[lojban-beginners] Re: z and s

[Philip Newton <philip.newton@gmail.com>]

On Fri, 25 Mar 2005 22:52:56 -0800, Brandon Wirick <bwirick@calpoly.edu> wrote:
> It's a pretty simple concept: with voiced
> consonants, your vocal chords move and make noise; with unvoiced
> consonants, they don't.

.ie

> In English, voice accounts for all the
> significant difference between 's' and 'z', 'p' and 'b', 't' and 'd',
> 'k' and hard 'g', 'ch' and 'j', etc. Hope that helps.

.ienai

Voice is a salient feature for the difference between those sounds,
but I'd say that it's not "all the significant difference" -- vowel
length also plays a part. In general, vowels before voiced consonants
are held significantly longer than before unvoiced consonants --
compare yourself saying "bus" and "buzz", "cap" and "cab", "pat" and
"pad", "back" and "bag", "larch" and "large" --, and this is probably
one thing that lets you understand even whispered speech, which has no
voice distinctions.

mu'o mi'e .filip.
-- 
Philip Newton <philip.newton@gmail.com>