# phonemes difficult to pronounce



## kusurija

Hi, all, there was discussedphoneme [θ], which is hardly pronounceable for non-English speakers. There is somewhat more difficult to pronounce phoneme [ř] in Czech or phoneme [ყ] as in word ბაყაყი(frog) in Georgian. 
Both they are so specific, that one don’t know, how to “transliterate” them. So I didn’t do it, neither. 
So, if You know any other "unpronounceable" phonemes in other languages, please refer about it. 
There You are some Czech sentences, which are hardly pronounceable, too:
Chrt pln skvrn vtrhl skrz trs chrp v čtvrť Krč. 
Plch zdrhl skrz drn, prv zhltl čtvrthrst zrn. 
Smrž pln skvrn zvlhl z mlh.
A staghound, which (is) full of spots, bursted into (Pragues) district "Krč" through clump of cornflowers.
Other sentences I’ll translate if someone will need it.


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## Outsider

If they were really unpronounceable, they wouldn't be phonemes. 

Have you seen this thread yet?


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## astlanda

Ok

Russian: Скажи сейчасже! (Which is particulary difficult for me)

Estonian: Jõelähtme. Jäääär. Jüriöö ülestõus.

Finnish: kieltäydyimme, ei löytäydy, pyöreällä pöydälla

The last one means: "on the round table"
Other sentences I’ll translate if someone will need it.


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## kusurija

astlanda said:


> Russian: Скажи сейчасже! (Which is particulary difficult for me)


Да, я знаю это! Защищай щуку!


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## DrWatson

astlanda said:


> Finnish: kieltäydyimme, ei löytäydy (?) What does this mean? Did you mean *is not found*? That would be *ei löydy*, löytäytyä is not a Finnish verb,
> pyöreällä pöydällä
> 
> The last one means: "on the round table"
> Other sentences I’ll translate if someone will need it.


Besides, I don't think this thread is looking for tongue twisters, rather than individual phonemes which are difficult to pronounce.


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## astlanda

Thanks

Dr Watson is correct. I meant "*ei löydy*" I'm not a native speaker of Russian or Finnish.
Thats why I missed the last "ä" as well.

Speaking about individual phonemes: even Estonian "l" is difficult to pronounce for both Russian and Finnish speakers. There are 2 words, both written "tall", but it depends on the pronunciation (if it's palatalized or not), if it means "a lamb" or "a stable".

So whom should those phonemes be difficult to pronounce to?


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## Anatoli

Some Arabic sounds caused me trouble and still do sometimes, since I don't have much exposure to native speech:

They actually cause problems to many foreign learners, since they are not available in any European or East Asian languages:

For me personally, these 2 are the most difficult, showing the Arabic letter and the IPA.
ع [ʕ] (transliterated as `, number 3 or sometimes superscript C)
ح‎ ħ (transliterated as h with a dot below, capital H or as a number 7)

Sometimes I have difficultly distinguishing these sounds form other similar ones.
There are of course other complex sounds in Arabic, notably emphatic consonants, guttural q (ق), etc. Anyway, the Arabic phonology is very rich and it's very important to distinguish sounds, which may sound like something else.

More details here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_language#Sounds
or here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_phonology

As for Russian, Czech and other Slavic languages - the difficulty is perhaps in clusters, not the sounds but some people I know have problems with palatalising consonants. Well, Russian is my native tongue, I don't find anything unpronounceable 

Some Russian tongue-twisters for you:

1. Шла Саша по шоссе и сосала сушку.

2. Ехал грека через реку
видит грека в реке рак
сунул грека руку в реку
рак за руку греку цап!


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## Anatoli

Cherine has provided excellent links to the sounds I described above:

http://www.almadrasa.org/letras/hh.htm
http://almadrasa.org/letras/'.htm


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## palomnik

One phoneme that virually all Europeans find difficult is initial ŋ, although it's quite common in several Asian languages, especially in Southeast Asia, some Chinese dialects (viz., Cantonese) and in (non-standard dialect) Japanese.

