Japanese phonology

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For assistance in making IPA transcriptions of Japanese for Wikipedia articles, see WP:IPA for Japanese.

This article deals with the phonology (i.e. the sound system) of the Japanese language.

[edit] Consonants

Japanese phonemes
	Bilabial	Alveolar¹	Palatal	Velar/ Uvular	Glottal
Nasal	m	n		ɴ²
Plosive³	p b⁴	t d		k ɡ⁴
Fricative		s z⁵			h⁸
Flap		ɽ⁶
Approximant			j	w͍⁷

/t, d, n/ are laminal denti-alveolar (that is, the blade of the tongue contacts the back of the upper teeth and the front part of the alveolar ridge) and /s z/ are laminal alveolar. Before /i/, these sounds are alveolo-palatal ([tɕ dʑ n̠ʲ ɕ ʑ]) and before /u͍/ they are alveolar ([ts (d)z n s (d)z]).
/ɴ/ is a moraic nasal, fully a stop before another stop, where it becomes homorganic with that consonant, but not achieving full occlusion before fricatives or between vowels, where it is realized as a nasal vowel. Word finally before a pause, it may be realized as a uvular nasal stop, a bilabial nasal stop, or as a nasal vowel. Some analyses treat this as an abstract archiphoneme "N"; some as a coda /n/.
Voiceless stops /p, t, k/ are slightly aspirated: less aspirated than English stops, but more so than Spanish.^[1]
Voiced stops /b, ɡ/ do not always achieve full occlusion, being sometimes realized as fricatives or approximants. Intervocalic /ɡ/ is realized as [ŋ] in many dialects, especially in eastern Japan.
The fricative [z~ʑ] is in free variation with the affricate [dz~dʑ]. Usually, this is represented phonemically as /z/.
/ɽ/ is an apical postalveolar flap undefined for laterality. That is, it is specified as neither a central nor a lateral flap, but may vary between the two. It is similar to the Korean r. To an English speaker's ears, its pronunciation varies between a flapped d ([ɾ], as in American English buddy) and a flapped l [ɺ], sounding most like d before /i/ and /j/ listen (help·info), most like l before /o/ listen (help·info), and most like a retroflex flap [ɽ] before /a/.
The compressed velar /w͍/ is essentially a non-moraic version of the vowel /u͍/. It is not equivalent to a typical IPA [w] since it is pronounced with lip compression rather than rounding ([ɰ͡β̞]).^{[citation needed]}
/h/ is [ç] before /i/ and /j/ listen (help·info), and [ɸ] before /u͍/ listen (help·info), coarticulated with the labial compression of that vowel.

[edit] Vowels

Japanese has 5 vowels:

IPA	Notes
[a̠]	This is a low central vowel, it is between the English a in "father" and the English a in "dad".
[i]	This sounds like the English ee in "feet".
[ü͍]	listen (help·info) This is a somewhat centralized close back compressed vowel, [ɯ͡β̞], pronounced with the lips compressed toward each other but neither rounded like [u] nor spread to the sides like [ɯ]. There is no IPA symbol for lip compression, and the combination of round vowel with spread diacritic "[u͍]" is an ad hoc transcription.
[e̞]	The e sounds to English speakers like a mix between short e in as in "bed", and long e as in "lay", though it is closer to the former than the latter.
[o̞]	listen (help·info) This is a pure o, unlike the English one, which is a diphthong. The tongue is kept lowered while pronouncing the Japanese o, and the lips are mostly kept from moving.

Vowels of Standard Japanese. From Okada (1991:94)

The Japanese vowels are pronounced as monophthongs, unlike in English; except for /u/, they are similar to their Spanish or Italian counterparts.

Vowels have a phonemic length distinction (short vs. long). Compare contrasting pairs of words like ojisan /ozisaɴ/ "uncle" vs. ojiisan /oziisaɴ/ "grandfather", or tsuki /tuki/ "moon" vs. tsūki /tuuki/ "airflow".

