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How is 'r' pronounced in Japanese?
Can someone explain to me how the rhotic consonant ('r') is pronounced in Japanese? Preferably in terms of how it is actually articulated, not imitations or approximations. It's clearly not a post-alveolar retroflex approximant like English, nor does it seem to be a trill or flap like Spanish, so exactly how is it described phonetically?
4 Answers
- Anonymous9 years agoFavorite Answer
in fact Japanese are bad at such pronunciation so it may be better that you pronounce "l" for "r"
Source(s): I'm Japanese - 9 years ago
I am unsure of how it is described in exact phonetic terms. Usually, when I describe it to someone, I describe it as being phonetically halfway between that of an English "r" and a Spanish "r." Hopefully this helped.
- 9 years ago
If it's fastly said, it's almost like a soft d (you can thibk Spanish here, because that's the same). But if it's heavily pronounced, its kind of a mix between l and r. However, dependong on where you are, some people pronounce it more line an r, and some more like l.
