Quote:
Originally Posted by KyleGoetz
For linguistics-minded people, Japanese phonology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia They are all basically alveolar flaps, which means you flap your tongue against your alveolar ridge, which is the roof of your mouth where it is bumpy about 1cm behind the teeth, right before your mouth opens up into a wider cavern.
In English, the only alveolar flap I can think of offhand that we have is the "tt" in words like "better" and "butter." |
I would imagine everyone finds a way that works best for them, but this is pretty close to the way I do it, except that my tongue does not touch my alveolar ridge when saying ら, り, る, れ or ろ.
Consider it like squeezing the end of a hosepipe: The water is suddenly pushed out at higher pressure because you're restricted the passageway. ら, り, る, れ and ろ are like this - constricting the airflow with your tongue pushes your breath out faster, and the "flap" will come naturally.
The best thing you can do is listen to examples and practice, over and over again, until it comes naturally to you.