In most phonological analyses, all vowels are treated as occurring with the time frame of one mora. Phonetically long vowels, then, are treated as a sequence of two identical vowels. For example, ojiisan is /oziisaɴ/ not /oziːsaɴ/.

Within words and phrases, Japanese allows long sequences of phonetic vowels without intervening consonants, although the pitch accent and slight rhythm breaks help track the timing when the vowels are identical.

/hoo.oꜜo.o/ [hòō.óò.ō]	hōō o (鳳凰を)	"Fenghuang" (direct object)
/too.oo.oꜜ.oou/ [tòo.ōo.ó.òōú͍]	tōō o ōu (東欧を覆う)	"to cover Eastern Europe" (This artificial example is not something that would normally be said.)

[edit] Phonological processes

Japanese contains a number of phonological processes which greatly alter the phonetic realization of consonants and vowels. A few are listed below.

[edit] Consonant processes

[edit] Weakening

Non-coronal voiced stops /b, ɡ/ between vowels may be weakened to fricatives, especially in fast and/or casual speech:

		/b/ → bilabial fricative [β]:	/abaɽeɽu/ → [aβaɾeɺu͍] abareru 暴れる 'to behave violently'
		/ɡ/ → velar fricative [ɣ]:	/haɡe/ → [haɣe] hage はげ 'baldness'

However, /ɡ/ is further complicated by its variant realization as a velar nasal [ŋ]. Standard Japanese speakers can be categorized into 3 groups (A, B, C), which will be explained below. If a speaker pronounces a given word consistently with the allophone [ŋ] (i.e. a B-speaker), that speaker will never have [ɣ] as an allophone in that same word. If a speaker varies between [ŋ] and [ɡ] (i.e. an A-speaker) or is generally consistent in using [ɡ], then the velar fricative [ɣ] is always another possible allophone in fast speech.

/ɡ/ may be weakened to nasal [ŋ] when it occurs within words — this includes not only between vowels but also between a vowel and a consonant. There is a fair amount of variation between speakers, however. Some, such as Vance (1987), have suggested that the variation follows social class; others, such as Akamatsu (1997), suggest that the variation follows age and geographic location. The generalized situation is as follows.

At the beginning of words:

all present-day standard Japanese speakers generally use the stop [ɡ] at the beginning of words: /ɡaijuu/ → [ɡaiju͍u͍] gaiyū 外遊 'overseas trip' (but not *[ŋaiju͍u͍])

In the middle of simple words (i.e. non-compounds):

A. majority of speakers uses either [ŋ] or [ɡ] in free variation: /kaɡu/ → [kaŋu͍] or [kaɡu͍] kagu 家具 'furniture'
B. minority of speakers consistently uses [ŋ]: /kaɡu/ → [kaŋu͍] (but not *[kaɡu͍])
C. smaller minority of speakers in Kantō consistently uses [ɡ]:^[2] /kaɡu/ → [kaɡu͍] (but not *[kaŋu͍])

In the middle of compound words morpheme-initially:

B-speakers mentioned directly above consistently use [ɡ].

So, for some speakers the following two words are a minimal pair while for others they are homophonous:

sengo 1,005 (せんご) 'one thousand five' = [seŋɡo] for B-speakers
sengo 戦後 (せんこ゜) 'postwar' = [seŋŋo] for B-speakers^[3]

To summarize using the example of hage はげ 'baldness':

A-speakers: /haɡe/ → [haŋe] or [haɡe] or [haɣe]
B-speakers: /haɡe/ → [haŋe]
C-speakers: /haɡe/ → [haɡe] or [haɣe]

[edit] Palatalization and affrication

The palatals /i/ and /j/ palatalize the consonants they follow:

		/m/ → palatalized [mʲ]:	/umi/ → [u͍mʲi] umi 海 'sea'
		/ɡ/ → palatalized [ɡʲ]:	/ɡjoːza/ → [ɡʲoːza] gyōza ぎょうざ 'fried dumpling'
		etc.

