Re: 5-vowel system like Spanish?

John Atkinson <johnacko@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:W5Xvh.970$sd2.931@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Paul J Kriha" <paul.nospam.kriha@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...
John Atkinson <johnacko@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...
"Paul J Kriha" <paul.nospam.kriha@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...
John Atkinson <johnacko@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...
"Paul J Kriha" <paul.nospam.kriha@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...

Some Czech speakers maintain that the "y" and "i" are
in fact two different vowels as in some dialects they are
pronounced differently. Counted them as two separate
vowels would make that a total of twelve vowels, six
short and six long ones, not counting diphthongs.

Same with Russian -- except without the length. I was going on
the
discussion in Comrie's "Slavonic Languages", which claims that in
Czech
and Russian (and Polish and Belorussian, but not Ukrainian)
"i" and "y" are allophones.

When it can lead to ambiguity, the Czech speakers may
spent extra effort to pronounce "i" and "y" (and "í" and "ý")
differently from each other. For example, "mít" (to have) can
be pronounced with more frontal high pitched "í" and "mýt"
(to wash) with a dark "ý".

This sounds like those English speakers who make a conscious effort
to
pronounce <wh> different from <w>, especially in homophones (which
there
are lots of), even though their native dialect lost the distinction
centuries ago.

Yes. I'd say it's exactly like that.

FWIW, both the references on Czech pronunciation that I have at hand
say
that <i> and <y> are the same sound, and don't mention that they're
ever
pronounced different from one another. Do you have the distinction
yourself?

No, I don't, and in the normal spoken conversation (including
the high prestige register speech) nobody is expected to have
any distinction at all. In the rare case of a real semantical
ambiguity, when somebody asks for clarification, the speaker
may either recast the sentence to make the meaning clearer
or repeat the offending word with a distinctive high-pitch-i or
low-pitch-y pronunciation.

In Russian, <i> and <y> _are_ pronounced differently, but the
difference
isn't phonemic since <i> is used only after palatised consonants and
syllable-initial,, <y> only after unpalatised consonants. Thus <mir>
(peace) is /m;ir/ while <myt'> (to wash) is /mit;/.

Min.pair <myt'> (to wash) versus <mit'> (to have).

Is <mit'> a word in Russian? The usual word for "have" is <umet'>.

Grrrrrrr..... No it's not. Sorry about that, <mít> is a ruddy westslavism!
When I wrote it I was actually thinking of <bit'> and <byt'>
which I used before.
Btw, it's <imet'>. I think I know how you got <umet'> (to hnow how).

Hmmm, let's say <mishka> (teddy bear) and <mysh'ka> (mousie).
It's not quite a minimal pair, the sh in <mysh'ka> needs a myagkiy
znak. Okay, how about <pil> (he drank) and <pyl'> (dust).
Oh, drats, again only one of them has a myagkiy znak.

What about <pitat'> (to feed/supply) and <pytat'> (to torture).
.....at last, a true min. pair.

Now I cheated, armed with <milo> and <bit'> I got this off the web:
бить — быть
вить — выть
следи — следы
грози́ — грозы́
клик — клык
мило — мыло
сосни́ — сосны́
пил — пыл
сгори — с горы
сир — сыр
ти́кать — ты́кать
графи́ — графы́


A minimal pair might be "Mylo milo", the soap is amiable. (Though
perhaps the long form adjective "milye" would be more appropriate here,
no?)

"Mylo" is a neuter, I'd probably say "milo mylo" or "mylo miloje"
but my Russian is far from idiomatic.

pjk

I was surprised that even Russians were treating them as one
and the same phoneme, but I accept their reasoning.

But in Czech this
wouldn't work since Czech has merged palatised and unpalatised
labials
(/m;/ became /m/, etc).

Correct. The only palatisable Cz consonants are <d>, <t>, <n>,
<r>, <s>, <z>.

[...]

John.


.

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