# accent - búho



## jent

If "búho" (meaning owl) were written without the accent, it would be still emphasized on the penultimate syllable.

In my understanding, words in Spanish whose pronunciation follows normal grammar rules are only accented when there are multiple definitions, and one gets an accent in order to differentiate it (té meaning tea versus te meaning you as an indirect or direct object, for example).

If my understanding is correct, and there is no such thing as "buho" without the accent mark, then why does "búho" have an accent mark? Thanks!


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## gengo

I think it would form a diphthong without the accent, and become one syllable.


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## jent

It would if there were no _h_, but doesn't the _h_ silently break up the syllables? I'm not clear on that but that's been my impression.


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## Juver

*Porque las vocales "u" y "o" forman un hiato (dos sílabas) y el acento sirve para separarlas.
Si la "u" no llevara acento hablaríamos de un diptongo, que tendríamos que pronunciar.
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Because the vowels "u"and "o" form a hiatus (two syllables) and the accent used to separate them.
If the "u"it would not speak ofa diphthong accent,we would have to pronounce it.*


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## gengo

jent said:


> It would if there were no _h_, but doesn't the _h_ silently break up the syllables? I'm not clear on that but that's been my impression.



No, I don't think that's true.  But wait for a native speaker to confirm.


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## Adelaida Péndelton

jent said:


> It would if there were no _h_, but doesn't the _h_ silently break up the syllables?


No.


> *3.* La _h_ intercalada no influye en absoluto  en la consideración como diptongo o como hiato de una secuencia  vocálica. Así, hay grupos de vocales con _h_ intermedia que forman diptongo: a_h_i_jado, _a_h_u_mar, pr_o_h_i_bir, _y otros que forman hiato: a_h_í_nco, turb_o_h_é_lice, pr_o_h_í_be_.
> _Diccionario panhispánico de dudas ©2005
> Real Academia Española © Todos los derechos reservados_


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## jent

So "ahijado" is pronounced as [aijado] with three syllables?

Thanks for the information, all. This is helpful.


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## Billbasque

jent said:


> If "búho" (meaning owl) were written without the accent, it would be still emphasized on the penultimate syllable.
> 
> In my understanding, words in Spanish whose pronunciation follows normal grammar rules are only accented when there are multiple definitions, and one gets an accent in order to differentiate it (té meaning tea versus te meaning you as an indirect or direct object, for example).
> 
> If my understanding is correct, and there is no such thing as "buho" without the accent mark, then why does "búho" have an accent mark? Thanks!



No, it's not like that. You are right in thinking that "búho" is emphasized on the penultimate syllable (because of the accent of course), but not in thinking that without the accent it would still be emphasized the same way.

 If "búho" didn't have an accent, it would be a monosyllabic word emphasized on the "o". This is because without the accent, the "uo" diphthong formed by a weak (u) and a strong (o) vowel would have to be stressed on the strong vowel (bu-*ho*), since that is the rule with diphthongs. Since we know that that is not the actual way "búho" is pronounced, you need to put an accent on the (u) and transform the diphthong (u*o*) into a hiatus (*ú* - o), which effectively means breaking it in two syllables. Again, this is unrelated to the other reasoning you mentioned about monosyllabic words being written with or without an accent depending on their meaning.

There are many other words that follow a similar pattern, by the way: lío, reír, río, caído, etc... All of these would be stressed on the strong vowel if they didn't have an accent. In fact some of those words actually have a meaning -a different one- when they don't carry an accent, because then you have a diphthong that is naturally stressed on the strong vowel (eg: rio , which is stressed on the "o" and is of course a different word than "río")


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## gengo

jent said:


> So "ahijado" is pronounced as [aijado] with three syllables?



Sí, lo es.


