Japanese Phonetics Episode 34—LIVE!
Added 2018-01-15 08:15:38 +0000 UTCBibliography
Japanese Phonetics Index Page
Note: This lesson originally contained a section on 'vocal placement', or Japanese voice and speaking style, but I've since removed this, and moved all of my thoughts on this topic to episode 5.1, which can be found here.
Good evening Patrons! The thirty-fourth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live! In this episode, we explore default lip, jaw, and tongue position in Japanese.
As always, if you have any questions leave a comment below, and thank you all for your continued support!
Best from Beppu,
Dogen
Comments
Do you have any recommended practices for integrating the pronunciation knowledge? I'm imagining having a list of things to keep in mind and going back between practicing speaking and looking at the list so as to remember.
Sashin Exists
2024-05-08 08:00:32 +0000 UTCThe video can be found here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/japanese-episode-17966973 That said, I would encourage you to watch the following video as well, as it's related: https://www.patreon.com/posts/33215870 Please be sure to also read the attached post (and also watch the video I did with Yoichi-san) in detail as well, as this is a very complicated topic. I think it's also important to emphasize that while it's good to avoid speaking from your chest with a deep, reverberating voice, you also don't want to raise your base pitch of your voice too much; if you're concerned about this I would recommend only concentrating on speaking from your mouth. That is to say, rather than thinking about not speaking from your chest AND also very slightly raising the default pitch of your voice, concentrate only on not speaking from your chest, without worrying too much about the base pitch of your voice. Hopefully this helps—I'm going to talk more about this topic in the fairly near future as it's something that's been on the back burner for a bit now. Cheers!
Dogen
2021-01-28 12:13:35 +0000 UTCWhere's the video with Joey?
Andy
2021-01-25 07:34:44 +0000 UTCHi Joel! It's OK to have a minimal amount of lip rounding, but make sure you're not protruding your lips forward at all. Incidentally I cover both of these sounds in detail in later lessons. Cheers!
Dogen
2019-11-22 05:13:02 +0000 UTCHey Dogen, quick question. Regarding ゆ and を. When I say these, are you saying that I shouldn't use my lips AT ALL and have it completely come from the throat? Or is it okay to add a slight rounding to my mouth?
Joel Mitchell
2019-11-22 03:30:47 +0000 UTCHi Elisabeth—English speakers certainly have larger ranges of motion; which is why many Japanese speakers can improve their pronunciation by opening their mouths wider. The issue is more about vowel reduction, as I spoke about earlier. Native English speakers certainly make very wide, open 'a' sounds, but usually only when the 'a' is the accented vowel of the word. When 'a' isn't accented it's usually pronounced as a much more closed schwa, as I talked about in the earlier post. Many native English speakers assume that this same kind of vowel reduction also occurs in Japanese, but it does not, which is why so many native English speakers say words like 走る with the initial あ in は as a schwa, rather than an open あ, because the 'accen't in 走る is not on the は, but on the し. Hope that this helps! Cheers!
Dogen
2019-04-09 04:58:02 +0000 UTCThank you for your response! This is all very interesting. I think I understand what you mean for う; if it disappears during normal conversation, then it makes sense why the teachers would tell us to exaggerate more for clear enunciation. However, I'm a bit confused about い and あ. According to your explanation, I would think that I, as a native English speaker, would have a less wide い and a less open あ, but it's the Japanese students that struggle the most with getting their mouths wide and open. I feel that this lesson suggested that I move my mouth less while speaking, while my acting classes say the opposite. Perhaps it's just a difference between the articulatory setting for speaking and the setting for performing? I suppose I'll just have to watch actors and singers more closely when they perform and see if I can find the middle ground that I need. Thanks again!
