Pronunciation Problems in Japan

When I started considering pronunciation problems in speaking a language besides L1 in general, and a Japanese person speaking English in particular, my thoughts were fairly simple.  There are some sounds in our L1 (whatever it may be) that aren’t in other languages, and some sounds in other languages that aren’t in our L1.  Because of this, if we are going to learn to speak an L2 (or 3 or 4) with clarity, we will have to learn these sounds and practice saying them.   In learning L1 as a child we tailored our tongues, lips, mouths, and muscles to this language.  We must retrain these and make adjustments where necessary in order to make appropriate sounds in other languages.  There might even be some mental retraining—learning a new writing system and the sounds associated with the new symbols, or even looking at very familiar letters and associating different and sometimes unfamiliar sounds to them. To me this seemed logical.  Still, it doesn’t account for the broader scope of issues that influence or cause pronunciation problems.  In delving into issues more particular for Japanese students, I often saw other obstacles.  Rhythm of speech, stress and unstress of syllables can also be problematic to gaining the desired clarity of speech.  

For a Japanese person learning English, there are some sounds that need attention.  This is namely because English includes sounds not used in Japanese, and many English letters can be used to signify a variety of sounds while Japanese symbols in hiragana and katakana only have one pronunciation each.  Using the phonetic alphabet could be a benefit to the students.  Two of the consonant sounds particularly problematic for a Japanese student speaking English are:

·         R-L.  There is no separate symbol or sound for these in Japanese; for them, they have a sound that is somewhere between /r/  /l/  and /d/.  The students will need to practice the difference in words such as “raw and law,” “right and light” and “fright and flight.” Not learning to separate the sounds could cause great confusion in meaning.

·         Th –S/ D.  In English, “th” can be /ᶿ/ - /ᶞ/ but neither sound exist in Japanese.  They are normally replaced  with  /s/ and /d/ respectively.  “Thank you” sounds like “Sahnk you,” and “father” more like “fodder.”  The student will need to work on differentiating:  thing and sing,  worth and worse,  think and sink,  then and den.  

There are only 5 vowels in the Japanese language. While English may have 5 vowels letters (sometimes 6 with ‘y”) , these letters represent many more than 5 or 6 vowel sounds. 

·         /oʊ/ (work) /ӕ/ (apple) and /ɝ/ (girl) are vowel sounds that don’t exist in Japanese and are often replaced by /ɑː/ /ɔː/ or /e/.

These are by no means all of the problem sounds and there is an extensive and detailed list at this website: http://englishspeaklikenative.com/resources/common-pronunciation-problems/japanese-pronunciation-problems/ .

            Japanese has a different writing system from English, although Romajii (Japananse written in Latin letters) has become common with the use of electronics.  Both hiragana – the writing system for words of Japanese origin, and katakana – the writing system for foreign words- are based on syllables.  Japanese symbols stand for syllables such as “ku, tu, su, na, ni, no.” “Ah” is the only stand alone vowel, and “n” is the only stand alone consonant.  All other come together.  Foreign words get integrated into this system and as such, vowels (often “o” or “u”) are added for their ease of pronouncing strings of consonants.  My last name could become something like “Ku-la-ku-son” instead of “Clarkson.”  This can pose an interesting problem for a Japanese person speaking English.  Since they have already incorporated many English words and made them Japanese (some may even seem unrecognizable) having the students say them in the English way may be difficult. 

            English is also a language that uses stress and unstressed syllables to create rhythm, change meaning and add emphasis.  Japanese is unstressed.  Speaking English without the stress and the rhythm could cause a native English speaker to have difficulty understanding what is said. Shizuka Kamij writes more extensively about this issue  in the article here.

This stressing and unstressing of syllables, rhythm considerations, and various

differences in sounds can pose major issues in clarity and fluency of speech for a Japanese person speaking English.