Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-20, 21:04

Naava wrote:There's a Finnish term ilmasota that means - surprise surprise - air war. Would that be also ilmasõda in Estonian?
Nope, we don't use "ilm" for air (anymore). Air is "õhk", so õhusõda, or if you're talking about a single battle then õhulahing.

"Ilm" is used only for weather and world.

How about Estonian? Would that be millisest mastist see on?
Yes. Or colloquially "Mis mastist see on?".
Also "Millist/mis masti see on?" <- partitive; used the same way like other words that mean type/sort/kind.

The names are quite similar to the Finnish ones!
ärtu - hertta, pada - pata, ruutu - ruutu, risti - risti
Hmm, then maybe they are loaned from Finnish. They decline differently than our words:
ruutu : ruutu : ruutut but square is r`uut : ruudu : r`uutu
risti : risti : ristit but cross is r`ist : risti : r`isti
Also I haven't heard the genitive form pada used for the card suit, which is paja.
On the other hand, poti also acts differently from our p`ott : poti : p`otti.

EDIT: I added the (`) marking to the suit names to distinguish overlong from regular pronunciations.

That's clever. I think we say something like "sticking out of the ground".
Oh, I meant that if something falls to/onto the ground, then it "kukub maha", but if it falls into the ground then it "kukub maasse" - both are illatives.

Usually older words tend to use the "irregular" short illative more and newer words the regular "-sse" illative more. And occasionally for some words the two illatives have slightly (or completely) different meanings.

The only good thing in it is that you can use the verb törröttää which I find hilarious. :lol:
Sounds like our turritama. :D
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Naava » 2016-03-21, 9:32

ainurakne wrote:
Naava wrote:There's a Finnish term ilmasota that means - surprise surprise - air war. Would that be also ilmasõda in Estonian?
Nope, we don't use "ilm" for air (anymore). Air is "õhk", so õhusõda, or if you're talking about a single battle then õhulahing.

Oh, of course, I forgot. :D
It seems I'm starting to approach the level of "can talk about weird topics in" with my Estonian vocabulary, btw.

I checked Eesti etümoloogiasõnaraamat and it says there that õhk is a cognate with hehkua, to glow, and that it's been originally hingeõhk. Do you have any theory what happened? I don't see the connection there. Has the word had some other meaning than "to glow" earlier?

Do you decline loan words differently than your own words? Do they ever have consonant gradation?

I added the (`) marking to the suit names to distinguish overlong from regular pronunciations.

Which sound does it affect? It wasn't explained very clearly in my study book... The only thing I can remember was the d - t - tt / g - k - kk / b - p - pp and "it happens in other words too but it's not shown in ortography and we won't help you either". We passed the whole thing very quickly in the lessons, too, but when I met a native Estonian speaker, she told me I was pronouncing t / k / p just fine. Surprisingly I had problems with tt / kk / pp, they were too short. :lol: I think Finnish has tt / kk / pp in careful, slow articulation but t / k / p in fast speech. It could be my dialect/idiolect too. I don't know, but I thought it was funny.

Oh, I meant that if something falls to/onto the ground, then it "kukub maha", but if it falls into the ground then it "kukub maasse" - both are illatives.

I don't think I understand what you mean. How can anything fall inside the ground? Maybe a meteor but...

Sounds like our turritama.

What does it mean? I tried to find out but I failed. :D

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-21, 14:09

Naava wrote:I checked Eesti etümoloogiasõnaraamat and it says there that õhk is a cognate with hehkua, to glow, and that it's been originally hingeõhk. Do you have any theory what happened? I don't see the connection there. Has the word had some other meaning than "to glow" earlier?
Maybe hehkua is more related to hõõguma (hõõgama) and "õhk" has somehow mixed with õhkama/õhkuma ~ fi:hohkua.

Or maybe "õhk" actually comes from ohkima/ohkama ~ fi:ohkaa. :hmm:

Do you decline loan words differently than your own words? Do they ever have consonant gradation?
I'm afraid I'm not exactly sure what do you really mean by loan words. In Estonian we have native words (põlis- or omasõnad) which originate from Proto-Finnic and before (and have survived, not just reintroduced from Finnish), loan words (laensõnad) which originate from everywhere else and artificial words (tehissõnad). So, most of the vocabulary consists of loan words, even if they have been loaned so long ago and changed so much that it's barely recognizable that they are loans.

Additionally we also have võõrsõnad (foreign words) which are loan words that haven't conformed or have only partially conformed in Estonian. Are these the words you mean?

