Re: [tied] Other IE language with /w/

From: Miguel Carrasquer
Message: 41453
Date: 2005-10-16

On Sun, 16 Oct 2005 11:00:59 +0200, Grzegorz Jagodzinski
<grzegorj2000@...> wrote:

>The information on Sorbian pronunciation on
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorbian_alphabet is highly incomplete (however,
>[w] for the Lower Sorbian <w> is mentioned there). My page on Sorbian
>(http://www.aries.com.pl/grzegorzj/gram/unipl/luzyc.html) is available only
>in Polish as for now (however some information may be understood). I have
>based myself on a book in German and informations from a scholar
>specializing in Sorbian and a Sorbian speaker at the same time.
>
>The Upper Sorbian <w> is also [w], at least in some positions, not [v] like
>Wikipedia says, cf. "w und l sind wie englisches w zu sprechen, also wie u
>in sauer" from the Upper Sorbian online course (in German):
>http://sibz.whyi.org/~edi/wucbnica/1.lekcija.html.


But cf. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/7636

>You are fully right, and that is why I wrote "I mean the standard version".
>I was also interested in this problem, and just asked some native Dutch
>speakers what they think. Basing on what they said I can present the thing
>this way now: the pronunciation of (initial) <w> as the labio-dental
>approximant is recommended by some courses and dictionaries (including these
>I have) but is spread only in some dialects, especially those from the
>southern part of the Dutch language area.

No. In the standard languages, <w> is a labiodental
approximant in the north, a bilabial approximant (not
labiovelar) in the south.

The dialect maps show a similar distribution, except that
the bilabial pronunciation, which is absolutely general in
Dutch-speaking Belgium, also predominates in the southern
parts of the Netherlands (the whole of Zeeland and Limburg,
parts of Noord Brabant, Gelderland and Utrecht).

The labiodental pronunciation predominates in Holland,
stretching into the urban areas of Utrecht and
Noord-Brabant, and in the whole Saxon area (Groningen,
Drente, Overijssel). Also the Frisian area.

There are a number of pockets on the Holland coast (Katwijk,
Noordwijk, Egmond-aan-Zee, Zandvoort), where the
pronunciation is labiovelar [w].


=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...