# Urdu: How do you distinguish between different h sounds هـ، ح



## tarkshya

How do you distinguish between voiceless glottal fricative and voiced glottal fricative in Urdu?
In my self study of Urdu, I have come across at least 3 variants of glottal fricative sound, (commonly called "h" sound). i.e. ح, ہ, ھ. If there are more, I am not aware of it, so please do point out to me if there are more h sounding letters in Urdu.

It is not clear to me which one of these letters are used for voiced vs voiceless h sound? It is difficult to find audio resources with accurate pronunciation on the Internet. Can someone help?


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## Qureshpor

There are only two ہ and ح. The sounds are not distinguished in ordinary everyday Urdu speech. However, in writing they are distinguished. حل solution, ہل plough. All words which have a ح in them are of Arabic origins whereas those with ہ can be Indic, Persian, Arabic or any other language.

ہ in the form of ھ is primarily used in Urdu to convey the Indic  aspirate sounds such as bh بھہ ,Th ٹھہ  etc.

The same logic applies with ث, س and ص (all s)

ذ, ز, ض and ظ (all z)

ت and ط (both soft t)


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## tarkshya

Thanks Qureshpore, I have more questions.

>> "There are only two ہ and ح. The sounds are not distinguished in ordinary everyday Urdu speech."

So, what kind of "h" sound do these letters make, is it a voiced one or voiceless one?

You can refer to the following audio files to point out the right sound to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_glottal_fricative
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_glottal_fricative

Also, why do you say that There are only two ہ and ح, and ہ is a form of ھ? All online Urdu resources that I have found, including the wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urdu_alphabet, say that ہ and ھ are two separate letters (chōṭī hē and dō chashmī hē). 
​


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## Qureshpor

^ I am sorry I have n't got much time today to listen to your sound recordings. The "h" is just like the English "h" in "hat".

Regarding ھ it is another form of ہ used in Urdu to indicate aspirate sounds.

ek-baar ایک بار once

bhaarii بھاری heavy


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## marrish

tarkshya said:


> How do you distinguish between voiceless glottal fricative and voiced glottal fricative in Urdu?
> In my self study of Urdu, I have come across at least 3 variants of glottal fricative sound, (commonly called "h" sound). i.e. ح, ہ, ھ. If there are more, I am not aware of it, so please do point out to me if there are more h sounding letters in Urdu.
> 
> It is not clear to me which one of these letters are used for voiced vs voiceless h sound? It is difficult to find audio resources with accurate pronunciation on the Internet. Can someone help?





tarkshya said:


> So, what kind of "h" sound do these letters make, is it a voiced one or voiceless one?
> 
> You can refer to the following audio files to point out the right sound to me.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_glottal_fricative
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_glottal_fricative
> 
> Also, why do you say that There are only two ہ and ح, and ہ is a form of ھ? All online Urdu resources that I have found, including the wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urdu_alphabet, say that ہ and ھ are two separate letters (chōṭī hē and dō chashmī hē).
> ​


The answer is simple. 

1) These two *letters*, ح and ہ represent the same sound in Urdu*. It's a matter of orthography.

Leaving the letters alone, the *sound* is represented as in IPA: [ɦ]

*In other words, it's voiced glottal fricative.
*
2) The letter ہ has several forms - depending on its position:

ہ - stand-alone; final if not connected with the preceding one.
ﮩ - medial. 
ﮨ - initial.
ـہ - final, connected with the preceding one.
ھ - in Standard Modern Urdu's orthography, used to indicate aspiration of a preceding vowel.**

*Marginal notes:*
3) * ح is at times, very seldom, pronounced differently, as it is in Arabic: IPA [ħ] - voiceless pharyngeal fricative.
** ھ can be scarcely found in the initial or the middle position in some typographic sets or in phrases from Arabic.

