Re: Q about /c/

On Sun, Jan 25, 2004 at 02:27:10PM -0500, Carlos Thompson wrote:
> There are a few another clues (the kind of clues that makes a foreing sound
> foreign while untrained Spanish speaking natives cannot know why), like
> pronouncing every voiced stop /b/, /d/ and /g/ as stops [b], [d], and [g]
> even in intervocalic positions, or like aspirating the voiceless stops (i.e.
> [t_h] for /t/).  The pronunciation /r/ and /rr/, the quality of the vowels,
> etc.
Don't forget things like pronouncing <b> and <v> differently from each
other, or [v] for /B/.

Far and away the most noticeable errors in my Spanish class were
with the vowels, though.  English is strict about consonants
and relatively lax about vowels, while Spanish is the reverse -
not that you don't have to pronounce the consonants correctly,
but there's more dialectical variation, and consonant sounds are
more likely to be altered due to position,  usually weakened  -
like the fricativization of voiced stops in medial position
(and not just intervocalically), the "aspiration" of /s/ before
another dental, etc.  "Hasta luego" in many dialects comes out as
/,ahta'lweGo/ or /,ata'lweo/, but those vowels stay pure even
as the consonants around them vanish into nothingness.

My favorite fellow student had a horrific Southern US accent in Spanish,
which I occasionally imitate for the amusement of others though I have no idea
whatever happened to him.  He really tried, bless his heart, but it all
came out so badly.  My best attempt at rendering his version of
"Buenos días, Señora. ¿Cómo está usted?" in CXS is something like
[bwej:n@Uz'di:j@zsejn'j@Ur\@'.k_h@Um@U.@'sta:uw'stej.@d].  If you can
imagine Gomer Pyle saying it (not Jim Nabors, who would have no doubt
nailed it with a perfect Castillian accent), you've got it.

-Mark