Episode 5.2: Stress-accent vs. Pitch-accent & the 'R' sounds
Added 2020-01-22 04:19:35 +0000 UTCBibliography
Japanese Phonetics Index Page
Good afternoon Patrons! Recently I have been receiving a fair number of questions regarding the difference between stress-accent and pitch-accent, so I wanted to share this quick, impromptu video I made on said topic. Note that because this isn't a full lesson, I've opted to include patrons in the $5 dollar price tier as well. I hope that this quick video proves to be useful.
In other news, earlier today I updated the lesson on the textbook R sounds; the old video had an incorrect citation, and I believe that my graphics for the り、りゃ、りゅ、and りょ sounds had the tongue position just slightly too far back along the roof of the mouth, so I moved the point of articulation forward just a bit. To expand on this point, most linguistics say that the initial consonant in り、りゃ、りゅ、and りょ has the same point of articulation (the alveolar ridge) as the normal R sounds (ら、る、れ、and ろ), but some linguists believe that this point of articulation is just slightly further back, though still on the alveolar ridge. I personally take this second view, and the graphics in the lesson reflect this.
If anyone has any questions or concerns with regards to this update feel free to let me know. Thank you for your continued support and good luck with your Japanese studies!
Dōgen
Comments
Thanks for the additional examples. I am not convinced, though, that the comparison between the English word "banana" and the Japanese バナナ is most helpful. In the English word, there are two different sounds for the "a" letter which is mainly due to the fact that the middle one has a stress accent. Although one can hear that both those things - phonetic value and stress accent - change when you put the stress on the first syllable, I am not sure how clear that is for learners who do not have any background in phonetics.
Dirk Schwartz
2025-04-27 12:45:07 +0000 UTC
