99093
I notice over hundreds and hundreds of japanese's videos, anime and podcast
that Japanese (mostly women but not only) tend in speech to length the vowel
in the ending like 〜まーす, 〜でーす and so on. I don't think it's technical or
linguistic issue, but sorto of speech style, to soften a sentence or something
like that.

So my question is: from a native speaker, what is your feeling about this?
It's sound more "cute"? More soft? Or am i totally miss and it's something
else?
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-28T11:17:42.130
99087
2023-03-28T23:35:33.253
56116
question
spoken-language vowels
The Vowel Lengthening in 〜ます, 〜です
Such a way of speaking is called 語尾をのばす, which can be used in several
situations. Generally, talking without ー (i.e. the normal way of
speaking/writing) can sound/look brusque, and as you mention, ー is kind of
softening.

One typical case is conversations with children. For example, a primary school
teacher talks to a classroom 準備できましたかー？( _Are you ready?_ ), then the pupils
respond はーい. Similarly まーす or でーす is used by pupils or students talking to
teachers (usually in context of responding or reporting something).

The lengthening is considered childish in business setting and should be
avoided (e.g. [a web post](https://otonasalone.jp/61312/)). A woman (say in
her 20s) speaking with too much ー would be regarded too coquettish(?) and a
man talking too much that way would be just weird.

So your impression is not wrong, but it's mostly because there are lots of
young girls in anime etc.

* * *

Another thing is 'vocative' usage of ー. This is not particularly childish or
anything and can be used by people of all generations.

In English, sometimes people say _Hellooo_ to reconfirm that nobody's there
(calling to a house, for example) or _Heeyy_ to attract the attention of a
person who is a bit far off.

Similarly, when calling at some place or talking to a person at a distance,
Japanese uses すいませーん etc. An example of checking if anybody is in a seemingly
empty house is すいませーん。ごめんくださーい。だれかいますかー？( _Hi, Helloo, Is anybody there?_ ).

Perhaps in youtube videos they speak in the way of talking directly to
listeners, so that you hear this kind of ー.
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-28T23:35:33.253
99093
2023-03-28T23:35:33.253
45489
99087
answer