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Re: Arabic Phonetics WAS Re: Primary Interjections - Unversals?

From:Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...>
Date:Monday, April 8, 2002, 11:06
En réponse à John Cowan <jcowan@...>:

> > The trouble is, allophonic for what? For many English-speakers, > unaspirated voiceless stops are allophones of the voiced stops, not > the voiceless ones. >
Well, only in initial position. I meant allophonic in the sense that the average English speaker will take the 't' in 'top' and the 't' in 'stop' to be the same sound (and won't hear the difference), even though one is aspirated and the second not. And I also take for a fact that I've never been misunderstood by English speakers because of my unaspirated voiceless stops.
> > Use Rosta's Observation: it's a whole lot easier to pronounce > the *nasalized* clicks in words, because you don't have to stop and > restart the voicing. Then the non-nasalized clicks can be done > by coarticulating a glottal stop with the click. >
Well, the problem is that I *can't* pronounce nasalised clicks. I just don't manage to pronounce them. So I basically disagree on the statement that they are easier to pronounce than normal clicks, and that because of personal experience.
> > Even at home, I got strange looks while practicing bilabial trills. >
It's nice to have a baby handy for those :)) . Christophe. http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr Take your life as a movie: do not let anybody else play the leading role.

Replies

John Cowan <jcowan@...>
Raymond Brown <ray.brown@...>Clicks (was: Arabic Phonetics WAS Re: Primary Interjections - Unversals?