Ok, let's take one with a foreign letter: dren`aaž : drenaaži : dren`aaži (drainage) <- If the stress is on the last syllable then there is gradation.
Even consonant gradation: meteor`iit : meteoriidi : meteor`iiti (meteorite).

Which sound does it affect? It wasn't explained very clearly in my study book...
This can be tricky.

If the long vowel is followed by a short non-stop consonant or a soft stop consonant (ruudu vs. r`uudu), then the vowel becomes a bit longer and there will be kind of like a pause between the vowel and the following consonant.

If the long vowel is followed by a strong stop consonant (ruutu vs. r`uutu), then I guess different people can say it differently. The vowel gets a bit longer but the pause is either between the vowel and the following consonant (which I think also gets longer) or the vowel is followed by kind of like a half length consonant which turns into the pause and then back into the full-length consonant again.

If it's the consonant cluster (or long consonant) that gets overlong, then again something in there gets a bit longer and the pause appears somewhere in-between there.

This pause thingy is not exactly like a real pause, but more like this "cutoff" (or however it's called) between the word boundaries in a compound word.

The only thing I can remember was the d - t - tt / g - k - kk / b - p - pp and "it happens in other words too but it's not shown in ortography and we won't help you either". We passed the whole thing very quickly in the lessons, too, but when I met a native Estonian speaker, she told me I was pronouncing t / k / p just fine. Surprisingly I had problems with tt / kk / pp, they were too short. :lol: I think Finnish has tt / kk / pp in careful, slow articulation but t / k / p in fast speech. It could be my dialect/idiolect too. I don't know, but I thought it was funny.
Maybe you didn't have that pause thingy?

One way to show this in orthography would be to also use triple letters. And then for the compatibility's sake also throw away g, b and d, and instead use single, double and triple variants of k, p and t.
This would be... unconventional, but I guess easier to learn. :D

rutu - ruttu - rutttu
rutu - ruutu - ruuutu
ruutu - ruuttu - ruuuttu/ruuutttu :?:
etc...

I don't think I understand what you mean. How can anything fall inside the ground? Maybe a meteor but...
Oh, I meant like the knife or the shovel from the previous example. When falling and the blade of the knife or the shovel goes (at least partially) into the ground, so that it gets stuck, then it "kukub maasse". But when it just falls onto the ground (or even onto the floor), then it "kukub maha".

If it really falls completely into the ground (goes underground), like for example there is a deep hole in the ground, then I would say "maa sisse" or "maa alla".

What does it mean? I tried to find out but I failed. :D
It should be pretty much the same as törröttää.
I think it's related to Finnish turri, although our "turri" means (to turn) into the state of [turri] and "turris" is to be in the state of [turri].
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Naava » 2016-03-24, 15:47

ainurakne wrote:Maybe hehkua is more related to hõõguma (hõõgama) and "õhk" has somehow mixed with õhkama/õhkuma ~ fi:hohkua.

Or maybe "õhk" actually comes from ohkima/ohkama ~ fi:ohkaa.

What are these words? I've never heard any of them. :para:

Are these the words you mean?

Yup! I meant any relatively new words that are taken from some other language. I assumed older loans are so assimilated to the language that it's hard to see any difference between them and the native words. For example, Finnish äiti is conjugated äidin, whereas auto is auton and not *audon. The only difference there is that äiti is an older loan than auto. Estonian ruutu and pada reminded me of this.

This can be tricky.

Guess so, because I didn't understand anything... :lol:

Oh, I meant like the knife or the shovel from the previous example.

That's what I meant at first too. If you drop something like that, I'd say it "jäi (pystyyn) törröttämään" or "jäi pystyyn" or something similar to describe its position. I don't think there's an exact translation for Estonian "kukub maasse". Imo we need one!

I think it's related to Finnish turri

Really, where do you get these words? :D The only word I can think of is karvaturri, which refers to furry animals. I don't think turri means anything by itself.

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-25, 12:02

Naava wrote:What are these words? I've never heard any of them. :para:
Do you mean the Estonian words or the Finnish ones?
I just followed the links in the etymological dictionary: õhk -> õhkama, hõõgama, ohkama.

I guess some the Finnish words referenced there can be often dialectal or archaic.

Naava wrote:... For example, Finnish äiti is conjugated äidin, whereas auto is auton and not *audon.
What's the difference between auton and audon? I fail to pronounce Finnish t and d (also k vs g, and p vs b) differently when they are between vowels. :?

