Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

ohh... I see. I had a similar conversation recently with my niece who just spent 4-5 years living in Japan teaching Japanese students English (and she can't speak Japanese... well very little anyway). We talked about the fact that there is no R sound at all in the Japanese language which makes teaching the English language a challenge for some words.

We don't really have diphthongs in the English language. That's like AE or OE right? (with the letters hooked together?)... I'm not sure what they're supposed to sound like, so that's why (I guess) I really can't imagine what a vowel slide sounds like.

I've been so sheltered.. LOL.. geesh... feeling rather ignorant at the moment, yanno?

No, haven't tried to pronounce Van Gogh properly yet but will give it a try. I remember we had this conversation about his name before and I was surprised at the correct pronunciation.

Thanks for the conversation, Panta!

..........

I forgot to even reply to the poem itself.

Sorry sweetwater...

It's a very nice two-liner. I really love the writings you've been posting lately. You have a wonderful way with both imagery, philosophy and meter.

a diphthong is a vowel that "changes quality during its pronunciation, or "glides", with a smooth movement of the tongue from one articulation to another, as in the English words eye, boy, and cow" (quoted from wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphthong ).
you do have them - like in night, or fair, or show, or beer. actually, most of the vowel sounds in english are diphthongs - you do only have few monophongs, or "pure vowel sounds" (mostly short ones then, like sin, or bar, or long).

those other sounds, those that you do not have, the oe=ö, ae=ä, ue=ü sounds, are called "umlauts", and they indeed do require some practice for most english speakers (unless those speakers outsmart themselves and say a non-rhotic "gerta" for "goethe"! )

and regarding the rhotic way of speaking english - yeah, that's also quite a challenge for most germans.... words with many 'r's feel like our tongue was stumbling over itself inside our mouth ("just imagine to roll a hot potatoe inside your mouth while speaking" used to be the pointer to speak american english for us ). the british, non-rhotic way is a lot easier for us to pronounce.... and that's probably why gerta wants to be a non-rhotic goethe! ha.

oh and - yeah. hi, sweetwater! smile.

panta... i didn't think of the letter Y

boy and eye, yes
but cow? no, not at all. It only has one vowel in it.

night has a silent gh ... and a long i ... but not a diphthong

fair? ok i guess.. you sort of pronounce the i but not really.. it's more like just a long a

show? no! .. only one vowel... pronounced like an o

beer?.. i guess so maybe... but really it's just like one long e

perhaps you're calling a diphthong what i was taught to call a LONG vowel sound as opposed to the SHORT vowel sound in sin or bar or long

I still have to study "rhotic" as i'm not exactly clear what you mean but i appreciate very much the description

a very interesting conversation ... because what i suspect is that you and i probably pronounce the same english words differently (sometimes) so unless we were sitting in the same room pronouncing words to compare them, it's quite difficult in text to explore sounds

but i like trying!

a roll of hot potato inside your mouth while speaking used to be the pointer to speak american english? that's really funny! i love it! is that what we sound like?

great conversation. thanks again.. it also lends itself to a discussion about what you "hear" when you read poetry text. My poetry is often meant to be spoken and if the reader pronounces the words differently than i do, it makes me wonder what they "hear" in their heads as they read it and whether it works with the alternate pronunciations

yeah... you're all hot potato rollers!

and regarding the diphthongs - listen thoroughly to the vowels. when you say "show" - what do you hear after the 'sh'? it's your o-sound, right, but what does the o-sound do? it slides down from open sound to a closed sound: [oʊ̯]
other vowels do it the other way round.

if you listen closely to the pronunciation, you'll hear that the names of the english vowels are pronounced as diphthongs themselves (except for the e) - their sounds make "curves"!
it has nothing to do with what's written - a plain written o-vowel still sounds like [oʊ̯], sliding from open sound to closed one, a simple a-vowel sounds like [eɪ̯] and does the same.

it does have something to do with long and short vowels, that's true - the long ones are almost always diphthongs in your language (maybe even always, don't know), the short ones may be or may be not - still, a long vowel is not necessarily the same as a diphthong (think 'creep' - no slide within the 'ee'.... compared to 'beer' - huge opening slide in non-rhotic accent, still a slight opening slide towards the 'r' in rhotic accent)

read the wikipedia article on that, if you're interested, also the one on rhotic and non-rhotic accents in the english language - it's quite fascinating to delve into the area of phonetics and pronunciation, especially for one who works with it, like you do with your poetry.

and as for the wondering about what you hear when you read someone else's written text... yeah, you can never be quite sure if what you hear in your mind is the what the writer hears in her/his mind. even if you speak the same language!

thanks for the conversation, dor. i enjoyed it!
but now i gotta go to bed. it's far too late already to be up (3 a.m.)!

interesting thread guys.

i guess if you'd spelled Goethe like you say it, it would look more like this : Gutte

as for Van Gogh...that's exactly how we say it in Afrikaans. the "g" sound...if you haven't grown up in a culture where the "g" is pronounced like that, it will be hard for you to say. someone once said it sounded like clearing your throat. the sound is made in the back of your throat, forcing the air out with the back of your tongue pressed against the roof of you mouth...it's juSt as hard to explain