The usage and future of the special Polish letters: ą, ć, ę, ł, ń, ó, ś, ż, ź (Polish language)

Oops typo alert, that should be tagże, pogżep

Interestingly, the translate.google robot reads "także". This is not correct either but when you listen to that, you'll notice it passes well, too.

This is why I say most of the pages in this thread are purely academic discussion. Living people do not use linguistics when they speak. I know it is so hard for linguist to get that very fact accepted...

Back on topic. Will replacing "także" with "takze" help or make things even more obscure?

Diacritical marks are there for a reason and should not be removed. Your question is rather pointless, as it's absolutely obvious that removal of diacritics would lead to confusion (in any language that uses them).

I am not worried about the future of ogonki. After some years of neglect during the early expansion of computer technology, they are now back on track and going from strength to strength :-)

You wouldn't read them, because they would most likely be rather inaccessible. If we had Earth is flat argument and I behaved like the two of you, the discussion would go like:

"I think the Earth is flat, I don't trust satellite photos"
"Here's a picture of a satellite photo"
"I don't trust satellite photos"
"LOL Polish education system" (=you're an idiot)
"I think the Earth is flat, I don't trust satellite photos"
"But I am better educated in this field, and various professors say it's not flat"
"Can you provide me with some convincing argument?"
"Go educate yourself. Besides, here's a satellite photo"
You two were dancing around the real explanation and repeatedly refused to provide one. And please don't give me the time argument as you spent 2-3 hours discussing it anyway.


google also give 180 results for "chłobca" and no one hears "b" there. People misspelling stuff is hardly a proof of anything.

I think saying "go educate yourself" to someone who would behave like your imaginary discussion partner would be absolutely justified. There is no convincing argument for a round Earth that would not have to go into a lot of detail, probably with illustrations (if I did not believe in photos, that is).

But that is beside the point, because what you did to our discussion was more along the lines of:

"Blood contains red and white blood cells".
"No, it does not. I have often bled and the colour is red. I have never seen any white in blood. How can you deny my actual experience?"

<Link to a wiki article about blood>
"But that is just theory. You cannot tell me what MY blood looks like. It's red, I tell you."
"You cannot influence the contents of your blood. You DO have white blood cells, you just don't know it".
<More links>
<Links remain unread>
"You are so high and mighty about your white blood cells and your stupid hematology. I know what I see and that's what matters. My blood is all red"

<FACEPALM>

;-p

Magdalena...

No average human is interested in composition of blood unless one gets blood disease. The blood is red regardless of the composition.
No average human is interested in linguistics; people just speak.

There are convincing arguments that the Earth is spherical (not round! and you're a linguist? :P) that require you to understand only one thing (Coriolis acceleration) and I would concentrate around that, not just linking to physics 101 basics websites. The fact that the person wants to be assured that the Earth is not flat doesn't mean he/she's interested in physics or geography basics.

I'd say the better educated person in the field should be able to explain that only one single issue without throwing "teach yourself the basics" and overwhelming the other person with scientifical jargon.

So why did you start the discussion in the first place by denying facts you are not really familiar with?


But you did not want to be assured that the Earth is not flat - you told me outright that the Earth WAS flat and that I couldn't challenge your perception because I lived on a different planet (if we are to extend the metaphor).

The only thinking you gave me is how deaf some people can be.
I admitted nothing as there was nothing to admit or hide. ALL sounds become devoiced when they are whispered. No exceptions. Just like ALL vowels, without exception are voiced in normal speech. And that too is described in any manual describing Polish phonology to speak of, including in the primary school manuals for the Polish language in Poland.

I didn't whisper "taksze". I simply didn't shout.

These opinions are really amazing. I wonder who in Warsaw thinks that we are the "real" Poland. The "funny dialect" of Warsaw, as you call it, had virtually died out with the end of the Second World War after the city and its people had undergone the biggest destruction in its whole history.

The Mazovian dialect had always been mocked of by the rest of the country until the end of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1795. The Warsaw city dialect had developed in the course of the 19th century and, based on the local dialect, had quite a number of Russian imports in it. The Polish, as we speak it today in cities and towns, is largely universal across the country and, historically speaking, is based on the dialect of Małopolska with some important influences from the dialect of Wielkopolska.

I cited a rule of phonology, not whether you shouted or not.


I am not discussing the emotional events that undoubtedly are a part of ALL of Poland, not just Warsaw and Mazowsze. That would be another topic. Also a lot depends what you mean by "biggest destruction". Slowinski is dead. Mazovian is not. The "biggest destruction" is also a little too emotionally charged. True, a lot of people of Warsaw died, many non native to the city. Many people died in other regions too. The Mazovian dialect is dying out, and it is a natural process, even without wars.

