Muke Tever wrote:
>From: "Raymond Brown" <ray.brown@...>
>> >This one /j\/ isn't a voiced, palatal stop, but a voiced, palatal
fricative.
>>
>> Yep, [j\] is the voiced equivalent of German ich-laut. IME the Spanish
/j/
>> is often pronounced this way, at least by Spanish speakers from Spain (I
>> don't know about Latin American varieties). I'd be suprised if any
>> language had /j\/ and /j/ as separate phonemes.
>
>Well, I usually hear [j\] for consonantal /j/ (spelled <ll> and <y>), but
not
>vocalic /j/ (spelled <i> before another vowel).
>
>So...some might have a minimal pair between <hiena> "hyena" and <llena>
"full"
>(first pair that comes in my dictionary).
>
This matter was recently mentioned on the "Ideolengua" Spanish list-- if I
read everything aright, there is another minimal contrast <hierba> 'grass'
vs. <yerba> same word, different spelling (I think more used in Latin
America).
In most of Argentina (I should say, in Buenos Aires) both <ll> and <y> are
[Z]; interestingly, Pablo Flores always used [S] instead......a regional -
personal - generational difference? Or a change since 30 years ago?