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Hello all,
I’m working my way through the end of Season 2. In the chapter on numbers, 千 is pronounced せん, and 円 is pronounced えん. Thus I would expect ２千円 and ５０００えん to be pronounced にせんえん and ごせんえん respectively. What my ears are hearing in the audio on the practice page sounds more like にせいえん and ごせいえん. It said in the chapter that, Japanese not having a ‘ye’ sound, 円 isn’t pronounced ‘yen’. But that is exactly what I’m hearing on the practice page. ‘ni-se-yen’, ‘go-se-yen’.
Also, in the Anki sentence decks, whenever a card has こういちさん’s name, the audio sounds like こいさん. Instead of Ko-u-i-chi-san I’m hearing Ko-i-san.
Are these some sort of Japanese contraction that I’ve not heard of before/yet? Or are my ears all wonky?
Z-man
I can’t speak for “Koi-san”, but when え follows ん it tends to make a bit of a y-sound, simply from the effect of what mouth flaps are necessary to get the sounds out. So yes, 千円 sounds a bit like “sen yen”, or even “sei yen”.
原因 (げんいん) does something similar.
I feel like it’s more of her dialect combined with the slight speed that she talks at more than anything. However, it could just be Anki wonkiness, it seems really beta rather than a full fledged thing even though it’s used so often. For example,
(Unless it means “your words”, although Kotoba just means words so I have no idea what the Anata is there for.)There’s also another card in one of the sentence decks where it’s clearly written
“私の弟さん五千円を貸しました” or “わたし の おとうとうさん ご せん えん を かしました”, which means “I lent my brother 5 thousand yen”, and Emi even reads it the exact same way too, but when you reveal the answer it incorrectly says “I lent my father 5 thousand yen.” Close, but no cigar. おとうさん is father, but I guess it’s just some Anki Wonkiness.Ok, so go with what the kana looks like it should be pronounced?
Ok, so go with what the kana looks like it should be pronounced?
Yes, usually. The ones that have weird pronunciations or exceptions are usually pointed out and the cards are correct for those. If you really think you need to double check a reading and saying of a word, there’s always the forums, koichi, google, and if you’re really desperate but can’t find the answers you need, most translate programs have a speech option.
Also, I know you’re in season 2 but when you learn katakana later, the cards for those are usually right and most katakana words do the tricky silent vowel, kind of like です is Dess, not Desu.Well, you’re unlikely to get any funny looks if you pronounce it as written, but you also need to understand it being spoken to you. 千円 honestly does sound like “sen yen” or “sei yen”. 原因 regularly comes up in drama series as “gei yin”.
That’s not Anki Wonky that’s Koichi Wonky. Or aka typos.
Anki gives back whatever is imputed so he simply made a mistake on the card.
As for pronunciation, best thing to do at this stage is be aware of it, but kinda ignore it too.
Just stick with the way it should be for now. Once you are much more advanced, and are constantly listening to native speakers, you’ll pick this kinda thing up very easily.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N_(kana)
There’s a list there of some (all?) of the ways the pronunciation can change.
I do notice that Japanese speakers seem to omit the “i” sound…for example, “Kouich-san”, or “ich” instead of “ichi”. I guess it’s just to shorten the word. Not too sure about the first one, though both seem like a dialect thing, if you ask me.
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This reply was modified 10 years, 11 months ago by
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Some of them are still there, but it’s very subtle. It takes awhile to be able to hear them properly.
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This reply was modified 10 years, 11 months ago by
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