Re: [tied] Re: Pronunciation of "r" - again?

david_russell_watson <liberty@...> wrote:

Actually they use the same sound in both instances, which is
a labio-dental approximant with velar co-articulation. As you
would have it above, Indians are capable of pronouncing both
sounds, but for some strange reason are switching them.  :^)  

 

-- I am very much aware of the official Hindi/Gujarati/Punjabi etc. "v/w" made as you describe (although I never knew it had velar coarticulation!), but it really does sound like English "v" before front or unrounded vowels, and like English "w" before back or rounded vowels, so I wonder whether this "v/w" phoneme has two different allophones?

I watched a comedy skit on T.V. once in which a priest with a
speech defect was performing a wedding, and he pronounced all
of his 'r'-s, not 'v'-s, in the same way!   

-- Are you referring to those who are supposed to pronounce their "r"'s as "w"'s?  I have heard many of these people, including the famous Barbara Walters, and I agree with you, they do not actually use /w/, rather the labiodental approximant (sometimes even an approximant made by bringing the flesh well below the upper lip up close to the upper teeth) that is a characteristic of Hindi and other languages.

By the way, Dutch is supposed to have (approximately) the same labiodental approximant, but every time I hear Dutch speakers use it, it sounds like English /v/ to me, while what officially is /v/ in Dutch (written "v") usually seems to sound like English /f/ to me (in initial position at least), although I have heard a couple speakers whose Dutch "w" and "v" sounded exactly the same to me, even after I pressed them to repeat contrasting examples several times for me to be able to hear the difference.  Does Dutch really have the labiodental approximant, or has it evolved to /v/?