[Decimus]

Originally Posted by steven

I'm not confusing diphthongs with digraphs. I know what 音節 is and what it means.

I realize that some people say outright that there are no diphthongs in Japanese. Some people will say that there are. I say that there are and I don't think I'm going to change my stance on that.

ちゃ　ちょ　and ちゅ are in no way two syllables. (I'm not sure if that's what you were implying or not) With that logic, the word "choose" would be two syllables (unless you want to throw in one more for good measure because of the "silent e"). I would argue that when spoken normally they are not diphthongs as well. I think we agree on that.

Let me get this straight- you are saying that the word 牛肉 is four or possibly five syllables? This is because the ぎゅ is 2 syllables by your logic... plus a syllable for the う then there are a syllable each for に　and く, right?

Here's how I see it: ぎゅう is one syllable...　as is に and as is く (that makes three). ぎゅう also happens to have a diphthong in it in my opinion. It's similar to that which is in the words "cute" and "ambiguous", which are one and four syllables respectively.

For another example, let's take a look at the words 病院 and 美容院. I say 病院 has 2 syllables and 美容院 has three syllables (don't worry, I'm not just counting the kanji). To pronounce 病院 with three syllables would give you 美容院, which is a completely different word with a completely different meaning. (I am implying that the extra syllable is added to びょう makes びよう).

The same thing goes for 牛 and 義勇. 牛 being one syllable and 義勇 being two. Those meanings are also very different.

Not only that, but the characters や　ゆ　and よ by themselves can be considered diphthongs in my opinion (depending on how they are spoken). In combination with certain kana (like the ones I explained above) make something that is definitely a diphthong as I understand it. As far as syllable stuff goes, to add syllables in the places I showed is to say a completely different word which can confuse things and distort the language. To be clear, that's why I brought this up to begin with. A lot of beginners don't make this distinction (I'm talking about native English speakers) even though extremely similar sounds exist in our native language. It's a simple mistake which can be avoided with a little explanation as far as I can tell.

Originally Posted by NNescio

「や」、「ゆ」、「よ」 are morae that also happen to be monomoraic syllables. Youon 「拗音」, like 「ちょ」、「ちゃ」、「きゃ」 are digraphs (set of two symbols) that represent a single mora and are often also monomoraic syllables.

Each of the examples only have one mora. They also happen to be single syllables with only one mora. Is that clear enough for you?

Quit misrepresenting my position.

I thought I had waved this article under your nose often enough. (this is the third time.) Apparently I had not, as reading it would made it clear that I WOULD NOT regard 「ちゃ」 as having two syllables.

Now note the International Phonetic Alphabet for the following:

「や」 : [ja] : One mora, One syllable, One consonant [j], ONE monophthong vowel [a], NO diphthongs.

「ゆ」 : [ju͍] : One mora, One syllable, One consonant [j], ONE monophthong vowel [u͍], NO diphthongs.

「よ」 : [jo] : One mora, One syllable, One consonant [j], ONE monophthong vowel [o], NO diphthongs.

「ちゃ」 : [t͡ɕa] : One mora, One syllable, ONE consonant [t͡ɕ], ONE monophthong vowel [a], NO diphthongs.

「りゅ」 : [ɽʲu͍] : One mora, One syllable, ONE consonant [ɽʲ] (The superscript ʲ indicates that the consonant is palatalised), ONE monophthong vowel [u͍], NO diphthongs.

「きょう」 : [kʲoː] : Two morae 「きょ」＋「う」, One syllable [kʲoː], One consonant [kʲ] (Note the palatalised consonant.), ONE monophthong vowel [oː] (the colon, ':', indicates a long vowel, and it's still a monophthong.), NO diphthongs.

Note that all the examples only have ONE CONSONANT and ONE VOWEL. There is no room whatsoever for any vowel gliding to occur, as each example contains only a single vowel, and vowels CANNOT BE jumbled up together with consonants, so diphthongs CANNOT EXIST at all. Consonant clusters are also impossible since there is only ONE CONSONANT in each example.

Now compare the above with the IPA symbols of the following:

"Sign" (English, most dialects) [saɪ̯n] : Two consonants [s] and [n], Two vowels [a] and [ɪ], One diphthong [aɪ̯]. One syllable. Analysing morae is pointless in English since nobody knows what to do with unstressed syllables.

"Insane" (English, most dialects) [ɪnˈseɪ̯n] : Three consonants [n], [s], and [n]. Three vowels [ɪ], [e], and [ɪ]. One monophthong [ɪ], and one diphthong [eɪ̯]. Two syllables, [ɪn] + [seɪ̯n], and the stress mark, <ˈ> indicates that [seɪ̯n] is stressed.

"文" (Chinese) (wén) [u̯ən˧˥] : One consonant [n], Two vowels [u] and [ə], One diphthong [u̯ə], One syllable and One mora. <˥> indicates the syllable is in the second tone. (Distinguishing syllables and morae is pointless in Chinese as every character corresponds to one syllable and one mora.)

"狗" (Chinese) (gǒu) [koʊ̯˨˩˦] : One consonant [k], Two vowels [o] and [ʊ̯], and One diphthong [oʊ̯]. <˨˩˦> indicates the third tone.

See the difference?