How do you say....

[moonie05]

As many of you may know, anime become very popular in North America. So I have some friends as school and they just loved Naruto (heck they even celebrate Naruto's birthday by wearing orange).

One day I was talking to my friends about manga but I accidentally say "men-ga" because you know how the "an" is pronounce in English, the word "van" would be said as "ven". So my friends started lecturing me and "attempt" to teach me the right way to say "manga" (no problem with me ^__^)

But I've notice that they've always says "manga" w/ emphasis and the end of syllable "man" and that makes a sound similar to "tank'' so they says "mankga" (which I didn't say anything to).

So they lectured me for awhile because I said "menga" but they next day while calling each other using the suffix "-chan" they said this: "chen"

"manga" ---> "mankga"
Sasuke-chan ---> Sasuke-chen
Hime-dono ----> Hime-dana

Anybody every notice that about every English dub, they always put unnecessary emphasis on a syllable of the character name that makes it sound heavier?

[Cherry-Kun]

pronunciations, pronunciations. a problem that affects all of us

being an english speaker you might have a problem while trying to emule the sounds of the words in jap coz your pronunciation is different (obviously)

they say "a" (with open mouth), you say what sounds like "ei". see?

a=a, but on fonetic a/=ei

it would take you lots of practice to get the right pronunciation

thats why instead of saying "chan" they say what sounds like "chien" coz thats how they are used to pronounce the vowel "a"

as for "manga". the sound of g in jap is more nasal, so you wont hear "ariGatou", but "ariNGatou". the "n" sound is very sutil, but its there. pay careful attention to any g sound next time you watch anime.

if they say "mankga" is coz they are stressing to much the nasal g, so it sounds like k.

it is very weird to be called chan, kun and stuff in your day to day life. its seems to me too allienated, and the fact that they are correcting you and lecturing you to pronounce correctly in jap..........its just too much. i mean, i love animes and japan, and yeah i use some jap words in my normal vocabulary but trying to impose on others my likes. why would i? everyone has their way to be, right?

plus, why trying to copy an accent when its cool to have your own one? even so, if you really want to pronounce propperly the japanese. i recomend you to start learning lines of your fav characters from animes. that helps a lot, learn lyrics from jap music.

practice and practice and practice
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[xenocrisis0153]

[ddogt432]

attempts at phonetic teachings never turn out well in writing. the best way to learn is to find a native japanese speaker, but even then, they might speak a very casual version (think about all the ways we can speak english).

the simplest rule to stand by is that every single syllable in the japanese language is pronounced the same, this is the easy party. the other side of speaking japanese is getting the emphasis and innotation correct, this is the hard part. english is not very strict on where the emphasis goes in most words, so native english speakers will almost always have a very difficult time with this while someone with, say, a chinese speaking background will find it relatively easy.

with this in mind, the easiest way to start learning japanese is to find a recording of the proper pronunciations of the syllabaries. once you can get the correct pronunciation down, it's just a matter of listening to a lot of japanese (dont just pay attention to the subs when watching anime!).

tl;dr - back on topic, i start my pronunciation of "manga" with the "ma" sound found in the first syllable of "mahogany". the "n" sound is not exactly pronounced as it is floated across. hard to explain, but try pronoucing it without letting your tongue touch the roof of your mouth (this may just be a habit of mine, though). then, the "ga" sounds more like "got" than "gag" (short 'a').
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[Cherry-Kun]

[kevinchaosvs]

Heyo!
Got a question here. If "kun" is for boys, why is it that in some anime, they address girls with "kun"?
(eg, in School Rumble, Yakumo is called Yakumo-kun by Hanai)

[Ropponmatsu]

[IMG:704:400:513d3cc6b4]http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee140/cracker0254/vlcsnap-4119118.jpg[/img:513d3cc6b4]

¨*~-.,,.-~*Ropponmatsu Sparkle*~-.,,.-~*¨

Disclaimer:
The Ropponmatsu wants to become a teacher, and loves to get a chance to talk about stuff that interests it, such as the japanese language.

