Japanese Phonetics Episode 58—now with native recordings!
Added 2019-03-10 04:55:17 +0000 UTCBibliography
Japanese Phonetics Index Page
Good afternoon, Patrons!
The fifty-eighth episode of Japanese Phonetics is now updated with high-quality native recordings!
In this lesson we review and clarify some basic pitch-accent information, as well as look at a couple of effective pitch-accent exercises I’ve picked up since beginning this series. I did not include native recordings for the parts where I discuss some of the strategies since these strategies are targeted toward native speakers of English or other stress-accented languages. This part aside, remember to always use native recordings for your studies and any shadowing practice.
As always, if you have any questions or concerns with regards to this lesson, please don't hesitate to leave a comment below. Thank you very much for your continued support, and good luck with your Japanese studies!
Best from Beppu,
Dōgen
Comments
Yeah it's a bad habit of mine I'm trying to fix—one of the reasons I've since switched to native recordings. Interesting to know that about Russian!
Dogen
2020-10-31 00:45:10 +0000 UTCAs for slight stress accent in Japanese words... Yep, I was comparing my recordings and your videos. I've found that in some words you pronounced I could hear stress accent on the last high mora (right before downstep). I guess, such position is typical fo English. On the other hand, in my recordings stress could be heard on the syllable next to the last high mora (after downstep), which is one of possible ways to pronounce a word in Russian. Though, unlike English, Russian doesn't have strict correlation between stress and pitch, as a result of transition from pitch-accented Common Slavic to stress-accented modern Russian (which also led to a total chaos and unpredictability in accent placing). Nevertheless, it was interesting to be able to hear those little things that I wasn't aware before. Once again, thanks for making my ears better )
Strange Guy
2020-10-30 18:54:52 +0000 UTCMore faster, more better!
kusterdu
2020-10-27 01:15:40 +0000 UTCHi Rafy! Thanks for the comment. We're all doing much better, thank you very much! I unfortunately have never found a web page as comprehensive as that one, but books such as NHKアクセント辞典 or the 新明解日本語アクセント辞典 have all of this information and more! Perhaps it would be worth buying and importing one of these two books? I hope that this helps! Cheers!
Dogen
2019-03-19 01:35:30 +0000 UTCDogen, hope you and your family are feeling better. This is Rafy from the youtube channel "En Japonés Con Rafy". I've been llooking all over the net for a resource like the one in the link below. It is a pretty comprehensive page on accent, verbs and adjectives, among other things. However, this one's on Kyoto dialect. Are you aware of anything like this for 標準語? <a href="http://www.akenotsuki.com/kyookotoba/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://www.akenotsuki.com/kyookotoba/</a> Update: I did find this one page for the time being, though it's not too comprehensive: <a href="http://accent.u-biq.org/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://accent.u-biq.org/</a>
Rafy Riquelme
2019-03-18 18:46:31 +0000 UTC参考になったようで何よりです！ちなみに僕も気づくのにかなり時間がかかりました。今後ともよろしくお願いします！
Dogen
2019-03-12 05:08:41 +0000 UTC＃3の助言は、「目から鱗」でした（”Aha! moment in English?）。私は日本人ですが、それでも 全てを一度で理解するのは難しいので、くりかえし見たいと思います。ありがとうございました。
Meme
2019-03-11 19:41:37 +0000 UTCHi Nathan. My pleasure! I have heard some native speakers slightly drop their pitch in 平板 words, but I wouldn't recommend mimicking this as it's certainly not the norm. Very glad to hear that you're getting those kind of comments—once they start commenting your intonation (if they haven't already), then you're really starting to make progress. Thanks again for the support and good luck with your continued studies!
Dogen
2019-03-11 06:08:07 +0000 UTCThanks for another great lesson, Dogen! Your point about the pitch accent charts not being exact is really helpful. I think on some level I was aware of this, because I've largely been trying to use imitation of native speakers + phonetic awareness to learn how to say words. There are always going to be things not captured in notation, I think. I do have a question, though: sometimes when listening to native speakers, I hear a very slight drop in pitch at the end of some 平板 words. Am I just imagining this, or does that actually happen sometimes? To be clear, what I believe I'm hearing is a *slight* drop, much less than an accented word, but nevertheless detectable. (Also, a note about the real-world impact of your lessons: I'm in Japan now, currently kicking back in Tokyo. I've gotten into some (very basic) conversions with Japanese people here, and several have specifically commented on my good pronunciation, which seems to surprise them. This is different than the generic "上手！上手！" comments that everyone (myself included) gets just for knowing a few basic phrases. People are specifically calling out my pronunciation. And although in reality I still have a long way to go, I wanted to let you know that your lessons have been pivotal in getting my pronunciation to where it is. So: thank you!)
Nathan Vegdahl
2019-03-11 03:48:21 +0000 UTCHi Gabe! Thank you. Just to clarify, have you already watched episodes 34 and 39 in which I talk about this concept in more detail?
Dogen
2019-03-11 00:53:38 +0000 UTCHey, this was a really informative video! one question though, is there a video where you explain how to avoid "chest resonance"? I'm not exactly sure what you mean when you say that.
Gabe Tanenhaus
2019-03-10 18:53:54 +0000 UTCThanks James. I recommend going with the male character with a mustache and great hair—he's quite likeable! haha
Dogen
2019-03-10 14:49:46 +0000 UTCGlad to hear y'all are feeling better. I chuckled when you first said to "get into character". I was thinking "welp, time to act like all 12 members from 12人の優しい日本人”
Admiral Captain Fabulous
2019-03-10 13:59:51 +0000 UTC
