[lojban-beginners] Re: PodCast comments ...

[Chris Capel <pdf23ds@gmail.com>]

On 9/20/05, Wim Coenen <wim.coenen@advalvas.be> wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 20, 2005 at 04:54:59PM +0100, Colin Wright wrote:
> > I have a real problem with part of it, though.  Throughout the letter "o" is
> > being pronounced as the vowel sound(s) in these words:
> >
> >     low
> >     though
> >     toe
> >     crow
> >
> > This includes, specifically, in the word "lojban".  My understanding from the
> > written material is that the "o" sound should be a pure vowel, pronounced as
> > in "topic" or "hot".
> 
> I had the same feeling about the pronounciation of lojban. It sounds
> very american that way, but I wouldn't call it wrong. Plus, I just listened
> to the podcast again, and realized that epkat only pronounces lojban
> 'american style' when it's part of an english sentence, *not* in the lojban
> parts.

Well, the thing is, if you pronounce the O as in "top", then you have
to shift the A over to where it is "van" and "can", otherwise the two
sounds are the same. And, yes, I would say that's a very American
sounding pronunciation, and also very very wrong! And it would
probably be terribly confusing, probably utterly unintelligible at
first, and very difficult for a time thereafter, to many non-English
speakers, though I'm just guessing here.

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)