Japanese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "妻" in Japanese?

Q: How do you pronounce 妻 in Japanese?

妻 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /tsɯ.ma/. It means “wife.” tsu-ma, two beats — one indivisible affricate at the front, with flat lips.

tsu-ma, two beats — one indivisible affricate at the front, with flat lips.

妻 /tsɯ.ma/

tsuma

Both units take the same time, with the crest on the first. The whole difficulty is packed into the opening consonant, and the risk is slowing down for it — which stretches the first beat and makes the second sound rushed by comparison.

Listen: 妻

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Sound it out

tsu The affricate in its hardest position, word-initially. Seal for t and release directly into s in a single motion; English only allows this cluster at the ends of words, so it takes practice. The u is unrounded and, before a voiced m, stays voiced.

ma A lip closure, then a bright short a. The straightforward half of the word.

Hear it in a sentence

妻は弁護士です。

Tsuma wa bengoshi desu.

My wife is a lawyer.

Listen: 妻は弁護士です。

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妻は弁護士です has 弁護士 (be-n-go-shi), four morae with a nasal beat and a final shi that tends to devoice before です. So the sentence opens with an affricate, passes through a hum, and ends on a run of whispered vowels.

Where English speakers slip

"tsoo-MA" or, more commonly, "SOO-ma" with the t dropped entirely — that's the sound that makes つ distinctive, so losing it changes the word. Keep the t audible inside a single release, spread the lips for the u, and don't let the affricate take longer than the ma that follows.