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Native Spanish speaker lacks "rr" | ||
Tags: Pronunciation | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| drp9341 Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 4715 days ago 115 posts - 217 votes  Speaks: Italian, English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French Studies: Japanese | Message 9 of 11 17 September 2012 at 4:22am | IP Logged |
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In Cusco Peru, a decent amount of Native Spanish speakers who are from a Quechua background can produce the
trilled "RR" BUT it does not sound like the trilled R of other Spanish dialects. They can make it, but it's not very pronounced at all and sometimes can be difficult to hear at all. I attended medical lectures given by a doctor from the city of Cusco who was bilingual in Quechua, although grew up in the city therefore spoke Spanish better, and even he had that difficulty with the trilled "RR" Although they definitely didn't replace it with a "th" sound 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dmarman Bilingual Triglot Newbie Spain Joined 4339 days ago 3 posts - 4 votes Speaks: Spanish*, Catalan*, English Studies: German, Mandarin | Message 10 of 11 20 September 2012 at 5:41pm | IP Logged |
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In Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba they do not pronounce RR. For me they
pronouced it like a L sound. And of course it's not a deffect on the speech if your living in those countries! But if your leaving in others where the RR is pronounced, then it's a deffect. Extra information as a native speaker: -We cannot trill RR while whispering, we pronounce something like the chinese r. -Depending on the position of the RR, it's hard to do that sound and if you trill it, it sounds wierd. -Sport commentors or in advertisements you can find long trills just to make the speech with more emphasis. You just need to check wikipedia: "R" sounds All varieties of Spanish distinguish between a "single-R" and a "double-R" phoneme. The single-R phoneme corresponds to the letter "r" written once (except when word-initial or following "l", "n", or "s") and is pronounced as [ɾ], an alveolar flap—like American English "tt" in better—in virtually all dialects. In some dialects, the single-R phoneme in syllable-final position loses its contrast with /l/, so a word such as artesanía may sound like altesanía. This neutralization or "leveling" of /ɾ/ and /l/ is frequent in dialects of southern Spain, the Caribbean, Venezuela, coastal Colombia, and central Chile.[10] The double-R phoneme is spelled "rr" between vowels and "r" word-initially or following "l", "n", or "s". In most varieties it is pronounced as a an alveolar trill, and that is considered the prestige pronunciation. Two notable variants occur, however, one sibilant and the other velar or uvular. The pronunciation of the phoneme as a voiced strident (or sibilant) apical fricative is common in New Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica; highland areas of Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Chile; western and northern Argentina, and Paraguay.[11] Some linguists have attempted to explain the assibilated "rr" as a result of influence from Native American languages, and it is true that in the Andean regions mentioned an important part of the population is bilingual in Spanish and one or another indigenous language. Nonetheless, other researchers have pointed out that sibilant "rr" in the Americas may not be an autonomous innovation, but rather a pronunciation that originated in some northern Spanish dialects and then was exported to the Americas. Spanish dialects spoken in the Basque Country, Navarre, la Rioja, and northern Aragon (regions that contributed substantially to Spanish-American colonization) show the fricative or postalveolar variant for "rr" (especially for the word-initial "rr" sound, as in Roma or rey). The other major variant for the "rr" phoneme—common in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba—is articulated at the back of the mouth, either as a glottal [h] followed by a voiceless apical trill or, especially in Puerto Rico, as a voiceless uvular trill [χ] or velar [x]. This [χ] realization for "rr" maintains its contrast with the phoneme /x/, as the latter tends to be realized as a soft glottal [h]: compare Ramón [χaˈmõ̞ŋ]~[xaˈmõ̞ŋ] ('Raymond') with jamón [haˈmõ̞ŋ] ('ham'). Edited by dmarman on 20 September 2012 at 5:41pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| anamsc2 Tetraglot Groupie United States Joined 4362 days ago 85 posts - 186 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Catalan, German Studies: French | Message 11 of 11 23 September 2012 at 8:33am | IP Logged |
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Not to mention that it's not uncommon for people to have trouble with various aspects of their heritage language (for many people raised in the US but from Spanish-speaking homes, English is their stronger language). The 'rr' sound is already one of the last sounds acquired by a native Spanish speaker (who grows up in a Spanish-speaking country) -- I believe that up to age 7 is still considered a normal acquisition timeframe. Add to that that this child presumably does not have the exposure to / opportunities to learn Spanish that a child would have in Mexico, and that speech therapists in the US often take a pragmatic approach and wouldn't necessarily work on something like that, and it's not surprising that he hasn't fully acquired the sound. I think you'd find that many heritage speakers of Spanish in the US can't consistently pronounce a 'rr' (and they may have different strategies to compensate). Of course, as others have said, it could also very well be his dialect. There are dialects of Spanish that don't use a trill /r/ for that sound.
Interestingly, I have known of a couple Andorrans who couldn't produce the sound, and they tend to go with a French 'r' sound as a replacement. That's probably because of the overall familiarity with French in the country -- people readily interpret that sound as being some sort of 'r,' whereas in other places they might interpret it as a g or something. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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