Naava wrote:Estonian ruutu and pada reminded me of this.
They actually look more like (foreign) names which mostly aren't declined at all besides adding case endings.

Naava wrote:
This can be tricky.
Guess so, because I didn't understand anything... :lol:
Yeah, this is something that you have to hear yourself a lot to understand. You can't just learn to pronounce it (or sometimes even distinguish it in speech) from the books alone.

It seems that what I mistakenly thought of as "kind of like a pause" in overlong syllables, is actually falling pitch: suprasegmental length.

Naava wrote:
I think it's related to Finnish turri
Really, where do you get these words? :D The only word I can think of is karvaturri, which refers to furry animals. I don't think turri means anything by itself.
Again, from the etymological dictionary. :mrgreen:
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Virankannos » 2016-03-25, 19:12

ainurakne wrote:What's the difference between auton and audon? I fail to pronounce Finnish t and d (also k vs g, and p vs b) differently when they are between vowels. :?
The letter T is pronounced unvoiced, [t̪] (unvoiced dental stop) whereas D is a voiced alveolar stop [d]. Also, *audon is not a word form that exists in Finnish, only auton is correct.

I think there is a similar tendency in both Finnish and Estonian, namely that recent loanwords and foreign names often lack qualitative consonant gradation, ie. t : d, p : v and k : Ø. This is why we have auto : auton, tipu : tipun 'chick' and muki : mukin 'mug' instead of *audon, *tivun or *muin. Quantitative gradation, ie. tt : t, pp : p and kk : k, however, continues to be productive, for example nikki : nikin (colloquial) 'nickname (in IRC, chat, forums etc.)' or kuppi : kupin 'cup'.

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Naava » 2016-03-25, 21:20

ainurakne wrote:Do you mean the Estonian words or the Finnish ones?

Both! :D

I fail to pronounce Finnish t and d (also k vs g, and p vs b) differently when they are between vowels. :?

Like Virankannos said, t is dental whereas d is alveolar. You can also hear d pronounced as t, l, r, ɾ (tap) or Ø.

I think t is very rare, mostly used in few loanwords or genitives like presidentti ~ presitentti, äiti ~ äitin. (I do this. :I There's just something in the word presidentti that makes me substitute d with t. Maybe it's the tt at the end?) But in general, I believe it's a feature from the days when people didn't know how to say d.

L is also rare. It was used in Tavastian dialects in place of d: pata - palan. So far I haven't heard anyone using it.

R and ɾ are used in Western dialects instead of d: pata - paran / paɾan. (There's a joke that we wash hands with blood because vesi -> vere-) I think I flap most of my d's.

Ø is used in Eastern dialects, and I think it resembles Estonian gradation quite a lot. There can be either Ø or some "help" consonant in place of d: pata - paan, käsi - käet; sydän -> syvän, saada -> saaha. (There's again a joke that these people have cuckoos in their pockets instead of hands, because they pronounce both cuckoos and hands in the same way.)

I don't think you need to worry about b and g because I can't hear any difference there either. :lol: One of my friends says these a bit softer maybe, which could be voicing, but I'm not sure.

(I know this was supposed to be questions about Estonian, but I'm saying these because I saw you study Finnish and thought you might be interested.)

It seems that what I mistakenly thought of as "kind of like a pause" in overlong syllables, is actually falling pitch

Ok, thanks! I must read it.

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-26, 11:30

Thank you very much for your helpful reply, Virankannos.
Virankannos wrote:The letter T is pronounced unvoiced, [t̪] (unvoiced dental stop) whereas D is a voiced alveolar stop [d]. Also, *audon is not a word form that exists in Finnish, only auton is correct.
Hmm, then I guess my T/D is neither of them. I slap my tongue onto the whole "alveol" up to my teeth (included). :silly:

Although this can vary a lot depending on what other sounds surround it. Sometimes the tongue doesn't reach to the teeth at all. So, I guess even my T-s are, in some circumstances, alveolar. At the same time T and D between the same sounds don't differentiate at all, except their lengths.

