わなしは にほんじんです Here は is read as wa instead of its usual ha Can somebody explain this?
I’m not sure there’s an answer beyond “because sometimes ‘は’ is pronounced ‘wa’.”
Kindof like asking “why is ‘c’ sometimes pronounced like an ‘s’ like in ‘cistern.’”
“こんにちは” is another word in which “は” is pronounced “wa”.
I’d imagine there are probably historical reasons, but I don’t know them. I suspect the cases where “は” is pronounced “wa” are pretty rare and just have to be learned by wrote.
I was confused when there was no explaination in genki, hence the question. Thanks for answering
It’s WA when it’s used as a particle and HA when not used as a particle. The Japanese government attempted to standardize WA sounds to わ after WWII, and was mostly successful, but the は particle stuck around, seemingly due to inertia. Lots of languages have little oddities in pronunciation that aren’t reflected in spelling, or vice versa. Where do the British get the F in lieutenant?