Elisabeth Kaseda
2019-04-08 11:34:33 +0000 UTCHi Elisabeth, I think I can sort this out for you! う: In Japanese there is a phenomenon known as lip compression that often occurs in very slow speech or when native speakers say う in isolation. During lip compression, the sides of the lips come in, but the lips don't stick out, or protrude so while they do end up rounding a bit, the type of rounding is very different than the lip rounding found in English or French. It's also important to note that this tends to disappear entirely during normal conversation. い: This sound is essentially identical to the English 'ee' (like the 'ee' in 'meek'). That said, in English, this vowel is often preceded by consonants that can make the lips round, like the 'sh' in 'she'. This never happens in Japanese however, which is why the lips are always much wider in し then they are in she; in my estimation it's not the vowel itself but preceding consonants that can add unnecessary rounding to 'ee' in English. Finally, with regards to あ, this is because native English speakers often end up pronouncing the vowel あ as a 'schwa', which is the first sound in the word 'about'. Japanese speakers almost never reduce vowels, however, so the あ in あ is always much more open than certain variants of the English 'a', such as the schwa. This is less of lip issue, however, and more of a jaw issue, which, in turn, affects how much the lips are open. Hope this helps! Bigger 'あ' is one way of saying, 'stop reducing your vowels!' Cheers!
Dogen
2019-04-05 13:37:49 +0000 UTCThis question is coming extremely late as I belatedly work my way through this series; I apologize! In this video, you mention that Japanese has little to no lip rounding or spreading. However, in my acting lessons, the teachers are always telling us to make wider いs, rounder うs, and bigger あs. In fact, this is one of the things that I have been praised for being better at than my Japanese colleagues, presumably for the reasons mentioned in the video related to the articulatory setting of native English speakers. Is there a way to reconcile these two ideas--the lack of rounding and spreading in Japanese, but the efforts of voice teachers to get more?
Elisabeth Kaseda
2019-04-05 10:56:31 +0000 UTCHi Charles! I actually highly recommend speaking with a high voice in Japanese, as it makes it significantly easier to reproduce accurate pitch-accent. I talk about this in detail in episode 39—do you mind watching that lesson and letting me know if you have any questions afterwards? I think it might be particularly useful for you. Cheers!
Dogen
2018-08-01 02:02:42 +0000 UTCHi Dogen, this might be a really weird question and I might be totally off the mark here, but I’ve noticed that many of my male Japanese friends tend to speak with a very hoarse and deep voice. Do you have any advice on how to make your voice more low so that it can add more texture and character? I feel I might be taken more seriously if I can have a deeper voice in Japanese, haha.
Charles
2018-07-30 23:51:59 +0000 UTCThanks—I just updated it!
Dogen
2018-05-19 00:50:15 +0000 UTCThe PDF link does not work anymore.
Kazuya
2018-05-18 17:12:16 +0000 UTCHi Sami. I haven't been able to get the video just yet as Joey is a very busy individual, but I'll be sure to post it as soon as I get it! Apologies for the delay!
Dogen
2018-03-05 01:50:50 +0000 UTCHi Dougen, in this video you mentioned a video where the anime man talks about his thoughts, but I haven’t found it anywhere. Is it still to be released?
TheHighDinosaur
2018-03-04 20:27:02 +0000 UTCHi Bertrand. Really glad to hear that you enjoyed the lesson, and that you were able to learn something new! I think that Dr. Vance's two books might be especially valuable to you—there are many passages that specifically contrast Japanese, English, and French. Might be worth checking out from a library! I really, really appreciate your kind words and feedback with regards to pitch-accent and vocal placement. I think the main reason that the difference is so drastic is because my poor vocal placement had become habitual to a certain degree; I had been doing it so long that each time I spoke Japanese I unconsciously switched into 'artificial resonance mode'. Needless to say, simply not adding this fake resonance and bass has, at least in my eyes, made a big difference. I'll continue to work on this though, as I still a lot of room for improvement. I'm looking forward to your comments on Joey's video as well! Again, it should be up in a few days. Thanks again for the feedback and support, and 今後ともよろしくお願いします。Incidentally I'd love to hear your thoughts on Sherry's comment above!