For coronal consonants, the palatalization goes further so that alveolopalatal consonants correspond with dental or alveolar consonants ([ta] 'field' vs. [tɕa] 'tea'):^[4]

		/s/ → alveolopalatal fricative [ɕ]:	/sio/ → [ɕi.o] shio 塩 'salt'
		/z/ → alveolopalatal [dʑ] or [ʑ]:	/zisiɴ/ → [dʑiɕĩɴ] jishin 地震 'earthquake'; /ɡozjuu/ → [ɡodʑu͍u͍] ~ [ɡoʑu͍u͍] gojuu 50 'fifty'
		/n/ → alveolopalatal [n̠ʲ]:	/niwa/ → [n̠ʲiw͍a] niwa 庭 'garden'
		/t/ → alveolopalatal affricate [tɕ]:	/tiziɴ/ → [tɕidʑĩɴ] ~ [tɕiʑĩɴ] chijin 知人 'acquaintance'

/i/ and /j/ also palatalize /h/ to a palatal fricative ([ç]): /hito/ → [çi̥to] hito 人 ('person')

Of the allophones of /z/, the affricate [dz] is most common, especially at the beginning of utterances and after /ɴ/ (or /n/, depending on the analysis), while fricative [z] may occur between vowels. Both sounds, however, are in free variation. The [n̠ʲ] is alveolopalatal, not a true palatal.

In the case of the /s/, /z/, and /t/, when followed by /j/, historically, the consonants were palatalized with /j/ merging into a single pronunciation. In modern Japanese, these are arguably separate phonemes, at least for the portion of the population that pronounces them distinctly in English borrowings.^{[citation needed]}

		/sj/ → [ɕ] (Romanized as sh):	/sjaboɴ/ → /ɕaboɴ/ → [ɕabõɴ] shabon シャボン 'soap'
		/zj/ → [dʑ] or [ʑ] (Romanized as j):	/zjaɡaimo/ → /dʑaɡaimo/ → [dʑaŋaimo] じゃがいも 'potato'
		/tj/ → [tɕ] (Romanized as ch):	/tja/ → /tɕa/ → [tɕa] cha 茶 'tea'

The vowel /u/ also affects consonants that it follows:^[5]

		/h/ → bilabial fricative [ɸ]:	/huta/ → [ɸu͍̥ta] futa ふた 'lid'
		/t/ → dental affricate [ts]:	/tuɡi/ → [tsu͍ŋi] tsugi 次 'next'

Although [ɸ] and [ts] occur before other vowels in loanwords (e.g. [ɸaito], 'fight'; [tsaitoɡaisu̥to], 'Zeitgeist'; [eɾitsiɴ], 'Yeltsin'), *[hu͍] is still not distinguished from [ɸu͍] (e.g. English hoop > [ɸu͍pu]).^[6] Similarly, *[si] and *[zi] do not occur even in loanwords so that English cinema becomes [ɕinema].^[7]

[edit] Moraic nasal

Some analyses of Japanese treat the moraic nasal as an archiphoneme /N/. However, other, less abstract approaches take its uvular citation pronunciation as basic, or treat it as a regular coronal /n/. Even when the nasal coda is proposed as /N/, it is in a complementary distribution with the nasal onsets within a syllable. In any case, it undergoes a variety of assimilatory processes. Within words, it is variously:

uvular [ɴ] at the end of utterances and in isolation.
bilabial [m] before [p] and [b]; this pronunciation is also sometimes found at the end of utterances and in isolation. Singers are taught to pronounce all final and prevocalic instances of this sound as [m], which reflects its historical derivation.
dental [n] before coronals [d] and [t]; never found utterance-finally.
velar [ŋ] before [k] and [ɡ].
[Ṽ] (a nasalized vowel) before vowels, approximants (/j/ and /w/), and fricatives (/s/, /z/, and /h/). Also found utterance-finally.

Some speakers produce /n/ before /z/, pronouncing them as [ndz], while others produce a nasalized vowel before /z/ (see Akamatsu 1997).

