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And then there is this beast: ع a consonant pronounced so far back in the throat that you must wait two hours after eating to safely attempt it. Naturally it's
by rmbryan 7y ago
And then there is this beast: ع a consonant pronounced so far back in the throat that you must wait two hours after eating to safely attempt it. Naturally it's one of the most common sounds in the language.
- AtlasLion 7y agoYour body is made to make that sound, you just need to let it do it instead of fighting it.
- vowelless 7y agoTell that to the Arabs who can’t bronounce “p”
- AtlasLion 7y agothe statement still stands.
- SketchySeaBeast 7y agoOur bodies are made to pronounce a ton of sounds we both can't hear and speak as adults. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/accents-are-forever-35886605/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/accents-are-fo...
- yorwba 7y agoThe expert quoted in that article disagrees with the idea that you can't do it: "People talk about a 'window of opportunity' for learning language," Kuhl says. "The implication is that if you miss that opportunity, it's too late. I don't agree. It is more difficult with the years. But not impossible." Personally, I think the largest difficulty is the amount of practice required. Kids can babble about all day, but as an adult, even investing an hour a day into language practice is hard to find the time for.
- Cyph0n 7y agoWell, there is no “p” in Arabic, so it makes sense that native Arab speakers would struggle with it initially. The same applies to “v”. As a native speaker of both Arabic and English, I have no trouble with pronouncing letters in either language.
- ocschwar 7y agoCan you figure out which dialect the original author is learning here? From some of the vocabulary I'm pretty sure it isn't the Damascene Arabic I learned.
- Cyph0n 7y agoIt’s formal Arabic, i.e., Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). This is a neutral and more grammatically correct version of the language. Its use is mostly limited to the written medium, but is also used for verbal communication in news channels and academic contexts.
- barry-cotter 7y agoCalling FuSha (Modern Standard Arabic) a >neutral and more grammatically correct version of the language is nuts. Arabic isn’t a language any more than the Romance languages are. Moroccan, Egyptian and Yemeni Arabic are at least as divergent as Spanish, French and Romanian. FuSha is like if the entire Romance speaking world wrote in Latin. The academic contexts FuSha is used in are also limited to primary and secondary instruction, Arabic language and religion mostly. Tertiary education across the Arab world is often conducted in English or French so the educated classes will speak at least one of those languages at a near native level. That’s part of why there are fewer books translated into Arabic each year than into Dutch.
- Cyph0n 7y agoTrue, the differences are significant, to say the least...
- 7y ago
- ComputerGuru 7y agoIt’s more an inability to grasp it rather than an inability to produce that sound. It’s especially apparent when after learning to make the “p” sound, ESL (or ETL/EFL even!) Arabs go around saying “apsoloutely no broblem.” The most common reverse substitution is probably “peautiful” with considerable emphasis on the p.
- ithkuil 7y agoThe mechanics of speech is complicated and most of the people most of the time have no idea what is actually going on, pretty much like with breathing. It doesn't help that alphabetical writing systems are sold to us from young age as if they were actual representing the sounds. They are not, and in more subtle ways than you'd think. For example, in the context of B's and P's, English has "explosive consonants". In many words the "p" sound is actually followed by a puff of air. But this also happens incidentally when B is followed by some other sounds. Imagine pronouncing "beautiful" without emitting any puff of air after the B and you'll notice you sound Italian or Indian. So, if your native language doesn't have the p sound at all and you learn it from examples in English it's quite likely you'll latch on the "puff of air" feature of exaggerated explosive variant of the p sound you might be practicing a lot. You'll then hear a similar sound in beautiful, and try to repeat that too but native speakers might percieve that as a p sound
- ComputerGuru 7y agoThat's an interesting explanation, thank you.
- rvense 7y agoIts formal name is 'amanual autoasphyxiation', because to pronounce the 'ayn, you simply attempt to strangle yourself without using your hands. I remember looking up from my grammar book one day I felt particularly stupid and saying to one of my classmates that this language must have been thought up by a sadist on a bad day! To which they replied that he was, in fact, probably having his best day ever. (I never learned to speak it, properly, but I feel better for having attempted)
- frenchyatwork 7y agoAs a random anecdote, [ʢ] and [ʕ] (the sounds that make ع) are my 9 month old son's favourite sounds.
- simlevesque 7y agocan someone link to a video/recording of the sound ?
- idlewords 7y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSwHMvc0zM4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSwHMvc0zM4
- AtlasLion 7y agoMaha explains how to pronounce it quite Nicely here https://youtu.be/Y0ro6b50-Lk?t=159 https://youtu.be/Y0ro6b50-Lk?t=159
- kissickas 7y agoIt's not an uvular letter though, it's pharyngeal (to epiglottal in some places). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayin#Arabic_%CA%BFayn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayin#Arabic_%CA%BFayn
- AtlasLion 7y agoTrue, she struggled with that part, but that technique of limiting the airflow by hand works and gives you a good feel on how to pronounce it.
