The same reason how in English we don’t say “I am going to go to the store.” We say “I’m gonna go t’ the store”. It’s still correct and can be used in formal situations. There are so many examples of this and so many rules in Japanese and English, at the beginning stages it’s much easier to just copy how Japanese people say things. It’s called devoicing IIRC if you’re super curious!
They’re called unvoiced vowels and they’re everywhere. 好き, たくさん, くつした, です I fell into this rabbit hole early on. There is a rule but it has a ton of exceptions. You get a feel for it over time
Phonology, it’s just one of the quirks of Japanese that /u/ and /i/ are devoiced, in certain places.
I think unless you’re already familiar with linguistic terminology it isn’t super helpful to try and explain the rule – at a low level it’s best to just pronounce words as you hear them. It’s never wrong to pronounce the vowel, just would give you a “foreign” accent.
(In many cases they’re actually pronounced, but voiceless, so you don’t hear them except as a trace on the nearby consonant. But we’re getting super technical there.)
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This is very common in Japanese verbal language. Basically, vowels (う and い) that are within two voiceless consonants are omitted.
Easy examples:
好き (すき) — s[u]ki
靴 (くつ) — k[u]tsu
した — sh[i]ta
There are many exceptions too, ofc, and the rule is not really a rule, more like a common phenomenon in Japanese phonology.
Better look into this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_phonology#Devoicing
The same reason how in English we don’t say “I am going to go to the store.” We say “I’m gonna go t’ the store”. It’s still correct and can be used in formal situations. There are so many examples of this and so many rules in Japanese and English, at the beginning stages it’s much easier to just copy how Japanese people say things. It’s called devoicing IIRC if you’re super curious!
They’re called unvoiced vowels and they’re everywhere.
好き, たくさん, くつした, です
I fell into this rabbit hole early on. There is a rule but it has a ton of exceptions. You get a feel for it over time
Phonology, it’s just one of the quirks of Japanese that /u/ and /i/ are devoiced, in certain places.
I think unless you’re already familiar with linguistic terminology it isn’t super helpful to try and explain the rule – at a low level it’s best to just pronounce words as you hear them. It’s never wrong to pronounce the vowel, just would give you a “foreign” accent.
(In many cases they’re actually pronounced, but voiceless, so you don’t hear them except as a trace on the nearby consonant. But we’re getting super technical there.)