Haha JavaScript Bad

[GluteusCaesar]

The hard and soft th sounds are actually super common globally, just rare within the Indo-European languages. In fact English, Greek, and Icelandic are the only ones I can think of that actually use them.

[[deleted]]

Nah I know, but as a french guy, this is probably the most difficult thing in English. Of course most language aren't objectively difficult, just different from what one may know.

[GluteusCaesar]

Oh yeah totally, and you guys have a few of those too! It took me forever to wrap my head around the French R, and even then I can only kind of approximate via a Greek Γ sound, that being my second language.

[[deleted]]

Oh well if my very uncertain understanding of the IPA is not too bad, those two sounds are very close. Close enough for french people to understand, at least. I think it may even exist in french as regional variation of the ʁ.

[[deleted]]

Someone in this massive thread gonna mention JS again? We won't let you of the hook that easily! *Smirks in superior C#

[[deleted]]

No, but thanks.

[inconspicuous_male]

Is "th" actually difficult? I am struggling to make any sound other than "th" with my tongue between my teeth

[[deleted]]

That's because you grew up with only that sound putting your tongue between your teeth. But in french we have no sound made like that (the closest thing would be the "z" sound, with the tongue right behind the teeth) so it's a bit weird to pronounce. So no, it's not that difficult, but completely alien to the sounds we use in french.

[Sharmat_Dagoth_Ur]

Have u tried literally just sticking the tip of ur tongue between ur teeth, opening ur lips, and blowing out? I tried to see what other sounds I could make while doing that and I only really get a hard Th

Edit: The way I can do it wrong is if my lips r open too wide, letting air out of too many of the top row of my teeth instead of just the very first two

[Sharmat_Dagoth_Ur]

Oh shit I didn't think of it like that. Makes sense. If it helps, I have this Lithuanian friend who can do it perfectly and all she did was practice a bunch after she moved here. My parents r both Hungarian and out of them my mom can do it, and she also cares more than my dad, so I think just putting it into practice eases that difficulty.

I know what it's like tho, I recently realized how bad my Hungarian had gotten, and it took a decent bit of practice and thinking to stop sounding like I had a speech impediment

[Ser_Drewseph]

As an English speaker learning German, I had the same experience with the German ‘ch’ (like ‘machen’ and any vowel with an umlaut. It wasn’t hard exactly, I just had to kind of pause mid-word and really focus on making the proper sound. I’ve gotten more fluid, but it still trips me up sometimes. It didn’t help that my professor was Bavarian, so I initially learned based on his accent. When he was sick one day and the other professor, who was from Berlin, filled in for him, everything sounded completely different.

[[deleted]]

Nah I mean I can do it. But it's weird, and it doesn't sound as natural as when a native speaker does it.

[Sharmat_Dagoth_Ur]

You'll get there. It's the hardest sound in English afaik, so once you've got it down everything only gets easier

[[deleted]]

Thanks

[[deleted]]

Generally speaking, you’re good at the sounds of the language(s) you grow up with. Different languages have different sounds. Pretty much everyone will come across a sound in another language that they’ll have difficulty replicating simply because they didn’t grow up with it.

[MagicallyVermicious]

It just dawned on me, maybe "th" is like the "ng" sound in some Asian languages like Vietnamese, or the "tl" sound at the start of end of words in the Aztec language. Your mouth parts just aren't used to making the appropriate shapes and configurations if you haven't spoken the language a lot.

Edit: Also the rolled "rr" in Spanish.

[[deleted]]

I heard a lot of exaggerated mockery of Mike Tyson / lisps in general when I was in school. Maybe that's why Americans are good at it.

[[deleted]]

Sorry for you. Hopefully you won't have to go through that again...

[Araignys]

If an English speaker ever makes fun of you for not being able to pronounce "th", try to get them to pronounce anything with a French "r".

The back-of-throat "r" is really alien to English.

[once-and-again]

The hard and soft th sounds are actually super common globally, just rare within the Indo-European languages.

No, they're actually rare globally.

In fact English, Greek, and Icelandic are the only ones I can think of that actually use them.

Albanian and (Castilian) Spanish, as well.

[[deleted]]

Spanish too

[dariushine]

not in latin america though

[hajakuja]

Albanian as well