Pronunciation of 'Samurai'.

[arnisador]

I watched Samurai I and am now watching Samurai II. They are subtitled.

Every time the word samurai appeared in a subtitle, I listened to the Japanese, but I could not hear anything like it. Finally when he wwent to see the sword polisher I heard samurai loud and clear, twice, almost exactly like I'd say it in English.

Why am I not hearing it in the other spots? Is there another word that means samurai that they might be using in the Japanese? The usage seems to refer to class more than swordsmanship, as one would expect, but it isn't always perfectly clear to me that that's so. Is there a very different pronunciation of the word, possibly because of affixes, or a pronunciation rule like how keri is so often pronounced as geri when its' used? Am I just not picking it up? I've gone back and listened again but I cannot make it out if it's there.

 

[Rich Parsons]

Originally posted by arnisador
I watched Samurai I and am now watching Samurai II. They are subtitled.

Every time the word samurai appeared in a subtitle, I listened to the Japanese, but I could not hear anything like it. Finally when he wwent to see the sword polisher I heard samurai loud and clear, twice, almost exactly like I'd say it in English.

Why am I not hearing it in the other spots? Is there another word that means samurai that they might be using in the Japanese? The usage seems to refer to class more than swordsmanship, as one would expect, but it isn't always perfectly clear to me that that's so. Is there a very different pronunciation of the word, possibly because of affixes, or a pronunciation rule like how keri is so often pronounced as geri when its' used? Am I just not picking it up? I've gone back and listened again but I cannot make it out if it's there.

What little I know about Japanese is that Americans would say "Sam-U-Rye", and that the Japanese phonetics is different. I would believe it to be "Sa-Moo-Rye"

A few of the words I do know, when I was in Japan were said very fast and many Americans would not hear the last syllable properly or at all.

I would also like to know if there was another word.

 

[MA-Caver]

I love Kurasawa movies. I love them even more because they often come with subtitles (I'm hearing impaired). But when I can get away with it I have the volume up loud enough to hear the language because I also love the fluidness of the Japanese spoken words.
I recall also the film adaptation of James Clavell's "Shogun" and the one scene stuck in my head in regards to the Japanese spoken language. Blackthorne is learning to speak the language and the interpreter is trying her best to get him to understand the subtle differences. He (typical 16th century englishman) just couldn't get it. I did.
She explained that the tone and inflection of the spoken word carries as much meaning as the word itself. The same holds for sign-language.
Most of Kurasawa movies are historically accurate as far as language, clothes and mannerisms... story lines not-withstanding.
Thus what you're hearing is accurate it's more of how you listen.
:asian:

 

[kroh]

Hey there,

Also try to keep in mind that the language that you are hearing has a different word order than we have in English. Look for the word in other spots.

One other effect that you might be seeing is that the context of what they are talking about could call for a different word, yet the translator translated it in the same way...

Ex-> Bushi, bugeisha, bujin, kenshi, and of course samurai...
some of these words come no where near the translation of samurai yet the translators still subtitled it the same way... some could be a usage thing...such as certain words get modernized ( kempo is translated by a lot of americans as martial arts) and sometimes the translators feel that we stupid americans just wouldn't get it...

oh well...

Thanx for the minute...
WalT

 

[Kempo Guy]

I haven't watched the Samurai series in a really long time, but I'll have a look and see if I can catch it...

I know that in some chanbara flicks they use specific dialects which sometimes makes the words hard to distinguish during the conversation. BTW, often times the translator's don't do a literal translation... sometimes the translations are quite puzzling.


As a note, the Samurai trilogy was not made by Kurosawa. I'm a big Kurosawa fan and own about eight of his movies on DVD, along with other chanbara / samurai movies.

KG

 

[arnisador]

It still seems like they often aren't saying 'samurai' when that word appears in the subtitles, even allowing for differences in word order, affixes, etc.

An unrelated question--they often refer to having others serve as seconds for duels, but on at least one occasion said "no seconds" because of some concern over honor (I think the fear that it'd be reported as a several-on-one "duel"). What was the nature of the second in a samurai duel? Just like in a Western European duel?