| << Previous | Up | Next >> |
This section is for readers who don't understand the technical description of the sounds given in the Phonemic inventory page (a diagram of which is included here as well). Its tone is informal and less technical than that of the rest of this guide. It only assumes you know and speak English in a more-or-less standard way (there isn't such a thing, but you get it). If you're not interested in spoken Senu Yivokuchi or understood the phonetic description, skip the next paragraphs.
The consonant phonemic inventory:
Lab Alv Pal Vel
Stop p t c k
b d J\ g
Fricat f s C x
v z j\ G
Nasal m n J
Approx w j
l L
r
Consonants come in series. They can be grouped and related within these series, as you saw in the diagram above. We will call the rows and columns in the diagram "series" and name each one by its header. Sometimes one series will cover two rows.
The rows in the diagram are groups of consonants that shared the same mood of articulation (MOA), which refers to the way the tongue, lips, etc. let the air flow from the lungs out. Senu Yivokuchi has three MOAs: stop, fricative, and approximant (the nasal consonants are a subset of stops). The columns in the diagram are consonants that share the same point of articulation (POA), which means the place where the sound is produced.
Stops (the consonants in the Stop row, or the "stop series") are known to all English speakers. Senu Yivokuchi has two subseries, the voiced one and the unvoiced one, just as English. Unlike English, the unvoiced stops (/p t c k/) are all unaspirated. The puff of air you hear when you pronounce "pit" (which you won't hear if you pronounce "spit") is called aspiration; the "p" in "pit" is said to be aspirated, while the "p" in "spit" is unaspirated, or non-aspirated. Well, Senu Yivokuchi pronounces its p always non-aspirated, as well as t, c, and k. You may hear unaspirated stops in Spanish, if you listen closely.
Senu Yivokuchi also has fricatives and approximants, which should not be difficult, so we'll come back to them later.
The really difficult sounds are those in the palatal series (the column marked pal in the diagram), since English doesn't have that series. Palatal sounds, as the name implies, are made at the hard palate, which is the vault that arches up in the middle part of the mouth (between the places where an English speaker would pronounce "t" and "k"). English has only one palatal consonant, usually represented by "y" (as in "you"). Senu Yivokuchi has seven, one of them being /j/ (exactly like English "y", and written the same way) and the others being two stops and two fricatives, two voiced and two unvoiced, as well as a nasal and a lateral approximant. The stops are /c/ and /J\/ (written c and j), and the fricatives are /C/ and /j\/ (written ch and jh, for symmetry). The palatal nasal is /J/ (written nn), and the palatal lateral is /L/ (written ll).
In order to produce /c/, you need to do like this. Place your tongue as if to pronounce an English "t". Your tongue tip is touching the alveola (the place behind your teeth), and the middle of the tongue is roughly horizontal. You need to retract the tongue, taking the tip back and arching up the middle part, until a nice portion of the tongue touches not the alveola, but the palate (it will be in contact with the palatal ridge, where the bony edge of the palatal vault can be felt). Now stop the flow of air and then release it, as you would do for "t". That's a /c/. Apply the same procedure to produce /J\/, only imitating the voice quality of a "d". If you let the air flow causing friction, as with "s" and "z", you will produce the fricative palatals, /C/ and /j\/. The sound of /C/ is by far (in my opinion) the easiest one to master, since it's a lot like English "sh"; if you're familiar with Mandarin Chinese, this sound is the one represented by "x" in Pinyin. Finally, /J/ (nn) is like Spanish "ñ" (Italian or French "gn"), while /L/ (ll) is like (standard Castilian) Spanish "ll".
The velar series (the column marked vel in the diagram) has two other sounds that are unknown to English phonology, the fricatives /x/ and /G/ (written kh and gh to relate them to k and g). The first one, unvoiced, is the same sound as Spanish "j", in the dialects where it's pronounced strong and "guttural" (that excludes Centroamerican and Caribbean Spanish, which pronounce it like English "h"). The second one is its voiced counterpart. Note that there isn't a velar nasal (English "ng")
The only other sound that may cause problems to English speakers is /r/, which is not an English "r" in any of its varieties, but sounds more like an Italian "r" (sometimes a Spanish "rr"). This sound is a soft, quick version of Spanish trilled "rr", pronounced by having the tip of the tongue vibrate rapidly at the alveola.
All other sounds are pronounced as you would imagine, taking into account the fact that each symbol (single letter or digraph) is pronounced the same no matter what, so for example, g is always a hard "g" as in "get", not a soft one as in "gin".
If you want to hear these sounds spoken, download this file and play it in any MP3 player (it's only 34 KB). It's me speaking out each consonant, row by row, with the vowel /a/ after it.
The vowels are exactly as in Spanish. Really. Each vowel is pure, without glides, distinct from the others, and never reduced. They cannot be represented by English-like transliteration. I also have a sound file for these too (me saying the vowels /i e a o u/) [8 KB MP3 file].
The diphthongs are a bit more difficult, but should pose no problems once the individual vowels are mastered. Again, you can hear them (27 KB MP3 file).