I've always found it interesting how certain phonemes are limited to certain geographical areas, even between languages that aren't related to each other. Implosive labials and clicks are mainly found in Africa, glottalized consonants in Native American languages.


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## ronanpoirier

In Portuguese we have the diphthongs ão, ãe and õe which are really hard because they're not just diphtongs, they are nasal diphthongs!

ão = /â~w~/
ãe = /â~w~/
õe = /o~j~/

(The ~ indicates the preceding sound is nasal. /â/ is an upside down "a". AT IPA chart, it's under the schwa.  )


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## Lugubert

What you want to pronounce, you can.

But it takes practice, and preferably a knowledgeable teacher.

I know people who have lived in Sweden for scores of years, and still can't pronounce _sju_ '7' like a Swede. Our long and short <u> sounds, and for some students fom Asia, the r/l distinction, and our two tonal accents were the most common problems when I taught Swedish for immigrants. There was a discussion here (My post #43 on among other things "hooktop heng").

I sure would need appreciable time to create the Xhosa clicks, but think that I've succeeded enough with Semitic emphatics, Indian aspirated vs. non-aspirated plosives and even Sindhi implosives. And I'm coming to grips with the several different Dravidian r's, l's and n's. Please don't test my Chinese tones, though.

Consonant clusters are no big problems for Swedes. Try _pu*nschskv*ätt_ 'a splash of a punch' (the beverage) or _lä*rftskr*amhandel_ 'haberdashery'.


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## MarX

Many Germans find it hard to pronounce *NG* as in si*ng*i*ng* in the beginning of a word in Indonesian.

Many also have problems saying* NY* as one sound as in Catalan Espa*ny*ol.


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## Stiannu

Something very hard to pronounce for foreigners is the Italian *gli* group, in words like ma*gli*a, sba*gli*o, etc. 
It does not sound like *gl*ycerine. It's difficult to explain but it reminds the *ll *group in French, in words like mai*ll*ot or gui*ll*otine, just "harder".
Some native speakers cannot pronounce it correctly, either.


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## dudasd

Italian "gli" and French "ll" are rather common in Slavic languages; that voice can exist by itself (like, for example, lj, љ, ль) or as a iotacized voice (like in Russian ля, лю, лё, ле), and it comes in "softer" and "harder" variants depending on the particular language or a dialect. But I noticed that Englishmen hardly can pronounce it. (Once I spent half an hour teaching my English friend to pronounce "ljubičasto" (violet, purple) and we both laughed, for he managed to utter only "hlubićasto".) Also, some European nations can't grasp the difference betweeen Serbian/Bosnian/Croatian č and ć (hard ch and soft ch).


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## Anatoli

Agree, that's the palatalisation problem I mentioned before. I also tried to teach palatalisation to English speakers, it's quite hard 

The situation you describe is quite similar to problem distinguishing the pairs:

The first in each pair is hard, the second is soft (palatalised)

*Polish*:
sz - ś
ż - ź
cz - ć
dż - dź

Standard *Chinese *(*Mandarin*) (Pinyin notation):
shi - xi
chi - qi
zhi - ji

I'd say, the problem is not only in phonemes being "unpronounceable" by speakers of other languages but some similar sounds are also "indistinguishable". It's easy to slip to a sound, which sounds close enough but not acceptable form the native speaker's point of view.


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## dudasd

And there is something I also have noticed: though people from the Balkan area have "well trained" pronouncing apparatus (often we hear from foreigners that we speak their languages without - or almost without - accent), the last voice that our children master is usually "lj". One would expect problems with r or with sibilants, but it's lj. The most of children pronounce it as "j" till the age of 4-5, even 6. Now I am curious to know how Italian children manage with their "gli".


