analytical versus inflected languages

[Paul Frank]

From: Grant Barrett <gbarrett at MONICKELS.COM>
> Now for something completely different.  Why do some native
> speakers of
> Spanish, when speaking English, substitute the "y" sound for the
> "j" sound
> (e.g. "Ayax" for "Ajax")?

I reckon that it's because nothing remotely resembling the English j sound
exists in Spanish, whereas the Spanish and English y sounds are quite
similar. I'm a native speaker of Spanish, by the way, and I don't substitute
the y sound for the j sound when speaking English. I'm glad you said some
native speakers of Spanish.

Paul
___________________________________
Paul Frank
Business, financial and legal translation
>From Chinese, German, French, Spanish,
Italian, Dutch and Portuguese into English
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E-mail: paulfrank at post.harvard.edu