Hideyuki,

Yes, it is neat if you can speak a language like a native. I’ve met hundreds of adults over my career as a teacher and language learner who have succeeded in doing that. I myself used to be able to convince French speakers, on the telephone, that I was a native speaker of French. (I couldn’t do that today – out of practice!) Every person who succeeds, adult or child, succeeds by doing one thing, and one things only. They listen. Analysis can help, IF you are able to identify the key elements of the sound system of the target language, and then LISTEN for those things.

I have never before heard of Japanese having any special pitches and in ten years in Japan, I never met a student who tried studying them. Or even mentioned them. Of course human beings do many wonderful, creative things with language, including adding emotion and subtle meaning with small changes of the voice. However there is nothing I know of that is basic to the Japanese language that resembles tones or pitches. Could you, or anyone else, enlighten us on this? What tones or pitches or inflections does Japanese have that learners can study?

Joe, welcome to the mysterious world of Japanese pitches.

You can find basic info here, including a recording.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_pitch_accent

This website is interesting, and it has the following description; "Foreign learners of Japanese are often not taught to pronounce the pitch accent. Incorrect pitch accent is a strong characteristic of a “foreign accent” in Japanese".

Well, I guess this accept thing is not absolutely a priority in language teaching since you can still communicate fine and make yourself understood to some extent at least, unless your mission is to become a spy to act as a native of some country, like Jason Borne in the movie.

Alexandre

Thanks for the wikipedia link. You say “mysterious world”, I say “tiny village”. I couldn’t hear the recording but it doesn’t matter. I’ve heard my own voice in Japanese and heard the reactions of my Japanese friends. They noticed a few words I pronouned with Kansai pronunciation (not strange since I lived in Kansai) but nothing else I ever said was noteworthy.

You can find equally minor points in English that nobody should be too worried about. For example, initial “L” and final “L” are different. I don’t see that it matters to students of English, but someone could worry about it if they had a mind to. Or, I pronounce the vowels in “light” and “line” differently. Most Americans do (though they don’t notice it) but millions of Americans pronounce “light” and “line” with the same vowel. I used to teach that difference to my students, but it just doesn’t matter.

In any case, as you said, the topic is completely up for grabs. Perhaps you could be the one to grab it. It should be very easy to become an expert in this subject with just a little practice and you would learn to speak perfect Japanese in the process. I hope you would record your Japanese as you speak it now, then record it again as it improves with pitch practice. That would provide clear evidence showing the value of your approach.

Hideyuki,

I think we need to be careful when reading the sentence you quoted. It claims “incorrect” pitch is a “characteristic” of a foreign accent. (I guess it is also a characteristic of a Kansai accent, too!) I believe pitch is a minor (very minor) aspect of Japanese pronunciation. Pitch is like a piece of A4 paper balanced on top of a Coke bottle. Even the smallest earthquake (foreign accent) or a small breeze (a smaller accent) or a truck passing by outside (a native Japanese speaker with a different dialect) can cause it to sound different, or as the Wikipedia article says, “incorrect”.

But what is the root cause of the accent in the first place? If you want to teach pronunciation well, or learn to speak another language like a native speaker, this is the main question to ask. By far the biggest cause of an accent by learners of ANY language is “L1 Interference” which means interference from your first language. That is why Japanese speakers have trouble with “L” and “R” in English, for example, or they pronounce “want” with two syllables and “English” with four syllables. It’s also why Americans cannot pronounce “Nomo”. So, the biggest problem for English speakers is trying to put stress where there is none. It may be that some learners have learned to pronounce every syllable in Japanese with equal stress, and now are hoping to become more like NHK announcers with pitch practice. I suspect Alexandre is one of these very advanced learners, but for ordinary learners, getting them away from their first language, and getting them to focus on the fundamental aspects of the target language instead, is of prime importance.

I can remember one case where pitch alone caused a misunderstanding: I said “ippai arimasu”. High and Low means 1 (cup) and Low and High means lots. And the person I said it to made sure to correct me. Not without making a very puzzled face first.

I agree with you, Joe, that this whole pitch issue is made even more complicated by the fact that Kansai and Kanto (to name just these two) often use opposite pitches, but within either system, it’s consistent.

You’re right! People from Kanto will notice Kanai accent, and vice versa. With foreign accents, hearing different accents make you feel unique, and some people are delighted to hear them. On the other hand, there are also people who’d feel strange and somewhat unpleasant about hearing different accents. This is thought to be due to Japanese cultural aspect. You know basically Japanese culture tend to be such a culture that prefers to have a harmony with the group to which you belong. If I could describe this aspect by making a comparison with another culture, US is of an individualism society whereas Japan is of a collectivism society. People grew up in a way that doing the same things as other people do is virtuously a good thing and that doing different things as other people do is a bad thing. Historically, when Korea and Taiwan were under Japanese territory during the World War, Japanese regime made their people not to use their language nor bear their foreign names. It’s basically because it doesn’t sound good to have something different from those of Japan. Like I mentioned previously, most people are not used to having foreign people around but probably people from different parts from the country. It depends on where people live (what I mean by that is that people from cities are likely to meet people from different region of the country or some foreigners, but I assume people from countryside don’t get to see any outsiders).

So in terms of accent, what would those who mind being paid attention for their accent usually do to have as least bias from local people as possible? They’d try to learn the standard accent and its language, and try to hide their way of speech. It’s the safest way to overcome the situation. Of course, there are a few people who wouldn’t mind going by the accent of their origin, but I’d say such people are less than those who dislike having attention. Most people are raised to act in a conservative manner. I remember when I was in junior high school at English classes, I disliked repeating English with an American accent, but I’d repeat English just as other classmates with Japanese accent, because I didn’t want my classmates to make fun of me… It’s a strange concept to think of it now, but it’s the culture, and I felt like that because I grew up in such a society.

I have heard other Japanese people tell me that they repeated bad pronunciation like everyone else, just so they wouldn’t stand out.