- Rampoina 7y agoI was a bit confused with it being called a consonant. After some research, although I had a flawed understanding of vowels and consonants, I think it's classified as a semivowel.
- fortran77 7y agoThe Hebrew Ayin (ע) is also pronounced as a glottal stop in some communities -- Like the Jews who returned to Israel from communities in Syria and Iraq). So is a "Hay" (ה) with a Dagesh (usally not written) at the end of a word is pronounced short way back in the throat by Jews who came back to Israel after exile in North Africa (Tunisia, etc.)
- einpoklum 7y agoNot just "in some communities"; glottal ע is the recognized correct pronunciation. We Ashkenazi are just lazing out with proper pronunciation.
- marton78 7y agoHow do you pronounce the ayin?
- edanm 7y ago(Not parent) Basically "ah-in" or "ah-yin" ("ah" being pronounced like when a doctor tells you "open your mouth and say ah"). It makes the use of that letter much closer to "a" (א or ה in Hebrew). We don't really involve the deep part of the throat, though I think it's pretty well known that you're "supposed to".
- 2rsf 7y agovery close to א and ה... They all sound like Ah/I/Uh/Eh depending on the punctuation
- lordgrenville 7y ago"Recognized correct" in the sense that we guess that's how ancient Hebrew speakers pronounced it, based on Arabic. But we don't really know for sure.
- mehrdadn 7y agoOh man, it's not that bad is it :-) but yeah I was trying to think of a way to explain this in text and it's hard... but the closest English equivalent I can think of is the diaeresis, like when you say "naïve"... except, imagine if instead of blending the 'a' and 'ï' together, you made as hard of a constant-ish boundary as you possibly could. I think that's a rough approximation?
- jfk13 7y agoI'm not sure I can describe any better, but I think most English speakers would tend to produce a glottal stop [ʔ] between the vowels in response to that description, rather than a pharyngeal fricative.
- mehrdadn 7y agoYeah that's true. Also just realized I wrote constant when I meant consonant... hope that wasn't confusing.
- dsimms 7y agohttps://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/feb/07/learn-arabic-pronunciation https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/feb/07/learn-arabic-... says: : We have a muscle in our throat which is never used except in vomiting. Think about that and pretend you are about to be sick. You will find that what is normally called in English gagging is actually a restriction in the deep part of the throat. If you begin to gag, and then release the airstream from the lungs, you will have produced a perfect : (called :ain in Arabic).
- hinkley 7y agoIs that the same muscle used to roll Rs in some of the Romance languages?
- etatoby 7y agoNo, the rolled R is just a vibration of the tongue against the roof of the mouth.
- hinkley 7y agoYeah I dunno how to tell you this, but those of us who make the rrr sound at the back of our throats roll our eyes at you when your backs are turned. I can't speak for the other Romance languages, but that's for sure the wrong way to make that sound in French, and a lot of people can't seem to hear the difference. There's a reason some comedians make fun of european languages by clearing their throats. The rolled consonants are throaty, not mouthy (a word I just made up right now, sue me).
- ocschwar 7y agoMy first name starts with it. Owing to my accent, I have trouble pronouncing it. Growing up in Israel, among "Arab Jews" who did not have this problem, I was reminded daily of the difficulty I have in pronouncing my own name.
- mcguire 7y agoGiven the trouble I have with the glottal stop in "mcguire", I understand your problem.
- amaccuish 7y agoDoes anyone know if it's similar to russian ы in that respect? I know people in my russian class use to struggle with ы.
- yongjik 7y agoPresumably French speakers would feel the same about English /h/, a sound that is created even farther back in the throat (glottal vs. pharyngeal(?)).
- anticensor 7y ago/h/ is not really a fricative, though. Linguists consider it a voice transistion.
- omarish 7y agoThat's the first letter of my name.
- zouhair 7y agoNone of my western friend can pronounce ق some can handle ع but the ق is a lost cause.
- whalabi 7y agoYeah that one's tough for me and I grew up Arab ت
- whalabi 7y agoIt's really not that hard It's in the word "Saudi" for example - right when you transition from the a to the oo sound, your throat just does a bit of the work along with your mouth. There's another letter that's way harder in my Arab-Australian opinion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qoph#Arabic_q%C4%81f https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qoph#Arabic_q%C4%81f That one legit is close to a cough, just higher up in the throat.
- sdiq 7y agoSomali does have this sound too. I am yet to come across another language with the same.