japanese
- Watching movies, TV programms and anime
- Youtube, Karaoke
- Practice writing hiragana following lyrics
you can find your favourite J-pop lyrics here!
http://www.jpopasia.com/