Re: NATLANG: What's the sound of Castilian <s>?

Andreas Johansson wrote:
(Quoting somebody)

> > [T] for _all_ /s/? I've never heard that -- often [T] for /s/ /_i,e --
but
> > then again I've never listened carefully around Spanish speakers so I
may
> > just be imposing on them what my textbooks tell me they "should" be
saying.
> > Spain Spanish, btw. I know the situation is different in Chicano and
other
> > American Spanishes.
>
> Apparently, there's some Andalusian dialects that have merged /s/ and /T/
as
> [T] everywhere - a Spanish guy with whom I spoke of dialects a few days
ago
> had nothing good to say about them!
>
Oh those Andalusians!! Actually, that sound more like hypercorrection to me,
on the order of oft-cited [bil'baDo] for "Bilbao"-- but ¿quién sabe?

While I'm at it-- one doesn't often get a chance to correct the Incredible
Mr. Cowan, but:  _ceceo_ refers to the pronunciation of /z/ and /c/-before
front V as [T], nothing to do with /s/.  I think most Castillians would gasp
to hear someone lisp their /s/'s.  _Seseo_ does refer to the merger of both
/T/ and /s/ > /s/.  Whether that /s/ comes out as apical or laminal seems to
vary by region or even by individuals

Also a self-correction/modification-- the apical [s] doesn't _have_ to
involve curling the tongue tip back, but merely raising it a bit so that the
friction occurs between the tip and the upper teeth. Whereas in laminal [s],
the tip is most likely touching the lower teeth, and the sibilance occurs
between the body of the tongue just behind the tip and the alveolar
idge.  --Once upon a time these were distinguished as "slit" vs. "groove"
fricatives, but those terms I think are now passé (and I never quite
understood which was which anyway.........)

I've always suspected that the reason why one hears apical [s] from so many
elderly, is that they have ill-fitting dentures. :-((
Roger, who still has all his teeth :-))

ObConlang!! Oh dear-- how will we say "denture" in Kash. hici volu? tooth
man-made? Naah, don't like it....
Yesterday I was making example sentences with "unless"and "except", but got
sidetracked and discovered the following instead:
yalambik (formal), yala-yala, yalaci, yalambici ~yalapici ~lalapici 'drinks,
in genl., as a social occasion, more spec. cocktails, drinks before dinner'
(< yala '(drinking) glass')
tahambik 'hors d'oeuvres, ~tapas' (dish-little)
tahañom ~tañom 'main course' (dish-basis)
tahanjami ~tanjami 'dessert' (dish-sweet)
(tahan- itself is a variant of andahan 'food' < nahan 'eat')

Odd how the mind works.

Replies