Spelling seems to be completely arbitrary in relation to the actual pronunciation of a word or a phrase. The letters used to make up a word can make different sounds depending on the language applied. For example, there is the word “auto” in English and in Slovak. In English, “auto” would be pronounced “ah-tow”. In contrast, a Slovak speaker would pronounce “auto” as “ow-tow” with a soft-sounding “t”. It is important to differentiate between spelling and sound in order to recognize the difference in written and spoken language. When a word is spelled incorrectly, the language speaker has a greater ability to determine the target word. However, when a word is pronounced incorrectly, the temporality of speech can make it difficult to determine the target word. Spelling is important but understanding the sounds of your target language will assist in both speech production and comprehension.
There are a lot of new, unfamiliar sounds in Slovak. I have little experience observing accents, tildes, and trills from my Spanish education, but there are also many sounds that prove challenging. There are long vowels/short vowels and long consonants/short consonants. The stress is always placed on the first syllable of the word. Only Slovaks in the East (populations near Poland) place stress on the penultimate syllable. There is a lot of variability between Eastern and Western dialects.
Additionally, Slovak has the largest Slavic and European alphabet with 46 letters. One of my biggest challenges is that the Slovak alphabet involves trills and taps with the letters “r” and “ŕ”. The “r” without an accent creates more of a light tongue tap on the soft palate. The other letter, “ŕ”, indicates additional stress on the soft palate, resulting in a trill. Additionally, the letter, “ch”, challenges my American accent as I imagine myself adopting a Scottish brogue. It’s like creating an “h” noise at the very back of the throat, it focuses more on the throat and less on the expulsion of air. For example, the Slovak word for fridge is “chladnička” (xl̩adnɪt͡ʃka). One of the biggest resources in better comprehending speech is listening to podcasts of Slovak speakers. They help me better observe typical pronunciations while also allowing me to pick out recognizable words. After listening, I try to find the transcript for the podcast episode to better understand its context. I plan on continuing to listen to these podcasts and ask for listening exercises during my tutoring sessions.
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