4) Voiceless glottal fricative - IPA  is just the slight variation of the voiced one and it can be pronounced in some positions where the adjacent vowels are voiceless, e.g. پھول [phu:l]/[بھول bɦu:l]


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## tarkshya

So I got two contradictory replies. 
One user said these letters are pronounced like h in "hat". That would make it IPA /h/, i.e.  a voiceless glottal fricative.
Another user said the correct pronunciation is IPA /ɦ/, meaning voiced glottal fricative.

To me, it appears that since Urdu speakers are essentially indic people in their origin, they can't differentiate the variance in "h" sounds which comes naturally to Semitic people.

Since both ح and ہ are Arabic letters originally, I fell upon Arabic pronunciation to solve the mystery. Sure enough, *Arabic clearly differentiates the sounds of the two letters.* This particular video is excellent. (xxx)  It actually devotes some time to explain the difference in pronunciation of ح and ہ. After watching this video, I came to understand that:

ح  - IPA /ħ/ - voiceless pharyngeal fricative
ہ - IPA /h/ - voiceless glottal fricative

But the problem remains. It appears that there is no letter in Urdu to represent the  voiced glottal fricative, i.e. the "hard" h sound. It is the sound of a deep, throaty h. Both IPA /ħ/ and IPA /h/ represent the "soft" h sound. 

Any thoughts?


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## Qureshpor

tarkshya said:


> So I got two contradictory replies.
> 
> 
> One user said these letters are pronounced like h in "hat". That would make it IPA /h/, i.e.  a voiceless glottal fricative.
> 
> 
> Another user said the correct pronunciation is IPA /ɦ/, meaning voiced glottal fricative.
> 
> 
> To me, it appears that since Urdu speakers are essentially indic people in their origin, they can't differentiate the variance in "h" sounds which comes naturally to Semitic people.[...]?


It could be that the persons who have replied to you are not infallible. Perhaps a DNA sample from both of us could help you in determining the answer you are looking for. All I will tell you is that I can differentiate between ہار (necklace) and حار (hot). This according to you shows that I could be Semitic. My view, however is that anyone can train himself/herself to pronounce a particular sound. People speaking Urdu don't normally differentiate between h and H but you will hear some members of the clergy who do differentiate between them. I would n't know if they are Indic or Semitic.


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## marrish

tarkshya said:


> So I got two contradictory replies.
> One user said these letters are pronounced like h in "hat". That would make it IPA /h/, i.e.  a voiceless glottal fricative.
> Another user said the correct pronunciation is IPA /ɦ/, meaning voiced glottal fricative.
> ................
> Since both ح and ہ are Arabic letters originally, I fell upon Arabic pronunciation to solve the mystery. Sure enough, *Arabic clearly differentiates the sounds of the two letters.* This particular video is excellent. [YouTube links are not allowed without the prior permission of a moderator]But the problem remains.* It appears that there is no letter in Urdu to represent the  voiced glottal fricative*, i.e. the "hard" h sound. It is the sound of a deep, throaty h. Both IPA /ħ/ and IPA /h/ represent the "soft" h sound. Any thoughts?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> marrish said:
> 
> 
> 
> The answer is simple. 1) These two *letters*, ح and ہ represent the same sound in Urdu*. It's a matter of orthography. Leaving the letters alone, the *sound* is represented as in IPA: [ɦ]. *In other words, it's voiced glottal fricative.
> **[...]Marginal notes:*
> 3) * ح is at times, very seldom, pronounced differently, as it is in Arabic: IPA [ħ] - voiceless pharyngeal fricative.
> 
> *4) Voiceless glottal fricative - IPA  is just the slight variation of the voiced one and it can be pronounced in some positions where the adjacent vowels are voiceless, e.g. پھول [phu:l]/[بھول bɦu:l] *
Click to expand...

tarkshya, you've got just two answers so be patient - perhaps you can be fortunate to get more. As the other person who answered your query said, we are not infallible but we both are consistent on the main issue which you offered for discussion in your opening post, i.e. that it's not true that *letters* represent different Urdu H-*sounds*. For 95% of the cases, it's always the same sound - [ɦ].
Now whether "hat" in English uses [ɦ] or  that's another matter, I think both.
Arabic is irrelevant.
*There are two letters to represent "voiced glottal fricative" [ɦ] in Urdu: ہ ح and the forms I provided before.

