Re: Catalan dialects and pronunciation
- From: "Perique des Palottes" <despalottes@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 24 Oct 2006 05:43:04 -0700
Ruud Harmsen wrote:
While listening to radio stations created using http://www.pandora.com
I got to know the artist Maria del Mar Bonet. I like the way she
sings. I always thought I didn't particularly like the sound of the
Catalan language (although I hadn't often heard it), but the way she
uses it in her songs I do like it.
Maria del Mar Bonet is originally from the island Mallorca. She uses a
lot of shwa-like vowels. This is in accordance with the description I
read in my 1975 Teach Yourself book by Alan Yates: it states that all
<a> and <e> in unstressed syllables become [@] and that unstressed <o>
becomes [u].
(General) Majorcan Catalan does keep unstressed [o], and in particular,
Maria del Mar Bonet does too.
However, when listening to Catalan radio stations like
http://www.onacatalana.com/, this is less clear: some speakers tend to
use more full Castillian-like [a] vowels, even in unstressed position;
others tend more to shwa-like vowels, but nit quite.
Is this a matter of regional accents, or of interference from
Castillian, among bilingual speakers? Most of today's Catalan
speakers probably _are_ fully bilingual in Castillian and Catalan?
Do all of them keep the phonetics of the two language fully apart?
This neutralisation of unstressed /A E e/ into [a] instead of [@],
the so called català 'xava' (both [a]) is a general phenomena in
Barcelona conurbation area specially among native Castilian (Spanish)
speakers having learnt Catalan in school. Speakers using this [a],
in turn, don't do the elisions detailed below.
In most of the so called Oriental Catalan area (say get 20 km away
from Barcelona), unstressed /A E e/ are neutralised into [@], an
unclear vowel, which is dropped in certain positions,
e.g. [@] in final word position followed by another vowel,
"la mateixa imatge -> la mateix'imatge"
or initial [@] in an unstressed word preceded by another vowel:
"fer el canvi -> fe'l canvi"
Or even inside word in certain sequences, e.g.
second vowel in the sequence [@r@CV]
"caramel -> car'mel"
first vowel in the sequence [@rVCV]
"veritat -> v'ritat"
Side note: Algherese Catalan have been neutralising for ages into [a]
as well, due to Sardinian, and later Italian, influence.
.
- References:
- Catalan dialects and pronunciation
- From: Ruud Harmsen
- Catalan dialects and pronunciation
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