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## grahamcracker

This video helped me. My understanding is that weak vowels (i and o) use the accent to keep the strong vowels (a, e, u) from overpowering them in the pronunciation. If "i" and "o" are not accented and they are next to a stronger vowel, the weak vowel is going to be slighted somehow. The unaccented "i" and "o" will not cause a syllabic break.

http://www.professorjason.com/index...-accent&catid=68:stress-and-accents&Itemid=78


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## grahamcracker

jent said:


> So "ahijado" is pronounced as [aijado] with three syllables?
> 
> Thanks for the information, all. This is helpful.


I believe the reason, in this case, is that consonants separate the vowels.


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## grahamcracker

Billbasque said:


> No, it's not like that. You are right in thinking that "búho" is emphasized on the penultimate syllable (because of the accent of course), but not in thinking that without the accent it would still be emphasized the same way.
> 
> If "búho" didn't have an accent, it would be a monosyllabic word emphasized on the "o". This is because without the accent, the "uo" diphthong formed by a weak (u) and a strong (o) vowel would have to be stressed on the strong vowel (bu-*ho*), since that is the rule with diphthongs. Since we know that that is not the actual way "búho" is pronounced, you need to put an accent on the (u) and transform the diphthong (u*o*) into a hiatus (*ú* - o), which effectively means breaking it in two syllables. Again, this is unrelated to the other reasoning you mentioned about monosyllabic words being written with or without an accent depending on their meaning.
> 
> There are many other words that follow a similar pattern, by the way: lío, reír, río, caído, etc... All of these would be stressed on the strong vowel if they didn't have an accent. In fact some of those words actually have a meaning -a different one- when they don't carry an accent, because then you have a diphthong that is naturally stressed on the strong vowel (eg: rio , which is stressed on the "o" and is of course a different word than "río")



Love the explanation.


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## gengo

Billbasque said:


> There are many other words that follow a similar pattern, by the way: lío, reír, río, caído, etc... All of these would be stressed on the strong vowel if they didn't have an accent.



This same thing occurs in Japanese, but instead of using a tilde when writing in Roman letters, we use a Y instead of an I.

For example, Tokyo is pronounced in English as three syllables, but it is actually only two in Japanese, to and kyo (although each is held for two beats; that's another story).  It would be three syllables if spelled as Tokio in English:  to, ki, and o.


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## ptak30

I don't think I've got it yet. In #10  "i" and "o" are said to be weak vowels but in #8 we have "o" as a strong vowel. Is there a further internal classification among these vowel sets. I can see the reason for accenting but I can't see the purpose of the "h". In what way would the pronunciation of búho and búo differ?


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## Spug

grahamcracker said:


> My understanding is that weak vowels (i and o) use the accent to keep the strong vowels (a, e, u) from overpowering them in the pronunciation.



The strong, or open, vowels (vocales abiertas), are _a_, _e_, and _o_. The weak, or closed, vowels (vocales cerradas) are _i_ and _u_.


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## gengo

ptak30 said:


> I don't think I've got it yet. In #10  "i" and "o" are said to be weak vowels but in #8 we have "o" as a strong vowel. Is there a further internal classification among these vowel sets. I can see the reason for accenting but I can't see the purpose of the "h". In what way would the pronunciation of búho and búo differ?



It may be a remnant of older Spanish, but I don't think it serves any purpose today.  Another word like this is moho (moss).  In this case, the O is just elongated (held for two beats).

Spug (message #15) is right about the strong and weak vowels.


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## grahamcracker

Spug said:


> The strong, or open, vowels (vocales abiertas), are _a_, _e_, and _o_. The weak, or closed, vowels (vocales cerradas) are _i_ and _u_.


Gulp . I should probably have gone back and reviewed the video before posting.


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## Spug

There used to be an excellent PDF document on the RAE website, from 1999, called _Ortografía de la lengua española_. I was looking for it the other day because I had a question about _diptongos _and _hiatos_, but I could not find it. Perhaps when they updated the _Ortografía _a while back they got rid of the old document. Oh well..


