Pronounciation of Hearth (who has been saying it wrong?)

[Amanda44]

It's not just other nationalities that have a problem with pronouncing the 'Th' sound, I've known a few British people that have trouble with it too, my brother being one of them. He would use a V, saying 'va' in place of 'the', vem - them, vose - those and so on, if the 'Th' was at the end of a word he would would use an 'F', so instead of hearth he would say 'harf'. My mother thought it was laziness and my childhood was spent with my mother constantly correcting him and trying to make him say the 'th' sound, in his head it sounded the same so as an outsider you would hear - all day every day -

'va'
'no, the'
'vats what i'm saying - Va'
'Th, th, the'
'Va, va, va'

It makes me laugh now but as a child it was incredibly annoying, lol, especially for my brother who just couldn't make the 'Th' sound, he is now in his 40's and still says 'va', thankfully mum has long since given up.

[Tonkyhonk]

konyakku (Cognac)

its probably the hardest of the 3 similars (kon'yaku, konnyaku, and konnyakku) but fortunately we hardly use that word, but instead those who drink it usually say the brand name or the rank, as in remy martin, hennesey, vsop, xo, napoleon

In Germany it was a common (bad) joke in the 1970ties that Asians (Chinese) can't pronounce the "r" and always use "l" instead - there had been even few Kung_Fu movies synchronized that way.

never heard that joke, and dont remember one in kung-fu movies ive watched as a kid, but yes, i think i know what youre talking about as chinese "r" in pinyin is far from english "r", its more like "j" in russian ж - which i can never manage to pronounce correctly so far. (and Wade-Giles/cambridge was known overseas as a way of romanizing chinese sound before pinyin and that version used "j" for this chinese "r" instead for a long time, most likely so in 70s.)

and hurray for mentioning patois, borka many japanese who have been to jamaica claim its much easier for us to learn than real english. creoles and pidgins always interest me, but i havent got an opportunity to study one seriously yet. (some say japanese was originally a creole from austronasian and altaic, though.)
african influence must be huge on american english, i do remember one british friend of mine from liverpool pronounced [th] a lot closer to [s/z] than most americans and others, but lets say, its probably how language evolves generally - or "less barbaric" by loftar :p

Most russians use f for those (except thumb, it's more like t), some use s. "Th" is probably the hardest thing in english to pronounce correct for russians and slavs in general. Even ones with really good english often pronounce th wrong. It can sound like t, s, z, f and d. There are simply no sounds with the same tongue position in russian language (and I believe in all slavic languages, but I barely know a few) and it's kind of hard to undertand when someone is trying to explain to you how to use your tongue, but after you get the right position it's not an issue anymore, your th can sound alright.

thanks for the confirmation for slavics! i should probably ask mongolians about this too as russian has changed mongolian phonetics so hugely (and obviously not so to chinese mongolian, they sound totally different).

thankfully mum has long since given up.

thanks for the insight, she would have needed a professional speech therapist if she seriously wanted to treat it, but i guess its alright as long as he didnt have trouble with it himself.
we have those who use [th] for [s/z] and also those who use [sh] for [ç](german -ch or -ig), but only actors/actresses/news anchors try to correct it. (actually there is one popular voice actor for anime who doesnt seem to care to correct his and it sometimes makes me want to cut his tongue short.)

a related article from a while ago, tongue operations being popular in korea and china for english pronunciation...
http://saundz.com/south-korea-tongue-op ... unciation/
i think this is going a bit too far and never heard of it being done in my country, but i guess some have different priorities when theyre rich enough. id rather enjoy different accents and sounds though.

[Potjeh]

I bet my th is still better than all y'all's lj, though

[borka]

@Amanda
Has your Brother ever done a fMRI ?

He prolly would be an interesting Person for Neuroscientists researching on Brains Speech Recognition (as long it's not tongue related as Tonky assumes)

@Tonky
http://www.wdr.de/tv/wissenmachtah/bibl ... und_l.php5
there's a Flash video at the bottom - pls watch (good german TV Show for Kids)

@Potjeh
soundfile example for lj please

[Potjeh]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... bljana.ogg

[Tonkyhonk]

(as long it's not tongue related as Tonky assumes)

oh no, i wasnt assuming it tongue related, but professional therapists could tell why and give decent recommendation for whatever treatment needed. im pretty sure it was about both recognition and articulation.

@Tonky
http://www.wdr.de/tv/wissenmachtah/bibl ... und_l.php5
there's a Flash video at the bottom - pls watch (good german TV Show for Kids)

ha ha, english "r" and "l" werent that hard (though i still get confused often), but german "r" and french "r" is another thing.... it took me years to actually get the right sound, and i still dont get it right most of the times... like only once or twice in a dozen tries T_T

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... bljana.ogg

i think i can manage that Ljubljana.. i should buy me a microphone and prove it to you sometime!

[Tonkyhonk]

would someone upload a sound file for vapntreyiu and einherjeraspekt? pretty please?!
ive never learned how to pronounce either of them.

[GrapefruitV]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Sl-Ljubljana.ogg

That's easy (or maybe that's because of my slavic mouth). I bet no one can do "ы" at the first try (word example).

[borka]

*aaarg* - Ljubljana pronouncing is familiar to me but Grapie you gave me one i have to train for weeks

@Tonky
not having found sound examples yet
btw. vapntreyiu -> norsk: vápntreyja

too bad the common label seems to be Gambeson http://player.mashpedia.com/player.php?q=i9-k_1nHzO8

[Amanda44]

@ Tonky - He did have some form of speech therapy, tbh I can't remember exactly, but it wasn't until he was about eleven so maybe it was too late, idk, but it didn't last long and it didn't work. In his head he doesn't hear a difference, so -

im pretty sure it was about both recognition and articulation.

This seems to apply.

a related article from a while ago, tongue operations being popular in korea and china for english pronunciation...
http://saundz.com/south-korea-tongue-op ... unciation/
i think this is going a bit too far and never heard of it being done in my country, but i guess some have different priorities when theyre rich enough. id rather enjoy different accents and sounds though.

Wow, that does seem to be going too far! I like different accents and pronunciations too, language wouldn't be so 'pretty' if we all sounded the same.


@ Borka - not as far as I know, by the time we had gotten to that age sibling rivalry was rampant, we spent our teenage years either ignoring each other or trying to kill each other, lol - so I never really paid any attention to anything that was going on with him again until after we had both left home.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... bljana.ogg

That's easy (or maybe that's because of my slavic mouth). I bet no one can do "ы" at the first try (word example).

That is difficult!