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Japanese Phonetics Bibliography

These are the resources I use to create Japanese Phonetics. A PDF which follows traditional formatting rules is also available here (last updated April 25, 2020). Please also note that I acquired a fair amount of the information in this series while intensively studying Japanese linguistics at both the University of Washington (05-07, 08-09) and Keio University (07-08), as well as  through first hand experience living and working in Japan for more than ten years, and having extensive native conversations with native speakers trained in linguistics.


Comments

Thanks for the share Enrico!

Dogen

Hi everyone! I wanted to suggest a couple of resources I've found to be extremely useful in my studies. The first one is 『語形成と音韻構造』, by 窪薗晴夫 (1995, くろしお出版), and specifically Chapter 2. I didn't actually read the whole book, so I'm not sure about the other chapters (I skimmed them a few years back, before photocopying just the second chapter, so I assume that past-me didn't find them useful for learning purposes, but I have no way of checking their content right now), but Chapter 2 deals with accent in compound nouns in a very in-depth way. A little too in-depth for general purposes, perhaps, but the great thing about this chapter is that it deals with a phenomenon that is ignored (or, at best, very lightly touched upon) in the appendix to the Shinmeikai dictionary and in all other learning resources I know of. Briefly put, it deals with how nouns behave when combined into long compounds, explaining for example why 名古屋工業大学 is pronounced with an 'accent reset' in the middle, while 名古屋工大 is pronounced as a single word, or why マルクスレーニン主義 is somewhat counterintuitively pronounced with an 'accent reset' between the two names, and a lot of other things like that. It took me roughly a couple of days to get through the whole chapter while putting all relevant information in my Anki deck (I got about 25 new longish explanation cards out of it), but it's definitely worth it if you've ever wondered how the heck you're supposed to properly pronounce 武村正義前官房長官 or 神戸女子短期大学 without either running out of breath or committing seppuku (whichever comes first). It also contains a bit of 'bonus' information on 連濁 and intonation, nothing vital as far as I'm concerned, but still potentially interesting. The second resource I'd like to suggest is 「複合語におけるアクセント規則と連濁規則」, by 佐藤大和 (you can't get much more overtly Japanese than that), which is an article contained in 『講座 日本語と日本語教育 第2巻 日本語の音声・音韻(上)』 (1989, 明治書院). The other articles in the book might be interesting, but I haven't read them because they seemed way above my pay-grade and focused on linguistics topics without much practical application. This article, however, contains a few gems, like detailed rules for the pronunciations of 寺じ・猫・手 in compounds (something which was barely touched upon in the Shinmeikai appendix, and I was especially grateful for the 寺 one because I couldn't figure it out on my own however much I tried), and some rather interesting explanations and rules about 連濁 (such as why 比叡山 is pronounced ひえいざん, while 高野山 is こうやさん, or the fact that more often than not surnames with a 連濁 are 平板 while those without are not, which I took as a very useful generalised version of the 田た・だ rule). It's not for beginners and it comes nowhere near to being a complete 'course' or anything, but I was able to extract several useful bits of information from it that are either ignored or glossed over in other, more 'learner-friendly' resources. Cheers!

Enrico Paolini

Thanks!

Dogen

Nice article with appriciated efforts ... specially thanks for your references , https://www.worldlastnames.com/most-common-japanese-last-names/ also best i got

World lastnames

Hi Taryn. I actually think that my lessons would be be beneficial for you—I usually just recommend a basic to intermediate level of understanding such that people aren't too confused by the example words or grammar points I use. Hope this helps! Thanks for the support!

Dogen

Dear Dogen, what skill level do you recommend starting your lessons? I just finished Rosetta Stone (yea, depressing) and still can't pass the JLPT. I found you on Tofugu and am eager but wary (seriously butthurt about the Rosetta Stone thing). Love your YouTube channel!

Taryn L'écureuil

Hi Mugen. Thanks for reaching out! I unfortunately get the majority of my linguistics information from either physical books or academic journals, and most of it is phonetics related. There is one twitter account, however, that I think might be useful for what you're trying to do. Check this guy out: <a href="https://twitter.com/kanji_project" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://twitter.com/kanji_project</a> Good luck! ^^

Dogen

Hi Dogen, I've been a fan of your vids for a little while now (though not yet a patron)! I understand you have a background in Japanese linguistics, and as a linguistics student, I wanted to ask if you know of any good general websites to look for (preferably English-language) articles on Japanese linguistics! I'm currently looking into language usage on Twitter, and hoping to compare English and Japanese on the platform, but am struggling a little on the Japanese end of literature.

Mugen

No worries Jorge! Definitely know the feeling. I'll keep updating the list as I find more useful resources. Good luck with your studies and let me know if you ever have any questions!

Dogen

Thank you for making this. As a Japanese student, I feel that we don't have nearly enough practice understanding how to actually speak properly. I've tried getting random books from our school's library on the subject of phonetics in Japanese, but I honestly had no clue what to go for.

vio


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