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## Billbasque

Yes, a/o/e are the strong vowels and i/u are the weak ones. And no, the H is completely silent in spoken Spanish. As gengo said it is a remnant of the Old Spanish, and many words that currently have them used to have an F instead, so for example the word "hacer" used to be spelled "facer" centuries ago. For some reason long alog they were replaced by a silent H, although in other Romance languages like Portuguese those same words retained the F. Now its only apparent purpose is to make Spanish speaking students -and I guess those who learn Spanish as a 2nd language as well- fail spelling tests, since we don't have the luxury of hearing the silly Hs in spoken Spanish to learn where they are before seeing them in writing.


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## ptak30

thank you all. I'd often wondered about the connection between Portugese falar and Spanish hablar.


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## duvija

gengo said:


> This same thing occurs in Japanese, but instead of using a tilde when writing in Roman letters, we use a Y instead of an I.
> 
> For example, Tokyo is pronounced in English as three syllables, but it is actually only two in Japanese, to and kyo (although each is held for two beats; that's another story). It would be three syllables if spelled as Tokio in English: to, ki, and o.



Sure, and now, you're in charge of explaining moraic theory to the whole forum...


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## Forero

When these _h_es were _f_s, they separated syllables; when they became _h_es but were still pronounced, they separated syllables; but now that they are silent we have to add the _tilde_.

Of course some _h_es in Spanish were never _f_s. For example _ahuevar_ got its _h_ when _u_ was used for both _u_ and _v_ (it would have been _avevar_ without the _h_).


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## jent

Thanks for the comprehensive answers, guys.

This leads me to another question! Does that mean "rehenes" (hostages) is pronounced as two syllables? Or is it still three because a strong and weak vowel are required to create a diphthong, as opposed to two strong or two weak vowels?


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## duvija

jent said:


> Thanks for the comprehensive answers, guys.
> 
> This leads me to another question! Does that mean "rehenes" (hostages) is pronounced as two syllables? Or is it still three because a strong and weak vowel are required to create a diphthong, as opposed to two strong or two weak vowels?



You're right. It's re.he.nes, for the reason you mentioned.


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## Aviador

For the purpouse of syllabic division, vowels in Spanish are divided into two different groups: *open vowels* and *closed vowels*. Open vowels are _a_, _e_ and _o_ and closed vowels are _i_ and _u_.
The rule says that:



RULEEXAMPLEopen vowel + unstressed closed vowel = diphthong*au*la (au-la)unstressed closed vowel + open vowel = diphthongm*ue*la (mue-la)closed vowel + different closed vowel = diphthongr*ui*na (rui-na)unstressed open vowel + stressed closed vowel = hiatusc*aí*da (ca-í-da)stressed closed vowel + unstressed open vowel = hiatusb*ú*h*o* (bú-ho)two equal vowels = hiatusl*ee*r (le-er); ch*ii*ta (chi-i-ta)two different open vowels = hiatust*ea*tro (te-a-tro)


By diphthong in Spanish we mean two vowels that are part of the same syllable and by hiatus two vowels that belong to two different syllables and are pronounced accordingly. Letter _h_ has no importance at all in syllabic division: _búho _(bú-ho).

The main job of the tilde (´) in Spanish is to indicate the exceptional stressing of words. For example, in Spanish stress goes naturally on the second last syllable of words ending by n an s (cantan, casas); simple statistics can show that. To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _canción_, _revés_.
Naturally in Spanish, an open vowel followed by a closed vowel belong to the same syllable (diphthong): _laico_ (lai-co). To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _caída_ (ca-í-da). The same happens in the case of a closed vowel followed by an open vowel: _cuota_ (cuo-ta). To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _búho_ (bú-ho). Again, simple statistics can clearly show that.
Actually, words that include the sequence _uo_ are very few in Spanish. I only used this example for better consistency with the case of the word _búho_.