I remember my Finnish teacher mentioning that Finnish D is different, but I didn't get it. I guess I really should find a place where I can hear them side by side. :roll:

Naava wrote:
ainurakne wrote:Do you mean the Estonian words or the Finnish ones?
Both! :D
Ok, then:
hõõguma - to glow, to smoulder; mostly used for things that are hot: embers, hot gases, hot metal, ...
hõõgama ~ to radiate (heat)
õhkuma ~ to radiate, to radiate from something; but I guess this can be also used for convectional heat transfer, and not just heat, but other "things" as well, like cold and anger, etc...
õhkama - like previous, but to radiate something out from itself, but also used for mild sighing
ohkama - to sigh; to say "ohhhhhhh" while blowing out a lot of air
ohkima ~ to sigh repeatedly, hyperventilatingly

Naava wrote:[...]
(I know this was supposed to be questions about Estonian, but I'm saying these because I saw you study Finnish and thought you might be interested.)
Thanks, that was interesting to know. :D

(There's again a joke that these people have cuckoos in their pockets instead of hands, because they pronounce both cuckoos and hands in the same way.)
:hmm: So, et:kägu - käod is fi:käki - käet.

We've got a similar thing with tegu (fi:teko) and tigu (a snail), both decline into teod.
When someone happens to declare "Meid ootavad suured teod!" (Great deeds await us!), then there's occasionally someone else who shouts "Ja veel suuremad nälkjad!" (And even bigger slugs!). :mrgreen:
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Virankannos » 2016-03-26, 20:45

Naava wrote:I think t is very rare, mostly used in few loanwords or genitives like presidentti ~ presitentti, äiti ~ äitin. (I do this. :I There's just something in the word presidentti that makes me substitute d with t. Maybe it's the tt at the end?) But in general, I believe it's a feature from the days when people didn't know how to say d.
The [d] sound is actually not native to Finnish and didn't originally belong to the sound inventory at all. In native words (and older loanwords) the sound that was in its place was pronounced [ð], for example KODIN was pronounced [koðin]. When people first started writing Finnish in the 1500's, this sound was usually represented by D or DH. This practice never really went away, and after the written language started to stabilise, D was ultimately chosen. The pronunciation [d] in standard language came through Swedish speakers, and that's how we arrive to the current situation. That's also the reason why there's so much variation in the spoken language and dialects: the [ð] sound developed further to [r], [ɾ], [l] and [Ø] independently from writing conventions. There are recordings from an area in the southwestern coast, where people actually still had the [ð] sound at least until the 1960's, and standard Kven (based on Porsanger dialect) still has it. In newer loanwords some people tend to pronounce D's like T's, similarly to other voiced consonants (banaani [panaani], gerbiili [kerpiili], presidentti [(p)resitentti] etc), but this can give the impression of being "from the countryside".
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Broadway » 2016-03-29, 19:46

Is there a meaning of the Estonian last name Rimm? I have a friend with that name who says it doesn´t mean anything, but I have learned that almost all Estonian names means something?

If anyone can help I will be most grateful.

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Naava » 2016-03-30, 13:44

Virankannos wrote:The pronounciation [d] in standard language came through Swedish speakers, and that's how we arrive to the current situation.

Yeah, that's what I meant by "didn't know how to pronounce it". :) I've heard a story that back in the day, some people in South Ostrobothnia replaced all the R's with D's so that they would write stuff like vädi for väri. :D I don't know if it's true, I don't remember where I've heard this, but seems possible (and funny!)
But what's strange is that I don't do this with any other words really. (Ok also with hiilihydraatti, but it's because I can't really say DR :S)

ainurakne wrote:I slap my tongue onto the whole "alveol" up to my teeth (included).

I'm not quite sure about the details of IPA or any of these alveolar/dental/palatal things, but this sounds pretty close to how I pronounce my T's. I could've understood you wrong, of course.

So, I guess even my T-s are, in some circumstances, alveolar.

Finnish T becomes alveolar after R, maybe after S too? I think rest of the alveolar consonants assimilate to dental ones before T. No wait, L doesn't always...? I think I could say malta both with a dental and an alveolar L, but malttaa with double T has always dental L. Ok I have no idea what's happening here, maybe Virankannos knows better than I do. :D (I haven't really studied Finnish phonology.)

Another difference between T and D is (at least for me) that I tend to say T with a flat tongue and D with the tip of my tongue. I know these have their own terms but I've forgot them. Also, when I'm speaking in English, I press my tongue slightly harder on the palate than when speaking in Finnish, but this could be explained by my tendency to flap Finnish D's.

Again, if you're interested, I think these are the translations for the words you gave me earlier:
hõõguma - hehkua
õhkuma/õhkama - not really sure because I haven't heard it used in any other way than in the third person: [jokin] hohkaa [kylmää / kuumaa]. Hohkata, maybe?
ohkima - not an exact translation, but it reminds me of hönkiä which means a repeated "sigh" with rounded lips. Think about a cold weather and the "smoking" game kids have. (Please say we weren't the only ones doing this. :lol: )

I don't know if the other words have any equivalents in Finnish. Anyway, thanks for translating these! :)

So, et:kägu - käod is fi:käki - käet.

