Lesson 2: eh what? nice to meet you^__^
Welcome, to Lesson 2. Now that you're more familiar with the how the different writing systems are used, let's actually take a look at our basic kana writing systems.
Sounds in Japanese are usually CV = a Consonant sound, followed by a Vowel sound.
Luckily for us, there are only 5 vowel sounds (much easier than English, Chinese, etc...)
The 5 vowel are A I U E and O.
A (short a) as in father (in standard neutral region-free American English)
I (long e) as in eat
U (long u) as in food or zoo
E (short e) as in end
O (long o) as in Ohio
the Consonant sounds include K, G, S, SH, Z, J, T, TS, CH, N, H, F, B, P, M, Y, R, W.
These sounds as you expect them to sound in standard neutral english pronunciation except F is a cross between F and H, and R is a cross between R and L.
The consonants are paired up with a vowel.
for example, M + A = MA (which sounds like MA = Mother)
You can have only the Vowel (for example "A")
or you can have a Consonant+Vowel (for example "HA")
or you can have the ん /N/ glottal stop.
This character is special and we usually like to think of this an N/M with no vowel.
For example, YEN = YE + N
For more detailed information on Japanese pronuncation please see the wikipedia article on Japanese Phonology
Japanese phonology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Characters with TENTEN or MARU
You may notice that some characters are almost the same except for a little mark in the upper right corner.
for example KA and GA (カ and ガ) These two little marks are called "ten ten" and they result in voice being added to a character.
GA is really a KA with voice added. Try saying it out loud and you will see they are the same except GA has more voice behind it.
Another example is HA, BA, PA (ハ、バ、パ) BA is a HA with the tenten and voice added. But PA is a HA but your lips start together to form the P sound. These character are noted with a little circle called maru
HA->PA, HI->PI, FU->PU, HE->PE, HO->PO. These are the only characters to use the maru.
K->G
T->D
CH->DZI (This is very rarely used in the modern age and it's a cross between D, CH and a song J sound)
S->Z
SH->J
H->B
In Katakana, U ウ can be turned into a V sound with a tenten.
However this is a relatively new addition to the language.
ヴァ、ヴィ、ヴ、ヴェ、ヴォ
Characters with different vowel sounds added
We can use A I U E O YA YU YO to also make new sounds.
The most common sounds we find are _I mixed with ya yu or yo.
for example KI + ya => Kya. き＋や＝きゃ
Please note, that when we mix these in, the vowel sound character is written smaller.
SHI + ya = SHA/SHYA , CHI+ yu = CHU/CHYU, RI + yo = Ryo, etc...
In Katakana we have more options to write to make foreign words when we use the smaller characters.
For example, Party = PA-TI
However, there is now TI character (instead there is a CHI character) we have to make one. We mix TE plus a small "i" テ＋イ＝ティ
Finally, we need to use moraic obstruent /Q/ also known as the double consonant. It is almost always found before a consonant sound (except for some modern writing of colloquial spoken language).
The double consonant causes you to stop speaking for a moment... kind of like a hiccup in the flow of a word, that makes your mouth or throat close. In romaji, we write this by repeating the consonant and in kana, we write it as a smaller TSU.
For example Japan = nippon = にっぽん
QUOTE
FYI:
The system they use as a timing unit (the equivilent of the syllable) is called a "mora".
each regular character is considered one more.
れ = 1 mora
ポ = 1 mora
ん = 1 mora
However, the vowel combined characters are also considered one mora.
きゃ = 1 mora
ショ = 1 mora
ティ = 1 mora
Furthermore, the double consonant is considered it's own mora.
nippon = ni p po n = にっぽん = 4 mora
* Mora is the basis of the Haiku, not syllables.