JSL is a

romanization In linguistics, romanization is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Latin script, Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and tra ...

system for transcribing the

Japanese language is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...

into the

Latin script The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...

. It was devised by Eleanor Jorden for (and named after) her 1987 book '' Japanese: The Spoken Language''. The system is based on

Kunrei-shiki romanization , also known as the Monbusho system (named after the endonym for the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology) or MEXT system, is the Cabinet of Japan, Cabinet-ordered romanization system for transcribing the Japanese langu ...

.Jorden 1987: 21 Japanese Yale is a less well-known alternative name for the JSL system. It is designed for teaching spoken Japanese, and so, it follows

Japanese phonology Japanese phonology is the system of sounds used in the pronunciation of the Japanese language. Unless otherwise noted, this article describes the standard variety of Japanese based on the Tokyo dialect. There is no overall consensus on the nu ...

fairly closely. For example, different conjugations of a verb may be achieved by changing the final vowel (as in the chart on the right), thus "bear nga direct relation to Japanese structure" (in Jorden's words), whereas the common

Hepburn romanization is the main system of Romanization of Japanese, romanization for the Japanese language. The system was originally published in 1867 by American Christian missionary and physician James Curtis Hepburn as the standard in the first edition of h ...

may require exceptions in some cases, to more clearly illustrate pronunciation to native English speakers. JSL differs from Hepburn, particularly in that it uses doubled vowels, rather than macrons, to represent the long vowels and .

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

() and

Osaka is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the List of cities in Japan, third-most populous city in J ...

(), for instance, would be written () and () in JSL. Also, JSL represents , the syllabic n, as an "n" with a macron over it, (), to avoid the practice that other systems use of sometimes writing (n) and sometimes (n') depending on the presence of a following vowel or (y). There is a close tie between Japanese pronunciation and JSL, where one consistent symbol is given for each Japanese phoneme. This means that it does depart from Japanese

orthography An orthography is a set of convention (norm), conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, punctuation, Word#Word boundaries, word boundaries, capitalization, hyphenation, and Emphasis (typography), emphasis. Most national ...

somewhat, as is romanized as () when it indicates a long , but as () when it indicates two distinct vowel sounds, such as in () for (). Similarly, () is reserved for the pronunciation ionly, whereas other romanization systems (including Hepburn) follow the

hiragana is a Japanese language, Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''. It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", ...

orthography, therefore making it impossible to tell whether ːor iare represented. It also distinguishes between (), which is used when only a sound is possible, and (), which is used when a velar nasal sound (the "ng" in the English word "singer") is also possible. The particles は and へ are romanized () and (), by their pronunciation. However, like Kunrei-shiki and Nihon-shiki, JSL does not distinguish between allophones in Japanese which are close to different phonemes in English. JSL indicates the

pitch accent A pitch-accent language is a type of language that, when spoken, has certain syllables in words or morphemes that are prominent, as indicated by a distinct contrasting pitch (music), pitch (tone (linguistics), linguistic tone) rather than by vol ...

of each mora. A vowel with an

acute accent The acute accent (), , is a diacritic used in many modern written languages with alphabets based on the Latin alphabet, Latin, Cyrillic script, Cyrillic, and Greek alphabet, Greek scripts. For the most commonly encountered uses of the accen ...

(´) denotes the first high-pitch mora, a grave accent (`) marks the last high-pitch mora, and a

circumflex The circumflex () is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is also used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from "bent around"a translation of ...

(ˆ) marks the only high-pitch mora in a word. In this system 'Japan' would be written () and 'two (sticks)' as (), 'It's the edge' would be () (standing for ].Jorden 1987: 11-13 (This is why doubled vowels must be used instead of macrons.)

References

*Jorden, Eleanor Harz with Noda, Mari. ''Japanese: The Spoken Language'', vol. 1. 1987. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Jsl Romanization Romanization of Japanese Japanese writing system Writing systems introduced in 1987

See also

References