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## duvija

Aviador said:


> For the purpouse of syllabic division, vowels in Spanish are divided into two different groups: *open vowels* and *closed vowels*. Open vowels are _a_, _e_ and _o_ and closed vowels are _i_ and _u_.
> The rule says that:
> 
> 
> 
> RULE
> EXAMPLE
> open vowel + unstressed closed vowel = diphthong
> *au*la (au-la)
> unstressed closed vowel + open vowel = diphthong
> m*ue*la (mue-la)
> closed vowel + different closed vowel = diphthong
> r*ui*na (rui-na)
> unstressed open vowel + stressed closed vowel = hiatus
> c*aí*da (ca-í-da)
> stressed closed vowel + unstressed open vowel = hiatus
> b*ú*h*o* (bú-ho)
> two equal vowels = hiatus
> l*ee*r (le-er); ch*ii*ta (chi-i-ta)
> two different open vowels = hiatus
> t*ea*tro (te-a-tro)
> 
> 
> 
> By diphthong in Spanish we mean two vowels that are part of the same syllable and by hiatus two vowels that belong to two different syllables and are pronounced accordingly. Letter _h_ has no importance at all in syllabic division: _búho _(bú-ho).
> 
> The main job of the tilde (´) in Spanish is to indicate the exceptional stressing of words. For example, in Spanish stress goes naturally on the second last syllable of words ending by n an s (cantan, casas); simple statistics can show that. To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _canción_, _revés_.
> Naturally in Spanish, an open vowel followed by a closed vowel belong to the same syllable (diphthong): _laico_ (lai-co). To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _caída_ (ca-í-da). The same happens in the case of a closed vowel followed by an open vowel: _cuota_ (cuo-ta). To indicate the exception, we use the tilde: _búho_ (bú-ho). Again, simple statistics can clearly show that.
> Actually, words that include the sequence _uo_ are very few in Spanish. I only used this example for better consistency with the case of the word _búho_.



I'm glad you explained what a diphthong is, in Spanish. In English, it's different.


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## jent

This makes me wonder what the diminutive of "búho" would be in Spanish… "buhocito"?


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## duvija

jent said:


> This makes me wonder what the diminutive of "búho" would be in Spanish… "buhocito"?



Buhito. (maybe with a tilde, maybe not). Buhíto.
[bwito] for me.


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## Peterdg

duvija said:


> Buhito. (maybe with a tilde, maybe not). Buhíto.
> [bwito] for me.


Sin tilde.

No importa que se pronuncie bu-hi-to o bwi-to: en los dos casos, sin tilde.


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## duvija

Peterdg said:


> Sin tilde.
> 
> No importa que se pronuncie bu-hi-to o bwi-to: en los dos casos, sin tilde.



 Esta no se la perdono a la RAE


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## lenni22

duvija said:


> Esta no se la perdono a la RAE


Es que los hablantes de español solemos pensar (erróneamente) que una vez que uno consigue dominar las reglas de acentuación, la pronunciación de una palabra está inequívocamente determinada por su ortografía. Esto no es así. Tal es el caso de *todas *las combinaciones u-i, donde *nunca *está claro si hay diptongo o hiato.

¿Acaso nuestra ortografía muestra si "construir" se pronuncia en 2 ó 3 sílabas? No, y normalmente se pronuncia en tres.
¿Cuántos hablantes de español pronuncian "cambiar" en dos sílabas y "enviar" en tres? ¿Cómo demonios se supone que el hablante de español como segunda lengua tiene que deducir esto?
Antes, en este hilo, se habló de la pronunciación de "moho" y se dijo cómo se debía pronunciar. Pero yo he escuchado tres pronunciaciones distintas para esta palabra: [mo.o], [mo:] y [mo]. Y en este caso prefiero que haya una única ortografía y tres pronunciaciones antes que tres ortografías y tres pronunciaciones. Es un problema similar al que presenta la normalización de la ortografía inglesa, inconcretable por las miles de palabras que admiten diversas pronunciaciones en distintas o en una misma región.

Por lo tanto, esta yo sí se la perdono a la RAE , aunque considero que es un tema muy subjetivo y tolero otros pareceres .


