Japanese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "先生" in Japanese?

Q: How do you pronounce 先生 in Japanese?

先生 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /seɴ.seː/. It means “teacher.” se-n-se-e, four beats — a nasal beat in second place and a long e at the end.

se-n-se-e, four beats — a nasal beat in second place and a long e at the end.

先生 /seɴ.seː/

sensei

Four beats, and only one is an ordinary short vowel with a consonant in front of it. One beat is nasal, two are a single sustained e — so three-quarters of the word's duration comes from things English wouldn't count as syllables.

Listen: 先生

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Sound it out

se A short clean s into a front e that stays in one position rather than gliding.

n A beat given entirely to nasal. With an s following, the tongue sits near the teeth-ridge, so this is a held n rather than a back-of-mouth hum.

sei Written with an i, but pronounced as the same s plus an e held for two full counts. The i marks length — this is the standard treatment of the "ei" spelling.

Hear it in a sentence

先生に聞きたいことがあります。

Sensei ni kikitai koto ga arimasu.

I have something I want to ask the teacher.

Listen: 先生に聞きたいことがあります。

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先生に聞きたいことがあります contains 聞きたい, where the first i devoices between two k-like sounds and the ta-i must stay two separate beats. So the sentence has a whispered mora and a vowel pair to keep apart, after four beats that are mostly nasal and length.

Where English speakers slip

"sen-SAY" reduces the nasal to a closing consonant and turns the ending into an English diphthong. Hum the ん for its own count, then hold a pure e for two — no movement of the tongue during it. The "sei" spelling misleads nearly every learner at first.