Vowel breaking in Russian

[Alina Israeli]

Не‒а meaning 'no' is just two syllables.

Some Russian vowels are дифтонгоидные, as the late prof.  
L. Bondarko wrote. For example, one recognizes Poles who speak very  
good Russian (I had one such occasion) by the fact that their sound  
[o] does not have the element [u] before it. Russian номер is  
[nuomer].

Here's a quote on [ы] (except not only ы  
характеризуется дифтонгоидной  
артикуляцией, as mentioned the quote):

В фонетической системе русского языка  
[ы], в отличие от осталь-
ных русских гласных, характеризуется  
дифтонгоидной артикуляцией:
“...начинаясь с непередней  
артикуляции, он разворачивается во  
време-
ни как гласный, произносимый с передне- 
верхним положением языка,
т. е. как гласный переднего  
ряда” [Бондарко 1998, 78; cм. также: князев,
Пожарицкая 2003, 36]. как отмечает л.В.  
Бондарко, “дифтонгоидность
гласного [ы] была замечена еще А.Н.  
Томсоном, она, так же, как неодно-
родность гласного [о], является  
обязательной приметой русской речи,
а ее отсутствие воспринимается как  
акцентное произношение” [1998,
78].
http://www.leidykla.eu/fileadmin/Kalbotyra_3/2005-2009_54_2/278-286.pdf


On Sep 21, 2013, at 5:15 AM, Don Livingston wrote:

> Dear SEELANGtsy,
>
> I had the most interesting conversation with a co-worker about vowel  
> breaking in Russian.  I have to admit, I've never considered the  
> topic.  Essentially she said that when Russian native-speakers are  
> emphasizing the pronunciation of words, they break stressed vowels  
> into diphthongs.  Among her examples she noted that vy in  
> contrastive contexts by native speakers is pronounced [vwy] and ty  
> in contrastive contexts is pronounced [twy].  This is a colleague  
> whose opinions I very much respect; she is not a person of casual  
> opinions.
>
> That said, I must say that I myself have not observed such a thing  
> when Russian native speakers stress the pronunciation of ty.  The  
> [w] sound one seems to hear in vy and my and pyl' I have previously  
> ascribed to a difference between Russian labials and English  
> labials; that is, I posited that Russian labials have more lip  
> rounding than English labials, and the seeming [w] sound I have  
> taken to be simply an artifact of my American ear trying to  
> interpret Russian sounds as English phonemes.
>
> She also said that other stressed vowels in emphatic contexts show  
> vowel breaking.  I can only think of one vowel I have ever heard  
> that sometimes shows this vowel breaking effect.  Sometimes ne  
> becomes ne-a.
>
> So I'm wondering what your thoughts are on this topic.  Is vowel  
> breaking something you have observed among Russian native speakers  
> in emphatic contexts?  Do you know of any documentation on the  
> topic?  (I don't remember anything of the sort in Avanesov, which is  
> my go-to on pronunciation.) I look forward to any thoughts you might  
> have.
>
> Peace, joy and light to you, Don Livingston.
>
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Alina Israeli
Associate Professor of Russian
WLC, American University
4400 Massachusetts Ave.
Washington DC 20016
(202) 885-2387 	fax (202) 885-1076
aisrael at american.edu






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