**My suggestion: in order not to run in circles, could you please offer a few examples of Urdu words that you are wondering about? The discussion will be not so theoretical then.*


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## mundiya

Qureshpor said:


> All I will tell you is that I can differentiate between ہار (necklace) and حار (hot). [...]People speaking Urdu don't normally differentiate between h and H but you will hear some members of the clergy who do differentiate between them.



I didn't know you were in the clergy QP saahab.  But thank you (and marrish saahab too) for describing how the H sound is supposed to be.  I was wondering about that myself.


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## tarkshya

See, the point I am making is that if a language has got multiple letters for what appears to be single sound, then you can pretty much bet your clergy robes on it that all those letters represent different sounds. After all , ancient grammarians were no fools. Adding redundant letters in a alphabet makes no sense to a grammarians.

Somebody mentioned in this thread that  ذ, ز, ض and ظ all represent z sound. They do not. Even a novice learner can detect the variance in sounds by listening to some youtube videos.

Then you say, Arabic is irrelevant. It is not. If a word comes to Urdu from Arabic, and Urdu faithfully follows its Arabic spelling, then it goes without saying that only its exact Arabic pronunciation will be considered correct. All other pronunciations will be wrong.


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## marrish

No, it's not true. In Urdu, you named your thread Urdu, it's not the case. Arabic pronunciation would be in most case be *incorrect*. Let's stay away from Z as it is about H, but my and the other one's point is about H and it is most of the cases pronounced the same as ہ. Your other interlocutor said something about members of the clergy and that's right but sometimes, as I said, it's pronounced so in Arabic expressions which are part and parcel of Urdu. By the way, it's not only the clergy but they are famous for it that tend to differentiate between ہ ح. There are other parts of the vast community of Urdu speakers that do it, especially in India.


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## eskandar

tarkshya said:


> See, the point I am making is that if a language has got multiple letters for what appears to be single sound, then you can pretty much bet your clergy robes on it that all those letters represent different sounds.


Really? So the [f] sound in English _full_ must be different from the [f] sound in English _enough _and the [f] sound in _telephone_. And I suppose the [ s ] sound in _sick_ must be different from the [ s ] sound in _circle_, right? After all, as you said, "ancient grammarians were no fools. Adding redundant letters in a alphabet makes no sense to a grammarians." Right?

The only reason Urdu retains different spellings for , [z], etc. is because they are borrowed from Arabic (through Persian) and they retained the original spelling. They are not pronounced anything like the original. ضرور is pronounced_ Daruur_ in Arabic. It was borrowed into Persian, and you will not find a single Persian speaker who says _Daruur_, as they cannot pronounce the emphatic sound. Similarly you will not generally find Urdu speakers who say _Daruur_ instead of _zaruur_. You will even find Hindi/Urdu speakers who say _jaruur_ or _juruur_ but not _Daruur_. Challenge your average Urdu or Hindi speaker to pronounce the Arabic sound _D_; I guarantee that unless they have specially studied Arabic, they cannot. Even many who HAVE studied Arabic cannot pronounce it properly. This is exactly the same phenomenon as English words borrowed from French. Take the word _source_ for example. It is an English word borrowed from French. It is pronounced as [suʁs] in French but you will not find any native English speakers who pronounce it that way. In fact most English speakers cannot properly pronounce the French R [ʁ] even if they try. The vowel is also different; English speakers treat the vowel as [oə] or [ɔ] but not [ u ]. Why don't English speakers say [suʁs] ? Why don't they change the spelling to make it sound more French (eg. soors)? Why don't they change the spelling to reflect the English pronunciation (eg. sowrs or sores)? *Because they kept the original spelling of the word even though it is pronounced differently. *This is the case for literally thousands of French (and other foreign) loanwords in English, and it is the case of thousands of Arabic loanwords in Urdu, just as it is the case of Arabic loanwords in Persian, or Persian loanwords in Turkish, or Chinese loanwords in Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese.



