speaking in front of people and accents?

How do you sound Japanese? I am learning words and phrases and listen to audio cd's. What I find is that when I can hear someone I can immitate them pretty well. When I am on my own and have to say something in Japanese I get all choked up and struggle to sound right. I have found that because of that I am avoiding using any Japanese with my friends and family and depend on them to speak English. I am jealous of their ability to speak so well. How do you get past your fear of sounding bad and speak? I am sure I'll get the "just do it" speach but there has to be more to it than that. (I hope!) Now that I can read a little I have to sound out each character and sound very choppy and like a computer. I am having difficulty in explaining this well, but my frustration level is high; I just want to sound normal....help please!

Have you tried recording yourself? Maybe being able to isolate your voice into just seeing it as an instrument to be practiced and refined over and over again would help. I get super self conscious about my voice, and this is a good way to counteract the aggravation of insecurity.

Another thing is that I dabble in fansubbing dramas as a means of being more active in learning the language and to train my ear to the different nuances of japanese pronunciation. There is something to be said for hearing a casual phrase over and over again until your ear just knows it's right. Then all of a sudden you realize the pitch patterns in simple words that you just wouldn't think of without getting really focused on the words. Doing this has really helped me build a feeling of confidence in my pronunciation. Plus then I get to watch my stories...

I suggest just saying things over, and over, and over, and over... And if you speak it with your family, it's your family, they'll understand if you don't have a perfect accent. "just do it" and you will improve

Recording might help. Thanks for the idea. Oh and Tomii515 should have thought of you, because if I remember correctly you are recording yourself teaching Japanese.

I find it so hard to imitate the right sound. I don't know the right sound. I find it hardest to speak to family and friends. I am ashamed to say that I won't even talk to my husband in Japanese anymore. I can talk with my Japanese study partner ok, but he isn't judgmental because he too is a beginner. Perhaps it is just a phase I am going through. I just don't remember this as a problem when I was in French class.....

I found pattern drills to be useful. Repeated in various permutations over and over and over and over and you get the picture.

The way I got over worrying about sounding bad was making my livelihood dependent upon using Japanese. I can't think of a better incentive than knowing the rent and the groceries are riding on it.

I can talk with my Japanese study partner ok, but he isn't judgmental because he too is a beginner. Perhaps it is just a phase I am going through. I just don't remember this as a problem when I was in French class.....

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First of all, you can relax because this is NOT France or Parisians we're talking about here. There are two major differences : Firstly, Japanese pronounciation truly is simpler than most languages. There are few silent or devoiced syllables and even if you speak "pitchless" Japanese (without a high or low intonation) you will be understood, easily. If you try and get it "wrong" by local standards it can sound extremely unnatural, or in the worst case be mistaken for totally unrelated words.

Knowing where the long vowels are and getting them drawn out appropriately is probably the most important training and very, very subtle nuance your ear needs to pick up on. That is the crucial difference in literally thousands of similiar sounding words. Oftentimes your attempt can be something very, very close but the people can also be notorious for not "guessing" or "estimating" the proper meaning out of the context.

A second difference with French is that, lucky for us, it is my experience that most Japanese couldn't care less if you speak with an accent ! Don't your husband and his friends in English ? What they want is nothing more than to understand and be understood at a reasonable level in return.

Like Tomii515 said, just keep on listening to simple phrases, attempting to speak and when those are communicable, building on that. Record yourself if you don't mind the distortion that comes with being taped but in the end it's
endless hours of practice that are going to make it second nature.

Ganbatte ne!

Goldiegirl said:

Recording might help. Thanks for the idea. Oh and Tomii515 should have thought of you, because if I remember correctly you are recording yourself teaching Japanese.
I find it so hard to imitate the right sound. I don't know the right sound. I find it hardest to speak to family and friends. I am ashamed to say that I won't even talk to my husband in Japanese anymore. I can talk with my Japanese study partner ok, but he isn't judgmental because he too is a beginner. Perhaps it is just a phase I am going through. I just don't remember this as a problem when I was in French class.....

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I'm in French class! hehe, I don't have problems saying the pronunciation correct... Or being afraid to speak it... Anyways, back to Japanese...

The pronunciation, I would say, is the easiest in languages (exept for maybe Hawaiian...). Anyway, Just sound out everything in syllables, and learn the exeptions (ou, -masu, desu, -mashita, etc.) And even if you don't know the exeptions, people with understand you. PRacticing and lsitenign is key, and you'll eventually notice you're getter better and obtaining a Japanese accent!@ Hooray!

All I can say is ,practice,practice,practice,practice. If you have native speakers around you, ask them to correct you when your pronunciation sounds funny. Also the tape recording is good to, b/c you can listen and evaluate yourself at the the same time. GL

Thanks to everyone. Yes, practice is one of the biggies. And I am so glad to know that my dinner is not dependent on my Japanese speaking ability! I do think though that some added pressure does have a way of pushing me into trying harder. I feel shy for the first time in my life. I have never been fearful of making a mistake now and again. I sometimes think all the Japanese I know is a mistake. Maybe it was because I didn't start out really wanting to know, or really even learn the language. I thought it would be nice to say hi, how are you and so forth. But truly learning to understand, read or write I didn't care. Now I care! A LOT! I am going to give recording a try, maybe I don't sound as weird as I think I do, and I will keep listening. I also think that mens voices sound better, or at least I can hear more detail in their speaking.

Elizabeth, what you said made me cringe...about people not guessing what you said...that has happened to me and I get frustrated with that. They know very well what I meant. It's not done to hurt my feelings, but they do laugh and say it's cute.