I imagine S1eth was referring to the stresses on syllables, or maybe the mispronunciation of the letter R.
Either way, it would sound even sillier if they tried to pronounce it perfectly in the middle of an English sentence anyway. I always thought doing that was awkward.
Either way, it would sound even sillier if they tried to pronounce it perfectly in the middle of an English sentence anyway. I always thought doing that was awkward.
I could not agree more: while in the middle of an English sentence I see Japanese coming up and I'm like 'okay, gotta put my Japanese hat on and then take it off again real quick'. I've occasionally been so confused by this that I end up speaking French instead.
I could not agree more: while in the middle of an English sentence I see Japanese coming up and I'm like 'okay, gotta put my Japanese hat on and then take it off again real quick'. I've occasionally been so confused by this that I end up speaking French instead.
Let's be honest: How many English-speaking Touhou fans pronounce names exactly? I bet 90% of them say "Muh-rih-suh" instead of "Mah-ree-sah".
I still pronounce the names like "Kay-sen", "Saw-nay", and "Kay-nuh".
I'd like to point out that as a Touhou fan who partakes in everything the fandom has to offer (other than cosplay and conventions, because I'm too cheap) I can't believe that in 5 years I've never given serious consideration to the correct pronouncing of names. This especially when until last year I had always called Reimu "Rei" like a song that "rhymes" with "mu" like a cow goes "moo". I still feel slightly embarrassed. That's probably why I haven't bothered to look up how to pronounce them since I'm certain I've completely wrecked most of the character names.
I guess most Asian people won't have problem reading Japanese name ( I just pronounce it the way it written). Except for Flandre, because the Japanese katakana seem read as Furandooru.
Since I find it pretty pointless to write pronunciations with "ee", "nuh", "ay" that still sound nothing like they are supposed to (Keine certainly isn't pronounced Kay-nuh), and many people don't know how to read IPA:
I guess most Asian people won't have problem reading Japanese name ( I just pronounce it the way it written). Except for Flandre, because the Japanese katakana seem read as Furandooru.
Actually Chinese people have problem pronouncing any non-Chinese name, especially western ones which are basically impossible to write without massive butchering.
Asian languages vary among each other much more than European languages do(the fact that they don't even share alphabets should be more than enough for indications), that's why it's still not as easy as just "pronouncing how it's written".
As a German I can say that we pronounce the names exactly like they are written (we pronounce it the german way of course). If there are more letters spoken (like the thing with Cirno) we tend to ignore them and just say what we can see.
As a German I can say that we pronounce the names exactly like they are written (we pronounce it the german way of course). If there are more letters spoken (like the thing with Cirno) we tend to ignore them and just say what we can see.
Yeah, from my time spent in Germany, I've seen that many German people tends to pronounce untranslated foreign words the way they're written in the German way rather than the original way.(ie, pronouncing Jedi in Star Wars as "yeh-dee" instead of "jeh-dai").
This means to them names like Yukari and Marisa will be pronounced the same way as the Japanese pronunciation while something like Cirno and Flandre would get butchered.
And while German language pronunciation usually follows things as exactly as they're written, as an Asian who speaks German I sometimes sees that the way some pronunciations are made are still iffy, especially when it comes to words involving umlauts. I've seen many words where the letter ā is pronounced differently.
As a brazilian (and japanese decendent), I got no problems with pronunciations. The "A" in portuguese is the same as the "A" in Japan, so as the E, I, U and O.
As a brazilian that learned english through audio books and music when I was very young, I always found that mimicking sounds was so easy it was always a non-issue. Once I learn how to say it correctly, I don't even think about it and it happens. The Wakamoto R rrrrrrrrrrrolling, for example. Or saying Touhou names correctly, for example.
Can't really talk on no-one's behalf, though. That's just how things are.
As a brazilian (and japanese decendent), I got no problems with pronunciations. The "A" in portuguese is the same as the "A" in Japan, so as the E, I, U and O.
There would be discrepancies with Sirno or mariZa though, if using the usual pronunciation...
the attempt to synthesize japanese pronunciation with "english" (not sure how accurate that is) pronunciation is kinda why i dislike from-japanese romanization so much. for example, japanese doesn't really have an "ee" sound; their analog for that is a sort of extended "ih" sound... kinda afraid to write it even like that. if you sit down and look at the issue, you'll see that it's a minefield of dangers, a nearly unsolveable problem that's best solved by treating it as unsolveable and simply learning both sets of rules. this isn't even getting into the topic of cultures, either.
(anyone who thinks trying to get this stuff right will "sound silly in 'english'" oughta get punched in the face. it's precisely because of these people that it ever "sounds silly", that this subject is always seen as a joke. and yes, at this point "english" may as well always be written in quotes because it's so fucking vague. it's barely a single language, let alone the ten thousand it wants to be. this is a living language that needs to be put down.)
(...i kinda wish this was an mr-s and not a bmw :E)
at this point "english" may as well always be written in quotes because it's so fucking vague. it's barely a single language, let alone the ten thousand it wants to be. this is a living language that needs to be put down.
Lol okay, lemme just drop my native language and pick up a new one. It'll only take a few minutes.
Lol okay, lemme just drop my native language and pick up a new one. It'll only take a few minutes.
please don't do that; that is in no conceivable way what i implied. i said that "living" languages are overrated and self-defeating (because they are) and that random english speakers really need to stop obsessing over this trait (because they do, because they have no idea what the trait means).
though fyi, it would take you only a few minutes to learn the very basics of comprehending a particular language, the kind of basics that everyone really needs.
I wonder how people with, say, German, French, or Russian as their first language pronounce these names...
French is my native language. If I pronounce "Yukari" it already sounds similar to the Japanese pronounciation, except for the "r". Japanese has that "r" that has a "l" sound to it, French has a rolling "r".
"Youmu" sounds quite different however. In French, the "You" would sound like "Yoo" in English, which is not the way to pronounce it correctly in Japanese. They don't pronounce the "u" in "You". So you get "Yo-mu". Not "Yoo-mu". lol
One special case is "Flandre". I can't even explain how it sounds in French to native English people.
Finnish is an awesome native tongue for pronouncing Japanese. The syllable stress is usually the same in both (primary stress on the first syllable of every word, lighter secondary on the third e.g. YU-ka-Ri) and the pronounciation is really easy once you get familiar with ou~oo ei~ee. I also speak a bit of French, so Flandre is no problem. It's a phonetic language, too, so every letter sounds the same in different words. No silent letters, either.
What I find the oddest thing about approximating other languages into English is the long e. How come do you insist on transforming the "ee" or "é" into "ay".
"May the force be with you." sounds nothing like "Mée the force be with you" in any accent of English I've ever heard.