Rendaku: Why it's HITOBITO and not HITOHITO

The Tofugu Podcast: Japan and Japanese Language

Have you ever wondered why 人々 is ひとびと and not ひとひと, or even ひとぴと? Or why it’s てがみ instead of てかみ, or くさばな and not くさはな? It’s all because of a little thing called rendaku, or “sequential voicing,” which we talk about in this episode. While most Japanese teachers will just say, “it’s a mystery,” we’ll teach you the rules that make things rendaku or not, and the exceptions in between. Of course, we couldn’t explain EVERYTHING. For that, you’ll have to jump over to our very in-depth rendaku article on Tofugu: https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/rendaku