INNOVATIVE PRONUNCIATION		Katakana Lesson 4, Page 128: Note 20
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Katakana ウ with nigori is used to represent the voiced labiodental 'v' which occurs in Japanese only in loanwords in the more innovative variety of the language. When followed by a reduced vowel a, i, e, or o, ヴ represents the v only. Without a following reduced vowel, ヴ represents the syllable vu. Thus:   ヴァ va   ヴィ vi   ヴ vu   ヴェ ve   ヴォ vo In the less innovative variety of Japanese, バ ba, ビ bi, ブ bu, ベ be, ボ bo occur instead of these special combinations. Examples: ヴァチカン ヴァンクーヴァー ヴィシー ヴォルガ サーヴ   vatikan 'Vatican'   vankuuvaa 'Vancouver'   visii 'Vichy'   voruga 'Volga' (river)   saavu 'serve'
"...one-fourth of all the characters used in modern Japanese occur in three-fourths of all the most frequently occurring words. This means that by concentrating on learning approximately 500 select characters, the student is assured of being able to read 75% of all the high-frequency words he will encounter in modern literature." - The Kanji Way to Japanese Language Power.

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