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"this letter sounds like" controversies | ||
Tags: Alphabets | Pronunciation | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 4841 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes  Speaks: Russian* | Message 17 of 25 22 October 2012 at 6:53pm | IP Logged | |||||
For a Russian ear there is no much difference between [h] and [x], so you can pronounce [h] before a vowel when you speak Russian. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4629 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 18 of 25 22 October 2012 at 6:58pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Really interesting are explanations for the voiceless consonants l, m, n, and r in Icelandic, which simply don't exist in other European languages (except Faroese). Colloquial Icelandic doesn't give the faintest clue how to pronounce them except for: "Try to speak an 'h' before the consonant", which is not really helpful at all. But at least it's better than 'voiceless l/m/n/r', which is the standard description in most other language materials. Nobody says that you have to pronounce the consonant + an [h] at the same time to come close to the sound.
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| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 6941 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 19 of 25 22 October 2012 at 7:31pm | IP Logged | |||||
At the same time though if I want to learn how to pronounce something, why would I rely on a description of it in print? If I want to learn how to pronounce something, I'd go for an audio or audio/visual recording of it knowing full well that a pronunciation guide on paper is hamstrung by needing to make reference to a language that I'm supposed to know. Those examples given in Colloquial Icelandic don't seem terribly enlightening on their own since I'd wonder how prominently I'm supposed to pronounce this hidden "h". 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| clumsy Octoglot Senior Member Poland lang-8.com/6715Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4963 days ago 1116 posts - 1367 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese, Korean, French, Mandarin, Italian, Vietnamese Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swedish Studies: Danish, Dari, Kirundi | Message 20 of 25 23 October 2012 at 2:33am | IP Logged | |||||
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" the letters 'i' and 'y' are pronounced the same in Polish, they are used to distinguish between palatalized and non palatalized consonants".
Not true :( They are clearly distinct. Moreover Si in Singapur is not palatalized, and still is different than 'y'. Edited by clumsy on 23 October 2012 at 2:45am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Ojorolla Diglot Groupie France Joined 4750 days ago 90 posts - 130 votes Speaks: French*, English | Message 21 of 25 23 October 2012 at 10:20am | IP Logged | |||||
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An American once told me the vowel in the French word 'peut' sounds exactly like the vowel in the Korean word '글'(geul) to his ears... which isn't correct.
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| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 4841 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 22 of 25 23 October 2012 at 12:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
To my mind, it is good to say voiceless l, m, n, r, because you can pronounce l, m, n, r and turn off your voice during that. Voiceless sonorants (is it the right word?) exist in Welsh and in Moksha as well. I can pronounce voiceless r and l. And of course I pronounce voiceless r every day but that's only an allophone of the voiced sound in Russian. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4629 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 23 of 25 23 October 2012 at 2:22pm | IP Logged | |||||
You're right. Of course good audio material is more important than any theoretical description, but when I start a language I find it very helpful if the formation of unknown sounds is explained, so I know what to do. It can be very difficult to imitate a sound only from hearing, especially if you can only hear it at normal speed of speech.
To simply say 'voiceless l, m, n, r' may make perfect sense to a phonetician, but anyone who doesn't happen to be one will ask himself how the f*** to pronounce an l, m, n, or r without voicing it! That's why an explanation of how to do that would be very helpful for a beginner - combined with some good recordings of that sounds. Now, I can pronounce those sounds, too, but it took me a lot of practice, during which I had to figure out more or less on my own how voiceless sonorants are produced. Edited by Josquin on 23 October 2012 at 2:24pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Mauritz Octoglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 4853 days ago 223 posts - 325 votes Speaks: Swedish*, EnglishC2, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, Esperanto, French Studies: Old English, Yiddish, Arabic (Written), Mandarin, Korean, Portuguese, Welsh, Icelandic, Afrikaans | Message 24 of 25 23 October 2012 at 4:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
They exist in Welsh ;) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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