So I’m learning kanji with WaniKani, and it’s going really well.
My understanding of pitch accent is that every syllable/mora is either at a high pitch or a low pitch, and the charts show that (and the pitch of the particle afterwards). But after looking at these pitch accent charts I’m often confused, as every now and then, what I’m hearing doesn’t match up with the chart.
The one that caused me to make this post is a word I’ve just reviewed on WaniKani – 本気 (honki/serious)
The chart on my mobile wanikani app and a website I just checked has ‘ho’ in the bottom and ‘n-ki’ in the top line, but when listening the wanikani examples [(which u can hear here)](https://www.wanikani.com/vocabulary/%E6%9C%AC%E6%B0%97), to me the inflection sounds 100% descending. The pitch of ‘ki’ is definitely lower than the rest…
Is my understanding of pitch accent flawed? Can someone enlighten me 😁
8 comments
Get Yomichan with pitch accent dictionary
Boom solved
Hello. Never used WaniKani before but I assume it’s the Kyoko/Kenichi examples of the pronunciation you’re referring to? I definitely hear heiban pitch (no drop) with nki being higher (it’s pronounced slow enough I can hear the n higher too). Wait for someone more qualified than me to answer though haha.
With respect to what you’re listening to on Wanikani, it took me a while to realise that the ‘low’ at the end of the word you’re hearing is still a high pitch, it’s just that the speaker being recorded does indeed sound like they’re dropping the pitch when they speak (but, not by much).
So your assertion on how to pronounce the word is correct until you were confused by the light drop of pitch. I was caught out by this as well.
I can definitely say the example voices sound off.
I think it’s just because they’re AI voices.
What you wrote about the pitch accent of Honki is totally right 🙂
Well, some Japanese people might say all the three sounds of ho-n-ki flatly though.
You may just be picking up on the change in sound quality from the open ‘o’ sound through the ‘n’ to the closed vowel of ‘i’. My Tokyo-raised ears find the examples to be both correct and also not descending… 本気 should (in my dialect) have the same intonation as 本当 or 本音. Compare to a word such as 本島 or 本能 which are atamadaka or I guess descending pitch in English.
I have an app called JAccent that I check if I’m unsure.
本気 is 平板 (LHH) and the audio clips on wanikani match that pretty clearly. You probably need to train your ears more. When people talk in real life the difference in pitch is not always drastic.
There’s an add-on/extension for web browser called Tampermonkey which allows you to use scripts to change website appearance… there’s one script called “Wanikani Pitch Info” [somewhere](https://community.wanikani.com/t/userscript-wanikani-pitch-info/18745).
It’s very handy, it visualizes pitch accent above where you have vocab pronunciation.