14
votes
Accepted
What constitutes a syllable?
The general method of counting in Japanese poetry is by a rhythmic unit known as the mora (morae or moras in plural). A mora is (essentially) the length of a single (full-sized) kana; so is a bit ...
- 3,737
5
votes
Accepted
Pitch Accent for Single-Mora Words
There is always a change in pitch after the first mora in the standard Tokyo dialect. So the only patterns that work in that dialect are
[歯が]{HL} H(L)
[名が]{LH} L(H)
Regarding other dialects (like ...
- 10.8k
4
votes
What constitutes a syllable?
Note that in Japanese poetry, there is a marked avoidance of moraic ん as well as Sino-Japanese lexicon and onbin, so the question is often irrelevant as all the syllables occurring are of form CV. ...
- 2,398
3
votes
Accepted
What to do when word ends in は
There is not much you can do or need to do.
どんなはは犬です is grammatical, but it would give a difficulty in parsing especially because どんな is an existing word. For the particular case, it is better to ...
- 37.6k
3
votes
Mora count for 思ふ in Classical Japanese?
The reason why such a pattern appears is, as currently understood, that Japanese was not a mora-timed language yet at the time 古今和歌集 was compiled.
Until around the 16th century, meters were counted ...
- 52.3k
2
votes
Pronunciation of こんばんは?
This discussion might help. I think the n that you're not hearing is just being nasalized instead.
- 4,077
2
votes
Accepted
Mora in spoken language, and syllable
Japanese kindergarteners cannot enjoy haiku yet, but I think most of them can count "the number of sounds" in a word based on the mora system. See my answer in this question: Do native ...
- 331k
1
vote
Are there any general rules for guessing the pitch accent of 1- or 2- mora nouns in compounds?
Timothy Vance, in An Introduction to Japanese Phonology, makes the following observation at the end of his chapter on accent: 'There seem to be relatively straight-forward regularities in verb + verb ...
- 890
1
vote
Loanwords not being pronounced in a normal moraic rhythm?
Not an expert, so I cannot cite any research, but I think what you are observing is the vowels not getting pronounced. English does this all the time, and "prototype" is a case in point ...
- 5,369
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