The commonest English vowel has no separate letter to represent it in the English alphabet. The vowel is called ‘schwa’ and is found as, for example, the first vowel in about. Schwa is a mid central unrounded vowel: mid means that the highest part of the tongue is neither high (where it is for /i/…… Continue reading Schwa, the vowel with no letter of its own
Tag: Phonology
The Italian Language Today
The Italian Language Today, by Anna Laura Lepschy and Giulio Lepschy (2nd edition, 1988) is a useful guide for anyone who has been through a basic to intermediate Italian course. The book has 2 parts: part one The Linguistic Situation in Italy has 4 sections: Italian today; a historical view; Italian dialects; varieties of…… Continue reading The Italian Language Today
Welsh challenge (5)
This post is the 5th instalment of the Welsh leg of my current Celtic challenge. It covers chapter 4 of Colloquial Welsh. For earlier instalments, please see Welsh Archives – Language Miscellany Mutation Table 1 provides a reminder of the aspirate and nasal mutations discussed in earlier instalments. Table 1. Aspirate and nasal mutations RadicalAspirateNasalcchnghpphmhtthnhg ngb md n…… Continue reading Welsh challenge (5)
English and German sibilants at the start of words
At the start of a word, both English and German have one sibilant that can appear in some positions where no other consonant can appear. That sibilant is /s/ in English but /ʃ/ in German (pronounced roughly like <sh-> in English she). The position where only English /s/ or German /ʃ/ can appear is at…… Continue reading English and German sibilants at the start of words
Sounds of Czech
In this post, I summarise the sound system of Czech and comment on spelling and on contrasts between Czech (a West Slavonic language) and Russian (n East Slavonic language). Consonants Table 1 lists Cech consonants. Table 1. Czech consonants LabialAlveolarPalatalVelar /GlottalNasalmnɲ PlosivepbtdcɟkgAffricate t͡s(d͡z)t͡ʃd͡ʒ FricativefvszʃʒxɦTrill rr̝ Approximant lj Comments on consonants the letters <ň ď ť > represent palatal consonants, although…… Continue reading Sounds of Czech
‘Syntactic doubling’ of Italian consonants
Single Italian consonants become pronounced as double (long) consonants (‘geminates’) if they follow: a stressed vowel some short unstressed words The Italian name for this process is raddoppiamento syntattico (‘syntactic (re)doubling’), or sometimes rafforzamento fonosyntactico (‘phonosyntactic stregntening’). ‘Syntactic’ refers to the fact that the doubling crosses word boundaries, unlike in word-internal geminate consonants as in [gattto] ‘cat’…… Continue reading ‘Syntactic doubling’ of Italian consonants
Why did two Spanish sibilants end up as /θ/ and /x/?
I’ve often wondered why standard European Spanish (Castilian) pronounces the letters written<c> and <j> as /θ/ and /x/. Penny (2002) and Alkire and Rosen (2010) explain that this comes from the history of sibilants in Spanish. Old Spanish sibilants In the 15th century, Old Spanish had 7 sibilants (table 1). Table 1. Old Spanish sibilants…… Continue reading Why did two Spanish sibilants end up as /θ/ and /x/?
Vowel harmony in case-marked forms of Hungarian personal pronouns
There is an oddity in how Hungarian vowel harmony works with personal pronouns. Many Hungarian suffixes undergo vowel harmony: when a case marker is suffixed to a noun, the suffix undergoes vowel harmony, but when a personal pronoun is suffixed to a case marking prefix, the prefix determines the vowel in the suffix. The same…… Continue reading Vowel harmony in case-marked forms of Hungarian personal pronouns
Language sketch: Albanian
In this post, I give some background information about Albanian and summarise its sound system and writing system. I will discuss morphology, syntax and vocabulary in a future post. For other posts on Albanian, please see https://languagemiscellany.com/tag/albanian/ Albanian language Albanian is a separate branch of the Indo-European family, but split off much later than most…… Continue reading Language sketch: Albanian
The future of German noun plurals
Native German nouns typically form their plurals with a variety of markers, including vowel changes (‘Umlaut’), -(e)n, -(e) and (-er). The marker -s is used for some words borrowed from other languages and for items such as acronyms, abbreviations and some proper names. Janda (2021) predicts (perhaps surprisingly) that -s will ultimately become the regular…… Continue reading The future of German noun plurals