Hmm~?

Did someone say something? O.o;

Ehem! Anyways! ~.~U

Hearing any language pronounced wrong is painful to the ears, but I have to say that english pronunciations of japanese words are the most painful to me. ^.^;

The main reason is the butchery of the japanese vowels, as well as adding strange emphasis on syllables for seemingly no reason. O.o;

Anyone seen the english dub of Martian Successor Nadesico?
"Yurrrriiiika Misumaaarrrrrruuu" '>.>

Cherry makes a good point, if you're born and bred english (american/austrailian w/e), you will probably have a harder time pronouncing and understanding the japanese language, due to the general seclusion of the english speaking world.

Also, as Cherry says, adding honorifics/name suffixes when speaking any other language than japanese sounds plain silly. I don't even do it when speaking to my japanese born teachers, unless we are speaking in japanese at the moment. O.o;

As Xeno says, the japanese word "manga" contains three syllables, "ma", "n", and "ga". 漫画 - �ん� - マンガ. In kanji, the first one contains the syllables "ma" and "n". ^_^

I'm not going to try and explain pronunciation. Since I'm not a native english speaker, you guys are probably better at making up explanations on how to pronounce it from an english point of view. ^_^

About pronunciation though, watching anime and focusing on the dialogue rather than the subs is indeed an awesome way of learning correct pronunciation.

Now~

Lets talk about honorifics/name suffixes!

While most honorifics are indeed mostly used in a very clear context. However, there are tons of exeptions. Honorifics are actually used to indicate your position towards the person, rather than his position to you

Kun is indeed an honorific mostly used to adress young boys/men, however, as kevin pointed out, it can also be used in other situations, such as when adressing a junior at school or work, as is the case with Hanai and Yakumo, and when used that way, gender does not matter.

Chan is an honorific that indicates affection towards the person, and is, as many of you know, considered "cute". As such, it is mostly used with girls, or small children. Because it is "cute", it is indeed also used to tease people sometimes.

Danna may be used when talking about your husband, or when adressing a middle age man, i.e. a man that is of an age you usually marry.

Oku+honorific (e.g. Oku san) is similar to danna, and can be used when talking about your wife, or when adressing women of same description as above, and is then roughly equal to english's "ma'am".

Dono was mostly used by servants or people who revered the person in question, and is rarely used.

Sama is used when talking to someone you respect very, very much, or to someone of high social rank, or if you happen to be a servant of some kind.

Sensei is not only used with teachers, but also with politicians, and "skilled people", e.g. craftsmen.

That's all for now! Whew! O.o;
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[kevinchaosvs]

Ah i see ... ..thanks alot sensei !!!
ive been greatly enlightened by you guys !

[Ropponmatsu]

¨*~-.,,.-~*Ropponmatsu Blush*~-.,,.-~*¨

If anyone brings up questions about the japanese language (or Excel Saga), I just can't help myself. ^.^;

Not that I'm an expert just yet, I've only studied it for 2.5 years so far, but I love shareing what I do know. ^_^
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[kevinchaosvs]

Hey, would it be good idea to make this thread a sticky, and let it be a language thread of some sort ?

[xenocrisis0153]

[07cbdj]

Yeah, make it a 'Ask Ropponmatsu' thread.
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Dv

[kevinchaosvs]

[Cherry-Kun]

there are threads about Japanase language already.

one made by Roppon himself here:
A look at the Japanese writing system

and other made by Meganekko:
Meganekko's Japanese Lesson Sigs

serve yerselves!

x9
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[Ropponmatsu]

>///<

I have a really big smile on my lips for some reason... ^.^;

I am happy that you found it interesting. ^w^

Anyways~! I've been thinking before as well that there should be some stickied thread about the japanese language, where one can ask questions and get them answered by anyone who knows the answer.

Seeing as there are many people besides me with knowledge of the language (i.e. answers from several sources), one would get quite accurate answers I believe. ^_^

And of course, it would be really fun too! As you can see, I can hardly stop myself when I get the chance to talk about it! ^.^;
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