The Letter य (ya)

This letter, य, makes the sound ya, which of course rhymes with क (ka).

First, let's examine the similarities between य (ya) and क (ka). There's that horizontal bar on top, which joins letters together. You're going to see on almost every Devanagari letter. Written together, these two letters would make कय. Don't try to think about what this would sound like, yet; I just want you to examine how they look joined together, hanging from the line. I also want to you look at both of them, and realize that the first one, क, makes the ka sound, and the second one, य, makes the ya sound.

How else are they similar? They both have a vertical bar coming down from the horizontal bar, although the vertical bars are in slightly different positions. Many letters have vertical bars, but not all.

How about differences? Besides the horizontal and vertical bars, everything else is different. In fact, the letter य (ya) should be easy to remember: if you were to take away the top bar, what's left looks like an English y with that has somehow been bent. (Maybe there was a letter क before it that कicked it, in which case the letter य यelled and यelped loudly as it was severely bent.) OK, so it doesn't look exactly like an English y, but you'll remember the sound, anyway.

Remember that य makes the ya sound, which is similar to (but not exactly) the sound in yum. It does not make the yā sound that rhymes with the English raw. Practice saying य: ya. ya. ya. ya.