For now we can still enjoy it, with all the funny ring to it. For those who do not have family members from the area but are interested in the dialect, and keen on a little more modern background to it, I highly recommend Warsaw Village Band (Kapela ze Wsi Warszawa)

kzww.pl/index.php?page=aktualnosci

Awesome sound, an easy intro to the study of Mazovian dialect.


Indeed, except it was "mocked" for much longer than that, as it differs rather significantly from what what I'd call standard Polish after WW2.


Yes, largely. I still switch to Kielce dialect (gwara Kielecka) when I speak with some 20+ year old family members.

Now, what is really amazing to me is that you chose not to take any position on the actual topic of the conversation, but instead concentrated on what was obviously a sign of frustration with, let's say, less than linguistically apt participants of this forum.

That was Antek, I said no such thing. So far you (collectively you anddarius) did absolutely nothing to disprove that the sound in "także" is different from a regular 'g' in words such as "pogoda" or "tygrys". Only ad hominem attacks (stupid, deaf and uneducated), links to general wikipedia definitions etc. No constructive argument.

A biologist from your blood example would argue that while blood appears red, it is not a homogenous liquid, it is mostly water containing cells such as hemoglobins (which are red) and leukocytes (which are white, almost transparent, that the concentration of hemoglobins is so much bigger that their color is dominant, finally that if I don't believe him I can easily check it either through chemical experiments or just see these cells directly with scanning electron microscope.

Seriously, I find it mostly peculiar that you seem unable to construct a convincing argument.

Before we can disprove anything, we need to know what it is that you are saying - your full description of the difference, using terminology generally accepted in the description of the sounds of spoken language. Could you please describe the phonological differences between the sound 'g' in the word pogoda, and the the voiced 'k' in the sound 'także'.

Feel free to use any phonetic alphabet suitable for the purpose, and any reputable sources, such as Polish universities and manuals of Polish phonology or where Polish phonology is also studied, such as Wiktor Jassem's work (just an example)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Phonetic_alphabets

I clicked on that international phonetic alphabet thing and frankly I don't understand most of the terms used there. I don't have sufficient knowledge to describe the difference, though I think this example would be kinda similar:


So I don't know, maybe tygrys and także have the same soung, maybe it's an allophone of the same sound, maybe it's something different altogether. I still find it amusing that instead of addressing a layman's argument in an area of your expertise (which should be very easy if you know your shit), the first thing you did was attacking them.

Stop beating dead horse. It's getting tedious.

That's understandable, although I'd say it would take an average learner no more than a couple of weeks to study it and achieve a near expert understanding of what these signs mean and how they are to be used, along with some associated, practical examples. Not a rocket science at all.


That's more like a fair assessment I can can live with that.
There are indeed allophones of 'g' in Polish, some due to regional differences. However, this particular allophone (g', notice the apostrophe) does not apply here since were are talking about neither regionalisms nor about the influence of 'i' on palatalization of sounds in Polish.

pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalizacja


The issue was first raised by Lyzko and my initial post was in response to his. It is my understanding that Lyzko is either a linguist, or at least a person with a deep understanding of linguistics. Hence I used a phonetic transcript to show him his pronunciation was correct when it comes to the "g" sound.

In my later posts, I also explained the mechanics of upododobnienie wsteczne as it relates to this topic and I provided a link to a very simple text on the subject. In return I received an incorrect argument that I supposedly know Polish from books. Magdalena was addressed with similarly incorrect arguments. Were these not attacks based on a persons current geographic location?

It was not me, nor Madga who started the incompetence argument. It was Antek, whose idea of a competent speaker of Polish is the knowledge of a slangish expression, and this can be easily verified. What can be also easily verified is that you bet against Antek knowledge of a couple of expressions from Swiebodzin (incidentally, I lived not far from there). He lost because he didn't know the answer. According to his own definition of language competency he is incompetent in Polish, and he lives in Poland! How much worse can it be?

You can't have it both ways.

Apparently, Polish is my native language and when it comes to it, due to my academic background, I am more than qualified to debate its phonology, even if I don't know two or three exresssions teens in Swiebodzin, or Legia fans use. Both of you received plenty of uncomplicated explanations, from me and from Magda, as to what happens in speech. You even heard opinions of two other native speakers of Polish in this very thread.

Any additional links that are evidently over your heads were simply signs that there is nothing to hide and that there is a tremendous body of research and observations of the issue by many, including Polish linguists who live in Poland today.

