Cowsham wrote: ↑12 Nov 2021, 10:55am
............... for some reason I have trouble with the word "celebrity". I want to say "cel-leb-ber-rat-y"
Or "cel-leb-er-rit-tary" and have to think carefully before I say the word. I'm not the only one either -- I hear tv presenters saying it all sorts of daft ways.
Simple really.
Sell-ebb ritty.
In RP there's no gap between the -b- and the -r-. It's -bri-.
Cowsham wrote: ↑12 Nov 2021, 10:55am
............... for some reason I have trouble with the word "celebrity". I want to say "cel-leb-ber-rat-y"
Or "cel-leb-er-rit-tary" and have to think carefully before I say the word. I'm not the only one either -- I hear tv presenters saying it all sorts of daft ways.
Simple really.
Sell-ebb ritty.
In RP there's no gap between the -b- and the -r-. It's -bri-.
thirdcrank wrote: ↑12 Nov 2021, 11:38am
Somebody once told me that all consonants are separated by vowels in Japanese (and if you can find an exception eg Datsun, it's because some Japanese consonants need two when represented in Roman script.)
I believe it is true that Japanese syllables are always consonant-vowel. In which Datsun as pronounced in Japanese is probably Da-tsu-n[vowel]. The [vowel] at the end might even be schwa! But just as likely it isn't. And equally likely I'm simply wrong about this.
English allows more complex syllables with blocks of consonants and occasionally of vowels. So the word 'English' is vowel-consonant consonant-vowel-consonant ('ng' and 'sh' are each one consonant sound despite requiring two letters to write) and the word 'consonant' is consonant-vowel-consonant consonant-vowel-consonant vowel-consonant-consonant. With variations depending exactly where you consider each syllable to start and end...
thirdcrank wrote: ↑12 Nov 2021, 11:38am
Somebody once told me that all consonants are separated by vowels in Japanese (and if you can find an exception eg Datsun, it's because some Japanese consonants need two when represented in Roman script.)
I believe it is true that Japanese syllables are always consonant-vowel. In which Datsun as pronounced in Japanese is probably Da-tsu-n[vowel]. The [vowel] at the end might even be schwa! But just as likely it isn't. And equally likely I'm simply wrong about this.
They can end with a nasal consonant.
And doubled consonants have a special mark and a slight modification to the sound and rhythm.
Jonathan
Ps: You can watch the preference appear when foreign words are imported into Japanese. And in mock-Japanese spoken by comic actors, although of course that's less common than it was. (Oh yes it is!)
thirdcrank wrote: ↑12 Nov 2021, 11:38am
Somebody once told me that all consonants are separated by vowels in Japanese (and if you can find an exception eg Datsun, it's because some Japanese consonants need two when represented in Roman script.)
I believe it is true that Japanese syllables are always consonant-vowel. In which Datsun as pronounced in Japanese is probably Da-tsu-n[vowel]. The [vowel] at the end might even be schwa! But just as likely it isn't. And equally likely I'm simply wrong about this.
They can end with a nasal consonant.
And doubled consonants have a special mark and a slight modification to the sound and rhythm.
Jonathan
Ps: You can watch the preference appear when foreign words are imported into Japanese. And in mock-Japanese spoken by comic actors, although of course that's less common than it was. (Oh yes it is!)
Increasingly I'm seeing adjectives and even prefixes used in the wrong order, e.g. a headline about Bertie Ahearn I saw the other day describing him as "the ex-Irish PM". Just plain no. He didn't stop being Irish, he stopped being PM, so he's the Irish ex-PM.