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oto

Diction
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

The Japanese word for sound, noise, or tone; a key sensory concept in classic haiku, conveying auditory depth in nature.

Detailed Definition
Oto is the final word in the romanized Japanese line and names the sound made by the frog’s splash. It is a basic Japanese noun, but English readers may still need help identifying it in the original text.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Bashō’s “mizu no oto,” oto means sound: the sound of water after the frog leaps; “Oto of rain on the shrine roof / enters the empty room” uses Japanese diction for atmosphere; A bilingual line might read “oto, sound, then silence widening”; The word helps students notice how haiku often centers one precise heard event
Additional Notes
The quoted line contains “oto,” a non-English word that most readers will not recognize without explanation.; Found in the poem, Frog Haiku by Matsuo Bashō
Also Known As
Ear Sound Perception Auditory Organ
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