> Then you say, Arabic is irrelevant. It is not. If a word comes to Urdu from Arabic, and Urdu faithfully follows its Arabic spelling, then it goes without saying that only its exact Arabic pronunciation will be considered correct. All other pronunciations will be wrong.


You are completely wrong. The vast majority of all Urdu speakers are not even able to pronounce most of the Arabic sounds the letters originally represent. It is clear you know nothing of the language. You can also refer to all scholarly grammars of Urdu for a confirmation of the fact that the Arabic emphatic consonants are not pronounced in Urdu. For just one example, Ruth Laila Schmidt's _Urdu: An Essential Grammar_ consistently represents ض as [z], such as in transliterating فرض as [farz] (p. 276). I am sure you cannot provide even a single scholarly example to back up your inaccurate claims.


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## tarkshya

I would like to revive this thread as I believe there are plenty of more letters which are pronounced differently between Arabic and Urdu. I would like to go to the bottom of this sound shift.

Take the letter ث for example. Arabs pronounce is as /th/, while Urdu speakers as /s/. So the name عثمان بن عفان, the third caliph of Islam, will be pronounced as "Uthman" by Arabs and "Usman" as Urduphones. Now it appears to me that only one version of pronunciation can be correct. After all, I will take umbrage if somebody would consistently, and insistently, mispronounce my name. So which version is correct?

Then, take the example of رمضا. The word is usually spoken as "ramzaan" by Urdu speakers, and "ramadhaan" by Arabs. Now, I notice that even some Urdu speakers have taken to speak the word as "ramadhaan". So this implies that Urdu speakers were always aware the /z/ pronunciation of the letter ض
 was somehow incorrect, isn't it?





So my question is, is this modified pronunciation of Arabic letters considered officially correct as per grammarians in Urdu, or is it considered incorrect but acceptable by Urdu language experts? I am asking the question from the perspective of official grammar rules, because I already know that in common speech the letters have changed sounds.


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## Dib

To summarize the "h" situation, between Urdu, Arabic and English, there  are 3 approximately "h" sounds (ignoring the aspiration of aspirated  stops and the velar fricative خ):

1) Voiced glottal [ɦ]
 - Almost the only variant in Urdu and other major Indian languages, irrespective of spelling (i.e. ہ ~ ح).
-  In native varieties of English, often the variant used between vowels,  e.g. behind. But used across the board in Indian English.
- Don't think it occurs in Arabic.

2) Voiceless glottal 
 - The dominant variant in most varieties of native English.
- The Arabic ہ
- Don't think it really occurs in Urdu.

3) Voiceless pharyngeal [ħ]
- The Arabic ح
- Don't think this occurs in usual English or Urdu speech.
(In  the short time I attended a beginners' Arabic class, the teacher  described this as the sound you make when you "fog" your spectacles by  blowing out of your open mouth, before cleaning them. I think, this is a  good description.)

Of course, this is a rough sketch, and there  would certainly be a lot more fine-grained variation in all 3 languages,  that is not captured here. The important thing to note is that none of the 3 languages contrasts between the first 2 varieties, and only Arabic contrasts the last one..


