Re: Hi to the Ukraine from Tokyo

> on Wednesday, November 28, 2001 8:06 PM
Vasiliy Chernov wrote:

> Not [i], either. Not in my 'New Moscovite' dialect, at any rate. It's the
> same sound as in _volja_ ('will', nominative), as opposed to _voli_ (same,
> genetive); and these two forms sound definitely different, with me.
>
> The vowel is not especially narrow and can be classified as 'fronted
> central' rather than 'front'. I think this is what Pavel meant.
Surely, you're right! That's not only "New Moscovite dialect", that's the
literary norm.
In practical Rus. transcription we use for this reduced palatal vowel the
sign "jerj", don't we? - In contrast to the reduced 'hard' vowel "jer"...
I can't guess the sign for them even in the IPA, to say nothing on any ASCII
representation...

> >Ukrainian is ["ke<retr>jiw] - Ukr. /y/ is a front (!) vowel, similar to
Fr.
> >/é/ in 'bébé', and /v/ has an allophone /w/ in auslaut and before the
>
> ...consonants, I guess... listserv goes on cutting lines on me...
Right, before the consonants. [v] and [w] are typical 'positional
allophones'.

> To my ears, Ukrainian {y} sounds more-less identical with English [I] in
> _give_. No?
At least it's NOT a Rus. [1] (jery)...
:-)
According to the literary norm, {y} should be pronounced as smth average
between [e] and [I] - that's why I used a note <retr> - not 'retroflex', but
'retracted'. But I don't know anybody who pronounces it like this. L'viv
(sorry, Lvov) pronounces more like [e], using [E] for {e}, and Poltava does
more like [I]. Theory and practice sometimes differ...

Kol tov!
-- Yitzik
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