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## Anatoli

I lost my post on Erhua:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erhua

Érhuà (儿化) refers to the r-coloring or addition of the "ér"(儿) sound (transcribed in IPA as /ɚ/) to syllables in spoken Mandarin Chinese. It is most common in the speeches of North China as a tool of diminution. The Standard Mandarin spoken in government-produced educational and examination recordings features erhua to some extent, as in 哪儿(nǎr), 一点儿(yìdiǎnr), or 好玩儿(hǎowánr), though Southern Chinese usually have difficulty in pronouncing and therefore avoid these words, replacing them with 哪里(nǎlǐ), 一点(yìdiǎn), or 好玩(hǎowán).

It's also a cause for pain for foreign learners, although it's very similar to the retroflex R in American English or any other _rhotic_ accents (as in _car_).


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

dudasd said:


> (Once I spent half an hour teaching my English friend to pronounce "ljubičasto" (violet, purple) and we both laughed, for he managed to utter only "hlubićasto".)


Funny. Can you imagine what problems they have with the name of my hometown? Two LJ in one word. If they can managed the first pair, they fail on second. 
Even Italians who officially made the name easier to pronounce: Lubiana. Maybe they should transcript it into Gliubgliana. 



> Also, some European nations can't grasp the difference betweeen Serbian/Bosnian/Croatian č and ć (hard ch and soft ch).


Despite being a Slav I have also troubles with this. I hear it, but I can't pronounce it in a normal/fast way. The word like *ćevapčići* always breaks my tongue. The same way like those Spanish words with a combination of s and z in them.


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## Stiannu

dudasd said:


> And there is something I also have noticed: though people from the Balkan area have "well trained" pronouncing apparatus (often we hear from foreigners that we speak their languages without - or almost without - accent), the last voice that our children master is usually "lj". One would expect problems with r or with sibilants, but it's lj. The most of children pronounce it as "j" till the age of 4-5, even 6. Now I am curious to know how Italian children manage with their "gli".


 
I think it's quite the same problem! Small children can hardly pronounce "gli"... but some adults too. So words like "sbagliato" (wrong) or "aglio" (garlic) become "sbaiiàto" or "àiio". 
Yes, Gliubgliana sounds good


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## Lugubert

In for example the Canary Islands, and in children, the Spanish lj tends to sound like j, so (in a more English transcription) _calle_ becomes _caye_.


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## Setwale_Charm

Lugubert said:


> What you want to pronounce, you can.
> 
> But it takes practice, and preferably a knowledgeable teacher.
> 
> I know people who have lived in Sweden for scores of years, and still can't pronounce _sju_ '7' like a Swede. Our long and short <u> sounds, and for some students fom Asia, the r/l distinction, and our two tonal accents were the most common problems when I taught Swedish for immigrants. There was a discussion here (My post #43 on among other things "hooktop heng").


 
What about the Chechen plosives, fricatives and affricates then? 
 As for the Swedish 'sju', the trick is to start practising this sound within the period when you are losing your first teeth like I did


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## Gwan

kusurija said:


> There is somewhat more difficult to pronounce phoneme [ř] in Czech or phoneme [ყ] as in word ბაყაყი(frog) in Georgian.


Yes, I always found čtyři very hard to pronounce, not because it's the most difficult, but because it's an everyday sort of word in my very basic Czech. I heard that in WWII, all Czech resistance passwords would have ř in them because non-Czechs couldn't pronounce it properly, but I don't know if that's true or not!
In Russian, I often find it hard to distinguish between 'soft' and 'hard' consonants as well, especially if they're not followed by vowels. Since I can't hear the difference, I can't say the difference!


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## kusurija

..čtvrtek..(thursday), skřet, skřek..
Jeden Řek mi řek, abych mu řek, kolik je v Řecku řek!
Řek =
1. Greece (person)
2. said
3. rivers (pl. genitive)

Name: Řehoř

Mařeno, řekni "ř"!
- Neřeknu, Vy byste se mi řehtali...
In English I find hard to pronounce 5/6 (five si*xths*)


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## darnil

Lugubert said:


> In for example the Canary Islands, and in children, the Spanish lj tends to sound like j, so (in a more English transcription) _calle_ becomes _caye_.


