Which One Is Correct?
If you're wondering which one is correct, arigatou, arigatō, arigato or arigatoo, the answer is: all of them. And they are all pronounced the same way.
This is because all the romaji above refer to the same word: 有難う.
If 有難う is pronounced one way, and arigatō and arigatou are simply a different way of writing 有難う, then arigatō and arigatou must be pronounced the same way as 有難う. They are all pronounced the same.
But if they are all pronounced the same, why is the romaji different?
Why Romaji Varies
Basically, transliteration isn't an exact science. There's no official romanization for a given word. Because the romaji changes depending on the method applied to obtain that romaji.
For example, some methods are based simply on the letters. The same letters result in the same romaji. It's consistent that way. However, if two words written the same are pronounced differently in Japanese, that won't show in the romaji.
So there are also methods which attempt to transcribe how the word is pronounced. Here you already have a difference. A single word may be romanized based on how it's written or on how it's pronounced. And since you're just writing down the sounds you're hearing, two different people may end up romanizing the same word differently based on what they think it sounds like.
Why Romaji Doesn't Vary, Sorta
To make sure the romaji stays consistent from person to person, certain rules were created to romanize words. A set of such rules is called a romaji system
One romaji systems or another and their rules are used as reference pretty much every time a word needs to be romanized. That's why, most of the time, a single word Japanese word is only ever romanized in one way.
But then there are differences between the systems. There are even differences within a same system, because its rules were updated and some people still follow the old version.
And then new differences are born purely from the fact that some people are using a system but they don't know or can't be arsed to follow all of its rules, so they adopt some rules but skip over others, creating a romaji different from that of a person who followed all the romaji rules.
But if they are all pronounced the same, why is thedifferent?
Below I'll list some of the common variations of romaji found in words and where they come from. I hope it serves as reference and answers the "why a single word has two romaji?" question.
Aa / ā / a
aa, ā, and a are for long vowels starting with a, like ああ and あー.See the
Examples:
- お母さん
おかあさん
おかーさん
okaasan
okāsan
okasan - お祖母さん
おばあさん
おばーさん
obaasan
obāsan
obasan - 麻雀
マージャン
maajan
mājan
majan
The romaji, andare for long vowels starting with, like ああ and あー.See the Long Vowels section below for explanation.
Ei / ē / e / ee
The romaji ei is for えい, which may be a long vowel.
ē, e, and ee are for long vowels starting with e, like えい, えー and ええ.See the
Examples
The romaji, andare for long vowels starting with, like えい, えー and ええ.See the Long Vowels section below for explanation.
Ii / ī / i
ii, ī, and i are for long vowels starting with i, like いい and いー.See the
Examples
- お兄さん
おにいさん
おにーさん
oniisan
onīsan
onisan - ヒーロー
hiiroo
hīrō
hiro
The romaji, andare for long vowels starting with, like いい and いー.See the Long Vowels section below for explanation.
Ou / ō / o / oo
ou is for おう, which may be a long vowel.The romaji ō, o, and oo are for long vowels starting with o, like おう, おー, and おお.
See the
The romajiis for おう, which may be a long vowel.The romaji, andare for long vowels starting with, like おう, おー, and おお.See the Long Vowels section below for explanation.
Examples
- 有難う
ありがとう
arigatou
arigatō
arigato
arigatoo - 今日
きょう
kyou
kyō
kyo
kyoo - ローマ字
ローマじ
roumaji
rōmaji
romaji
roomaji - 氷
こおり
koori
kōri
kori
- 妹
いもうと
imouto
imōto
imoto
imooto - 弟
おとうと
otouto
otōto
ototo
otooto - お父さん
おとうさん
otousan
otōsan
otosan
otoosan
- 後輩
こうはい
kouhai
kōhai
kouhai
koohai - 同人
doujin
dōjin
dojin
doojin - 東京
とうきょう
toukyou
tōkyo
tokyo
tookyoo - 東方 仗助
ひがしかた じょうすけ
Higashikata Jousuke
Higashikata Jōsuke
Higashikata Josuke
Uu / ū / u
romaji uu, ū, and u are for long vowels starting with u, like うう and うー.See the
Examples
The, andare for long vowels starting with, like うう and うー.See the Long Vowels section below for explanation.
- 九尾
きゅうび
kyuubi
kyūbi
kyubi - キュゥべえ
kyuubee
kyūbe
kyube
("Kyubey," from Madoka Magica) - 十二大戦
じゅうにたいせん
juuni taisen
jūni taisen
juni taisen
N / m
n ん is romanized as m ん if it comes before a b, m, or p syllable.In traditional Hepburn ん is romanized asん if it comes before a, orsyllable.
Modified Hepburn, more recent, does not have this rule.
Examples
- 先輩
せんぱい
senpai
sempai - 貧乏
びんぼう
binbou
bimbou - binbō
- bimbō
- 段ボール
だんボール
danbooru
dambooru
danbōru
dambōru - 乱麻½
らんま½
ranma 1/2
ramma 1/2
N / n- / n' / n̄
n ん is romanized n ん. However, to make sure n ん + a あ, two syllables, wouldn't look like a single na な syllable, the n ん is romanized differently if it comes before a vowel or an y-syllable.In Hepburn , the syllabicん is romanizedん. However, to make sureん +あ, two syllables, wouldn't look like a singleな syllable, theん is romanized differently if it comes before a vowel or an-syllable.
