Y'know, I've always wondered. Do you pronounce Ushio and Ooshio the same way? Or is one You-shee-o and the other Ooh-shee-o?

Andyoats said:

Y'know, I've always wondered. Do you pronounce Ushio and Ooshio the same way? Or is one You-shee-o and the other Ooh-shee-o?

Neither. The "oo" in Ooshio is a long "o" sound, not an "u" sound; in Hepburn romanization it's written Ōshio. (That's going to be the case just about anywhere you see an "oo" or "ou" in a Japanese name.)

ngedh said:

Neither. The "oo" in Ooshio is a long "o" sound, not an "u" sound; in Hepburn romanization it's written Ōshio. (That's going to be the case just about anywhere you see an "oo" or "ou" in a Japanese name.)

...Oh. So if I'm understanding this right, Ooshio sounds similar to the way Kongou's or Hoshou's names end...? Is that right?

Andyoats said:

Y'know, I've always wondered. Do you pronounce Ushio and Ooshio the same way? Or is one You-shee-o and the other Ooh-shee-o?

Andyoats said:

...Oh. So if I'm understanding this right, Ooshio sounds similar to the way Kongou's or Hoshou's names end...? Is that right?

Ushio = [ɯ̴̀ɕīō]. Roughly "oo-shee-oh", for most English speakers (especially for ESL speakers, who tend to use "purer" vowels instead of inserting diphthongs all over the place). UK speakers might get closer with "oo-shee-aw" instead. Keep in mind all three vowels are short unlike in English.

(Also, for those who pay attention to pitch accent patterns, it's unaccented, so Low-High-High, at least for Standard "NHK" Japanese.)

Ooshio = [òōɕīō]. Roughly "oh-shee-oh" (or "aw-shee-aw" depending on your accent). First "oh" ("aw") is twice as long as the last.

(Also, for those who pay attention to pitch accent patterns, it's again unaccented, so Low-High-High-High. There is a slight increase in pitch in the middle of the double "o" at the beginning.)

For those who are familiar with the International Phonetic Alphabet, you can generally get away with most Japanese pronunciations by reading the Hepburn romanizations exactly as they were IPA (at least for the vowels). It's pretty close. So, something like /u.ʃi.o/ and /oː.ʃi.o/ would work for most people.