In fact, _most_ speakers of Spanish do not pronounce the lj sound "comme il faut" (I for one). In present day Spanish, that sound (identical to Italian _gli_ or Portuguese -_lh-)_ is only pronounced in (roughly) the northern half of Spain and in several parts of America, where the influence of native languages (¿quechua, guarani?) have preserved the once general palatalised sound.
I, as a teacher of Spanish for native speakers, have realised that my students in Madrid could not realise that _pollo _([póljo] 'chicken' < latin _pullus_) and _poyo_ ([póyo] 'a stone or brick seat' < latin _podium_) where in fact distinctly pronounced when they heard me making a clear difference.
English language speakers have it really difficult to grasp this pronounciation, while Italians, Portuguese or Slavs do not need a second explanation.


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## Outsider

A correction:



darnil said:


> [...] that sound (identical to Italian _gli_ or Portuguese -_lhi-_ _lh_ ) is only pronounced in (roughly) the northern half of Spain [...]


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## BezierCurve

I think that in some languages the trick is to differentiate between phonemes. For a Slavic language speaker there is hardly any difference betweeen a sheet and shit. It's even more dangerous when you're talking about, say, a beach. On the other hand you find in Polish: "szczera" ['ʂt͡ʂɛra] - "honest" and "ściera" ['ɕt͡ɕɛra] - "a piece of cloth" or, very, very offending about a woman... I'd say that finding and making those differences is even harder than learning the correspondent phonemes.


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## darnil

Outsider said:


> A correction:


 
(Oh, oh...)

Obrigadinho.


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## darnil

BezierCurve said:


> I think that in some languages the trick is to differentiate between phonemes. For a Slavic language speaker there is hardly any difference betweeen a sheet and shit. It's even more dangerous when you're talking about, say, a beach.


 
Not only Slavs: One day, in a class with English-speaking students, I asked them to take out a _shit_ of paper. After that day, I always ask them to produce a _piece_ of paper...


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## .Jordi.

Different variants of vowels o, e, a in catalán. I can very hardly note the difference between for example fèiem, també, deu. And I think that never in my life I will learn how to pronunciate it correctly.


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## Lugubert

Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Despite being a Slav I have also troubles with this. I hear it, but I can't pronounce it in a normal/fast way. The word like *ćevapčići* always breaks my tongue. The same way like those Spanish words with a combination of s and z in them.


I prefer *ćevapčići* going into my mouth rather than exiting. I rehearse every time I have a chance, but still feel extremely uncertain. The corresponding (?) Polish sounds must be similarily difficult, but I have so far managed to keep a distance to them:


			
				Anatoli said:
			
		

> *Polish*:
> sz - ś
> ż - ź
> cz - ć
> dż - dź
> 
> Standard *Chinese *(*Mandarin*) (Pinyin notation):
> shi - xi
> chi - qi
> zhi - ji
> 
> I'd say, the problem is not only in phonemes being "unpronounceable" by speakers of other languages but some similar sounds are also "indistinguishable". It's easy to slip to a sound, which sounds close enough but not acceptable form the native speaker's point of view.


The Chinese examples above are no serious problems for a Swede (and, probably not for a Norwegian either). Most of our dialects are rich in retroflexes.

Anatoli hits the bull's eye with his distinction unpronounceable/indistinguishable. That describes my problem with Chinese tones. Despite Swedish having two of them, I find it almost impossible to distinguish between tones, unless they are spoken as an illustration for beginners. There have been occasions when I collected all my efforts and assets from my feet up to pronounce a really nice tone 2, and my Chinese friend coldly comments, "No, not 4."


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## Encolpius

I think foreigners tend to have problems with *geminated palatal consonants (nny, tty, ggy)* in Hungarian.


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