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Why is Italian considered beatiful? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6601 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 25 of 35 19 February 2014 at 5:47am | IP Logged | ||
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| Henkkles Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 4257 days ago 544 posts - 1141 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Swedish Studies: Russian | Message 26 of 35 19 February 2014 at 11:01am | IP Logged | ||
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I think there are certain things that a lot of people consider beautiful in a language, here's my take on this:
For example more often than not people say that Finnish is a nice sounding language and that got me to thinking what actually makes a language sound nice to the average person. Here are my findings: 1. Isochrony Italian is a syllable timed language, just like Finnish (in general) so that there are no reduced syllables and all vowels ring clear and true, unlike in English where you can have a sentence with only one unstressed vowel and the consonant clusters are separated only by the schwa-vowel. 2. Phonotactics Italian and Finnish have huge overlaps in phonotactics; there are only a limited amount of consonants that can be word final, and most words end in a pronounced final vowel. Word initial consonant clusters are very limited if possible at all. The syllable structures are also very similar; both languages (alike Japanese) prefer these sort of syllables; CV CV: (only stressed syllable in Italian, other syllables also in Finnish) CVC which create what is commonly held as a "smooth" or "even" flow. Compare to the English monosyllabic word "twelfths" which has a syllable structure as follows: CCVCCCC although Italian allows up to a triple consonants in word initial position. 3. Phoneme inventory There are certain sounds that are considered harsh and unpleasant and those are very often pronounced either in the velar, uvular or glottal areas. Italian phoneme inventory doesn't even go further than velar, where "w" and the hard-"g" are the closest to the throat as possible in standard Italian pronunciation. Finnish doesn't have any sounds in the uvular area, where the standard German "r" is pronounced. Fricatives are often considered unpleasant as well, more often coming from the back of the mouth than the front. Italian has five fricatives, the most "unpleasant" being probably the voiceless palato-alveolar sibilant "ʃ" (sh) which still doesn't reach quite as far. Finnish only has two fricatives, "s" and "h", but as the "h" is not a trilled velar but a smooth glottal one it doesn't usually get mentioned as "unpleasant" sounding. In comparison German has ten fricatives. 4. Palatalization While I personally like palatalization, from what I gather most people really don't. Italian has very limited palatalization, most notably the sounds of "c" and "g" change in front of "i" and "e". Finnish doesn't have any palatalization, save for a few eastern dialects. Personally I don't think there is such a thing as a beautiful or ugly language, to me all languages are equally graceful. If I find a language's sounds unpleasant I tell myself it's because I'm just not used to hearing those sounds, which always helps. It always makes me sad to see people give a hard time to languages for what they sound like. Edited by Henkkles on 19 February 2014 at 11:02am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Thor1987 Groupie Canada Joined 4738 days ago 65 posts - 84 votes Studies: German | Message 27 of 35 19 February 2014 at 2:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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While I don't think the actual sound of the language is unimportant, I do think it's
more a factor of cultural condition. I think it's hard pressed for most people when thinking of a language especially a beautiful one to not think of a romance language. I could easily envision a world where the exotic sounds of some eastern language were considered enriched full of prestige. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| vonPeterhof Tetraglot Senior Member Russian FederationRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4776 days ago 715 posts - 1527 votes Speaks: Russian*, EnglishC2, Japanese, German Studies: Kazakh, Korean, Norwegian, Turkish | Message 28 of 35 19 February 2014 at 7:49pm | IP Logged | ||
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Italian is actually one of the few languages whose sound I dislike, although it has little to do with its phonemes. I do love opera and really like how Italian sounds when it's sung. I probably also wouldn't mind whispered Italian, or Italian spoken by an expressionless, monotonous robot. The thing that annoys me about Italian spoken out loud by actual Italians is the intonation. More than anything this probably has to do with less than positive memories from the language school in England I attended every summer in my middle and high school years. The school I studied at in Kazakhstan sent a huge group there every year, and every time the only group comparable in size was from Italy. Because of this there was always lots of competitiveness and animosity between us "Kazakhs" and the Italians, as the two largest cliques. Maybe because of that whenever I hear people speaking Italian I start to suspect that they're secretly making fun of me :)
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| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4672 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 29 of 35 19 February 2014 at 9:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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In India, Italian is not considered beautiful. Sonia Gandhi's foreign accent is mocked at by almost every Indian.
In Croatia, Italian is not considered particularly beautiful, but annoying and girly/gay. On the other hand, Spanish is considered extremely beautiful (maybe because we get 20 Mexican, Colombian and Argentinian soap operas weekly and no programs from Italy). Many people don't like open and closed E's and O's of Italian (because in Croatian they're marker of peasent's dialects, those close to Slovenian, standard Croatian vowels are intermediate E's and O's like in Spanish and Greek) I find the staccato rhythm of Italian and double consonants (doppie) annoying. After 5 min. of listening to Italian speaking, I find it stuffy. I find Brazilian Portuguese and Latin American Spanish much more beautiful than Italian. I find Flemish, Macedonian and Slovak more beautiful than Italian too. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 4049 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 30 of 35 20 February 2014 at 12:10am | IP Logged | ||
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Italian is a very nice sounding language, but I prefer the sound of French. And, in my opinion, none of these languages have anything on Irish in terms of beauty. Edited by Indíritheach on 20 February 2014 at 11:31pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4913 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 31 of 35 20 February 2014 at 12:35am | IP Logged | ||
The Italian language and an Italian accent are two different things. And the mockery is probably as politically motivated as anything else, since some Indians don't like the idea of a "foreigner" in Indian politics. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6601 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 32 of 35 20 February 2014 at 7:18am | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, the Italian accent is mocked in English too :)
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