# Hindi / Punjabi :Namaste



## Hulalessar

Which syllable does the stress (if there is any) come on please?


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## kloie

i think on A but i am not sure.


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## shawnee

On the first 'a', if my experience of watching Hindi movies is anything to go by


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## Hulalessar

Anyone else, please?


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## panjabigator

Second "a".


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## BP.

Hi gator, nice to see you back.


panjabigator said:


> Second "a".


Wouldn't that make the word نماستے? I always knew the only long vowel in it to be the 'e'.


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## Hulalessar

panjabigator said:


> Second "a".



Thank you.


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## tonyspeed

Hulalessar said:


> Which syllable does the stress (if there is any) come on please?




In my experience, and according to most linguists who write books on Hindi, Hindi is basically a stressless language. It is especially important in my opinion for an English speaker to view Hindi as such because English is chock FULL of random stress issues. In particular English speakers always want to stress the second syllable, which means changing the pronunciation of Hindi words to a wrong pronunciation.
Rather, an English speaker should view Hindi as a phonetic language. What you see is what you get. Therefore, "a" (अ) is always pronounced as a short vowel sounding like the "u" in "but" (with VERY specific exceptions beyond the scope of this post). 

In my opinion, it is a horrible practice for English speakers to think they should stress the second a in Namaste because they end up saying something like namaaste नमास्ते, which is wrong and immediately singles you out as a bad pronouncer of Hindi. Therefore, pronounce all short vowels as short always! (अ इ उ ) Never change them for what you consider to be stress! (Because if there is a stress, it is minutely slight, unlike English) And pronounce all long vowels as long until you become an advanced learner.


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> In my experience, and according to most linguists who write books on Hindi, Hindi is basically a stressless language. It is especially important in my opinion for an English speaker to view Hindi as such because English is chock FULL of random stress issues. In particular English speakers always want to stress the second syllable, which means changing the pronunciation of Hindi words to a wrong pronunciation.
> Rather, an English speaker should view Hindi as a phonetic language. What you see is what you get. Therefore, "a" (अ) is always pronounced as a short vowel sounding like the "u" in "but" (with VERY specific exceptions beyond the scope of this post).
> 
> In my opinion, it is a horrible practice for English speakers to think they should stress the second a in Namaste because they end up saying something like namaaste नमास्ते, which is wrong and immediately singles you out as a bad pronouncer of Hindi. Therefore, pronounce all short vowels as short always! (अ इ उ ) Never change them for what you consider to be stress! (Because if there is a stress, it is minutely slight, unlike English) And pronounce all long vowels as long until you become an advanced learner.



*Just a small query. Would you say that "bajaa" in "din laa ek bajaa hai" is the same (in terms of stress) as "Bhaa'ii Dhol vaale! Dhol bajaa"?*


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## tonyspeed

QURESHPOR said:


> *Just a small query. Would you say that "bajaa" in "din laa ek bajaa hai" is the same (in terms of stress) as "Bhaa'ii Dhol vaale! Dhol bajaa"?*




When I pressed play in my head, I heard a difference. But in the grander scheme of things, I still think that a new Hindi learner should forget about the very small stress issues in Hindi and leave that until one is advanced. 

We are talking about separating a transitive tu-form command from an intransitive verb in the perfect tense here. That to me is a very minor issue. How many such stress differentiations can we come up with if we tried to make a list? I think it would be difficult. However, for English, the list would be endless.

The real question is, if I pronounced bajaa in number 1 as bajaa in number 2 would I sound awkward to the average Hindi native speaker? 

Another issue is, I have no idea how I know they sound different! That's why in Hindi, stress issues are best left to passive learning (listening to people actually speak Hindi).


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> When I pressed play in my head, I heard a difference. But in the grander scheme of things, I still think that a new Hindi learner should forget about the very small stress issues in Hindi and leave that until one is advanced.
> 
> We are talking about separating a transitive tu-form command from an intransitive verb in the perfect tense here. That to me is a very minor issue. How many such stress differentiations can we come up with if we tried to make a list? I think it would be difficult. However, for English, the list would be endless.
> 
> The real question is, if I pronounced bajaa in number 1 as bajaa in number 2 would I sound awkward to the average Hindi native speaker?
> 
> Another issue is, I have no idea how I know they sound different! That's why in Hindi, stress issues are best left to passive learning (listening to people actually speak Hindi).



