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“Huh” exists in all human languages, according to research (2019)
- 7373737373 6y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_semantic_metalanguage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_semantic_metalanguage
- a_imho 6y agoThe word is ‘huh’.
- trishmapow2 6y agoLink to full article (PDF): https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0078273&type=printable https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/jo...
- ggm 6y agoQue?
- pwdisswordfish2 6y agoI’m sorry, he’s from Barcelona.
- thih9 6y agoI’d edit the title, current one seems clickbait. Maybe: The word “huh” exists in all human languages, according to research
- ColinWright 6y agoIn the past I've edited titles, carefully crafting them to give a better indication of the content, only to have people complain that the title has been changed, and subsequently to have the mods change it back. So I've given up even trying to put any thought into the title ... if the article seems like it would, should, or could be interesting to the HN community, I post it. I've been trained not to put any work into it.
- leeoniya 6y agosame. kind of absurd that when you try to un-editorialize some clickbaity bs into a tldr; it gets mod-reverted to the original vague crap. this modding style has definitely discouraged me from submitting articles here with good content but unfortunate headlines.
- dirkt 6y agoAnd if you read the article and look at the list of examples, it's more the variants of "what?" in different languages. "Huh" and variants exist additionally in quite a few as well.
- blablablerg 6y agoWell, 'huh' is basically a grunt.
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 6y agoIn the same way that TCP/IP wouldn't work without ACK/NACK, grunts are an important part of linguistics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backchannel_(linguistics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backchannel_(linguistics)
- GreenHeuristics 6y agoThey must have missed Swedish. We don't have 'huh', we have 'va'.
- Zitrax 6y agoI was thinking the same, I haven't heard 'huh' in Sweden, and 'va' doesn't sound much like it. I also read in the source: "Therefore we collected data from recordings of naturally occurring informal conversations in a sample of 10 languages from 5 continents, varying fundamentally in terms of phonology, word structure, and grammar (languages 1–10 in Figure 1)". That sounds pretty far from "all languages" as in the title.
- mkagenius 6y agoThat's really weird. So, all languages do not have word for say 'water' ? or say 'father' ?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- StavrosK 6y agoGreeks have "e?".
- ejolto 6y agoLook at the table, non of the words are literally "huh", but they convey the same meaning. The title is confusing, I had the same thought as you at first.
- flurdy 6y agoYeah the table has an Icelandic example: "Ha". Though I only lived in Sweden for a year so I can't remember but Norwegian has the word "Hæ" which certainly has the same meaning as the English "huh"
- hashmush 6y ago
- prmph 6y agoI'd expect many more words to exist in all languages. It would seem that there is a core set of words that are absolutely fundamental to any sort of spoken communication (yes/no, for example), and would be very surprised if this word "huh" is the only one so far found to exist in all languages.
- StavrosK 6y agoThe article says "sound the same", but then the words they found don't sound the same across the listed languages, so it's confusing.
- oehtXRwMkIs 6y agoIf you read more carefully you'll realize that the hypothesis is that "huh" is universal in both meaning and pronunciation.
- hashmush 6y agoIsn't Mandarin a typical example without yes and no? You answer affirmatively but repeating the verb and negatively by negating the verb. (it's not really that simple, but it illustrates the point)
- Wildgoose 6y agoIrish Gaelic is similar, affirming or negating the verb.
- deadwing0 6y agoIn some situations, yes, but you can say yes and no. 是 (shì, roughly translates to "is" in most situations) and 不是 (bú shì, no is). It's definitely not as cut and dry as the English yes and no, and it gives Chinese kids hell when they're learning English (I taught there for 6 years).
- hashmush 6y agoDefinitely and to add to that, to my understanding (better than basic, far from fluent), 是 is more of a fallback verb following the same pattern than it is a translation of "yes".
- j7ake 6y agoI was thinking “mom “ and “papa”. If “huh” is the standard for a word then also laughing words like “haha” are also universal.
- markdown 6y agoNot true. Eskimos laugh "ho ho ho".
- toohotatopic 6y agoLike Santa Claus, things add up.
