6 ms·

I'm learning German, and only found out last weekend that the reason Germans pronounce W's as V is because they don't hear the difference. I was trying to get m

I'm learning German, and only found out last weekend that the reason Germans pronounce W's as V is because they don't hear the difference. I was trying to get my (German) gf to explain why some words start with a "V" sound and some with a "W" sound, and she couldn't tell the difference. It's all the same sound to them. I now know how to pronounce German W's properly (the sound exactly halfway between W and V). Of course, they pronounce V like F, so I still have to get used to that ;)

lordnacho 7y ago
The bible story about Shibboleths is quite an interesting example of this, and also where the term comes from.
- 77pt77 7y ago
  https://biblehub.com/judges/12-6.htm https://biblehub.com/judges/12-6.htm For those that don't know.
  - marcus_holmes 7y ago
    ahh, killing 42,000 people because of a mispronunciation. Gotta love that pro-life attitude that religion has ;)
    - 77pt77 7y ago
      I had completely forgotten about this story. It was nice to read it once again...
henrikschroder 7y ago
It's probably English that's the outlier here, though. 'W' is a double-V in other European languages, only in English is it called a double-U, and treated like a vowel.
- estomagordo 7y ago
  Treated like a vowel now?
  - henrikschroder 7y ago
    Other way around then? Is a consonant, but a defacto vowel? Whatever, English is weird.
    - OJFord 7y ago
      Why do you say it's a de facto vowel? It isn't used like a vowel. There's no word 'XwY' for any string of letters X,Y - and you can't prounounce 'xwy' (for any single letters x,y) without adding vowel sound.
      - checkyoursudo 7y ago
        I suspect in the sense that 'w' acts like a long vowel or a diphthong in many cases in English when it is used in the middle or at the of a word. E.g., (spelling vs pronunciation) 'town' vs 'toun', 'own' vs 'oan', 'bow' vs 'bo' or 'bau', etc. It definitely seems like the most vowel-like consonant after 'y'.
        OJFord 7y ago
        'Semi-vowel' seems to be the word, for 'y' too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semivowel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semivowel
      - henrikschroder 7y ago
        > There's no word 'XwY' for any string of letters X,Y Awe, ewe, owe, awl, owl, own, two... But my point was that in all other European languages, the letter 'W' is clearly a consonant, usually realized as [v] or [ʋ], and seen as a variant of 'V'. English is the odd one out, English sees it as a variant of 'U', and it's not clearly a consonant, it's a semi-vowel as you pointed out further down.
claudius 7y ago
Well, the English "V" is nearly identical to German "W"; the German "V" is nearly identical to English and German "F" and the English "W" doesn't quite exist in German. Someone had to point out to me as well that I was mispronouncing "water" as "vater" instead of "uuater" about ten years after I was somewhat fluent in the language. I never heard the difference before and native English speakers typically don't go around correcting the pronunciation of strangers….
OJFord 7y ago
Hindi (which I'm learning) is similar - व (usually transliterated 'va') is somewhere between an English 'w' & 'v' - not as much 'lip vibration' as the latter but more than the former. It varies across the v <-> w spectrum depending on region, and also some words seem mostly nearer one or the other (but it's the same character, there isn't a second). You sometimes hear that in native speaker's English, but more 'v's sounding nearer a 'w' than the other way around (as in native German speakers). Fascinating how growing up with different languages teach us different sounds, and those we didn't use can be so difficult to produce, even if we can hear and understand the difference. I struggle with two things in Hindi: aspiration (transliterated as 'ta' vs 'tha' for example, but that's not an English 'th', it's 'ta' with air forced out) which I usually either don't pronounce clearly, or it's way over-exaggerated; and retroflex consonants, which I can hear but often struggle to pronounce correctly quickly enough to flow with the rest of the word. And particularly 'd.a' which when correctly pronounced contains (to my ear) some 'r'.
- marcus_holmes 7y ago
  The German "ch" sound is the thing I struggle with. Not a hard "ch" as in "church", but a soft sound like "shhh" (but in the back of the throat). Pretty hard for an English speaker to do, especially straight after/before rolling an "R"
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]

lordnacho 7y ago

The bible story about Shibboleths is quite an interesting example of this, and also where the term comes from.

77pt77 7y ago
https://biblehub.com/judges/12-6.htm https://biblehub.com/judges/12-6.htm For those that don't know.
- marcus_holmes 7y ago
  ahh, killing 42,000 people because of a mispronunciation. Gotta love that pro-life attitude that religion has ;)
  - 77pt77 7y ago
    I had completely forgotten about this story. It was nice to read it once again...

henrikschroder 7y ago

It's probably English that's the outlier here, though. 'W' is a double-V in other European languages, only in English is it called a double-U, and treated like a vowel.

estomagordo 7y ago
Treated like a vowel now?
- henrikschroder 7y ago
  Other way around then? Is a consonant, but a defacto vowel? Whatever, English is weird.
  - OJFord 7y ago
    Why do you say it's a de facto vowel? It isn't used like a vowel. There's no word 'XwY' for any string of letters X,Y - and you can't prounounce 'xwy' (for any single letters x,y) without adding vowel sound.
    - checkyoursudo 7y ago
      I suspect in the sense that 'w' acts like a long vowel or a diphthong in many cases in English when it is used in the middle or at the of a word. E.g., (spelling vs pronunciation) 'town' vs 'toun', 'own' vs 'oan', 'bow' vs 'bo' or 'bau', etc. It definitely seems like the most vowel-like consonant after 'y'.
      - OJFord 7y ago
        'Semi-vowel' seems to be the word, for 'y' too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semivowel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semivowel
    - henrikschroder 7y ago
      > There's no word 'XwY' for any string of letters X,Y Awe, ewe, owe, awl, owl, own, two... But my point was that in all other European languages, the letter 'W' is clearly a consonant, usually realized as [v] or [ʋ], and seen as a variant of 'V'. English is the odd one out, English sees it as a variant of 'U', and it's not clearly a consonant, it's a semi-vowel as you pointed out further down.

claudius 7y ago

Well, the English "V" is nearly identical to German "W"; the German "V" is nearly identical to English and German "F" and the English "W" doesn't quite exist in German. Someone had to point out to me as well that I was mispronouncing "water" as "vater" instead of "uuater" about ten years after I was somewhat fluent in the language. I never heard the difference before and native English speakers typically don't go around correcting the pronunciation of strangers….

OJFord 7y ago

Hindi (which I'm learning) is similar - व (usually transliterated 'va') is somewhere between an English 'w' & 'v' - not as much 'lip vibration' as the latter but more than the former. It varies across the v <-> w spectrum depending on region, and also some words seem mostly nearer one or the other (but it's the same character, there isn't a second). You sometimes hear that in native speaker's English, but more 'v's sounding nearer a 'w' than the other way around (as in native German speakers). Fascinating how growing up with different languages teach us different sounds, and those we didn't use can be so difficult to produce, even if we can hear and understand the difference. I struggle with two things in Hindi: aspiration (transliterated as 'ta' vs 'tha' for example, but that's not an English 'th', it's 'ta' with air forced out) which I usually either don't pronounce clearly, or it's way over-exaggerated; and retroflex consonants, which I can hear but often struggle to pronounce correctly quickly enough to flow with the rest of the word. And particularly 'd.a' which when correctly pronounced contains (to my ear) some 'r'.

marcus_holmes 7y ago
The German "ch" sound is the thing I struggle with. Not a hard "ch" as in "church", but a soft sound like "shhh" (but in the back of the throat). Pretty hard for an English speaker to do, especially straight after/before rolling an "R"
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]