*Actually my point in asking the question was not to confuse language learners but just to affirm that there is stress in Urdu/Hindi. I am glad you replied in the affirmative because, in another forum, people were saying that there is no difference whatsoever in the two "bajaa"s. Frankly, I began to wonder if this was a figment of my imagination!*


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## tonyspeed

QURESHPOR said:


> * Frankly, I began to wonder if this was a figment of my imagination!*



I think it can be summed up like this...maybe. Stress in Urdu is different from stress in English. In Urdu, the length of the sound and the quality of the sound stays approximately the same. It is usually the pitch that changes, maybe accompanied by a slight elongation of LONG vowels sounds, but never short vowels. 

In English, however, stress is usually formed by changing the vowel sound completely to a heavier vowel sound. For short vowels this means turning them into a similar but different long vowel sound. A typical example to me would be that British say calENdar and Americans say CALendar.

Would anyone care to agree?


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## BP.

QURESHPOR said:


> *Actually my point in asking the question was not to confuse language learners but just to affirm that there is stress in Urdu/Hindi. I am glad you replied in the affirmative because, in another forum, people were saying that there is no difference whatsoever in the two "bajaa"s. Frankly, I began to wonder if this was a figment of my imagination!*


I think that because e.g. 2 is imperative, whatever the language you will end up stressing (raising the tone) of the action verb. The other bajaa, even though waznan the same, has to be content living under the shadow of 3 or 4 or whatever the hour is, and isn't stressed on in the sentence.

Intonation does exist in Urdu, even though it isn't a tonal language like Mandarin or even English. The easiest example for me are aanaa and jaanaa, the tone decidedly falling on the second -aa in the first and rising in the second. Be warned though that many people might not accept that indeed there are syllable stresses in Urdu: this might be an accent or worse dialect issue, and they'd be used to hearing flat and bland sonorous-articulations, just as I get to hear around me more and more.


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## Qureshpor

BelligerentPacifist said:


> I think that because e.g. 2 is imperative, whatever the language you will end up stressing (raising the tone) of the action verb.
> 
> The other bajaa, even though waznan the same, has to be content living under the shadow of 3 or 4 or whatever the hour is, and isn't stressed on in the sentence.
> 
> *Exactly my reason for choosing these examples to make the point that stress certainly exists in Hindi/Urdu.*
> 
> Intonation does exist in Urdu, even though it isn't a tonal language like Mandarin or even English.
> 
> *I believe you speak a "tonal" language yourself, namely Punjabi!*


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## BP.

Yeah, Panjaabii is definitely tonal, and that has been my single biggest difficulty in speaking it.


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## Qureshpor

BelligerentPacifist said:


> Yeah, Panjaabii is definitely tonal, and that has been my single biggest difficulty in speaking it.



*Try practicing the following sets of words, preferably within hearing distance of a Punjabi speaker. And I don't really know how to transcribe these in Roman accurately!

koRaa = bitter

k_hoRaa= horse

**koRhaa= leper*
*...........................................

kaRaa = kaRaa (bracelet)

k_haRaa =ghaRaa (earthen pot)

kaRaah = kaRaah (cauldron)
...................................................

How good are you with the retroflex L?




*


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## Qureshpor

tonyspeed said:


> I think it can be summed up like this...maybe. Stress in Urdu is different from stress in English. In Urdu, the length of the sound and the quality of the sound stays approximately the same. It is usually the pitch that changes, maybe accompanied by a slight elongation of LONG vowels sounds, but never short vowels.
> 
> In English, however, stress is usually formed by changing the vowel sound completely to a heavier vowel sound. For short vowels this means turning them into a similar but different long vowel sound. A typical example to me would be that British say calENdar and Americans say CALendar.
> 
> Would anyone care to agree?



*Tony, my knowledge on these matters is very meagre. However, there is no denying that the stress situation in English is quite distinct. Take a look at the following examples:

photograph (No problem in pronunciation for a mere mortal like me)

**photography (Good Lord! The pronunciation seems to have changed drastically!)

**pervert (the cause of justice)/He is a pervert!** etc*
..........................................................

*I don't know if the following would also come under this category or not but our subcontinental cricket commentators are certainly oblivious of the difference!

Close the door/ The ball got very close to the stumps.

Advise (verb)/Advice (noun)

*




*
*


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## BP.

QP I'll try this or the next weekend, whenever I get the chance.

The retroflex L is something I've been wanting to be taught for some time. But I can't  ask them because I'll have to explain what retroflex means. Could you give me a small list of words with the L in them please?


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## Qureshpor

BelligerentPacifist said:


> QP I'll try this or the next weekend, whenever I get the chance.
> 
> The retroflex L is something I've been wanting to be taught for some time. But I can't  ask them because I'll have to explain what retroflex means. Could you give me a small list of words with the L in them please?



*BP SaaHib. I have replied to your query under the thread entitled, "**Punjabi: Retroflex L". It seems to be under "Other Languages".*


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