- capableweb 6y agoThe physical sound of "haha" might be the same everywhere (to some degree, people laugh differently obviously) but different languages write "haha" different. Spanish: "jaja" or "jeje", Japanese: "wwwww"
- deadwing0 6y agoIn simplified Chinese: 哈哈哈！
- zanderwohl 6y agoThat's starting to get into paralinguistic territory. Sneeze sounds, for example, are learned to a degree (think some people sneezing very quietly or very loudly), and can be relearned even though they are involuntary in their timing, unlike "real" words.
- skrebbel 6y agoTheir Ig Nobel prize acceptance speech is excellent. I can't find it back right now (on mobile) but it's warmly recommended and not too long.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- INTPenis 6y agoHuh?[1] 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRsL9kCuZaA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRsL9kCuZaA
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- bishalb 6y agoI would say "haha" exists in all languages but what do I know?
- Cthulhu_ 6y agoThat's not a word though, that's an emotive sound, like crying. Sure, "haha" is a word you can use on the internet but it's the English interpretation of the sound laughter makes.
- yorwba 6y agoMost languages probably have an "interpretation of the sound laughter makes" and across the languages I know it's a fricative-vowel syllable repeated several times. That's about the level of similarity shown for 'huh?' across languages in the study.
- chownie 6y ago'Huh?' is significant because it forms a communicative purpose, it forms a request from listener to speaker to recall the previous spoken phrase. The study is showing that all languages have a sound for that purpose.
- bishalb 6y agoLook up onomatopoeia
- dogma1138 6y agoIt’s pretty clear that there are some grunts/vocalizations that are shared amongst all humans (and possibly primates) these would yes/agreement, no/disagreement, and question mark/surprise those aren’t language dependent. I’m not sure if it’s actually convergent evolution like the research paper implies my bet would that these predate humans by quite a bit, and some languages have a stronger onomatopoeic relationship between the base grunts and their question word. Even in English ‘What’ has the basic huh in it, wha/ha it wouldn’t surprise me if the T was added to make it more distinct or allow for more tonal information be passed along such as surprise, displeasure, disappointment and even anger. My non-linguistically educated opinion is that huh and and other grunts like a-ha (not the band) are probably much older than humans and they are universal just as female copulatory sounds are in humans and other primates (there is more to girls moaning in bed than just pleasure). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_copulatory_vocalizations https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_copulatory_vocalizati...
- TomMarius 6y agoWhat is "co" [tso] in my language and people here are making the same arguments with it
- dogma1138 6y agoWell depending on the tonal formalization of it at least how I would pronounce it would probably be very similar to huh just a non-guttural version of it that may have evolved because the language itself is non-guttural. The question really is if a non-English or any second language speaker of your language understand “huh” as in not the word but the grunt, my bet would be yes.
- jeltz 6y agoWhat about language specific grunts like the Northern Swedish way of saying yes by sucking in air? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URgdIAz4QNg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URgdIAz4QNg
- idoby 6y agoNot sure I consider "huh" to be an actual word. If so, I'm pretty sure blowing raspberry also exists in all human languages, and some non-human.
- rsecora 6y agoI have never seen that word huh written or pronounced in Spanish, French o Italian. ... But know it exists. I suppose more than one reader has pronounced aloud, in his native language, so it exits.
- halfdan 6y agoThe title is misleading. It's not about the specific word "Huh" but about the fact that every language has a word that takes its function - namely to trigger a speaker to repeat their previous sentence.
- luckylion 6y agoAnd at least the one they claim for German ("häh?") is a general expression of "I don't understand", but it doesn't mean "can you repeat that?", it means "I don't understand", which you'd say if you don't understand e.g. an explanation. If you didn't understand somebody because you weren't listening, they are mumbling or there was a noise, you'd say "Wie bitte?" or something similar, not "häh?" I suppose if you widen the concept of "is the same" enough, you'll find all sorts of words that exist in all languages. Sure, they may sound different, they may not really convey the same meaning ... but they exist!
