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"Germans can’t say ’squirrel’" | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| translator2 Senior Member United States Joined 6924 days ago 848 posts - 1862 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 9 of 24 11 February 2012 at 4:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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The German word that always trips me up is Chirurg or Chirurgie.
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| IronFist Senior Member United States Joined 6442 days ago 663 posts - 941 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 10 of 24 11 February 2012 at 6:52pm | IP Logged | ||
Cool. I asked because the Google Translate pronunciation sounded a bit different but I figured it was just an issue with the synthesized speech. Yes, that's a hard word to say! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kat0 Diglot Groupie Austria Joined 4715 days ago 89 posts - 97 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Mandarin, Bengali, Russian, Arabic (Written) | Message 11 of 24 11 February 2012 at 9:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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That's funny, it just reminded me of that Austrians like to make non-native speakers say "Oachkatzlschwoaf" (which is a dialect expression for squirrel's tail, "Eichhörnchenschwanz" - there are even videos on youtube about it).
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 Fasulye Heptaglot Winner TAC 2012 Moderator Germany fasulyespolyglotblog Joined 5852 days ago 5460 posts - 6006 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, DutchC1, EnglishB2, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Danish, Norwegian, Turkish Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 24 16 February 2012 at 5:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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For me as a German native it's not difficult to pronounce the English word "squirrel" correctly.
Fasulye 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6587 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 13 of 24 16 February 2012 at 6:33pm | IP Logged | ||
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Is this valid for both the Standard American and the British RP pronunciations? I can see people having trouble with the American version, seeing as it's comprised entirely of consonant sounds. No doubt a Japanese speaker, with a native language famous for its lack of consonant clusters, would find that hard! But the RP version?
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| IronFist Senior Member United States Joined 6442 days ago 663 posts - 941 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 14 of 24 17 February 2012 at 1:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Ari: I assumed it was for the American version, and I agree with your assessment of American vs. RP.
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| ReQuest Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 5037 days ago 200 posts - 228 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, French Studies: Spanish | Message 15 of 24 17 February 2012 at 8:31am | IP Logged | ||
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This topic has been annoying me ever since it popped up, I mean, they might be able to pronounce it or not, who cares?
I can make about 100 or so topics saying: "Americans can't say gracht!!!!" and the likes. Really, does it matter? Edited by ReQuest on 17 February 2012 at 8:32am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5565 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 16 of 24 17 February 2012 at 2:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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I sympathise because I always find those examples like Swiss kitchen cupboards und creamy Danish red berry desserts a bit pointless, but "squirrel" is just one of those words (and animals) that is just intrinsically funny and cute. You're going to have to come up with something better than "gracht" for a fair comparison.
edit: or rather, I don't find them pointless, but every single introduction to or commentary on those languages seems to include those examples. They might have been funny the first time. Edited by schoenewaelder on 17 February 2012 at 3:26pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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