Discussion Post #4 - Unfamiliar Sounds and How I Will Address Them

[Bryan C. Carapucci]

I have mentioned some of the phonetic inventory of Bahasa Melayu in previous posts, but it is helpful to go over it again. Malay has a host of loan-words from (British) English and Arabic (as well as from other languages like Mandarin and Hindi), meaning some sounds are quite familiar while others are not. Orthography-wise, there are some distinctions, e.g.  /ʃ/ (voiceless palato-alveolar fricative) written 'sy' instead of English's 'sh', /tʃ/ (voiceless postalveolar affricate) written as 'c' instead of 'ch', and /ð/ (voiced dental fricative) written 'z' instead of "th" as in "father." Apart from these, the sounds that are distinct from American English or less common in it are listed below:

- voiceless velar fricative of /x/: e.g. the Malay word "akhar" (often found in Arabic loanwords)

- voiced velar fricative of /ɣ/: e.g. the word "loghat"(also often found in Arabic loanwords, and pronounced differently in several different dialects)

- velar nasal of /ŋ/:  e.g. the word "ngarai" (found in English in the word "sing", but otherwise somewhat unusual)

- glottal stop of /ʔ/: e.g. "tidak" (seldom found in English, apart from "uh-oh")

- alveolar trill of /r/: e.g. "dari" (found in Scottish English and several Romance languages)

For my study of Malay, it is most important for me to be comfortable with these distinctions and practice the non-English sounds as much as possible. From my study of Mandarin, I know it can be difficult for me to master sounds not found in English and I admittedly still make some mistakes, however if I know from the start that these sounds exist and do my best to address them on my own and with Melissa, I think I can avoid this mistake. Orthography of other phones is simply an adjustment I'll have to make, such as remembering that 'c' in Malay has a 'ch' sound. Ideally, I would like to work with my language partner and make recordings of these difficult sounds for myself to listen to and go over. The more I practice and the more I hear a native speaker using these sounds, the easer it will be for me to master them.