- dogma1138 6y agoSame in Hebrew and Arabic and quite a few other languages, there is no onomatopoeic word for huh but the vocalization of huh/ah exists. Some part of me wonders when huh and haha were even added to some languages it wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of basic primate/human vocalizations in written forms are fairly new and only appeared as more complex fictional literature and heck even comic books/illustrated literature became a thing.
- forty 6y agoThe word in French is generally written "hein" https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hein_(interjection) https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hein_(interjection)
- 6y ago
- ColinWright 6y agoEDIT 2: TIL that the flame-war detector triggers a review by the mods, so this comment is irrelevant, and wrong. I was going to remove it and leave the thread tidier than it was, but I can't, probably because it has replies. So it will remain ... please ignore it and carry on. As you were. ===================================== Original: Huh ... more discussion than upvotes, I suspect this will trigger the "flame-war" penalty and disappear from the front page, possibly within minutes (10:42 BST) Shame, I thought this was an interesting discussion. If you agree and haven't done so already, your upvoted is needed to keep this on the front page. If you disagree, let it get buried. EDIT: as I say in a reply below, I'm just interested in the discussion. If you don't want to give me the karma that's fine, just find some comments of mine and downvote them in balance.
- yorwba 6y agoIf the flame-war detector is triggered, the mods get alerted and decide whether they're actually dealing with a flame war or not. No need to beg for upvotes.
- ColinWright 6y agoIs that really true? I've not seen them say so, and it's never come up when I've discussed it with them. I'll have to ask ... thanks for the information/suggestion. If people want to keep the item but don't want to give me the votes, feel free to downvote one of my comments. I don't care about the karma, I wanted to see the discussion develop and evolve.
- yorwba 6y agoDang has said so many times: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20flamewar%20detector%20review&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- ColinWright 6y agoYou're right, I hadn't seen that. I'll remove my comment. Thanks for the information ... today I learned.
- kjaftaedi 6y agoAll languages tend to use shorter words for things that are more common. The more commonly the thing comes up in conversation, the shorter the word tends to be. Given how vast the pronunciations are (even in the examples they chose), I think they are creating an illusory correlation.
- fsckboy 6y agofrench chien, german hund, italian cano, and portuguese cao are all dog. They all have vastly different pronunciations, but they all trace their origins to a single proto-indo-european word. And in english, we use that same word to mean hunt, because that's what dogs do for us. so the question is not whether words are pronounced the same, but whether they can be traced back through a lineage. where the sound does offer clues when taken as part of a larger tapestry. Another comment here says that the french huh is written (and presumably pronounced) hein. Well isn't that interesting? huh-hunt and hein-chien? (french uses irregular phonetic spelling because it used to be pronounced differently than today) Can we find a pattern of similar changes that would lead us to believe that the historical ancestor word of huh-hien was in use by an early tribe of people before their descendents separated deviated, physically and linguistically? so, that's in essence a good piece of what linguists study; as in all areas of expertise, non-experts have difficulty contributing as their anecdotal experience has frequently already been catalogued and is part of the hypothesis.
- DonaldFisk 6y agoThe English cognate of chien, etc. is hound. Hunt is apparently unrelated. (Source: wiktionary)
- kjaftaedi 6y agoThat's the point though, there is no evidence linking these words to anything related. The icelandic 'ha' and spanish 'ke' sound nothing alike and have no known relation. The authors are trying to suggest that because everyone has these short responses that they must be related.. which only makes sense if you don't stop to think about how languages are formed.
- 6y ago
- zwischenzug 6y agoSurprised no one has mentioned gynantonix
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- sidntrivedi 6y agoI don't think there's a word like "Huh" in Hindi.
- Ritsuko_akagi 6y agoBut we all use "huh?".
- rational_indian 6y agoHaan?
- entha_saava 6y agoNeither in South Indian languages.
