Ask A Foreigner

**Janszoon** · 01-08-2011, 01:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dotoar

Then it's probably my duty to inform you about the pronounciation, as none of them has any resemblance to the sound of either A or O:

Å: as in "wall" and "crawl"
Ä: as in "pass" and "stare"

...

Er... those certainly sound like they have a resemblance to A to me. All the examples you used have A sounds in them.

Dotoar · 01-08-2011, 01:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Janszoon

Er... those certainly sound like they have a resemblance to A to me. All the examples you used have A sounds in them.

OK, phonetic pitfall on my part. What I meant was that "wall" and "pass" have different pronounciations to the "A" in them, right? Maybe it'll be clearer if I add that the letter A is pronounced like in "car" in swedish.

**Janszoon** · 01-08-2011, 08:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dotoar

OK, phonetic pitfall on my part. What I meant was that "wall" and "pass" have different pronounciations to the "A" in them, right? Maybe it'll be clearer if I add that the letter A is pronounced like in "car" in swedish.

So basically, in Swedish you use different A-like characters to represent the different sounds in the A family, whereas in English we use only an undecorated A to represent a couple different sounds, depending on context. Would you say that's fairly accurate?

Guybrush · 01-08-2011, 08:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Janszoon

So basically, in Swedish you use different A-like characters to represent the different sounds in the A family, whereas in English we use only an undecorated A to represent a couple different sounds, depending on context. Would you say that's fairly accurate?

Sounds accurate to me. We do the same in Norway. There's A as in "car", then Æ as in "bad", Ø as in "bird" and Å as in "wall". U is always pronounced as it is in "user" (phonetic : yUser) and I is always pronouned as it is in "fizz". If we pronounced "tunnel" the way you do, we'd probably spell it with an Ø as that would clearly be the right letter for it!

The english language has sloppy use of vowels. You guys need more letters for the sounds you make.

**Janszoon** · 01-08-2011, 08:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

Sounds accurate to me. We do the same. There's A as in "car", then Æ as in "bad", Ø as in "bird" and Å as in "wall". U is always pronounced as it is in "user" and I is always pronouned as it is in "fizz". If we pronounced "tunnel" the way you do, we'd spell it with an Ø as that's clearly the right letter for it!

The english language has sloppy use of vowels. You guys need more letters for the sounds you make.

I've never really thought about that until this moment but you're definitely right. It seems like the way vowels are written in Swedish and Norwegian is much more straightforward and logical than how they're handled in English. I'd imagine the vowels must be the biggest obstacle for someone trying to learn English since they're so context sensitive.

Burning Down · 01-08-2011, 11:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

The english language has sloppy use of vowels. You guys need more letters for the sounds you make.

No kidding! I speak French as well so I realized that a long time ago. In French there are so many more sounds a vowel can make than there is in English, and most of the time, each sound has it's own representation with these diacritics: acute accent (é), grave accent (è), circumflex (ê), umlaut (ë) (also called a diaeresis). Those diacritics can be placed on any vowel depending on the word, it's tense, whether it's masculine or feminine, etc. Also used occasionally, and only on the letter C, is the cedilla (ç). The cedilla is used in French to indicate that the letter "c" is to be pronounced as an "s" - as in Français. You also see the use of ligatures (Æ, Œ). Æ (æ) is used mainly for words with Latin roots - it's pretty rare otherwise. Œ (œ), on the other hand, is used much more frequently, for example in œuf (egg), sœur (sister), and bœuf (beef).

Dotoar · 01-08-2011, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

Sounds accurate to me. We do the same in Norway. There's A as in "car", then Æ as in "bad", Ø as in "bird" and Å as in "wall". U is always pronounced as it is in "user" (phonetic : yUser) and I is always pronouned as it is in "fizz". If we pronounced "tunnel" the way you do, we'd probably spell it with an Ø as that would clearly be the right letter for it!

The english language has sloppy use of vowels. You guys need more letters for the sounds you make.

I confirm this is the case in Sweden too. But doesn't norwegian substitute the Å sound with AA, by the way?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Janszoon

I've never really thought about that until this moment but you're definitely right. It seems like the way vowels are written in Swedish and Norwegian is much more straightforward and logical than how they're handled in English. I'd imagine the vowels must be the biggest obstacle for someone trying to learn English since they're so context sensitive.

Personally, I realised I've got more problem with missing out the S on third-person verbs, and vice versa on the others. And I'm still not quite sure wether a band for instance is considered a band or a group of people, and thus wether "the band plays" or if "they play". In swedish the verb is always spelled the same regardless of its use.

But overall I think the english language is richer in nuances when it comes to trying to get certain things across. I sometimes get caught not quite finding the swedish word I'm looking for when trying to depict something.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Burning Down

No kidding! I speak French as well so I realized that a long time ago. In French there are so many more sounds a vowel can make than there is in English, and most of the time, each sound has it's own representation with these diacritics: acute accent (é), grave accent (è), circumflex (ê), umlaut (ë) (also called a diaeresis). Those diacritics can be placed on any vowel depending on the word, it's tense, whether it's masculine or feminine, etc. Also used occasionally, and only on the letter C, is the cedilla (ç). The cedilla is used in French to indicate that the letter "c" is to be pronounced as an "s" - as in Français. You also see the use of ligatures (Æ, Œ). Æ (æ) is used mainly for words with Latin roots - it's pretty rare otherwise. Œ (œ), on the other hand, is used much more frequently, for example in œuf (egg), sœur (sister), and bœuf (beef).

Intuitive spelling ftw! (Although I think the french overdid it

)

---

By the way, have you thought about that using the phonetics of english you can spell "fish" like "ghoti".

Paedantic Basterd · 01-08-2011, 11:58 AM

Well, they do say that English is the hardest language to learn, and this is probably mainly why. All this trial and error and exceptions to rules. Once you start learning other languages, you tend to find that they make much more structural sense than English.

**Janszoon** · 01-08-2011, 12:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dotoar

Personally, I realised I've got more problem with missing out the S on third-person verbs, and vice versa on the others. And I'm still not quite sure wether a band for instance is considered a band or a group of people, and thus wether "the band plays" or if "they play". In swedish the verb is always spelled the same regardless of its use.

I think even among people whose first language is English there's a lot of confusion over that. I'm not sure if this is completely true or not but in my experience it seems like American speakers tend to refer to a band as a singular thing while British speakers tend to refer to it as a group of people (ex. "Pink Floyd is my favorite band" for Americans versus "Pink Floyd are my favorite band" for Brits).

Paedantic Basterd · 01-08-2011, 12:11 PM

Even I catch myself not settling on just one.

01-08-2011, 11:58 AM	#518 (permalink)
Paedantic Basterd Music Addict Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 5,184	Well, they do say that English is the hardest language to learn, and this is probably mainly why. All this trial and error and exceptions to rules. Once you start learning other languages, you tend to find that they make much more structural sense than English.

01-08-2011, 12:11 PM	#520 (permalink)
Paedantic Basterd Music Addict Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 5,184	Even I catch myself not settling on just one.