Pronunciation question "rh"

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bontddu
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Pronunciation question "rh"

Postby bontddu » 2012-02-07, 4:33

Hi All

I'm new to the forum, so hi. I have a quick question about "rh". I heard a song on Youtube - Cerys Matthews singing Rhyw Dachwedd Yn Hwyr - and she pronounced the initial "rhyw" more like "shoe" - so, is this alocal thing to her dialect, slang, or normal, or ....please help. I was taught "rh" was basically "hr".

Diolch yn fawr

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YngNghymru
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Re: Pronunciation question "rh"

Postby YngNghymru » 2012-02-07, 10:57

It does sound slightly more like 'sh' than you might expect, but I don't think there's anything abnormal about her rh - it probably has slightly more friction than is typical. This is either her dialect or her idiolect or potentially her cantolect, so to speak. It's still clearly a trill.

Rh isn't just /hr/, although it does sound like that to English-speaking ears. It's specifically a voiceless /r/, probably with an element of aspiration.
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bontddu
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Re: Pronunciation question "rh"

Postby bontddu » 2012-02-07, 11:42

YngNghymru wrote:It does sound slightly more like 'sh' than you might expect, but I don't think there's anything abnormal about her rh - it probably has slightly more friction than is typical. This is either her dialect or her idiolect or potentially her cantolect, so to speak. It's still clearly a trill.

Rh isn't just /hr/, although it does sound like that to English-speaking ears. It's specifically a voiceless /r/, probably with an element of aspiration.


Diolch yn fawr, YngNghymru. Thinking about your explanation and listening to the song again it strikes me the "rh" she says sounds a little - a little - like the Swedish "sj", also it has a little reverb on it which is cushioning it a bit as well I guess. :)

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Jurgen Wullenwever
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Re: Pronunciation question "rh"

Postby Jurgen Wullenwever » 2012-02-11, 7:36

bontddu wrote:it strikes me the "rh" she says sounds a little - a little - like the Swedish "sj"

Sidenote: The Swedish sj is a number of very different sounds, so it is not really useful for comparison. If you meant like my Swedish "sj" it would be a different matter, but perhaps not clear to the reader what sound you talk about, unless he has heard you speak.

For my part, both her rh and her ll (in that recording, and on my computer) sound (very roughly) like my Swedish tj, an observation which might make it a little bit more effortless for me to speak broken Welsh, as I have not grasped rh yet.

Oppositely, her ch does rather sound like my Swedish sj. :)
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