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When I chat using romaji, Japanese people will always use si instead of shi,
for example yorosiku instead of yoroshiku, siteru instead of shiteru. Do
Japanese people actually pronounce shi as si?
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2019-08-06T13:11:20.200
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2020-02-09T08:38:22.567
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question
pronunciation
Is it shi or si?
It's the difference between [Hepburn
romanization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hepburn_romanization) and [Wapuro
romanizaton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W%C4%81puro_r%C5%8Dmaji). Adults
generally use Hepburn system for person names, signboards, posters and such (し
= `shi`, づ = `zu`, じゃ = `ja`). But when they need to type ordinary Japanese
sentences using romaji, they (almost unconsciously) use wapuro style because
it's more efficient and unambiguous (し = `si`, づ = `du`, じゃ =
`zya`/`jya`/`ja`). You don't have to type `shi` to get し when you can get the
same character by typing `si`.

Please remember that wapuro style **has nothing to do with pronunciation**.
That's just an input method, how they type hiragana/katakana on keyboards.
Don't assume anything about pronunciation based on English alphabet.
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-08-07T05:17:09.620
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For their own perception, yes, from the perspective of English speakers, no.

In languages there is a difference between what is called "[underlying
phonology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoneme)", which is the discrete
sequence of sounds that speakers perceive, and "surface realization", which is
what they're actually factually saying. In every language, a process occurs
called [co-articulation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coarticulation), where
sounds take on elements of the sounds that follow them, such as position of
the tongue and lips, effectively meaning that sounds blend more into each
other in practice.

The "i" is a palatal vowel, a vowel where the tongue is positioned near the
palate of the mouth, so while Japanese speakers are pronouncing what they
consider "si" the tongue is already moving towards the palate when pronouncing
the "s", this results into the s having an objective quality that places it
somewhat in-between the sounds of English "s" and "sh" — the end result being
that English speakers hear "shi", whereas Japanese speakers just hear "si".

In reverse, the vowel in "gal" is also a palatal vowel, but the vowel in
"girl" is not, the result is that the "g" in both words is slightly different
with the "g" in "gal" palatalized. This is almost completely imperceptible to
English speakers, but Japanese speakers pick up on this, so "gal" got loaned
as "ギャル" ["gyaru"] whereas "girl" became "ガール" ["gāru"] — note the "y" in the
former.

This gives rise to [two different widely used
families](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Japanese#Modern_systems)
of Romanization: the "Japanese styles", which are used in Japan, and sometimes
in technical settings outside of it, which are based on the Japanese's own
perception of their language, and the "Hepburn styles", which are based on the
perception of North American English speakers, and mostly used outside of it.

In practice, in Japan, both styles are used, sometimes often in the same word,
because Japanese speakers don't know what is up any more; the Japanese
government recommends the Cabinet-style variant of the Japanese-style be used
for all intra-Japanese communication, which they are taught at school, but
also advises Hepburn for external communication with Anglo-Saxons; one can
sometimes see "si" and "shi" in the very same word in the wild, due to
sloppiness or really inconsistent Romanization.

It's however important to remember that every language has its own phonology
and sounds; Japanese is not pronounced like English, or in reverse, and has
different sounds. You may look at the Wikipedia article on [Japanese
phonology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_phonology); the
transcriptions inside of /slashes/ repræsent the underlying phonology that
Japanese speakers perceive and what is inside of [square brackets] repræsents
the factual sounds made. So what is written as "Fujisan" in Hepburns-style,
and "Huzisan" in Japanese-style is perceived as /huzisaN/, with /N/ being
different from /n/, by Japanese speakers, which explains why it is written as
"Huzisan" in Japanese-style romanization.
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2020-01-10T15:58:40.667
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answer
Japanese people learn the forms si for し and tu for つ at elementary school.
This romanisation system is called Kunrei. If they are chatting in romaji they
are likely to use those forms since it also saves typing one character.
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-02-06T10:53:23.830
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answer
The usual Japanese pronunciation of し is /ɕi/.

Japanese phonotactics often palatalizes the consonant before `i` or `y` (/j/),
a feature that is also present in Korean ㅅ and some dialects of Brazilian
Portuguese with `t`. The digraph `sh` in English usually represents /ʃ/, which
is similar to /ɕ/ but differs in tongue position.

So しょ /ɕo/ will be romanized as `syo` instead of `sho` in systems that use
`si`, such as Kunrei-siki. In the same way, ち /t͡ɕi/, じ /(d)ʑi/, ぢ /(d)ʑi/ can
be found as `ti`, `zi` and `di` respectively, because the palatalization of
the consonant is expected to native Japanese speakers. Other "irregular"
consonants occur on ふ /ɸɯ/, つ /t͡sɨ/, づ /(d)zɨ/.

When I was a teenager, JICA sent a native Japanese speaker to our school in
Brazil. I was surprised to actually hear something very close to /hu/ instead
of /fu/ for ふ when she spoke (I was used to Hepburn). My grandmother, a native
Japanese speaker, could not distinguish /si/ and /ɕi/ well. That's why Kunrei-
siki makes a lot of sense from the point of view of a native Japanese speaker.

Romanizations are tools for easing transcriptions, but they may induce errors
because of biases we have due to our native languages. That's why any
discussion that involves pronunciation benefits greatly from IPA :)

Kunrei-siki does have a weakness though: how to romanize stuff like スィ, セィ,
ティ, ホゥ, ドゥ, combinations that are rare but do exist and may occur in
loanwords? The kana here indicate we are supposed to keep our /s t h d/ sounds
and not let them become /ɕ t͡ɕ ɸ dz/. Kunrei-siki just ignores the issue and
romanizes these as `si`, `si`, `ti`, `hu` and `du`. So, in extremely rare
cases, your `si` will indeed be /si/.

And yes, both スィ and セィ exist and are supposed to be /si/!

  * [スィヤードヴァーダ](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%B9%E3%82%A3%E3%83%A4%E3%83%BC%E3%83%89%E3%83%B4%E3%82%A1%E3%83%BC%E3%83%80) has around 1000 Google results and is a Sanskrit term specific to the Jain religion.

  * [セィア](https://www.tripadvisor.jp/Restaurant_Review-g298207-d6867427-Reviews-Serre-Fukuoka_Fukuoka_Prefecture_Kyushu.html) is the name of a French restaurant in Fukuoka.

(some edits for clarity)
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