The creator of Esperanto , Ludwik Lazar Zamenhof , illustrated the pronunciation of Esperanto by comparing its letters with their equivalents in several major European languages and proclaimed the principle of “one letter, one sound”. Given that the languages being compared were not completely identical, he said that pronunciation in Italian could be considered a model for Esperanto.
Over the hundred years of Esperanto's existence, phonological norms have been developed, including phonetics , [1] photostatics [2] and intonations , [3] Now we can talk about the correct pronunciation in Esperanto and the correct formation of words, regardless of the languages originally used to describe Esperanto. The norm differs little from the principle of “one letter, one sound”; only small allophonic variations exist. [four]
Content
- 1 Alphabet
- 2 Consonants
- 3 minimum pairs
- 4 Allophonic variations
- 5 notes
Alphabet
The Esperanto alphabet has 23 consonants, including 4 affricates and / x / , which has become rare; 11 vowels, 5 monophthongs and 6 diphthongs. There are six historically stable diphthongs: / ai̯ /, / oi̯ /, / ui̯ /, / ei̯ / and / au̯ /, / eu̯ /.
Consonants
| Labial | Alveolar | Postalveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | |||||
| Explosive | Deaf | p | t | k | |||
| Voiced | b | d | ɡ | ||||
| Affricates | Deaf | t͡s | t͡ʃ | ||||
| Voiced | ( d͡z ) || d͡ʒ | ||||||
| Fricatives | Deaf | f | s | ʃ | x | h | |
| Voiced | v | z | ʒ | ||||
| Approximants | l | j | w | ||||
| Trembling | r | ||||||
Minimum Pairs
The differences between several consonants in Esperanto carry very light functional loads, they are not in additional distribution and are not allophones. The practical effect of this is that people who do not control these differences can communicate without difficulty. So, slight differences Ĵ / ʒ / versus ĝ / d͡ʒ / contrast in aĵo ('the concrete thing') versus aĝo ('age').
Allophonic Variations
Allophones are a realization of the phoneme, its variant, due to the specific phonetic environment. In Esperanto, the following allophones are acceptable:
| Phonemes | a | e | o | i | u | n | m | r | v | z | ʒ | f | s | ʃ | b | d | dʒ | ɡ | p | t | tʃ | k |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Allophones | ɑ | ɛ | ɔ | ij | uw | ŋ, ɲ | ɱ | ɾ | ʋ, w, f | s | ʃ | v | z | ʒ | p | t | tʃ | k | b | d | dʒ | ɡ |
Borrowed words are a common source of allophonic variation, especially proper names, when the remains of the original language remain in the word or when new sequences are created to avoid duplication of existing roots.
Notes
- ↑ Burkina, O. (2005): “Rimarkoj pri la prononca normo en Esperanto”, Lingvaj kaj historiaj analizoj.
- ↑ PMEG . bertilow.com .
- ↑ http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/frazmelodio_plena.doc
- ↑ PMEG . bertilow.com .