Yep.

When someone happens to declare "Meid ootavad suured teod!" (Great deeds await us!), then there's occasionally someone else who shouts "Ja veel suuremad nälkjad!"

:D Sounds like my family's sense of humour.

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-30, 17:50

Broadway wrote:Is there a meaning of the Estonian last name Rimm? I have a friend with that name who says it doesn´t mean anything, but I have learned that almost all Estonian names means something?
I don't think it means anything either. At least not in modern day non-dialectal Estonian.

Do you happen to know how is it declined? Rimmi, Rimmu, Rimma or something else?

Naava wrote:I'm not quite sure about the details of IPA or any of these alveolar/dental/palatal things, but this sounds pretty close to how I pronounce my T's. I could've understood you wrong, of course.
I don't know how it's really called or how should I exactly describe it either, I just tried to describe what does it feel like in my mouth, with the help of this picture. :roll:
And, the more I try to make these sounds, the less confident I become about understanding how exactly my tongue is placed.

No wait, L doesn't always...? I think I could say malta both with a dental and an alveolar L, but malttaa with double T has always dental L.
:? Ughh, dentel L seems like a lot of work. Every time I try to make Finnish-like non-palatalized L, I put my tongue back there to that post-alveolar (or even pre-palatal) region. I guess I have always been wrong. :roll:

ohkima - not an exact translation, but it reminds me of hönkiä which means a repeated "sigh" with rounded lips. Think about a cold weather and the "smoking" game kids have. (Please say we weren't the only ones doing this. :lol: )
Thanks! :D

:hmm: Hmm, I don't remember smoking, but I remember lifting my chin up, yelling "I am a train!" and running around making: poof, poof, poof, ...
:lol:
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Jurgen Wullenwever » 2016-03-30, 21:26

ainurakne wrote:
Naava wrote:I'm not quite sure about the details of IPA or any of these alveolar/dental/palatal things, but this sounds pretty close to how I pronounce my T's. I could've understood you wrong, of course.
I don't know how it's really called or how should I exactly describe it either, I just tried to describe what does it feel like in my mouth, with the help of this picture. :roll:
And, the more I try to make these sounds, the less confident I become about understanding how exactly my tongue is placed.

No wait, L doesn't always...? I think I could say malta both with a dental and an alveolar L, but malttaa with double T has always dental L.
:? Ughh, dentel L seems like a lot of work. Every time I try to make Finnish-like non-palatalized L, I put my tongue back there to that post-alveolar (or even pre-palatal) region. I guess I have always been wrong. :roll:

Could you make some description of the place of articulation for Estonian l, or does it seem too uncertain?
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-03-31, 12:48

Jurgen Wullenwever wrote:Could you make some description of the place of articulation for Estonian l, or does it seem too uncertain?
I can't speak for other Estonians, but I can try to describe how I think I do that.

I think for most L sounds, the tip of my tongue is positioned quite similarly to the T sound:
L1.png
Except that I hold my tongue to the left and make a little gap at the right side in order to not block the airflow.

The more palatalized the L is, the more I lift the back side of my tongue:
L2.png
And also squish the back of my tongue wider, so it touches the teeth or even goes beyond them.

Non-palatalized L-s vary more:
L3.png
The tip of my tongue could be everywhere from teeth to further back (in some circumstances, it may even reach the pre-palatal region). And the back of my tongue is forced downwards and made narrower.

(I hope the images are somewhat understandable)
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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Jurgen Wullenwever » 2016-03-31, 17:49

ainurakne wrote:(I hope the images are somewhat understandable)

I think I get the general idea. So there is no major difference between apical and laminal, but instead between alveolar and palatal (or something ... ).
Chekhov wrote:I don't know about naive worldviews, but Jurgen Wullenwhatever pisses me off to no end because of his extreme pessimism and cynicism. You'd think the world was going to end imminently when talking to that guy.

Jag är rebell: jag sockrar teet, saltar maten, cyklar utan hjälm, och tänder glödlampor.
(Ovanstående var förut, nu försöker jag minska sockret och saltet, och har gett upp mejeriprodukter.)

