I never noticed this before but I do the exact same thing! I speak a lot higher when I am speaking Japanese, as a Male with a relatively deep voice. I think it might be hard to pronounce things in Japanese at the same pitch as in English since it requires a different amount of air than typical English phrases. I can either speak lower-pitched than English or higher, but for some reason, I can’t do it at quite the same pitch.
2 Likes
I speak with a higher pitch when I speak German, even though I don’t think people associate German with higher pitches. This is because it’s easier for me to push out the sounds that German is known for, like the “ch” sound or the German “r” and have my speech sound fluid and not clunky.
I also know that speaking with a voice that is too high is a common problem for women because we sometimes use higher pitches due to social conditioning but then it’s inappropriate in workplace conditions, etc. So I figured voice coaches must deal with it a lot and I found a video on youtube with a speech therapist and she’s going through breathing exercises, which helps with breath control and relaxing the larynx. When I speak German, I do have issues with breath control and tension in my throat.
So maybe, in addition to modeling from other native speakers, it may help if you make sure that you’re breathing from your diaphragm and that your throat is relaxed!!!
2 Likes
thank you so much! i’ll try that. </3
Sounds like you may be going into “head voice” whenever you have to think about what you’re going to say carefully.
Sounds like you may be going into “head voice” whenever you have to think carefully about what you’re going to say. Try watching some videos about how to find your chest voice. You may want to practice the distinction in your native language first.
It’s definitely normal to adopt different speech patterns in different languages, my pitch tends to go down when I’m speaking Japanese (down in French as well but up in Spanish, oddly enough). Part of it could be subconsciously mimicing whatever content you consume in Japanese (you’re trying to pick up an accent from that, so naturally pitch is part of that). If that’s music or anime, the pitch is really high (for most female characters and a lot of male ones).
If you haven’t already, try branching out and listening to audio of native speakers talking normally, even if it’s too fast it’ll give you a better feel for how the language actually sounds (lot of assumptions made there, if none of that applies just ignore me <3)
2 Likes
This topic was automatically closed 365 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.