more pronunciation

[Ralph Cleminson]

On Sat, 16 Jan 1999  John Dingley wrote:

> Avanesov himself warns against pronouncing v izbe as
> (v,iz,b,e), ot Ivana as (at,ivan-). And with the velars, Avanesov
> admits that the "soft" pronunciation is very widespread, e.g.
> k Ivanu (k,ivanu), smex i gore (s,m,ex,igor-).
>

The examples with the velars certainly do not invalidate the
understanding of i/y as a single phoneme, as there is no phonemic
distinction between "hard" and "soft" velars (or wasn't until very
recently - it all depends on what you think the present tense of
tkat' is), the soft allophone appearing precisely before i, so that
/k/+/i/ would naturally be realised as [k,]+[i].


R.M.Cleminson,
Professor of Slavonic Studies,
University of Portsmouth,
Park Building,
King Henry I Street,
Portsmouth PO1 2DZ
tel. +44 1705 846143, fax: +44 1705 846040