Pronunciation Criticism
- Thread starter Pacifica
- Start date
Stop sounding like Ibn Juzay! Your Arabic recording is impatiently awaited
I'm sure you'll do much better than you think. We are all perfectionists here I'm sure, so we understand each other!Linguistics is not without its dangers. It comes with the territory.What the hell? Lol.
 Toothless smile.gif "(1) Toothless smile :toothless:")
Maybe I'll try an السلام عليكم or so. That's bold enough because there's a ayn in there.Stop sounding like Ibn Juzay! Your Arabic recording is impatiently awaited
Well I've tried recording السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته over twenty times and it's just awful for several reasons. First, the Rs are perhaps giving me even more trouble than the ayn (the rolled R has been my nemesis whenever I've tried speaking a language that has it—and, unfortunately, languages that have it are, what, 95% of languages in the world?). Second, I think I can somewhat manage ح between two vowels, but before another consonant it's harder. And third, while I thought I had produced something at least vaguely resembling ayn, when I listen to the recording it just seems to have vanished.
Last edited:
OOOOOH, that explains a lot. I've always liked "this sound", except I didn't realize there were two of them, but here I can hear it clearly. The one I focused one (and I think managed to get right in terms of pronunciation) is the first one, because oddly enough it's the same/similar enough to one that happens in Portuguese, Spanish and Japanese as an intervocalic allophone of /g/... I think, but I might be completely wrong on that. Anyway, thanks for the explanation and recording!Here's an example. On second thought I think the final R in Martinican leads me to simply raise my soft palate, while the 3 leads me to raise it AND contract some unidentified throat muscles to widen my throat.
I'll move on to Venezuela now, and no it's going to be terrible because my Spanish is the language whose pronunciation I've always neglected the most... But you've been brave enough to tackle a completely new language so it's my turn now (and tomorrow @Pacifica
I guess that could be some sort of short cautionary tale against speaking in tongues :')
Well, that sounds heroically great! Obviously not familiar enough with the accent to judge it, but it sounds good to my ear. I think both your "desde" and -ión's sound better than mine!
By the way, what's your default/reference accent when speaking Spanish?
lol. I would say that R's are pretty much the biggest trouble in most languages. For instance, the English R is still probably the sound I'm the most dissatisfied with in my pronunciation, even though you'd think by now that shouldn't be a problem anymore.
As for the tap/trill yeah it's an annoying one for native French speakers I think. It's not a language that leads to the kind of... flexibility of the tongue? that's needed, it seems.
Still looking forward to your recording
Or maybe you could try Old English, since I think you've dealt with that language?
Last edited:
I think you’re being really hard on yourself. Most people (myself included) need months if not years to really get a feel for those weird consonants. I think at first a more realistic objective would be to produce them in a way that would allow the listener to tell them apart. From my experience and from that of other people I know who have learned Arabic, it is perfectly normal to start off with approximations of those consonants, and with time to tweak them little by little until you really figure out how/where in the throat to pronounce them.
Actually I think I may have cheated! I didn’t transcribe and read back what she was saying, I simply shadowed her, and this may be misleading. I’ll try and have another crack at it as soon as I find the time.
My default accent when speaking Spanish is, sadly, a horrible French accent which I am accutely self-conscious of, and I hate speaking Spanish for that very reason. Unlike in English, it would have been easy to simply stick with the Madrid accent and try and mimick it as well as I could, but I really don’t like the Peninsular accent at all. I much prefer the Latin American seseo, and their more reasonable pace, and the overall feel of Latin American Spanish which to me sounds so much nicer than Spanish from Spain, but back when I was seriously working on my Spanish, I didn’t have easy access to Latin American input. What about you?
Hm, that can hardly be considered cheating. Indeed I think that's the way to go.
Ah well, just stick with your Venezuelan accent then! It might be harder to use it in normal speech (as opposed to shadowing), but that seems like a pretty good start.
As for me, I never really "spoke" Spanish, but when I read aloud I'm going for that Madrid-ish accent I recorded. I really like its... martial feel?
Last time I went with friends to a restaurant in Spain, we entered and I tried to say ’tenemos reserva para las 8’, and the s-trilled r combination (linking the two words) made me trip and I completely messed up my trilled initial R. And I started Spanish in middle school... I think I’ll never get it right.
This might be a bit off-topic but still about pronunciation. I’ve been taking a philosophy of science course and North American teachers on Youtube tend to pronounce the word ’empirical’ in a way which I find surprising, whereby the stressed i sounds like [ee]. See here for example, at around 2:48 when he says "empirically", I hear "empeerically", he repeats it again at 2:53, and at 4:33.
And it’s not just him, I’ve heard this from other natives too. I wonder why, I can’t remember noticing this in other words.
PS. I’ve noticed just now that he also says ’expeeriment’ at 6:18, which is something I’ve never heard from anyone else, but what do I know.
And it’s not just him, I’ve heard this from other natives too. I wonder why, I can’t remember noticing this in other words.
PS. I’ve noticed just now that he also says ’expeeriment’ at 6:18, which is something I’ve never heard from anyone else, but what do I know.
Last edited:
Thanks Clemens. So is it because the vowel is stressed? Does it happen whenever it is stressed? I wonder about the underlying pattern.
I think that's how I would naturally pronounce it. Maybe it's because I've heard that word a lot and there's a strong tendency for Americans to pronounce it that way. The speaker who recorded it on the Wiktionary page does seem to use an /i/ or /i:/ even though the IPA says /ɪmˈpɪɹɪkəl/.
"Expeeriment" though is a new one for me. Influenced by "experience" I would guess.
Last edited:
I would be tempted to say Süria just to wind them up
I’m really surprised by this American woman’s pronunciation:
If I didn’t know who she is, I would assume without a doubt that English is not her native tongue. How would you characterize her accent?
Thanks.
If I didn’t know who she is, I would assume without a doubt that English is not her native tongue. How would you characterize her accent?
Thanks.