We have now covered all the traditional sounds used in Japanese. In recent years English sounds are becoming more familiar to Japanese ears as more and more people are exposed to foreign sounds through music, movies, etc. As they get to know more of the novel sounds of English, they come to feel rather restricted by the limited Japanese sound system.

Thus, various innovations in using the existing writing system have been developed.

ティ　テュ　ディ デュ
These innovations started out with relatively easy sounds, such as [ti] and [di], whose traditional Japanese alternatives, chi and ji, are very far from the original sounds. Additionally, the [ti] and [di] sounds are not too difficult for Japanese to pronounce. For example, "English tea" used to be called chii, but is now called tii; this sound is written as ティ (i.e. テ plus a small イ), and the word is almost always spelled ティー today. Similarly, "dill" is now called diru instead of jiru, and is written ディル. (When you type on a computer, however, spelling ti will give you チ, not ティ, and di will give you ヂ, not ディ. To get these innovative "spellings", you need to first type テ or デ by spelling te or de, respectively, and then xi to get a small-sized イ.)  

While the innovative spelling ティ is almost always used when this sound is elongated, as in ティー for "tea" or ピーティーエー for "PTA", チ is still widely used for short [ti] sounds, such as アンチ for "anti" or マルチ for "multi".  

Try reading the following words:

Here are some English names:

Now, write the words above, on your PC.

A more recent invention using テ and デ is テュ and デュ to respond to the [tu] and [du] sounds in English, respectively. 

To get these spellings on a computer, you need to type out te for テ and de for デ, and then xyu for a small-sized ユ.

Now, try reading the following words:

Practice the words above on your PC.



Your PC should support Japanese characters.

トゥ
For the [too] sound in English, as in "tool", traditionally ツ was used. Today more and more Japanese distinguish the [tu] sound from tsu, so another innovative spelling, トゥ, is sometimes employed to express this sound. Hence, instead of  ツール, you might see トゥール. This writing innovation is still relatively unusual, however.

To get a small-sized ウ on a computer, type xu.

Now, try to read the following words:

Now, write the two words above, on your PC.



Your PC should support Japanese characters.

Another "spelling" which has become fairly widely practiced is designed to help cope with some of the [f] sounds of English and other languages. Traditionally, as you have noticed, [h] was substituted for [f], as in フード huudo for "food".

For the [fa] [fi] [fe] and [fo] sounds in English and other languages, this フ may be accompanied by a small ア イ エ or オ, respectively; hence, ファ, フィ, フェ and フォ.

These characters can be obtained on a computer by typing fa, fi, fe and fo, respectively.

Now, try the following words:

Note that even if spelled with an [f] in Romanized Japanese, the vast majority of Japanese do not pronounce this sound with the real English [f] sound, i.e. by putting the upper teeth on the lower lip. Instead, most use a blowing sound like [h], so the above sample words are generally pronounced as spelled in parentheses above. Listen to the recording and see. 

Practice the words above on your PC.



Your PC should support Japanese characters.

As you have seen, the English [v] sound has been traditionally handled with the [b] sound in Japanese, as in バイオリン baiorin for "violin". These days, however, for [v] sounds, a modified character has been created for this specific purpose. Until recently there was no such character as ヴ, i.e. two dots on ウ. Now, ヴァ is used for the [va] sound, ヴィ for [vi], ヴェ for [ve] and ヴォ for [vo]; ヴ alone stands for [vu]. While Japanese people may write using this innovative spelling, you will generally find that their pronunciation of it is of the [b] sound and not the [v] sound. In fact, most Japanese differentiate between [b] and [v] by saying them as [b] and "bui" [booee] - this is as close as most Japanese natives get to the English [v] sound in their speech.

To obtain these characters on a computer, just spell va, vi, vu, ve and vo, respectively.

Now, try to read the following words:

Practice the words above on your PC.



Your PC should support Japanese characters.

Write the words above, on your PC.



Your PC should support Japanese characters.

This Chapter has covered all katakana presently in use in Japanese. You should therefore be able to read and write any words in katakana.

Note that while words introduced here for your practice are all foreign words (excluding Chinese-origin words which are written in Chinese characters), katakana are not used exclusively for foreign words only. They are also often used for onomatopoeia, animals, plants, fruit, or any words which the author wants to highlight; the last is much like italicizing in English writing.

When it comes to spelling your name or company name in katakana, there is no single correct spelling; frequently there are a few options and it is up to you which one to choose. You might ask natives to pronounce each option, and decide which one sounds best to you. Just keep in mind that all of them will deviate from your native pronunciation.