Unanswered Questions
63 questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
8
votes
0
answers
220
views
Historical pronunciation of Hindi यह and वह
The Hindi 3rd person singular proximal and distal pronouns यह and वह are commonly pronounced [jeː] and [ʋoː], in contrast to the [hyper-correct?] pronunciations [jəɦ(ə)] and [ʋəɦ(ə)] one might expect ...
- 3,132
7
votes
0
answers
204
views
Northumbrian pronunciation of ge-/gi- prefix and -g suffix
I'm working on a musical setting of Cædmon's Hymn, and I'd like to have the primary setting be in the Northumbrian dialect of its earliest written example (the 737 "Moore" Bede manuscript). I'm ...
- 87
6
votes
0
answers
192
views
Just how silent is the French e muet?
I know the e muet is usually considered silent. That being said, it is still often pronounced in songs and poetry (famously, in the Marseillaise). This is completely contrary to the situation in ...
- 161
6
votes
0
answers
148
views
Term for non-homograph homophone synonyms?
In Japanese, 熱い and 暑い are both read atsui and both mean 'hot'. The former pertains to an object (e.g. hot coffee) and the latter to weather.
In French 'cuissot' and 'cuisseau' have the same ...
- 507
5
votes
0
answers
159
views
Why in the world are French "Paul" and "Paule" distinguished by vowel openness?
Wikipedia lists
Paul [pɔl] ('Paul', masculine), vs. Paule [pol] ('Paule', feminine),
as a minimal pair of the two mid rounded back vowels of French.
What I wonder is, how did it happen that the two ...
- 159
5
votes
0
answers
448
views
Cellar door and Indo-European languages
Where I grew up (UK) there was a pub called The Drysalters. I always liked this name without having any idea what a drysalter was, or having any association or emotional connection to the pub itself.
...
- 31.1k
4
votes
0
answers
123
views
How did "y" come to represent the semi-vowel yod /j/ in French orthography?
I went down a bit of a rabbit hole trying to work out where the different sounds of the "y" in English came from. I quickly established that the semi-vowel was originally written with a yogh,...
- 151
4
votes
0
answers
198
views
Why French Adjectives Uses BAGS
In French, most adjectives are positioned behind the noun e.g.
vache bleue
médecin étrange
orange énevrant
But sometimes you have an adjective following BAGS -- the adjective describes beauty, age,
...
- 31.1k
4
votes
0
answers
476
views
Past participle agreement in French
Background (skip if you know French)
In French, to generate the past tense, you use the past participle of the verb, attaching in front a conjugated form of avoir or être. For example:
J'ai mangé. (I ...
CommunityBot
- 1
3
votes
0
answers
123
views
Can a trill be creaky?
Or in other words, is it possible to pronounce [ʙ̰], [r̰], [ʀ̰], or [ʢ̰]?
I tried to pronounce these phones by myself, and I always failed. It seems the airstream from the constricted glottis cannot ...
- 337
3
votes
0
answers
84
views
Is there any IPA TTS software that also considers tone
I want to create audio files for a conlect of Chinese I am studying, and therefore tone is one aspect I have to consider. Many of the IPA to speech software I've seen so far don't consider tone (or ...
- 31
3
votes
0
answers
127
views
The schwa in [meɪkəθ] for *maketh* in KJV English
This Wiki article seems to suggest that words like makes had lost their final syllable schwa in normal speech already by Chaucer's time (palmeres > palmers is the example they give). The rule, as ...
- 267
3
votes
0
answers
60
views
Looking for a thorough comparison of French and Spanish
Either in English, Spanish or French.
I haven't found a comparative grammar but I got pretty excited with this monograph:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Portuguese_and_Spanish
I'm ...
- 31.1k
3
votes
0
answers
168
views
Does Japanese have as many English-derived words as English has French-derived words?
According to current corpora and other tools used by language researchers, does the current vocabulary of Japanese already contain as many words borrowed/derived from English as the number of English ...
- 31
3
votes
0
answers
291
views
Specifics about the impact of natural gender on pronunciation?
What is the difference in pronunciation between women and men when speaking a language, as opposed to the difference in the voice of men and women? The context for the question arises from my looking ...
CommunityBot
- 1