Most of the world’s population has the same oral anatomy. Why is it so difficult for many speakers to roll their r, add a glottal stop, pronounce the “q” in Farsi etc, when it seems like all the tools are right there in our mouths and throats?
I’m mainly referring to borrowed words or attempts at learning new languages. Overcome rhotacism (replacing r with w) . Lisps might be a bit harder due to tongue sizes and disabilities there but lisps are the only impediment I can kind of see how a predisposed mouth structure could affect pronunciation.
I’m fascinated by accents and linguistics and these minor obstacles in others’ speech often stick out louder than the message they’re orating and I get fixated (tiktok content, for reference).
In: Biology
Making the correct mouth sounds take practice. When you are learning a language that doesn’t use sounds from a language you already know, you have to learn to make those sounds from scratch.
Latest Answers