Quoth Christophe:
> For example, Arabic, which has only 3 (a, i, u) vowels which
serve only
>for grammatical purposes allow much variation, and the a is often
rendered
>[e], the u [o], etc... But it is difficult to have a real idea of
what's
>tolerable and what's not. Russian and Spanish (or is it Russian and
>Italian, I don't remember -in any case, my point is still true-), for
>example, have the same vowel distribution, but where Russian is very
>tolerant and allows much variation, Spanish (Castillan Spanish I
mean) is
>very strict and disallows variation.
Russian has the same vowel distribution as Spanish -- plus one. The
the mid vowels (<e> and <o>) are are more open. The vowels form a
triangle:
i 1 u
E O
a
where /1/ is the high central vowel, usually transliterated <y>.
Italian has seven vowels:
i u
e o
E O
a
In other words, two degrees each of openness for both <e> and <o>.
Danny
_______________________________________________________________
Get Free Email and Do More On The Web. Visit http://www.msn.com