Like most English speakers learning Japanese, I had a hard time initially with pronouncing the “r” row of the hiragana (and that difficulty gave me extra sympathy to Asians I’d met that had a hard time with English R’s and L’s).
I think I’m getting better at it now, and part of that was hearing examples of English words that make that sound (e.g. water or butter), and thus realizing that my mouth already knows how to make that sound. I even read a comment earlier today saying that the “r” row was originally romanized as a “d” row which I can completely understand.
But, I can’t seem to figure out any examples of English words I know that make the rya, ryu, or ryo sounds. Am I overlooking something, or are there no such examples?
I don’t think I understand which sound you say you are hearing in “butter” or “water” from the らりるれろ series?
Also what is your reasoning for trying to find the sound for りゃりゅりょ in English words?
I would think that while it might feel helpful to get the pronunciation, it would feel like your pronunciation of the moras would end up with an “english twang” for lack of a better word.
Wouldn’t hearing more of the Japanese words with those sounds used in context be more helpful for getting a feeling for the pronunciation?
The “lio” in “million” is sorta like りゅ in my Aussie accent, but it’s not really all that close considering English has nothing that really matches the Japanese R sound. (“Million” is a better approximation for the Croatian “lj” letter, honestly…)
The American drawled pronunciation of those words as “buh-ddrr” and “wah-ddrr” sounds kinda like the American tendency to approximate the ら-line kana as “oh yeah, it sounds like a mixture of L and R and there’s also a bunch of D in there too”, which I’ve always found a bit daft because I’ve never been able to make out any D.
(American pronunciation guides for Japanese also like to approximate え vowel sounds as “ay”, which means I automatically disregard anything else they have to say.)
I know how they sound. I don’t know for sure how to use my mouth to make those sounds. If I discover that my mouth already can… that helps. It’s just a linguistic mnemonic device. People use them all the time when learning new languages where the vowel sounds differ, the first thing a teacher will tell you is that “vowel X in this language sounds like vowel Y in yours”.
I tend to describe that Japanese R sound as 60% R, 30% L, and 10% D.
I’ve never seen that, but I would certainly distrust any source that claimed that. Especially when there are perfectly fine words like “bed” to represent the え sound.
Which part of the words are even supposed to sound like the Japanese R? I’m trying to imagine the words in various English accents that I’ve heard before and I just can’t hear the Japanese R anywhere.
In my dialect, the t in water and butter do indeed sound like the Japanese r. If looking at a chart of tongue placement, it is very similar. The main difference is how much force is applied, the Japanese one is much lighter/shorter. (Remember only compare the “t”/“tt”, not the vowel that comes after it).
As far as the one in ryo/rya/ryu, I find that for ryu and ryo are still similar in placement to ra/re/ri/ro/ru, but have a bit more force and thus can end up a bit more rolled, but rya feels different and I can’t think of how to describe it
Not at all? That feels a bit hyperbolic. I’m aware English has many accents, and I’d understand if you think the sounds are not identical. Here’s one source for that idea. Admittedly, it’s just Wikipedia. But I know I’ve read it in other places, and I could have sworn one of those places was more authoritative. They have bold print showing it’s the letter “t” in “atom” (same letter/sound as in water and butter).
Interestingly, I notice just now that they also have an example for “ryo”. At first I thought “atom” and “party” were the same sound, but as I go slower I feel the difference out, I realize what my tongue is doing with “party”! And if I say a “ryo” word out loud now, I feel like it sounds better than any of my previous attempts! Which I think explains even better what I was trying to say in this earlier comment.
I can’t even imagine what an accent that has らりるらろ in a word like water or bottle would sound like. Brain’s probably too stuck on my own accent, which has the glottal stop in the middle, so I used water and bottle to figure out っ.
In English dialects with T- and D-flapping (like my own Western American English accent), the word “nada” can be pronounced quite close to some pronunciations of 「なら」.
We English speakers with T- and D-flapping generally pronounce “medal” and “metal” the same. In our accents, “water bottle” sounds like “wadder boddle.” (Compare the British vs. American accents on Forvo to see what I mean.)
In some Australian accents, “water” can even sound similar to わら (except the vowel sounds don’t match up… in Australian English, “water” has more of a ヲ sound).
I guess both “atom” and the Japanese R result in part of my tongue being on the roof of my mouth? But the resulting sounds still aren’t that similar. If you try to use “atom” as a reference for the Japanese R, I feel like you’d end up with a stronger D sound than you’re supposed to have. That said, I’m no linguistic, so I can’t figure out or explain why the sounds differ.
My tongue touches the roof of my mouth further back and more to the sides when I’m saying ら compared to if I’m trying to pronounce “atom” as “adəm” (or whatever the intended pronunciation is here).
(Also, all this discussion of “atom” as a phonetic mnemonic has gotten this episode of the Simpsons permanently stuck in my head…