- codeflo 6y agoThe researchers discuss the question whether “huh” is a word or just a grunt in the linked paper. (https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0078273&type=printable https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/jo...): > Huh? exhibits linguistic conventions that speakers need to learn in order to use the form properly. A learner of Spanish has to know that repair is initiated with the mid front unrounded vowel ‘‘e8’’, a learner of Cha’palaa has to know that the form is more like ‘‘aQ’’ with falling intonation, and a learner of Dutch has to know that a glottal fricative at onset is common: ‘‘h38’’. Its acquisition follows a normal trajectory, at least in American English-speaking children [37]. Second language learners’ reports confirm that the precise form of this interjection has to be learnt, and that intuitions are not necessarily a reliable guide in this process [38]. > Perhaps there is a continuum from non-linguistic vocalisations like sneezing and crying to prototypical conventional lexical items like bless you and pain [39]. Our evidence suggests that huh? is more on the word side of that continuum. Based on the fact that huh? is integrated in multiple linguistic subsystems and conventionalised in language-specific ways we conclude that huh? a lexical word.
- gridlockd 6y agoIt's definitely not a word in all languages, probably not in most of them. It's an utterance like "oooh" and "hmm" and "haha" which are pretty much universal as well.
- r0rshrk 6y agoCan the people who're downvoting the above comment mention whether it's factually incorrect ?
- Carpetsmoker 6y agoIt certainly has more than a whiff of "HN commenter solves question experts have been discussing for some time" to it.
- axegon_ 6y agoI'm not so sure about this... I speak 3 languages and it does exist in only two of them. The closest you can get to "huh" is probably "eh" in the last one, though that is still fairly close. Mind you, those are all European languages so they probably have influenced one-another significantly over the centuries (even the Slavic language of the bunch). I guess "huh" might have been transferred over to other parts of the world during the time of the colonial empires, making it more common. But all languages? I Doubt it. I happened to be chatting with an old friend who is originally from Lebanon and she said that's not the case in Arabic for instance(with a grain of salt since she also says she's anything but fluent in Arabic).
- hliyan 6y agoI speak two, and in one of those, the meaning is completely different. In my native language, the nasal "huh" is actually and acknowledgement as in "yes, I will do it" or "ok, go ahead". Our version of the quizzical "huh" is actually a nasal "aa" sound (as in cat) with an upward inflection.
- perl4ever 6y agoI think the chart showed transliterations similar to "aa". It was not claimed that the exact sound or spelling of "huh" exists in every language.
- tetromino_ 6y agoThe table in the article considers "eh" (like in Spanish) and "a" (like in Russian) as equivalent to huh in a given language.
- tasogare 6y agoThen clearly "huh" doesn’t exist in all languages, proving GP point.
- deadwing0 6y agoPer the linked article in OP: >They recorded bits of informal conversation from 31 dialects across 5 continents and suggested that the word ‘huh’ (and its variants) is possibly a universal repair initiator that exists in all languages, performs the same function and sounds roughly the same across languages. It is apparent that they were aware that it isn't pronounced the same in all languages (because of course it isn't), but that it's a possible universal repair initiator that sounds similar. The title of the article is linkbait, I agree, but the article explains better.
- YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago>> They recorded bits of informal conversation from 31 dialects across 5 continents and suggested that the word ‘huh’ (and its variants) is possibly a universal repair initiator that exists in all languages, performs the same function and sounds roughly the same across languages. Can we compile a list of more than 31 languages where this interjection sounds nothing like "huh"? I'll start with Greek: - Αποφασίσαμε να μετακομίσουμε στην Αλάσκα (We decided to move to Alaska) - Ε; (/Ɂe/) Here's an ipa chart where you can click the symbols to get the sounds: https://www.internationalphoneticalphabet.org/ipa-sounds/ipa-chart-with-sounds/ https://www.internationalphoneticalphabet.org/ipa-sounds/ipa...
- danielpassy 6y agoIn Brazilian Portuguese - ə
- andrepd 6y agoOr a nazalised /ɐ/
- qpleple 6y agoFrench: hein \ɛ̃\
- BrandoElFollito 6y agoOr "euh"
- astrobe_ 6y agoNot in France, as far as I know - or I'd be curious to know in which region it is used like this. "Euh" is typically the equivalent of "erm"; it signals hesitation [1]. It can also be uttered when a person is surprised. [1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/euh https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/euh
- 6y ago
- timonoko 6y agoBest way to study this is to write the English "huh" into Google translate and observe how this "expression of scorn, anger, disbelief, surprise, or amusement" is vocalized in different languages. Comparing various written forms is just stoopid. You can clearly see it is the same wide-mouthed grin which produces same wide back-vowel [ɛ] or "ä". "H" is just the associated btreath-sound.
