Should You Focus On Japanese Intonation (Pitch Accent) When Learning The Language?

There has been a recent rise around the whole discussion of “pitch accent” in Japanese, and if you should try and focus on this or not.

Traditionally this has been totally ignored by learners and even those who had reached quite high levels in the language had often not even been aware of its existence.

It is quite a complex part of the language, but if you can be aware of it, even as a beginner it will be more beneficial for you in the long run rather than completely avoiding it, but let’s go into this in more detail.

What Is Pitch Accent?

If you are not actually sure what Japanese pitch accent is, I will quickly explain it.

Basically there is an expected “intonation” to how Japanese words are spoken and you will find there are 4 different types of pitch pattern that can be used.

Each word has as pattern and if you listening closely you will hear the pitch rise or fall as the word is spoken, this can be very subtle and learners of Japanese (especially beginners) can struggle to hear this.

The reason why any of this matters is because what pitch you use can alter the meaning of the word. This isn’t the case for everything, but there are a lot of words where they “sound” the same, and the only way to tell them apart is through what pitch is used.

The classic example is the word for ‘chop stick’ and ‘bridge’ are both “hashi” and you tell them apart by the pitch that is used.

So really if you want to master Japanese, you will need to understand pitch accent and know how to use it and the lack of this is usually what allows natives to know you are not a native speaker. They will say your intonation isn’t quite right, and it will be clear as day to them that something is off.

(I briefly cover this topic in my free course, you can see the lesson here – Japanese Day 6 – Pitch Accent)

Don’t Worry About Intonation Right At The Start

I think this new found interest in pitch accent is great, but also, we don’t need to worry about it too much.

As beginners we have enough on our plates without stressing about this small aspect of the language. I honestly wouldn’t worry about pitch accent until you can get the basics down.

However, once you do have some basics I would start trying to pay more attention to pitch. If you want to focus on it sooner you can try, but the reality is that your ears are just not tuned into Japanese yet.

You will struggle to just recognise and differentiate words, let alone be able to spot different pitches. 

Try and Notice It Where You Can

Probably the best thing to do is to simply be aware of pitch accents existence and look into how it works and then don’t stress too much about it.

You can try and notice it where you can, and if you do that is great, but I really think it is going to be too much to process as a beginner.

There will be times when it is pointed out to you and this is excellent, you can use these times to actually focus on it and see if you can identify the differences. For the rest of the time, you can try to spot it, but you are probably just going to be using all your energy to understand what you are listening to and things will seem a little hazy from just doing this.  

Will You Need To Relearn Everything?

The big argument around trying to focus on pitch accent right from the start is so that you don’t need to relearn everything.

You might learn a word, but not its pitch and therefore you will need to go back at a later date and relearn the word, but this time with the pitch.

I guess there is some truth to this and it is why I say you should try and noticed it where you can as you go along.

However, trying to learn the pitch for every new word you learn is going to slow you down dramatically and you overall progress is going to suffer.

It really is quite the dilemma, but I would rather learn more quickly and be slightly imperfect than learn a lot less, while having perfect pitch …but as with most things it will come down to balance. You can probably find a happy medium and get the best of both worlds.

It Will Get Easier As You Progress

Really the secret to pitch accent is to get better at Japanese. As you progress it will be easier to hear the differences and you can start paying more attention to it and more importantly, start trying to use it in your own speech.

This is exactly why I wouldn’t worry about it at start, you are better off getting your general understanding of the language a lot higher, then you can start nit picking at little things like pitch accent.

Focus On Doing More Immersion

My go to answer when talking about improving anything in language learning is always “do more immersion” and this is also going to be true for dealing with pitch accent.

The more you can listen to the language, the better as it is going to help your subconscious figure things out.

However, I don’t think this is actually enough. The simple advice of do more immersion is great, but there are people who have done insane amounts of immersion and still not quite had pitch accent click.

I do think you need to be actively listening for it as such and also practicing it, so plenty of immersion is recommended, but you should also be listening out for the pitch where you can. This little change is going to make the time you spend listening more productive in the long run.    

Of course it won’t be easy at the start as you will be preoccupied with simply understanding the content, but as you get comfortable with the language, start listening out for the pitches.

(You can read more about – The Benefits of Japanese Language Immersion For Acquiring The Language)

Learn More Vocabulary

A large part of being able to spot the pitch of word is going to revolve around knowing the individual words to a high level, so of course the stronger your vocabulary the better.

The more words you can learn, the more comfortable you will get with the language. You will reach a point where you can understand pretty much all of what you are hearing, especially if it just general every day chat and not some obscure niche topic.

When you reach this level of understanding your basic vocabulary isn’t really going to get much bigger …but it is going to get stronger. Every word you know will just become stronger and stronger and really this is when you can really start to focus on the pitch accent.

The meaning of the word and sentence is going to feel very comfortable and you can actually start to hear the pitches at this point.

More vocabulary is always going to benefit you.

Your General Pronunciation Is More Important

While wanting to get good at pitch accent is good …it is usually trying to run before you can walk.

You should really focus on your general pronunciation and get really good at the Japanese sounds first, and then you can work on your pitch accent.

Of course you can argue that trying to perfect your pitch is half the battle with correct pronunciation and while this is true, I also don’t think it is.

If I listen to myself talk Japanese …I don’t sound Japanese at all. I sound dreadful. No amount of pitch work is going to make sound less foreign.   

I need to (and you probably do to) need to just focus on sounding more Japanese first, then the cherry on top is the pitch accent, and while we can try and work on that now, our energy may be better spent just generally trying to sound better.  

(You can read more about – Should You Try and Get A Japanese Accent?)

Try And Think About Pitch Accent Where You Can

While there are many other things we should try and improve on before we get caught up in pitch accent …I still think we should do what we can along the way.

I think the approach of totally ignoring its existence until we are quite fluent is wrong, but I also think trying to master it right from the start is equally as pointless.

Really I would suggest you make yourself aware of it and dabble with where you can. Knowing it exists and trying to look out for it, or even use it yourself is a good idea, but also do not get up on this.

As I already mentioned, things like your general pronunciation or just knowing the words to a comfortable level are more important, but paying some attention to the pitch as you focus on these other things will help you.

You are not really going to be able to master the pitch accent until you are quite advanced, but any work you before this is going to help you hone that skill a lot faster when you do decide to actively try and improve it.

Do More Shadowing

Probably one of the best things you can do for your pitch accent at any point in your language journey is to do shadowing.

This is when you listen to some audio and try and copy it exactly. The whole point of this is to try and replicate the native speaker exactly so that you end up sounding more natural.

If you do this correctly, you are going to end up copying the pitch accent without really having to think too much about it.

You are going to get your mouth used to saying words in a certain style …which means the perfect pitch, so hopefully when you end up using these words yourself, you say them with a more accurate pitch and just sound better.

If you pair this with actively trying to hear the pitches and focusing on it, you are going to improve quite a lot and sound a lot better than someone who has not paid attention to this.

Conclusion

Hopefully you can see that pitch is pretty important, but also not something you should totally worry about until you are at quite a high level.

Casually paying attention as you go long is going to be helpful in the long run, but realistically you can’t really put a lot of energy into this area of the language until you have reached quite an advanced level.

Try and look out for it where you can, but really just stick it on the back burner until later, then you can really focus on it.   

(You can read more about – How To Improve Speaking In Japanese)