Dogen
2018-01-18 06:03:51 +0000 UTCHaha not entirely sure. I was more under the impression that an underbite has more to do with the front-back position of the lower jaw, as opposed to the high-low position. I have noticed that a high number of Japanese people speak with a lisp, however!
Dogen
2018-01-18 05:53:04 +0000 UTCI'm sure it already exists somewhere on the internet haha.
Dogen
2018-01-18 05:51:10 +0000 UTCHi Sherry. Thanks for sharing this. I've actually experienced a similar phenomenon in the past—during the period when I tried to add texture and resonance to my Japanese voice I would often end up completely exhausted after just an hour of recording. On the other hand, since trying to speak with a higher base frequency recently, I don't experience nearly as much fatigue while recording. Might be interesting to hear other patrons thoughts on this topic as well. I'll be sure to ask Bertrand! Thanks for the support!
Dogen
2018-01-18 05:50:55 +0000 UTCHi Jim. That's a great observation. I also believe that my pitch-accent improved after learning to start with a higher pitch. That said, I tend to believe that the octave-range (the number of keys, as opposed to the average tone frequency) in both English and Japanese is actually fairly similar, and that Japanese simply has a higher base note, so to speak. In other words, the higher notes in Japanese will be higher than the higher notes in English, and the lower notes in Japanese will be higher than the lower notes in English, but the range of these keys, in my eyes, is close across both languages. I have a hypothesis that it's easier for most people to control the higher ends of their pitch-range without adding stress, which could account for the generally higher range. This is just a hypothesis though, so I can't say with conviction. Thanks again for sharing your thoughts!
Dogen
2018-01-18 05:45:59 +0000 UTCAppreciate the support Nicolas! Hope the upcoming lessons prove to be equally beneficial!
Dogen
2018-01-18 05:38:13 +0000 UTChigher lower jaw, huh? Does that mean that my underbite is coming in handy?
Admiral Captain Fabulous
2018-01-16 01:50:04 +0000 UTCAnother great lesson. I now realize why my u's sounded sometimes weird to the Japanese: I was rounding my lips too much. As you correctly pointed out, lip-rounding is key to French pronunciation. I can't believe I never made the connection before. Thank you. Also, I'm so glad that our exchanges could help you in any way. As I've been following your videos for a long time now, your improvements in vocal placement weren't obvious to me at first, but after watching your latest "Placeholder video" and your old Q&A video from 2016 back to back, I must say the difference is astounding. Your placement sounds so much more Japanese to me now it's not even funny. Oh and I had to look up what a capo was lol. Can anyone say "music illiterate"?
Toberu
2018-01-15 22:51:48 +0000 UTCI really want to hear someone remix the part where you said "You" and ”ゆ” back to back
Michael Rowell
2018-01-15 20:16:24 +0000 UTCVery insightful video. I am also used to produce all my sound using my mouth and my American students usually ask me to speak louder. Then I feel very tired if I have to teach more than one class or have to speak for a long time. But I rarely feel tired speaking Japanese. I can talk in Japanese on Skype for 2 hours and be fine with it since I do not have to try nearly as hard as I would when I speak English even though when it comes to fluency and express complex ideas, my English is much better than my Japanese.
sherrycous
2018-01-15 13:21:16 +0000 UTCInsightful and well-researched as always Dogen. I'd noticed during the pitch accent portion of your series (feels like a lifetime ago) that pitch drops were steeper than those in English, and over the course of a well accented sentence my voice would reach the lower limit of its range. I assumed that this was most likely due to the fact that I'd start my sentences at the same pitch as I would in English, and would make myself run out of steam so to speak before I got to the end of my sentence. Since then I think I've improved somewhat and learned to work with my range more effectively. But if my assumption were correct it would explain why Japanese speakers' base pitch tends to be higher than that of English speakers. Any thoughts on this?
Jim Cruse
2018-01-15 09:37:40 +0000 UTCEye-opening as always. Excited to see the upcoming videos!
Nicolas Guillemot
2018-01-15 08:38:16 +0000 UTC