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## Qureshpor

tarkshya said:


> I would like to revive this thread as I believe there are plenty of more letters which are pronounced differently between Arabic and Urdu. I would like to go to the bottom of this sound shift.
> 
> Take the letter ث for example. Arabs pronounce is as /th/, while Urdu speakers as /s/. So the name عثمان بن عفان, the third caliph of Islam, will be pronounced as "Uthman" by Arabs and "Usman" as Urduphones. Now it appears to me that only one version of pronunciation can be correct. After all, I will take umbrage if somebody would consistently, and insistently, mispronounce my name. So which version is correct?
> 
> Then, take the example of رمضا. The word is usually spoken as "ramzaan" by Urdu speakers, and "ramadhaan" by Arabs. Now, I notice that even some Urdu speakers have taken to speak the word as "ramadhaan". So this implies that Urdu speakers were always aware the /z/ pronunciation of the letter ض
> was somehow incorrect, isn't it?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> So my question is, is this modified pronunciation of Arabic letters considered officially correct as per grammarians in Urdu, or is it considered incorrect but acceptable by Urdu language experts? I am asking the question from the perspective of official grammar rules, because I already know that in common speech the letters have changed sounds.


You started the topic specifically about h/H distinction in Urdu. What you are asking now is off topic. The topic concerning Urdu alphabet, the letters with same sounds and how they are not the same in Arabic or Persian has been discussed in other threads. A little search may be helpful.


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## tarkshya

As you say. Here is the new thread http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=2906442

Thanks.



Qureshpor said:


> You started the topic specifically about h/H distinction in Urdu. What you are asking now is off topic. The topic concerning Urdu alphabet, the letters with same sounds and how they are not the same in Arabic or Persian has been discussed in other threads. A little search may be helpful.


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## Sheikh_14

marrish said:


> The answer is simple.
> 
> 1) These two *letters*, ح and ہ represent the same sound in Urdu*. It's a matter of orthography.
> 
> Leaving the letters alone, the *sound* is represented as in IPA: [ɦ]
> 
> *In other words, it's voiced glottal fricative.*
> 
> 2) The letter ہ has several forms - depending on its position:
> 
> ہ - stand-alone; final if not connected with the preceding one.
> ﮩ - medial.
> ﮨ - initial.
> ـہ - final, connected with the preceding one.
> ھ - in Standard Modern Urdu's orthography, used to indicate aspiration of a preceding vowel.**
> 
> *Marginal notes:*
> 3) * ح is at times, very seldom, pronounced differently, as it is in Arabic: IPA [ħ] - voiceless pharyngeal fricative.
> ** ھ can be scarcely found in the initial or the middle position in some typographic sets or in phrases from Arabic.
> 
> 4) Voiceless glottal fricative - IPA  is just the slight variation of the voiced one and it can be pronounced in some positions where the adjacent vowels are voiceless, e.g. پھول [phu:l]/[بھول bɦu:l]



Fascinating, the way I see it the two are meant to be pronounced differently as are kaaf ک and ق, but most Urdu-phones fail to make this distinction. The ح represents a hard H sound which most Urdu-phones do not bother adopting as is much the case with the guttural sound in qaaf. Higher language learning and understanding would encourage speakers to distinguish between the two as the sounds that the two represent are indeed subtly, but noticeably different, if voiced accurately.

No.3 in your marginal notes is seminal, since over time it has evolved to become a matter of preference. The difference in actuality is marked, but most Urdu-phones would not differentiate in normal conversations, which to me is a sign of lethargy and linguistic ignorance.

To put it succinctly the h sound in chhoTii he and do-chashmi he are soft and unvoiced. The H sound whereas in baRii He is voiced. So you ought to be able to tell the difference between the H sound in fataH and taraH in contrast to zarrah (particle). Similarly, the H in Haamil requires more throaty voicing as compared to the soft h in haar I.e. defeat or garland. Notwithstanding, that most speakers wouldn't differentiate, they ought to as it detracts from the richness of the language. As is very much the case with the two kaafs ک vs ق. So I would just put it down to linguistic apathy.

I would be interested to know if the Urdu-daanaan here do differentiate when speaking,  between the two. I am sure the proponents of the laknawi school of thought, sure would have.


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