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[lojban-beginners] Re: pronunciation
On 6/20/06, Alex Martini <alexjm@umich.edu> wrote:
On Jun 20, 2006, at 7:39 PM, Chris Capel wrote:
> When I was in grade school, it took me a week or two of speech therapy
> to learn to pronounce the American "r" sound. Several years ago, it
> took me (an American) about a year to really learn to easily pronounce
> a Spanish "r". (A trill between the tip of the tongue and the back of
> the front teeth.) A few months ago, it took me about two days to learn
> the French "r", which is a uvular trill. (I'm not sure if the uvula is
> actually flapping around, or what.) It could be that the latter is
> easier to learn, or maybe I'm just better at producing strange sounds
> nowadays.
Unfortunately, the other half of this is that I spend & have spent a
lot of time getting to know the shape of my mouth in different
positions so this doesn't work for everyone. The other thing is to
Well, would it be worth the effort to get to know the shape of one's
mouth? To understand those various linguistic terms relevant to
pronunciation? Language learners (with most curricula) already learn a
lot more about the target language's grammar than any uneducated
native speaker knows. Why not the same with pronunciation?
listen to a recording of the sounds, and try to copy them. Between
myself and some other Lojbanists, I'm sure we can pull together a
recording of just about any sound you need.
I don't personally have any problems currently, just thinking
generally. (As I said, I was able to pick up a uvular trill in a
couple days. The french "r" is often a uvular trill, and often a
uvular frictive, right? The speakers on my tapes do both, and sound
like they simply swallow it sometimes as well.)
> Do native Japanese and Chinese speakers learning to produce the "l"
> sound always have a lot of trouble? Is there some technique that can
> help them to consistently learn it?
There seems to be a common misconception that Chinese and Japanese
speakers sound the same when they (mis)pronounce English because of
their native language.
Did I forget to put a disclaimer in that I know little about Japanese
phonology and almost nothing about Chinese phonology? Oops, yes.
I don't know much Japanese, but a friend of
mine who has studied to near fluency tells me that their /r/ is in
Neat.
I don't think that this phoneme would actually be the hardest part of
Lojban for either of Japanese or Chinese speakers -- pronouncing a
syllable that ends in a consonant would be. In both languages, the
That's very interesting.
> Are there any consonant clusters in Lojban that commonly give English
> speakers trouble?
I would bet {ml} as in {mlatu} does, as well as {jr} as in {bajra}
and {kt} from {cukta}. These types of pairs aren't allowed in
English, so they're a tricky to wrap the tongue around.
Yes, I have a whole lot of trouble with {ml}. What does it sound like
when correctly pronounced? Does one voice the "m" with closed lips,
form the "l" with the tongue, and only then open the lips? That feels
so unnatural, but it comes out sounding about right.
As for the other two, I never had any trouble with them.
Really, there isn't a magic secret to learning new sounds. It helps
to practice a lot, especially the kind of practice that makes you
feel like an idiot where you just say the sounds over and over.
And yet some people take years and years to learn the sounds of
another language, and others only months. And then some never learn.
:-) I'm willing to chalk up that last to a lack of effort and proper
teaching, though.
Chris Capel
--
"What is it like to be a bat? What is it like to bat a bee? What is it
like to be a bee being batted? What is it like to be a batted bee?"
-- The Mind's I (Hofstadter, Dennet)