Quote:
Originally Posted by biocit
English can be manipulated in a way where it has the means to describe almost any sound. "si" is the placeholder for し、just like how し is the place holder for the sound.
What I'm trying to say is that you can say "Onegai Shimasu" in the same way you can say, "お願いします”。 There's absolutely no difference. Alphabets are just placeholders for sounds.
While you certainly can't produce the same sounds as a native English speaker by writing in katakana, you can definitely produce the same sounds by using romaji to describe kana.
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Fine. Yes you can LEARN how to manipulate the sounds from the Roman alphabet to make the proper sounds in Japanese, but that means you are RELEARNING pronunciation, but using romaji instead of hiragana.
Si is not naturally
し to a native English speaker.
The sound would more likely be written
she by native English speaker. But even that is not correct, as if a native speaker of English says
she, more than likely it would sound like
しい to Japanese ears.
So you can RELEARN romaji to fit Japanese, or LEARN hiragana.
For beginners, RELEARNING romaji seems like an obvious choice because it APPEARS to be easier. But long term students of Japanese know that which APPEARS easier often only extends the inevitable and in the end makes things harder.
This might be part of the reason so many people quit their Japanese studies after a certain period of time.
Certain hurdles must be passed. Delaying them does not make them easier...it simply delays them.