The assimilation occurs beyond word boundaries.

[edit] Moraic obstruent

In some analyses of Japanese, an archiphoneme /Q/ is posited, corresponding to some uses of the sokuon っ. However, not all scholars agree that this is the best analysis. Even when the the non-nasal coda is proposed as /Q/, it is in a complementary distribution with the non-nasal onsets. In those approaches that incorporate the moraic obstruent, it is said to completely assimilate to the following obstruent, resulting in a geminate (that is, double) consonant. The assimilated /Q/ remains unreleased and thus the geminates are phonetically long consonants. /Q/ does not occur before vowels or nasal consonants. This archiphoneme has several phonetic realizations, for example:

		[p̚] before [p]:	/niQpoN/ → [nʲip̚.põɴ] nippon 日本 'Japan'
		[p̚] before [pʲ]:	/haQpjaku/ → [hap̚.pʲa.ku͍] happyaku 八百 '800'
		[s] before [s]:	/kaQseN/ → [kas.sẽɴ] kassen 合戦 'battle'
		[t̚] before [tɕ]:	/saQti/ → [sat̚.tɕi] satchi 察知 'inference'
		etc.

Another analysis of Japanese dispenses with /Q/ and other archiphonemes entirely. In this approach, the words above are phonemicized as shown below:

		[p̚] before [p]:	/nippon/ → [nʲip̚.põɴ] nippon 日本 'Japan'
		[p̚] before [pʲ]:	/happjaku/ → [hap̚.pʲa.ku͍] happyaku '800'
		[s] before [s]:	/kassen/ → [kas.sẽɴ] kassen 合戦 'battle'
		[t̚] before [tɕ]:	/satti/ → [sat̚.tɕi] satchi 察知 'inference'
		etc.

The sokuon can be noted in IPA with a ː mark instead of a doubled consonant (i.e. [nʲipːõɴ] instead of [nʲip.põɴ], [kasːẽɴ] instead [kas.sẽɴ], etc.). However, it cannot show the syllable boundaries well.

[edit] /d, z/ neutralization

The contrast between /d/ and /z/ is neutralized before /u/ and /i/. By convention, it is often assumed to be /z/, though some analyze it as /dz/, the voiced counterpart to /ts/.
The above applies only to the phonology. The writing system preserves morphological distinctions, though spelling reform has eliminated historical distinctions: つづく[続く] /tuzuku/, いちづける[位置付ける] /itizukeru/ from //iti+tukeru//, おおづ[大津] /oozu/ from //oo+tu//,

[edit] Trill

Occasionally the post-alveolar flap /ɾ/ is realized as a trill [r], especially when conveying a vulgar nuance in speech. The phenomenon is called rolled tongue (巻き舌, makijita^?) in Japanese, and is usually transcribed by repeating the katakana syllable ru (ガルルルル for dog growling, プルルルル for phone ringing etc). In the Kansai region, it is sometimes used in a provocative sense with words like ahondara あほんだら 'dumbass' and kora こら 'hey!' (with a nuance of disapproval).

[edit] Vowel processes

[edit] Devoicing

In many dialects, the high vowels /i/ and /u/ become devoiced when between voiceless consonants.^[8] When a word contains more than one such environment, however devoicing in adjacent syllables doesn't normally occur. Additionally, /i/ and /u/ are devoiced following a downstep and a voiceless consonant at the end of a prosodic unit.^{[citation needed]}

		/kutuꜜ/ → [ku̥tsú͍]	kutsu 靴 'shoe'
		/aꜜtu/ → [átsu̥]	atsu 圧 'pressure'
		/hikaɴ/ → [çi̥kãɴ́]	hikan 悲観 'pessimism'
		/hikaku/ → [çi̥kakú͍]	hikaku 比較 'comparison'
		/kisitu/ → [kʲi̥ɕitsu͍]	kishitsu 'temperament'

This devoicing is not restricted to only fast speech, though consecutive voicing may occur in fast speech.^[9]