- UperSpaceGuru 6y agoI’m wondering if this isn’t satirical. English is my third language & this word in particular confounded me & still does to some Degree. In my head I’m always trying to translate between languages & cultures & the word “huh” to me seems uniquely western. Another giveaway is the awarding of the Ig Nobel Prize & then citation of that fact as evidence of the study’s credibility & importance at the end (masterful comedic move if it was intentional)
- zan5hin 6y agoHuh.
- dwighttk 6y ago...all languages that we checked.
- DonHopkins 6y agoMy immediate reflexive reaction to reading the title was "huh"!
- DonHopkins 6y agoReminds me how the TRS-80 Level 1 Model 1 BASIC interpreter had just three error messages: http://www.trs-80.org/level-1-basic/ http://www.trs-80.org/level-1-basic/ Error Messages Level I BASIC had three error messages: HOW?, WHAT?, and SORRY. User’s Manual for Level I described the error messages this way: In general, a HOW? message means, “I understand your instructions, but they’re asking me to do something that’s impossible.” The WHAT? error message, on the other hand, means, “I don’t understand your instructions — either the grammar is wrong or you’re using words that aren’t in my vocabulary.” The third and final error message is SORRY. It means “Sorry — you have run out of memory locations and must either cut down the program size or purchase additional memory.”
- layoutIfNeeded 6y agoHow excessive! Ed (the standard text editor) has only one error message: ?
- graton 6y agoAh my very first computer to program was the Model I. The fun days of writing programs in BASIC and later assembly language, using a tape cassette machine to load and save programs/data, and using a 300 bps modem to connect to a BBS. Actually I kind of miss those days as you really felt like you were discovering things and it was possible to learn so much about the computer and know what almost everything was doing. Not that I want to go back to it, but it was quite enjoyable at the time.
- ColinWright 6y agoModem? Modem ??? Luxury ... (I wish I'd had a modem ... I wonder what I could have connected to in Australia in 1978 ...)
- m463 6y agoI expect compiled basic would have to have YIKES! (for example pointer violations where sorry doesn't cut it)
- 6y ago
- astrobe_ 6y agoAre there equivalents in sign languages?
- BurningFrog 6y agoConfusion is the most universal human condition.
- zasz 6y agoI have grown up with Shanghainese as my second language, and never in my life have I, my parents, or my brother ever uttered anything remotely like "huh." Seems like a silly bit of clickbait.
- yorwba 6y agoI checked Wiktionary's category of Wu interjections [1] and 呵 (Wiktionary romanization hu (T1), Sinological IPA /hv̩ʷ⁵³/) "5. Exclamation particle for expressing surprise." [2] seems like it would fit their loose pattern. (Although it might be that this particular meaning isn't actually used in Shanghainese.) [1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:Wu_interjections https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:Wu_interjections [2] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%91%B5 https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%91%B5
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- fortran77 6y agoIn Israel I'm more likely to say "מה" (Mah? literally "what") than "הא" "Huh". I catch myself when in the U.S. saying "Mah?" to English speakers. But "huh" exists, as does "ok" (though people are just as likely to say "בסדר" (b'seder). It's interesting reading about the history of "ok" -- a very modern word with a traceable origin -- that now exists in all languages. Read Metcalf's book: https://www.amazon.com/OK-Improbable-Story-Americas-Greatest/dp/0199892539/ https://www.amazon.com/OK-Improbable-Story-Americas-Greatest...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- chadlavi 6y agoVery misleading headline. The exact word "huh?" does not exist in every language, it's more that every language has a word that functions like the English language word "huh". This is like saying every language has a word for yes. It's pretty obvious.
