Like @saibaneko, I find the long vowels much harder to pronounce correctly.
Not sure if it will help, but I think the “R” sound you’re trying to replicate is much closer to a “D” or “L” in English (as @riddlewrong stated). I hear it and speak it as a rolled “R,” kind of halfway between R and D.
In fact, I believe there is no true “R” sound in Japanese 五十音 (which is why Japanese people have such difficulty distinguishing between “R’s” and “L’s” — leading to all the horrible stereotypes of Japanese people speaking English). My name is Rex, but I learned long ago to answer to “Mr. Lex” when in Japan.
It’s also the surest “tell” of a westerner speaking Japanese: “ben ree” instead of something much closer to “benli” or “bendi” (rolled “R,” short “ee” sound).
That reminded me of this video by Fumi Sensei from Speak Japanese Naturally on Youtube
My Japanese teacher in Second Life was the one who recommended her video because we were learning the Hiragana Chart (or あいうえお / ごじゅうおんず Chart) and I find her explanation for Japanese pronunciations especially helpful for our Amenbo No Uta practice in class.
Edit: Found out that the Japanese pronounce English ABCs differently, for example, when saying NHK, JR, BBC (where the B in the middle is dragged longer) etc and not to mention the OL (Office Lady).
One of the hardest for me is the え sound - since it’s between the vowels in “get” and “say” my brain keeps trying to make it be inconsistently one of those two instead of what it’s actually meant to be. Also, it’s not that it’s hard to pronounce, but remembering to pronounce ん as an M before B and P sounds is difficult for me as well.
Just like a few others, I have a hard time pronouncing the “ry” sound of りゃ、りょ、りゅ, especially when it is at the beginning of a word. It helps me to lean more towards “ly” but I have not gotten used to it as much.
Also, when pronouncing 飛魚 とびうお I always need to take a split-second break after “i” to reorganize my mouth before I can continue
According to the IPA chart on Wikipedia, it’s the sound in ‘say’, but without the final ‘i’ sound (because English has diphthongs. Japanese doesn’t). I personally think that the pronunciation does change, with it being closer to ‘get’ most of the time. The same thing can be heard in French, where, for example, in Paris, the difference between è and é (which are the sounds in ‘get’ and ‘say’, diphthongs notwithstanding) is audible, but not very pronounced, and the combination ai can be pronounced either way depending on the word and conjugation.
They do, but it’s the same like with Finnish, that consonants and especially vowels just map much closer to Japanese than from English. So from the get go there is a slight advantage.
But yeah, I know you were probably mostly pressing the fact that @Nickk made it seem (granted, kind of high horsily) like they have perfect pronunciation from the start
Seems like I was looking at another chart. So the ‘standard’ pronunciation involves opening the mouth to an extent that’s somewhere in between the two. I still think variation is likely based on what I hear and because I think it’s hard to be ‘exactly’ in between all the time since pronunciation varies along a continuous spectrum. Still, perhaps it’s just because I’m used to distinguishing the two sounds, so I tend to hear one or the other.
EDIT: ok, actually, my tongue position changes when I pronounce “get” as compared to when I say a Japanese word containing an え sound, so I guess they are slightly different.
I think you are overstating this. If someone said べんり with an American accent R it would sound wrong, sure, but it would sound just as wrong if they used an American accent L or D.
I personally describe the Japanese R as something like 60% R, 30% L, 10% D.
Does Italian have a sound like the Japanese R? Does Italian have the ん followed by vowel sound like in せんえん? Does Italian have a sound like りょ that so many beginners struggle with?
I find it hard to believe that you have no pronunciation issues just because you are a native Italian speaker.
I’m lucky that Indonesian and Japanese have the same pronunciation, though I don’t really know how good I actually am since I never have someone to hear and correct me
Heh. I actually noticed myself when visiting Italy two years ago that pronouncing Rs in the Japanese style actually sounded pretty close to what the locals were saying.
And also that Italian is largely consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel et cetera without the weird consonant pile-ups and consonant word-enders that English likes to have.
