Re: Intergermansk

Ray Brown wrote:

> I had not realized, I admit, that /S/ in modern Swedish was now (generally/
> always?) pronounced [x]. That is interesting, and parallels the change of
> earlier Spanish /S/ to the modern /X/ as, for example, in _Mexico_
> /'meSiko/ --> _Mejico_ /'meXiko/.
It has been spreading northward from southernmost Sweden for more
than a century -- apparently reaching the Stockholm area after the
WW2 period, but it has not yet reached the northern half of Sweden,
where we instead find merger of earlier /S/ and /rs/, nor has it
reached the Swedish-speaking parts of Finland where /S/ actually
is realized [s\] -- the actual pronunciation of traditional "/C/"
on the mainland --, while "/C/" is [ts\] and /rs/ is still [rs].

One often cited reason for the spread of [x] is the "need" to
preserve the distinction against /rs/ [s`], but that does not
hold true of the area where [x] originated, since they have
[Rs] for /rs/.

--

/BP 8^)>
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se

         Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
                                             (Tacitus)

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