Good evening Patrons! The fifty-third episode of Japanese Phonetics is live! In this lesson we explore at the Japanese approximants, や [ja] and わ [ɰa], as well as common issues and good to be aware of points for each sound.
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
2018-11-23 07:29:50 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The fifty-second episode of Japanese Phonetics, now with updated native recordings, is live! In this lesson we continue to explore at the 'r' sounds, looking at the mainstream 'r' variants, as well as common issues ...
2018-11-05 23:25:53 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The fifty-first episode of Japanese Phonetics, with updated native recordings, is live! In this lesson we analyze what I call the 'textbook r sounds', which are widely considered to be the most difficult Japanese co...
2018-10-20 08:51:28 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons!
Some of you may have seen a video circulating on YouTube of a Japanese man named Kazu nitpicking my Japanese. I've actually been in contact with Kazu-san since he created these videos; he's a very pleasant and knowledgeable guy, and the current voice of the native male recordings in Japanese Phonetics.
I just wanted to let everyone know that Kazu-san and I had a conversation on Skype not too long ago where we discussed a variety of language-related topics, in ...
2018-10-13 13:24:19 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The fiftieth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, and updated with new, higher quality native recordings! In this lesson we look at the nasal 'm', and review all of the important points of the pronunciation sub-se...
2018-10-03 13:40:37 +0000 UTC
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Good afternoon Patrons! The forty-ninth episode of Japanese Phonetics, now updated with new native recordings, is live! In this lesson we look at the consonants 'b' and 'p', as well as some advanced phonetic phenomena rel...
2018-09-17 05:37:05 +0000 UTC
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Note: I had intended on including native recordings for the voiced version of 'h' in 'haha' and 'gohan', but after listening to these files on repeat, I came to the conclusion that isolated recordings of these pronunciations could end up confusing learners more than it helped, and thus opted to leave them out. My recordings for these words may not be 100% native, but because the voicing of 'h' is something most native English speakers are used to (as mentioned in the less...
2018-09-01 11:17:59 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The forty-seventh episode of Japanese Phonetics is live and updated with native recordings! In this lesson we look at the standard 'n' sounds, and talk about why they should be thought of as separate from ん, the ...
2018-08-16 13:00:13 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The forty-sixth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now with native recordings! In this lesson we look at the various 'd' sounds. I had originally planned on spending the second half of this lesson on review, but...
2018-07-31 10:47:49 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The forty-fifth episode of Japanese Phonetics, updated with native recordings, is live! In this lesson we look at the small 'tsu', also known as the sokuon (促音), in detail, covering topics such as double-voiced-...
2018-07-14 14:40:21 +0000 UTC
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Good morning Patrons! The forty-forth episode of Japanese Phonetics, now updated with native recordings, is live! In this lesson we look at the consonants t, ch, and ts, comparing and contrasting them with various English sounds, as well...
2018-06-28 01:00:01 +0000 UTC
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Note: At around 10:10 in this video, I note that the standard Japanese z sound（the initial sound in ざ、ず、ぜ、ぞ）sometimes does become a fricative in the word initial position if it comes after a word ending in a vowel and the speaker is talking at a fairly rapid pace. I just wanted to let everyone know that this is true for the initial sound in じ as well. I opted to not mention this as I've found that a fair number of Japanese learners naturally &nbs...
2018-06-11 03:49:48 +0000 UTC
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Good morning Patrons! The forty-second episode of Japanese Phonetics, now updated with native recordings, is live! In this lesson we look at the S and Z sounds, exploring the more difficult 'し' in detail.
As alway...
2018-05-22 00:24:45 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The forty-first episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now updated with native recordings! In this lesson we look at the consonants K and G, as well as some advanced phonetic phenomena related to the...
2018-05-06 09:19:33 +0000 UTC
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Good morning Patrons! The fortieth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now updated with native recordings! In this lesson we look at を, comparing phonetic literature with standard language programs, native speech fro...
2018-04-20 01:00:01 +0000 UTC
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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, whi...
2018-04-04 08:05:15 +0000 UTC
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A long overdue tour of the space and equipment I use to create videos (minus my 2016 macbook pro). If anyone has any questions feel free to let me know! More footage of the rest of my apartment coming soon.
Best from Beppu,
Dogen
2018-03-20 10:30:03 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The thirty-eighth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now updated with native recordings! In this lesson we look at some additional tips for vowel pronunciation, including vowel perception, reduction, centralizati...
2018-03-19 09:06:11 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The thirty-seventh episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now updated with native recordings! In this lesson we explore vowel combinations, including standard sequences such as [a][i], as well as th...
2018-03-04 10:00:59 +0000 UTC
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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...
2018-03-04 00:52:51 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The thirty-sixth episode of Japanese Phonetics, now with native recordings, is live! In this episode, we explore long vowels, covering concepts such as resonance and rearticulation. If y...
2018-02-17 10:59:15 +0000 UTC
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Good evening patrons! I have a couple quick announcements I wanted to share with everyone. First, and this is a big one:
I'm now the father of twin girls, Hannah and Kloe!
The girls were actually born a few weeks back, but things have finally settled down a bit, so I'm just now getting around to announcements. I want to personally thank each and every one of you that has contributed to Japanese Phonetics, or signed up in one of the lower price tiers
2018-02-11 14:18:47 +0000 UTC
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Good afternoon Patrons! The thirty-fifth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live, now updated with native recordings! In this episode we talk about the IPA vowel chart, and the five Japanese vowels. Directly below are the t...
2018-01-31 05:27:56 +0000 UTC
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For $15 patrons: You're good to go. Just scroll down for a complete, up-to-date lesson list, ANKI flash card decks, as well as a links to other Patreon exclusive content such as collaboration videos with other creators, livestream Q&A, etc.
For visitors interested in signing up: Use this page to learn more about the Japanese Phonetics curriculum. Below, you'll find a brief summary of each lesson, as well as access to episodes one through fi...
2018-01-20 09:05:14 +0000 UTC
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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 t...
2018-01-15 08:15:38 +0000 UTC
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Hello, Patrons! I hope this message finds you all well. The Japanese Phonetics Episode 33 follow-up is live, now updated with native recordings! In this relatively brief lesson, we continue to explore devoicing, going ove...
2017-12-28 17:59:47 +0000 UTC
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June 4, 2021 Update: In the previous version of this lesson, I talked about how the initial い in 行くか often gets partially dropped in rapid speech, and attributed this to devoicing. However, after doing additional research, I've come to the conclusion that this is more of a form of slurring / slang than devoicing, and thus removed this section from the lesson. To clarify, I no longer believe that devoicing occurs at the beginning of words, though word initial い certa...
2017-12-18 14:43:56 +0000 UTC
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Sunday, January 23, 2022 update: A previous version of this video contained a mistake in the pitch-accent graphic for 先生は女だ at 12:35, but this has been fixed, along with a few other minor cosmetic changes.
One additional note on pitch-accent graphics: In this series, particles and conjugations of the verb です are typically indicated with an open circle instead of a solid dot, but in this lesson, ‘でした’ in the verb ‘食べませんで...
2017-12-02 16:36:40 +0000 UTC
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Edit: In this video, I recommend studying Japanese holistically for approximately 3-6 months before getting started with phonetics, but recently I’ve come to believe that it's best to do this, ...
2017-11-17 14:46:13 +0000 UTC
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Good evening Patrons! The thirtieth episode of Japanese Phonetics is live! In this episode we look back at each of the important concepts and rules presented in the series thus far. This video is meant to be your cheat sheet / condensed gui...
2017-10-31 17:55:35 +0000 UTC
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