Secret to the Polish Rolling R

The fact I'm not a native English speaker does not stop me from beiong fluent in the language.


I'm telling you for the third time: yes, it is the same throughout the country.

Maybe you met some people with speech impediment which can't pronounce "r" properly and they do it in the "French" way. There is quite a number of them, for example Nina Terentiew

youtube.com/watch?v=xi6qX9rzY_k

No, I didn't!

I wrote: "In these words it's no longer "r", it's "rz", which is a compeltely different sound - you pronounce it like "ż"."

There's simply no "r" in word "gorzka" - trilled or not trilled.

One should pronounce "rz" like "ż".


Audible? How on Earth can you hear "r" in here?:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c0/Pl-gorzki.ogg


In general Polish language (the one you're taught at school and which most Poles speak) fricative rż (ř) turned in pronunciation into "ż" already in the 17th century. It was retained in some very few areas of Poland as this map shows:

However, even there such pronunciation disappears more and more rapidly and is spoken (rarely) only by older people.

From:
gwarypolskie.uw.edu.pl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=218

One more link:
pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C4%99zyk_polski

When I speak Polish, I too would NEVER pronounce the "r" in "gorzka"! I merely thought that perhaps, as with the Polish " ł " vs. the "dark" "l " -sound heard around Zakopane, that it might be a question of stage vs. everyday spoken diction:-)

This was the thrust of my original query.

Wulkan, you certainly can be fluent in a language without being perfect. The question remains though: fluency vs. accuracy.

It seems to me there was no "query" on your part.
First you stated that sometimes "the "r" in Polish is practically elided with the letter or sound following, NOT TRILLED at all" and as examples you've given words with "rz". That was rather useless because "rz" is pronounced as "ż" and has nothing to do with "r" anymore.

And so I decided to make it clear so you wouldn't confuse people who are trying to learn Polish.
Then you wrote: "Paulina explained that the"r"-sound in a word such as "gorzka", for example, is indeed pronounced, only not trilled:-)" which was simply not true and got me wondering whether you actually read what I wrote.

You also wrote: "In fact, this "r", even to my non-native ears, is definitely audible".
So, I'm still curious - where did you hear this "r" in "rz" (gorzki, Małgorzata, brzeg, etc.)?

HAHA I totally agree with you on that one ;-)))

Re-read my prior post(s) and you'll see that I only said I THOUGHT I detected an "r"-sound, not that I actually heard one, nor that one in fact existed. Hair-splitting? Perhaps. Then again, every language has its individual subtleties, much of which are implied, if not directly stated:-) In English also, matters can be inferred without being explicit!

The fluency/accuracy thing is really quite an old 'chicken-or-the-egg'-type issue in language acquisition. Most instructors nowadays would probably opt for the former in the name of "communicativeness", whereas ideally both are essential. There's also more than a little historic 'Anglophobia' at work here, as far too many Europeans particularly merrily mutilate the English language whilst getting all hissy and nasty about foreigners' infractions against their language, be it Polish, French, German or what have youLOL

Quite rightly, we get more than a trifle annoyed at this eternal double standard which few even acknowledge ^^

Is this the answer for your terrible/not terrible mistake? xD - "I too would NEVER pronounce the "r" in "gorzka"

All writing contains the proverbial "honest error", read, "sin of OMmission" rather than"COMmission". Undoubtedly your language skills help you in determing the occasional typo as opposed to the out-and-out blooper!

:-)

I have not only read your posts but I've quoted them. I see that you have problems not only with reading what I write but also with remembering what you wrote yourself o_O

You didn't write you THOUGHT you detected an "r" sound in "rz". You wrote: "In fact, this "r", even to my non-native ears, is definitely audible".

"Definitely audible." Do I really have to quote what you wrote over and over again? Can't you simply admit you were wrong so we could move on?

That's my problem with you. You don't ask, you don't "query", you state, despite the fact that apparently you lack some basic knowledge about Polish language. Be aware that overweening confidence with which many of your messages bristle combined with ignorance about Polish language can be rather irritating. And harmful as some learners of Polish language can actually believe what you're writing. It's not the first time I'm (and others) correcting you on this forum. So, please, have some humility and don't pose as an expert when you don't have enough knowledge, because you can confuse people who are learning the language.


Wow, you are really obsessed with this topic, aren't you? I think you wrote about it in almost every language thread on this forum.

*raises an eyebrow*

"...you don't ask, you don't query, you state...."

Hey, must be my German background surfacingLOL
DOWN BOY! DOWN!:-)