Re: Arabic (Arabiya)

--- David Peterson <ThatBlueCat@...> wrote:
> <<
> Hello
>
>  Salaam Alekum
> In Arabic, how do the sounds "Q" and the s that is
> not sh or s "so called
> retroflex s" sound like. Also how does the "gh"
> sound like. It is said to sound
> like the "french r" which it does, but it sounds
> more "g-ish."
>
>  Thanks
> >>
>
> Wa alekum as-salaam.
>
> The Arabic qaaf is pronounced like an IPA [q], which
> sounds like a [k]
> pronounced further back--at the uvula.   So if you
> try to pronounce it, and it
> sounds like a "k", try moving the back of your
> tongue back even further.   No
> matter how far back you go, it'll sound like a [q]
> (though if you go too far back
> you run the risk of swallowing your own
> tongue--j/k).
>
Qaaf gets borrowed into C-a as a /g/.

> The Arabic "s" that is neither "s" (siim) nor "sh"
> (shiim) is called "saad",
> and it's *not* retroflex; it's pharyngealized.   If
> you know how to pronounce
> "ayn", try pronounce an "s" while pronouncing an
> "ayn".  Or, while making the
> [A] vowel (as in, "Stick out your tongue and say"),
> try pronouncing an "s"
> *without* stopping the [A] sound.   That will
> approximate the sound.   Once
> you've got that, now try pronouncing it without an
> [A] vowel, and you're set.
>
Hmm.  Siim gets borrowed as /s/ (except in voicing
engironments where it is /z/ and in clusters where it
whould be /S/) and shiim gets borrowed as /S/ (usually
spelled "s" before other consonants or "x"
intervocallically).

I hadn't given any consideration to saad.  I've been
using transliterations of various ineptitudes, so I'm
not even sure when I may have been looking at a saad.
But if this is the correct pronunciation I've got some
faulty words in C-a that I need to root out somehow.
This sound ought to get borrowed as /z/.

> The Arabic "gh", called "ghayn", can be pronounced
> like a French /r/, since I
> *believe* one of the allophones for French /r/ is a
> voiced, velar fricative.
>  Anyway, if you can pronounce Arabic "khaa" (looks
> like a "haa" with a dot
> underneath), then just voice it, and you've got
> "ghayn".   However, it is true
> that, generally, "ghayn" is further forward (at the
> velum) than the French /r/
> generally is (which is generally at the uvula).
> This is all *generally*,
> though.
Ghayn also gets borrowed as /g/ and khaa as /k/.  I'm
still deciding what to do with haa.  It either gets
"hardened" to /k/ or dropped, unless I decide that C-a
has already re-accuired /h/ by the Arab period.

Adam

>
> -David
>

=====
Fached il prori ul pañeveju mutu chu djul atexindu.
-- Carrajena proverb

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