I know it's hard to admit defeat. Not a biggie. Even if you haven't been able to learn a whole lot of linguistics, at least you received a brief refresher course in a tiny aspect of Polish phonology, and that living in Poland doesn't necessarily prove someone is a reliable source of information on the language when it comes to detail. Since my understanding is that Antek works with computers (development), I would assume he might be much more open to the idea of attention to detail which is as critical in computing as it is in linguistics. He may be satisfying this requirement in his field of expertise, but Polish phonology is not that field.

Above all, I hope you managed to learn that the study (stress of study, not prescribing of rules) of language is quite a bit more complex than initially meets the eye.

I asked for an articulate post and when I finally got one, I didn't respond immediately. Sorry about that, I actually did write one before but Firefox crashed and didn't feel like write it down all over again. Since you great post deserve at least some appreciation, I'm writing it down again.

I'll have to give in and say that if phonetics experts say that's the same sound, I'll have to rely on it. But that's one big problems for me in general - it describes qualitatively, not quantitatively, which makes everything rely on blurry statements and authority, not on empirical data like normal exact science.


I know what many of those symbols correspond to (it was useful learning French), I don't know what the terms like "velar" or "pharyngelar" mean. And I certainly don't a have a couple of weeks of time to learn it LOL.


It's not hard to admit defeat as there's no battle in the first place, unless you treat a discussion as such, which tells more about you than anything else. Another thing I don't understand is why linguistics don't have several semesters of mathematics. It'd make much sense in that even a book like "A Hundred Years of Solitude" could be analyzed quantitatively (statistically) if you knew what data could be useful for your goals and how to extract it.

Both Dariusz, Koala and several others bring up the, at least for me, intriguing question of whether or not ANY language is actually 'phonetic'!

I've studied quite a few languages, not the least of which, the history of my own English tongue, and hav ecome to conclusion that 'phonetic language' to a linguist is rather much like saying 'beautiful' vs. 'ugly music' to a professional musician; the term makes no sense, other than perhaps to a layperson.

Polish is surely no less 'phonetic' by that definition of phonetic as linking exactly grapheme with phoneme, than English, French or Russian, excluding here any mention of non-alphabetic writing such as Chinese etc....

You mean "no more phonetic", don't you? :)
There's no 1 to 1 correspondence between phonemes and graphemes, but if a native language speaker sees a Polish word for the first time, he'll pronounce it correctly, something that's impossible in English. If a native Polish speaker hears a word for the first time, he might spell it incorrectly (ignoring u/ó, ch/h, rz/ż).

Good point! Indeed, the lack of congruence between English spelling vs. pronunciation notwithstanding, Polish might appear "unphonetic" owing to the preponderance of consonant clusters. Yet, suprisingly for some, they are pronounced in a consistent manner.

but Polish language is declined and has plenty of other word forms that originate from the same stem - if you say ósmy you can think of ośmiu and it is suddenly clear that you don't write a 'u' there - (or 'wór' -> 'worem') (the same goes to rz - morze - morski) - so it isn't as bad as English - (ch - h is definitely the worst case here)

Was not Old English phonetic? I particularly like the example of "hvil"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hwil

Sounds like Polish "chwila" and almost means the same, "while".

it's most probably because 'chwila' is a Germanic loanword in Slavic languages (I don't know if all of them) - many Germanic loanwords came into Slavic when the linguistic contact was established with Goths migrating from Baltic coast south to the Black Sea coast (the contact most probably took place in the present day Ukraine) (the loanwords include 'chleb' (Gothic 'hlaif' Old English 'hlaf'?), 'chlew', 'modry' and probably many others)

Własnie, gumishu!

So many loanwords came into Slavic from Germanic, that the original root can sometimes be detected by looking at the initial letters, e.g. 'hvil'/'chwil-' etc...

There is no power of authority involved. Phonetics an phonology is a science, and as such, it is subject to peer review. The fact that you lack the skill or the tools doesn't make linguistic statements false. The fact that I have no idea which of the little twinkling things on the sky Venus, and that I do not own even a basic telescope, doesn't mean Venus is not there. Looking at various stars I see some are obviously bigger than others. Is it because they are loser? Brighter?

That you hear /k/ where /g/ is present is not unsurprising either. That's the interference you get from, ironically, basic education i.e. the skill of spelling. The word is spelled with a /k/ so you assume that this is what you hear and sometimes, as it became apparent, the illusion is hard to get over with. Somewhat similar phenomena occur with our visual faculties. I'm sure you know of many examples of visual illusion where you see a bent line, but the line is in fact straight and you can check it with a ruler. The ruler is a tool you know how to use. Linguistics, as you admit, is not among the tools at your disposal.