To a lesser extent /o/ may devoice with the further requirement that there be two or more adjacent moras containing /o/:^{[citation needed]}

/kokoꜜɾo/ → [ko̥kóɺò]

kokoro 心 'heart'

The common sentence-ending copula desu and polite suffix masu are typically pronounced [desu̥] and [masu̥].^{[citation needed]}

Gender roles also play a part: it is regarded as effeminate to pronounce devoiced vowels as voiced, particularly the terminal "u" as in "arimasu". Some nonstandard varieties of Japanese can be recognized by their hyper-devoicing, while in some Western dialects and some registers of formal speech, every vowel is voiced.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Nasalization

Japanese vowels are slightly nasalized when adjacent to nasals /m, n/. Before the moraic nasal /ɴ/, vowels are heavily nasalized:

/seesaɴ/ → [seesãɴ́]

seisan 生産 'production'

[edit] Glottal stop insertion

At the beginning and end of utterances, Japanese vowels may be preceded and followed by a glottal stop [ʔ], respectively. This is demonstrated below with the following words (as pronounced in isolation):

		/eꜜɴ/ → [ẽ́ɴ̀] ~ [ʔẽ́ɴ̀]:	en 円 'yen'
		/kisiꜜ/ → [ki̥ɕíʔ]:	kishi 岸 'shore'
		/uꜜ/ → [ú͍ʔ] ~ [ʔú͍ʔ]:	u 鵜 'cormorant'

When an utterance-final word is uttered with emphasis, this glottal stop is plainly audible, and is often indicated in the writing system with a small letter tsu っ called a sokuon.

[edit] Phonotactics

In the same way that English words are divided into syllables, Japanese words are divided into moras (as the katakana and hiragana phonetic writing systems explicitly do). Each mora has the same approximate time value and stress (stress, here, being correlated with pitch, not loudness). The Japanese mora may consist of either a vowel or one of the two moraic consonants, /N/ and /Q/. A vowel may be preceded by an optional (non-moraic) consonant, with or without a palatal glide /j/. In this table, the period represents a division between moras, rather than the more common usage of a division between syllables.

Mora Type	Example	Japanese	moras per word
V	/o/	o 尾 'tail'	1-mora word
jV	/jo/	yo 世 'world'	1-mora word
CV	/ko/	ko 子 'child'	1-mora word
CjV	/kjo/¹	kyo 巨 'hugeness'	1-mora word
N	/N/ in /ko.N/ or /ko.n/	kon 紺 'deep blue'	2-mora word
Q	/Q/ in /ko.Q.ko/ or /ko.k.ːo/	kokko 国庫 'national treasury'	3-mora word

Traditionally, moras were divided into plain and palatal sets, the latter of which entailing palatalization of the consonant element.^[10]

Consonantal moras are restricted from occurring word initially, though utterances starting with [n] are possible. Vowels may be long, and consonants may be geminate (doubled). Geminate consonants are limited to /ɴn/, /ɴm/ and sequences of /Q/ followed by a voiceless obstruent, though some words are written with geminate voiced obstruents. In the analysis without archiphonemes, geminate clusters are simply two identical consonants, one after the other.

In English, stressed syllables in a word are pronounced louder, longer, and with higher pitch, while unstressed syllables are relatively shorter in duration. In Japanese, all moras are pronounced with equal length and loudness. Japanese is therefore said to be a mora-timed language.

[edit] Foot structure

[edit] Prosody

Main article: Japanese pitch accent

Standard Japanese has a distinctive pitch accent system: a word can have one of its moras bearing an accent or not. An accented mora is pronounced with a relatively high tone and is followed by a drop in pitch. The various Japanese dialects have different accent patterns, and some exhibit more complex prosodic systems.

