Quote:
Originally Posted by RickOShay
First I will agree with other people that kana is the most effective way to learn pronunciation. There is no room for confusion there. Take どうも for instance. When one looks at どうも its pronunciation is unmistakable.
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That's actually a particularly bad example. The o u in おもう is pronounced differently from the o u in どうも. It's one of the cases in which kana writing varies from the pronunciation. If you're interested in details, I have a whole page of other cases in which kana differs from pronunciation:
What are the differences between kana writing and pronunciation? - sci.lang.japan Frequently Asked Questions
Quote:
Originally Posted by RickOShay
But in romaji it is written commonly written as domo. Which is quite ambiguous as to what the corresponding (proper) kana and pronunciation should be.
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Sure, but aren't you setting up a straw man there? If a Japanese textbook said it was "domo" or even "doumo" rather than "doomo" or "dōmo", that would be more of a case of the textbook using poor romanization than a case of romanization itself being at fault. I'd expect any textbook or website which was attempting to teach Japanese to be clear about how the romanization corresponded to the pronunciation.