Foreign Cultures 84, Tokyo

Professor Theodore C. Bestor

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A (relatively) easy guide to Japanese pronunciation

Spoken Japanese consists of simple syllables, generally consisting of a vowel, or a consonant plus a vowel. There are few complex consonant clusters. All vowels and consonants have consistent pronunciation. Consonants are crisply pronounced.

Vowels are always pronounced the same way; long vowels (usually marked in English transliteration with a macron (“ū,” or as two vowels “ou”) are simply longer in duration (actually two syllables), the sound doesn’t change:

a = as in father	A-sa-ku-sa -- Tokyo place
i = as in eat	Ni-hon-ba-shi -- Tokyo place
u = as in food or zoo	U-e-no – Tokyo place
e = as in end	E-do – name of Tokyo before 1868
o = as in Ohio	O-cha-no-mi-zu – Tokyo place

The consonant sounds are:

k = as in cat	A-ka-sa-ka – Tokyo place
g = as in gourd	Gin-za – Tokyo place
s = as in Sue	E-bi-su – Tokyo place
sh = as in seashore	Shi-ta-ma-chi – Tokyo area
z = as in zoo	Zen
j = as in Jack	San-gen-ja-ya – Tokyo place
t = as in tick	To-ra-no-mon – Tokyo place
ts = this is one of the tricky ones; think tsetse fly.	Tsu-ki-ji – Tokyo place
ch = as in chicken	Chi-yo-da – Tokyo place
n = as in new	Ni-hon – “Japan”
h = as in have	Ha-ra-ju-ku – Tokyo place
f = another slightly tricky one; think of “who” with an f sound	Fu-ji-san – Mt. Fuji
b = as in Boeing	O-da-i-ba – Tokyo place
p = as in party, pea, Poe	I-p’pon-ba-shi – Tokyo place
m = as in mama	Ma-ru-no-u-chi – Tokyo place
ya = as in yahoo, yeoman,	Ya-su-ku-ni – Tokyo shrine
r = the trickiest one – more like a “d” than an “r” (as in a British butler saying “very good, madam”) **	Ro-p’pon-gi – Tokyo place
w = as in wander	Su-mi-da-ga-wa – Sumida River

Sometimes syllables are made up of a combination of a consonant and a semi-vowel (ya, yu, yo) – as in Tōkyō, Kyōto, gyūniku (beef), etc.—resist the temptation to pronounce these as Tokiyo, Kiyoto, giyuniku – the consonant plus semi-vowel sound be a single syllable. Think of kyu and the English word “cute”

All syllables receive the same amount of stress or emphasis. (For most Americans that means pronouncing Japanese without any stress or emphasis.)

“yo-ko-ha-ma” NOT “yo-KA-HA-ma“

“mi-tsu-bi-shi” NOT “meats-U-bi-shi”

“Ko-i-zu-mi” NOT “COY-zumi”

You can almost always divide the syllables after a vowel. (exception: some syllables end in “n” (shinbun = newspaper) (Nihon = Japan); sometimes a consonant is doubled (Roppongi – Tokyo place; or Hatchōbori – Tokyo place), which actually represents two syllables (pronounced with a slight pause– Ro-p’pon-gi; Ha-t’cho-o-bo-ri).

** this one is the source of the stereotypical difficulties that some Japanese have with pronouncing “L” and “R”) – a Japanese “r” is NOT an English ‘rolled r’ (i.e., NOT “Ralph likes Rock ‘n Roll”).