An example a little closer to linguistics, and specifically within the sphere of psycholinguistics, is one where a few words are misspelled, such as:

Cna yuo raed tihs?

The snetence is obviosly misspeld so it uses strings that do not exist in the English language, and yet understandable. Why? The answer is simple. It's our education. We have read these same words for a long, long time, over and over again. We no longer read words letter by letter. Instead we ended up learning their shapes. That is a sign we did well in our early yeas of education, but it also made us skip some of those misspelling when we proofread text written by ourselves. Words' shapes look fine so we miss the detail. That is also the reason why ALL CAPS ARE SO MUCH HARDER TO READ. THAT IS BECAUSE WE NEED TO CONCENTRATE MORE ON INDIVIDUAL LETTERS TO UNDERSTAND THE WORDS. Thatisalsothereasonwhyweincludespacesbetweenwordssowecandiscernindivid ualwordsmoreeasilly and why some German word, too many non-Germans, are so hard to read unless you spent a lot of time practicing.

To use the astronomical example above; good luck finding Venus on a clear night sky in Manhattan, NY. Too much light pollution (interference). People simply do not get to see the stars anymore. Which leads us to a little factual trivia.

When a few years ago the entire North East of the US and Canada went dark (massive power failures) emergency departments of larger cities in the affected area received a significant, number of calls. I heard about thousands of people who were reporting strange, lit objects on the sky. It turned out those were the stars. Both sad and funny, but for us here yet another example of how our experience sometimes throws us off in the way we perceive pictures, sounds, smells, touch (cold can feel hot) etc.


See? You're doing this again. Like you did when you put so much stress on who left Poland when, and whether someone knows a local jargon. That caused a blow back effect, as it turns out living in Poland doesn't ensure someone knows it all about the Polish language.


This is a common misconception among those, for the lack of a better word, uninitiated. The popular view is that linguists just talks about talking. Some talk about how people should talk. That's prescriptive linguistics and I am far from being its fan. Punch Lyzo instead :) Anyway, linguistics encompasses may branches of science and art and it is is much larger than can be perceived by a casual observer.

Mathematics, logic and statistical analysis is in fact of curriculum in some linguistics departments. The courses may bear names not immediately associated with math (such as Computational Linguistics), but math is an essential tool used in those courses. Interestingly, linguistics is also used by mathematicians and computer scientists. Chomsky hierarchy was the basis for compiler construction and automata theory.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chomsky_hierarchy
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automata_theory

So when you drop those few lines in the IDE of some compiler, wheather you're stuck with C++ or moved on to C# or Java, you are using the results of extensive linguistic research. Check the links just for kicks.

It's a fascinating area of study and I ad a chance to be exposed to it when I studied psychology. It was useful and I was getting my English Lit. degree and indispensable when I was taking compiler construction in Computer Science (incidentally, taught by a Pole, with a terrible English accent, from the University of Wroclaw).

"Eye kant reed inglish tu wel."

Would the equivalent of the above disconnect between sound and script be possible in any language OTHER than Mod. En.??

Yes, this is an interesting observation and it works equally well in Polish:


Same goes for hearing comprehension. In the times when the 2048 baud (or less) modems were primary means of communication between computers a single click on a noisy telephone line could ruin a long session of a file transfer. But human ear easily ignores much worse noise, and what's more - missing speech portion can be easily "interpolated" by brain.

he example you gave reminds me of my attempts to read a book in Czech. I understood approximately nothing. So I equipped myself with some basic phonetic skills of the language and I started reading he book aloud. Suddenly I could understand the essence of what I was reading. I still can't claim any knowledge of the Czech language.

But to answer your question, I think the example indeed shows how spelling/speech skills are interconnected through experience that can turn into linguistic interference. I kinda ran out of my morning slacking time so just off the bat:kantis reminiscent of kannt, inglish of inglisc/ingles, welis obviously well, I saw reed written by anglo-speakers where read should have been present. So the words are out there and some people are using them, it's just that either they are not English words, or English but "slightly" misspelled.

Further to my previous post on graphical ease of spelling, and directed to Koala and Antek, my impression is that you may be close to professions where you have o be aware of computer programing. Take an random procedure or function, say 50 to 100 lines of code and delete all EOL, i.e. make the code to be one long line and compile it. The compiler won't even flinch but good luck with visual debugging, or even basic understanding of what the function does. It's psychology at work. We need structures,visual representations etc. That essential part, in computer programming, is called... surprise, surprise... syntax.


Turns out, we are quite analogue ;)

It's an interesting thread and I'll be back, in the interest of domestic tranquility I better do some work around the house.

Or Proto-Indo-European...
Take a look at the link I posted. And sorry, I meant HWIL not HVIL.