Re: rhotics (was: Hellenish oddities)

On Mon, 27 Nov 2000 16:52:01 +0100, Christophe Grandsire
<christophe.grandsire@...> wrote:

>En réponse à Roger Mills <romilly@...>:
>
>>    Theoretically, that should be an uvular fricative, devoiced in these
>> particular environments....but I wonder if it hasn't been drawn forward
>> (to _velar_) due to the preceding palatal/dental consonants???  (I've
>> never been able to produce a proper French trilled uvular /r/-- sounds a
>> bit like imitating a dog's growl).
>>
>
>Well, in fact the trilled uvular /r/ has nearly disappeared in French.
>Only a few Parisians still pronounce it this way. The French 'r' is now a
>voiced uvular approximant, much nicer for your throat I believe. At least,
>it doesn't sound like a dog's growl :) .
>
>Christophe.
Gee, first un/in and [a]/[A] lost, now this! French is losing all its
interesting features!

Jeff