I’ve been learning Japanese for about 1-2 months now, and I’ve been seeing… inconsistencies with a certain kana. To be specific, this one: は
My guide told me it’s pronounced/read as “ha”, yet, I keep seeing it be pronounced as “wa”, which, if I’m not mistaken, is a different kana. I just don’t recall my guide mentioning anything about this is all.
4 comments
[particle は](https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/particle-wa/) is pronounced “wa”.
When it’s a particle, it’s “wa.” In other cases (i.e. when it’s part of a word), it’s “ha.”
The good news is that this is one of the only such cases in modern Japanese. Really the only other one is へ, which is “e” as a particle but “he” everywhere else.
Finally, as something of an inverse, the sound “o” is represented by を when it’s a particle, and by お everywhere else.
Oh, and as a P.S., there are the じ/ぢ and ず/づ pairs, and the long vowels おう/おお and えい/ええ.
Those things aside, kana are totally phonetic and predictable.
は pronounced ‘wa’ is the particle form.
Particles are one of the first things you should be learning.
As in, if you don’t know particles, it will be very difficult to learn *any* other grammar.
Are you using a textbook at least?
That’s the way it is so get on with it.