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## lenni22

ptak30 said:


> thank you all. I'd often wondered about the connection between Portugese falar and Spanish hablar.


Tenía entendido que la sustitución /f/ -> /h/ se había producido por influencia del vasco sobre el castellano. Pero según el siguiente artículo de Wikipedia, esta teoría no es tan aceptada. http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambio_fonético_«f_→_h»_del_español

Además de "hablar", otras palabras con h inicial en castellano y f inicial en otras lenguas romances son: hacer, harina, hoja, horno, hormiga, hada, Hernando, Hernández, hierro, halcón, humo...


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## ptak30

Gracias, *lenni22*
He leído el wiki . Muy interesante. Lástima que casí al final................


> En resumen, se puede decir que nadie ha analizado satisfactoriamente la  complejidad del fenómeno, es decir, que tanto el bilingüismo  vasco-románico como causas estructurales internas de la lengua pudieron  intervenir en la realización del cambio.


Parece que las investigaciones siguen
Saludos
ptak


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## duvija

lenni22 said:


> Por lo tanto, esta yo sí se la perdono a la RAE , aunque considero que es un tema muy subjetivo y tolero otros pareceres .



Sí, la joroba es que la RAE tuvo que elegir entre la ortografía y la acústica, y eligieron la primera. 
El argumento de 'cómo va a saberlo el hablante de español como segunda lengua' no es muy válido. La escritura no se inventó para extranjeros. Y si no, diríamos que el chino no es un idioma muy intuitivo, ni para nativos ni para extranjeros. Y el inglés no es ninguna joyita.

El problema del hiato/diptongo tiene siglos de discusiones, y la academia cortó y dijo 'Gana la escritura'. No me parece una solución al 100%. (Yo sigo con mis espectrogramas, por supuesto). Tal vez tomó la solución más práctica, pero cuesta que tu propia academia te trate como a un bobo.


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## lenni22

duvija said:


> El argumento de 'cómo va a saberlo el hablante de español como segunda lengua' no es muy válido. La escritura no se inventó para extranjeros.


"¿Cómo va a saberlo el hablante de español como segunda lengua?" es un *ejemplo *que puse para demostrar la discordancia entre la ortografía y la pronunciación del español. No era un *argumento* para demostrar nada. Creo que malinterpretaste mi mensaje.



duvija said:


> Tal vez tomó la solución más práctica, pero cuesta que tu propia academia te trate como a un bobo.


Si esto cuesta, entonces te aconsejo que te desapegues un poco de "tu propia academia", y que no te tomes tan a pecho una regla ortográfica. No creo que haya sido la intención de la RAE menospreciar a nadie.

Saludos cordiales.


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## duvija

lenni22 said:


> "¿Cómo va a saberlo el hablante de español como segunda lengua?" es un *ejemplo *que puse para demostrar la discordancia entre la ortografía y la pronunciación del español. No era un *argumento* para demostrar nada. Creo que malinterpretaste mi mensaje.
> 
> 
> Si esto cuesta, entonces te aconsejo que te desapegues un poco de "tu propia academia", y que no te tomes tan a pecho una regla ortográfica. No creo que haya sido la intención de la RAE menospreciar a nadie.
> 
> Saludos cordiales.



Anduve peleando con la Academia acerca de la palabra 'reuma/reúma' durante ya varios años. No fue mi intención, pero me contestaron de ahi a una protesta que puse en otro grupo de lingüística. Me hizo mucha gracia que me hubieran contactado, pero las simples 'reglas ortográficas' son buena parte de lo que la Academia hace. Yo hago fonética y fonología, y los hiatos me atacan.


Sí, lo de la segunda lengua y la escritura, temo que te malentendí. Es que a veces nos olvidamos que la escritura es totalmente secundaria respecto a la validez de algo en un idioma. Los idiomas son orales; la escritura, una pobre representación tardía de ellos.


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