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-04-01, 14:20

Jurgen Wullenwever wrote:So there is no major difference between apical and laminal, but instead between alveolar and palatal (or something ... ).
I'm not sure. We distinguish normal l and lj (palatalized l or "soft" l), but not otherwise, at least I don't.
Although, it seems that l sounds are made differently depending on what other sounds surround them.
Eesti keel (et) native, English (en) I can manage, Suomi (fi) trying to learn, Pусский (ru)&Deutsch (de) unfortunately, slowly fading away

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Virankannos » 2016-04-02, 8:40

ainurakne wrote:I'm not sure. We distinguish normal l and lj (palatalized l or "soft" l), but not otherwise, at least I don't.
Although, it seems that l sounds are made differently depending on what other sounds surround them.
This is normal in any language: sounds assimilate to the surrounding sounds. This can be unnoticeable (like how the exact point of the palate where e.g. /k/ is formed depends on the vowels around it) or perceivable to the speaker, like the palatalisation in Estonian, which is actually caused by a following /i/ that may have disappeared. A good example of a minimal pair is /pɑlk/ 'pay, salary' vs. /pɑlʲk/ 'log, beam', both written as <palk> (< earlier *palkka and *palkki respectively).

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Jurgen Wullenwever » 2016-04-02, 9:11

Virankannos wrote:the palatalisation in Estonian

Is there a dictionary for Estonian that marks this?
Chekhov wrote:I don't know about naive worldviews, but Jurgen Wullenwhatever pisses me off to no end because of his extreme pessimism and cynicism. You'd think the world was going to end imminently when talking to that guy.

Jag är rebell: jag sockrar teet, saltar maten, cyklar utan hjälm, och tänder glödlampor.
(Ovanstående var förut, nu försöker jag minska sockret och saltet, och har gett upp mejeriprodukter.)

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby ainurakne » 2016-04-02, 9:38

Virankannos wrote:A good example of a minimal pair is /pɑlk/ 'pay, salary' vs. /pɑlʲk/ 'log, beam', both written as <palk> (< earlier *palkka and *palkki respectively).
I think even more interesting is this pair:
/taljlj/ (declines: t`al'l : tal'li : t`al'li) - stable (fi:talli)
/tall/ (declines: t`all : talle : t`alle) - baby lamb/goat

Short partitive plural of /taljlj/ is /taljlje/ - looks like partitive singular of /tall/, but is palatalized.
Short partitive plural of /tall/ is /talli/ - looks like partitive singular of /taljlj/, but is not palatalized.

Jurgen Wullenwever wrote:
Virankannos wrote:the palatalisation in Estonian

Is there a dictionary for Estonian that marks this?
Yes, ÕS for example.

If you look at this, you can see that the second entry t`al'l has an ' after the first l, this marks palatalization.
Eesti keel (et) native, English (en) I can manage, Suomi (fi) trying to learn, Pусский (ru)&Deutsch (de) unfortunately, slowly fading away

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Re: Küsimus eesti keele kohta / Questions about Estonian

Postby Jurgen Wullenwever » 2016-04-02, 12:44

ainurakne wrote:Short partitive plural of /taljlj/ is /taljlje/ - looks like partitive singular of /tall/, but is palatalized.
Short partitive plural of /tall/ is /talli/ - looks like partitive singular of /taljlj/, but is not palatalized.

This contradicts the statement below:
"Before i or j the sounds denoted by t, d, l, n, and s are always palatalized. "
Or does the distinction between palatalised and non-palatalised just concern the basic core form, and stay the same regardless of what endings may follow? (I am at A0 level here, so I am just trying to get a grip on the basic pronunciation.)
http://lpcs.math.msu.su/~pentus/etpron.htm
Palatalization

The consonants denoted by t, d, l, n, and s are palatalized in certain words, which is not shown in spelling. Before i or j the sounds denoted by t, d, l, n, and s are always palatalized. They are never palatalized before a, o, u. In Estonian Grammar Dictionary, palatalization is shown with the apostrophe (') after t, d, l, n, or s; before i or j the apostrophe is not used ( pruun' = brown; mün't = a coin; pos'tiljon = a postman; in the last word there are three palatalized consonants: s, t, and l).
Chekhov wrote:I don't know about naive worldviews, but Jurgen Wullenwhatever pisses me off to no end because of his extreme pessimism and cynicism. You'd think the world was going to end imminently when talking to that guy.

Jag är rebell: jag sockrar teet, saltar maten, cyklar utan hjälm, och tänder glödlampor.
(Ovanstående var förut, nu försöker jag minska sockret och saltet, och har gett upp mejeriprodukter.)


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