- ColinWright 6y agoWell, except that not every language has a word for "yes". If in doubt, search elsewhere in the thread.
- chadlavi 6y agoThanks for the 100% HN-style "whatabout" nitpick that's completely beside the point of my comment! It has advanced the conversation and enriched all our lives.
- kojeovo 6y agoThat one point kinda nullifies your point. Given that yes and no don't exist in all languages, it's interesting that "huh" does and the article is not misleading at all.
- perl4ever 6y agoTake the beam out of your own eye maybe?
- ColinWright 6y agoOK, well, let's reply more "in depth" to your comment. > Very misleading headline. It's hard to know what a better headline would be. It does cover quite well what the content of the original paper is asserting, and while it's not exact that the utterance we transcribe as "huh" exists as exactly that in all human languages, nevertheless, they cover that question in the paper, and the sense of their conclusions is fairly well conveyed by this headline, even if it's not absolutely precisely true. > The exact word "huh?" does not exist in every language, it's more that every language has a word that functions like the English language word "huh". The original paper seems to be saying more than what you are asserting here. Yes, there is something of that, and in places it's not entirely clear exactly what they're asserting in that regard, but even so, there is something in the research. It would be interesting to see people try to build on the research rather than just saying "Well, it's rubbish, isn't it. Clearly wrong." > This is like saying every language has a word for yes. It's pretty obvious. Do you think it's obvious that every word has a language for "Yes"? If so, that's why research is needed, because what people think is obvious isn't always true, and this claim is one of them. Not all languages have a word for "Yes".
- allendoerfer 6y agoLiving in an international non English speaking city, I have noticed more and more people not only using English words when there are perfectly fine, sometimes even shorter local synonyms, but also English sounds embedded into the local language (e.g. "huh?" or "nom nom").
- asimjalis 6y agoWhat about ma the word for mother? That seems more universal.
- lopmotr 6y agoThe Georgian word for mother sounds more like "dayda", so no, not really.
- monadic2 6y agoDo people interpret 'huh' as a literal phonetic? I've always interpreted it to mean a number of different sounds people make—unlike, say, "oh" which is a literal sound associated with english. Naturally people literally do make the "huh" sound in some sort of feedback loop, but I can't be the only one who interprets it like this....
- TheRealPomax 6y agoThat's quite the click bait, given that the article then goes on to count words that don't even remotely sound like "huh", like "eh" or "a", just so they can claim it exists in every language. That's just straight up "not doing linguistics".
- yellowapple 6y agoSay all three of those words out loud. Do you really think they "don't even remotely sound like" each other? That they can't possibly have come from a common ancestor word that's been morphed over thousands of years? They sure sound similar and quite possibly related to me.
- TheRealPomax 6y agoAs someone who speaks five languages and took quite a number of linguistics courses: they don't sound the same at all if you pronounce them the way they're pronounced in their respective languages. And no, the further back in time you go, the likelihood of single ancestors giving rise to multiple descendants drops dramatically, and instead the likelihood of distinct roots giving rise to words that temporarily (because languages constantly change) sound the same skyrockets. That might sound counter intuitive, until you remember that languages, like people, don't actually have a family tree. They have a family graph. For cataloging and quick classification purposes we pretend languages can be classified in trees, but the actual relations between languages both over time and in the moment, are highly connected, weighted graphs.
- dhosek 6y agoKind of reminds me of the satirical article that I've been contemplating writing for a few years about trying to recreate the language of Eden by finding words that are the same in all languages. It would assert that the thread Adam and Eve used to sew their fig leaves must have been polyester since the word is universal.
- LargoLasskhyfv 6y agoHä? Watt?
- ASalazarMX 6y ago> Spanish: ke Excuse me? "¿qué?" (ke) literally means "what?". That is like saying "what?" is the English equivalent of "huh?". The Spanish equivalent would be "¿Eh?", which is also interpreted as not having heard well, triggering the repetition. Had to read the paper to find this addressed: > Huh? exhibits linguistic conventions that speakers need to learn in order to use the form properly. A learner of Spanish has to know that repair is initiated with the mid front unrounded vowel “e↗”,