In traditional Hepburn, it becomes n-, with a dash. In modified Hepburn, it becomes n', with an apostrophe..
Because not everybody is aware of this rule, people may end up transliterating kon'ya or kon-ya 今夜 as konya 今夜 instead, which looks like ko-nya こにゃ even though it is ko-n-ya こんや.
Examples
- 戦勇
せんゆう
sen'yuu
sen-yuu
senyuu
sen̄yuu
- sen'yū
- sen-yū
- senyū
- sen̄y ū
In JSL, it's always romanizedん with a macron, because they didn't want to deal with these shenanigans.
Hyphens
chan are added to nouns, and when romanized they're separated by a hyphen. Sometimes, they are not separated by a hyphen.Sometimes honorific suffixes like sama, san, and are added to nouns, and when romanized they're separated by a hyphen. Sometimes, they are not separated by a hyphen.
Likewise, other suffixes in general like pluralizing suffixes, etc. can get treated with the hyphen or lack of thereof.
Furthermore, in some cases the suffix is a noun, so it becomes hard to figure out if it's a noun plus suffix or an adjective-noun plus noun. In such cases, an hyphenated version and a space-separated version end up existing.
Nobody is really sure when to put the hyphen.
Examples
- お母さん
おかあさん
okaasan
okaa-san - 僕達
ぼくたち
bokutachi
boku-tachi - 六本木駅
ろっぽんぎえき
roppongi-eki
roppongi eki
Ha / wa, he / e, wo / o
The kana ha-he-wo はへを are sometimes romanized as wa-e-o はへを.
This only happens when the kana represents a grammar particle. For example:
- haha wa hantaa はは は はんたー
Mother is a hunter. - henshin e no enerugii へんしん へ の エネルギー
The energy [used] toward the transformation.
And it only happens with the particles because the particles are pronounced differently like that. And the reason for that has been explained in another post: Why is ha は wa?
Fu / Hu
fu ふ. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki, the romanization is hu ふ.In the Hepburn romaji system, it's romanizedふ. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki, the romanization isふ.
Examples
- 風船
ふうせん
fuusen
huusen
fūsen
hūsen
Sho / Syo
sho しょis romanized as sho, mimicking the pronunciation. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki systems, sho しょ is romanized as syo, because those systems prefer to be regular (kyo, myo, syo instead of sho).In Hepburn and similar romaji systems,しょis romanized as, mimicking the pronunciation. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki systems,しょ is romanized as, because those systems prefer to be regular (instead of).
Examples
- 少年
しょうねん
shounen
shōnen
syounen
syōnen - 少女
しょうじょ
shoujo
syouzyo
shōjo
syōzyo
Chi / Ti
chi ち, in Nihon and Kunrei-shiki, it's romanized ti ち.In Hepburn , it'sち, in Nihon and Kunrei-shiki, it's romanizedち.
Examples
- 地球
ちきゅう
chikyuu
tikyuu
chikyū
tikyū
Long Vowels
romaji varies is in how aA common way in whichvaries is in how a romaji system transliterates long vowels.
In Japanese, a long vowel happens when the vowel part of a syllable takes longer than one mora of time to pronounce.
To elaborate:
- ko こ
One syllable. One mora. - koe こえ
Two syllables. Two mora. - koo こー
One syllable. Two mora. - koo こお
One syllable. Two mora.
Basically, instead of pronouncing ko and o separately, the sound of the first syllable is dragged for a bit longer.
The long vowels don't only happen when you have the same vowel repeated. For example, ou おう may be pronounced as a long o. And ei えい may be pronounced as a long e.
Compound kana may have long vowels too. For example: kyuu きゅう is a kyu ending in a long u.
Generally speaking, (there are some exceptions), long vowels only happen within morpheme boundaries. This means that meiro 迷路, "labyrinth," has a me with a long e, because mei 迷 is a single morpheme. However, meiro 目色, "eye color," is pronounced differently, with me 目, "eye," and iro 色, "color," pronounced separately.
Ignore It
The most simple approach to transliterating long vowels is to just ignore them.
So o お and u う is always ou おう, no matter what it's pronounced like.
Macrons
A common approach to transliterating long vowels is to add a macron to the long vowel and remove the extra vowel. For example:
- gakkou 学校
gakkō
School.
Forget The Macron
Most people don't know how to type a macaroon, much less a macaroni, or a macron. So if they see kyōto written somewhere, they might try to copy it, but they won't be able to type the macron, and type it just as Kyoto.
- kyouto 京都
kyōto
Kyoto.
Doubled Vowels
Another approach (used by the JSL romaji system, for example), is to double the long vowel, but remove the second vowel. It's like doing the macron, but removing the macron and repeating the vowel. Example:
- kouhai 後輩
kōhai (add macron, remove u)
kohai (forget the macron)
koohai (double the vowel)
Discrepancies
It's interesting to note that the approaches toward long vowels vary from system to system.
For example, modified Hepburn says you can't macronize先生, even though it's a long vowel. Hepburn doesn't macronizeえい syllables. It only macaronizesえー syllables, written with a prolonged sound mark ー
However, the book Genki does think先生 should be macaronized... except it doesn't macaronize stuff. Instead, it uses double vowels. So, in the book, it's romanized先生, with a doubled
Every now and then you see a single same word with multiple, different. For example,and. Or, and. Orand. Orand. Or even "cake" turning intoandケーキ. After all, what's the correct romaji for these words? Why does this even happen?
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