口

[bbjordy4740]

Hi there

I have a question that probably has a very easy answer. But I started my adventure of learning japanese with some of jap.pod101 video's on youtube on how to write. There I came across the word kuchi 口(くち)[mouth]. On the introduction lesson #2 on the Kanji close up, I came across the word Yamaguchi 山口 (やまぐち)[a surname]. Here they also put down mouth 口but here it comes from ぐちguchi instead of くちkuchi. Is there a reason these 2 differ but still mean the same? I'm just a newbie beginner so if it contains a lot of grammar or rules and stuff I'll just take it as it is.
Thanks for the attention!


どうも

[jkerianjapanesepod5596]

This often happens with compounded kanji words. The second (or later) kanji will have it's pronunciation "voiced".

口 is a particularly common one. 入口、北口、etc

Another odd thing that can happen is when on kanji yomi ends in つ or even く, the pronunciation will be as a chiisai っ, hardening the start of the next kanji. 説教 is one example.

Note that this does not happen every time, so you do have to learn the words specifically.