[edit] Notes

^ Riney et al. (2007:?)
^ Akamatsu (1997) speculates that only 10% of population are consistent [ɡ] users, though this is the norm in western Japan.
^ Japanese academics represent [ɡo] as ご and [ŋo] as こ゜.
^ Itô, Mester & 1995 (827).
^ Itô, Mester & 1995 (825)
^ Itô, Mester & 1995 (826)
^ Itô, Mester & 1995 (828)
^ Tsuchida (2001:225)
^ Tsuchida (2001:242)
^ Itô, Mester & 1995 (827). In such a classification scheme, plain counterpart of moras with a palatal glide are onsetless moras

[edit] Bibliography

Akamatsu, Tsutomu (1997), Japanese phonetics: Theory and practice, München: Lincom Europa, ISBN 3-89586-095-6
Akamatsu, Tsutomu. (2000). Japanese phonology: A functional approach. München: Lincom Europa. ISBN 3-89586-544-3.
Bloch, Bernard. (1950). Studies in colloquial Japanese IV: Phonemics. Language, 26, 86–125.
Haraguchi, Shosuke. (1977). The tone pattern of Japanese: An autosegmental theory of tonology. Tokyo: Kaitakusha. ISBN 0-87040-371-0.
Haraguchi, Shosuke. (1999). Accent. In N. Tsujimura (Ed.), The handbook of Japanese linguistics (Chap. 1, p. 1–30). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0-631-20504-7. ISBN 0-631-20504-7.
Itô, Junko; Mester, R. Armin (1995), "Japanese phonology", in Goldsmith, John A., The Handbook of Phonological Theory, Blackwell Handbooks in Linguistics, Blackwell Publishers, pp. 817–838
Kubozono, Haruo. (1999). Mora and syllable. In N. Tsujimura (Ed.), The handbook of Japanese linguistics (Chap. 2, pp. 31–61). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0-631-20504-7.
Ladefoged, Peter. (2001). A course in phonetics (4th ed.). Boston: Heinle & Heinle, Thomson Learning.
Martin, Samuel E. (1975). A reference grammar of Japanese. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-01813-4.
McCawley, James D. (1968). The phonological component of a grammar of Japanese. The Hague: Mouton.
Okada, Hideo (1991), "Japanese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 21 (2): 94–96
Okada, Hideo (1999), "Japanese", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A guide to the usage of the International Phonetic Alphabet, Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, pp. 117–119, ISBN 0521652367
Pierrehumbert, Janet & Beckman, Mary. (1988). Japanese tone structure. Linguistic Inquiry monographs (No. 15). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-16109-5; ISBN 0-262-66063-6.
Riney, Timothy James; Takagi, Naoyuk; Ota, Kaori; Yoko, Uchida (2007), "The intermediate degree of VOT in Japanese initial voiceless stops", Journal of Phonetics 35: 439–443
Sawashima, Masayuki; & Miyazaki, S. (1973). Glottal opening for Japanese voiceless consonants. Annual Bulletin of the Research Institute of Logopedics and Phoniatrics, University of Tokyo, Faculty of Medicine, 7, 1–10.
Shibatani, Masayoshi. (1990). Japanese. In B. Comrie (Ed.), The major languages of east and south-east Asia. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-04739-0.
Shibatani, Masayoshi. (1990). The languages of Japan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-36070-6 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-36918-5 (pbk).
Tsuchida, Ayako (2001), "Japanese vowel devoicing", Journal of East Asian Linguistics 10: 225–245
Vance, Timothy J. (1987), An introduction to Japanese phonology, Albany: State University of New York Press, ISBN 0-88706-360-8

[0] Riney et al. (2007:?)

[1] Akamatsu (1997) speculates that only 10% of population are consistent [ɡ] users, though this is the norm in western Japan.

[2] Japanese academics represent [ɡo] as ご and [ŋo] as こ゜.

[3] Itô, Mester & 1995 (827).

[4] Itô, Mester & 1995 (825)

[5] Itô, Mester & 1995 (826)

[6] Itô, Mester & 1995 (828)

[7] Tsuchida (2001:225)

[8] Tsuchida (2001:242)

[9] Itô, Mester & 1995 (827). In such a classification scheme, plain counterpart of moras with a palatal glide are onsetless moras

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