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What does English sound like to Foreigners? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes  Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 9 of 25 28 July 2011 at 12:01pm | IP Logged | ||
Actually I think they would be of the same opinion. The big test would be whether Dutch or Afrikaans speakers would hear the phenomenon or not - their languages are also heavily 'diphongated' but in opposite directions: Dutch diphtongs mostly go from open to closed sounds, the Afrikaans diphthongs from closed to open. Would they notice the unwanted diphthongs in the same places? And now you might ask: why do the Germans, whose language also is full of diphtongs, care about the diphtongs of their Anglophones brethren? Well, have a look at the example. The anonymous German prankster keeps a stiff oberlip at the one case where German also has a diphtong (heisssee), but makes mercilessly fun of the elongated final sound (because it would just be a short schwa sound in German). In almost all other cases the corresponding German sound would be a 'flat' vowel: "'Giuuteein Teeag' (guuuuten Taaaag)". However I doubt that the Anglophone speaker of German would say 'Giuuteein Teeag' - something like 'Gouwten Täeeg' would be more likely. And of course there are exceptions like kyssäkaali who have learnt to suppress this tendency. Edited by Iversen on 28 July 2011 at 2:01pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ojorolla Diglot Groupie France Joined 4966 days ago 90 posts - 130 votes Speaks: French*, English | Message 10 of 25 28 July 2011 at 12:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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The English pitch varies too much, it is hard to keep up with, especially because I'm not a good singer. And I think it may sound somewhat rough: Its stresses are so heavy as to weaken the neighboring syllables.
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| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6012 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 11 of 25 28 July 2011 at 1:30pm | IP Logged | ||
That would depend on the accent, though. This spelling makes me think of the English upper classe "cut glass" accent, even Earhart wouldn't have spoken like that. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 25 28 July 2011 at 2:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have now changed my prediction into 'Gouwten Täeeg' - and yes, English is so varied that other pronunciations might be heard. Actually some German dialects also would have noteworthy diphtongs. In the Southernmost part of Germany "guten Tag" might be be pronounced like /guorrten tork/ (there is actually a program on Bayrische Rundfunk called something like "Bei uns dahoam" (bei uns daheim, 'with us there-home').
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| KimG Diglot Groupie Norway Joined 4978 days ago 88 posts - 104 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Portuguese, Swahili | Message 13 of 25 28 July 2011 at 2:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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Well, you got the refrain of Asereje, It's gibberish american as heard by a Spanish speaker who hear an American song on radio, and think it's cool, without understanding anything.
When I heard that song first, I thought, "what the h**k is that chorus/refrain part of the song? Must be some incredible complex Spanish I don't get.", then I found this now, the PORTUGUESE translation of the song: Asereje Portuguese Hehehe, then I finally figured it out. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5566 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 14 of 25 28 July 2011 at 3:14pm | IP Logged | ||
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This reminds me of Agent Crabtree from the (rather rubbish) English comedy called 'Allo Allo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=960UYL3Vue8 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4950 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 15 of 25 28 July 2011 at 5:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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On the opposite end, when English speakers imitate a Spanish speaker trying to speak English, they make their vowes pure and short:
"AI nid tu go tu rest rum. Kan yiu tel mi uer ai kan faind uan?" 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| ScottScheule Diglot Senior Member United States scheule.blogspot.com Joined 5229 days ago 645 posts - 1176 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Latin, Hungarian, Biblical Hebrew, Old English, Russian, Swedish, German, Italian, French | Message 16 of 25 28 July 2011 at 5:36pm | IP Logged | ||
Not terribly rude at all. This is one of the perennial problems classical voice professors deal with teaching Anglophones to sing in the Romance languages. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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