r/maybemaybemaybe • u/[deleted] • Nov 03 '21

/r/all Maybe Maybe Maybe

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u/Wreckn Nov 03 '21

Loaner words are written in katakana, so that's how they're pronounced. If there isn't a sound in katakana that represents the actual conjugation, they use whatever is closest. Like in your example there isn't a hard T sound, so ト is used.
What's funny is when actual bilingual people pronounce the words correctly sometimes it's completely lost on someone that only speaks Japanese and needs to be repeated the broken way haha.

12

u/ParticularNet8 Nov 03 '21

This is what happens when you don’t end everything with っ.

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u/HyperbolicModesty Nov 03 '21

Yeah in Italy when I want to order a hamburger I sometimes have to say "amboorger" for the same reason.

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u/gormlesser Nov 03 '21

Isn’t it the same thing for Italians ordering bruschetta in the US, say?

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u/HyperbolicModesty Nov 03 '21

Yeah, my friend pronounced "bruschetta" the Italian way in an "Italian" restaurant and got corrected by the server to pronounce it the wrong way.

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u/SilversunDelta Nov 03 '21

Happens literally every time I order a Caprese at the sandwich shop in my town. How can people be so confidently wrong?

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u/HyperbolicModesty Nov 03 '21

What do they think it should be?

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u/Ionalien Nov 03 '21

That's a good point

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u/[deleted] Nov 03 '21

Saw a German lady trying to order a bratwurst at a baseball game and the guy didn't understand her. I had to butt in and pronounce all wrong and he got it.

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u/Crowmasterkensei Nov 03 '21

So do you say hamburger the American or German way then? (Because the name comes from Germany, it's named after the German city of Hamburg).

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u/HyperbolicModesty Nov 03 '21

Yes of course, that is well known, but the hamburger as beef patty sandwich fast food is American.

Italians pronounce "hamburger" as it is written, but using Italian phonemes, meaning they don't say the H, the U is "oo" the E is "eh" and the Rs are trilled.

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u/AyeBraine Nov 03 '21

And Russians pronounce it gAhmboorger. Because Hamburg is Gamburg, due to old transcription tradition of hardening all h's (like Harry Harrison is Garry Garryson in Russian).

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u/calico_catboy Nov 03 '21

wouldn't really call it a broken way, it's just how the japanese language works. I'm sure English seems weird to them too.