Sorry, I was on my phone earlier and couldn’t read the screenshot. That’s weird that WK’s “Rendaku Information” section contradicts itself. I’d report this to hello@wanikani.com — that conflicting information isn’t helpful at all.
This word is weird in more ways than one. The main weirdness is that it uses kunyomi and not onyomi. The only way to remember that is with repetition. It’s an exception to the “rule” (that’s not a rule) that most 熟語 use onyomi.
The other weirdness is with rendaku. The word with the meaning provided by Wankani, “fast talker” definitely does not get rendaku. (At least I’ve never heard it spoken that way by a native.)
As @slkrebs and Jisho.org point out, there are names of places that (confusingly) do rendaku. I may be wrong about this, but I definitely get the sense that places that use the entrance/exit/portal sense of 口 rendaku, where the anatomical “mouth” sense of the word does not. I’ve no idea why I think this other than sheer repetitive exposure to many, many Japanese words over the years. Naming someplace after fast talkers would be weird (but nothing surprises me in Japan any more).
Lastly, if you ever accidentally said はやぐち when discussing a fast-talker, everyone would understand what you meant (but most would probably correct you because it sounds weird).
Further to that, I think you’re onto something with differentiating the mouth vs. portal usage of 口. If you take, e.g. 辛口 (からくち) for dry taste (as in dry tasting sake), we definitely have that mouth/oral usage. And it is, からくち. A fast talker works with their mouth, so that would fit as well. A ticket counter, on the other hand, is called 窓口 (まどぐち) or 出札口 (しゅっさつぐち). Here, once more with rendaku, because they are obviously “openings” or portals.
Interesting, thank you so much for your reply! So far I have been just trying to memorize these things. I’d like to understand it better, but even after reading articles on rendaku and then seeing these types of “unexpected” words I still find it somewhat confusing.
After reading what you and @slkrebs are talking about with mouth vs. portal, maybe that would be a good way to remember if it does rendaku or not. I don’t know enough words that use 口 right now, but after looking up some that do, it seems like that might be a pattern!
Yup. But I’d seriously not try to memorize any rules, even this one. Over time, with enough repetition and exposure to different words your brain will automagically recognize these “rules” (and the exceptions).
The human brain is freakishly well adapted to recognizing patterns. Let it learn to recognize the patterns from the raw data (vocabulary reviews) on its own instead of trying to memorize and apply meta-rules.
When I was learning this vocab two years ago, Wanikani listed both readings, はやくち and はやぐち.
Then they removed はやぐち (they probably had some reasons about it being much less used or else, do not remember). What I remember is failing couple of reviews due to this
As for rendaku script, I suspect it works of the WK content snapshot taken when the script was created, and thus later edits may not be reflected in the script. So the script still remembers rendaku’d version and says “yes rendaku is Ok”.
EDIT: it was way too easy to find the content update notice when the other reading was removed: November 13 2020 Content Updates
Interesting, thank you for bringing that up. The reasoning in the post you’ve linked was, (tofuguJenny said) the はやぐち reading is only for a proper noun:
While “fast talker” is not a proper noun (thank you @TheCodingFox for clarification) , “fast talking” would be an adjective, I assume.
@TofuguJenny - may I ask you to revisit your statement and perhaps add はやぐち to the shake list, seeing as it’s been on the curriculum before? Then perhaps add “fast talking” to the meaning as well, while you’re at it? This way, you’d have covered the existence of both readings, that one is for proper nouns and added the adjective form as well. Maximum benefit all around Thanks for considering it.
Thanks for the suggestions @slkrebs! Adding a shake makes a lot of sense. The reason we didn’t do this at the time is that we weren’t able to add custom shakes back then, but now that we can, this is a great candidate!
As for the “fast talking” meaning, it is already listed on my end. Isn’t it visible to you?
Hi Jenny, thanks for getting back to me. Wonderful, thank you. And as regards the adjective, yes, you’re absolutely right, I didn’t see the “fast talking” when I looked at it yesterday because I obviously didn’t pay enough attention. Apologies
Yup. Getting rendaku correct without knowing why is right up there with knowing how to pronounce a new kanji that you don’t know the meaning of. It’s a pleasant feeling, but it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up every time it happens.
One thing I’ve not seen mentioned is the importance of hearing and saying (at least in your mind) each item as you do your reviews. I think enabling the audio is a great idea, especially if you’ve not been exposed to a lot of spoken Japanese, but hearing/saying it in your mind first seems to be even more important.
I’d be willing to bet not everyone does this, but I guarantee it will help with your pronunciation, your listening skills, and your ability to distinguish, speak, and remember rendaku, broad vowels (しょう vs. しょ, for example), 促音 (きて vs. きって), and other unique Japanese pronunciation oddities.
(I’m less certain it’s necessary to taste@plantron 's posts in your mind’s, err, mouth, but it can’t hurt.)