Polish words that sound funny?

/bɪt͡ʃ/ =/= /bɨt͡ɕ/

the different phonetic symbols mean they are pronounced..... differently, it's not my fault if you don't understand IPA

Are you done throwing toys out of the pram?
All the ppl here (with various levels of fluency in both languages) including few Poles told you it doesn't sound the same. You want to carry on believing it does? Go ahead, it doesn't make me look stupid but you

This is an incorrect phrase. No one in Poland would have ever tell it that way. Anyone for correcting Dirk on that?

Exactly the way you are, and doing a fine job, but the ladies we should cut the slack , I know Atch is going to hate me for saying that, but as i said i'm an old git.

anyway I always found śmierdzi funny dunno why.

Wtf is a pram? Sorry I don't speak the language of the United Kaliphate complete with sharia courts and thought crime police.

I said the pronunciation is SLIGHTLY different as ch falls in between c' and cz... nonetheless they SOUND (Title of the thread) almost identical. Check your hearing aid batteries if it's not obvious to you.

You are really one poor, messed up kid. Go have fantasies about migrants and muslim and all the rest. I have better things to do than arguing with idiots on an Internet forum. Bye

@Ziemowit

It can also be ma kutasa w dupie.. but the ma-w-dupie-kutas(a) is closer to mafketis.. and both are correct and get the point across.. Now how could I polonize.your name...how bout jebowit? Yeah I like that. Jebowit and ma-w-dupie-kutas. Id add an sn before atch but I'll lay off for a while


Toodloo. Just avoid the no go zones of tower hamletx and basically all of birmingham unless you enjoy, or 'fancy' as the english say, cultural enrichment

Smierdzi... And it rhymes with pierdzi!!

He is not a kid. He is 27 or something about that age. The question is: what will he behave like when he turns 60?

Ok back on topic

Speaking of smierdzi, guwno wos is a good one... literally a car/truck that hauls manure but often used to make fun of a friends crappy car

Plenty of gems here too: wkurwiamnie.org/latest


Hopefully like hugh hefner. I'll settle for Donald Trump, putin el chapo or pinochet though... Or even slash but def not Obama trudaeu or juncker id rather be dead than be a b1tch cuck like them

Tut mir leid, das habe ich nicht verstanden ...

Don't speak germanistani either sorry

Not in the least. I agree with it. I'm not abusive to anyone here, I don't call them vulgar names or swear at them so I don't expect to be subjected to it. I expect a man to open the door for me etc. Even in art college I never carried my own portfolio or set up my own easel. One of the boys always did it for me. I'm small and light and the bloody things were too heavy for me.

Ah well, the only thing that matters is that Adrian has made an eejit of himself yet again :))

And I got my entertainment for the morning so I guess it's win win. But now I bid you adieu till I the next time I talk sh1t about western europeans self inflicted harm and how my homeland is superior and how president Trump and pis is pwning the leftists and eu...

But I'll leave you with one last gem: frajer

Now you can all discuss how it sounds like fryer or friar

Another point occurs to me just now.

Years ago when I was taking my first "official" aka formal Polish language class, the teacher (a native Pole who was living in Berlin with her German husband) told us that frequently learners will assume that there can't be a sound in a foreign language which is in any way similar to the learner's native language. This is not so.

She then proceeded to give as an example how English often elides certain sounds, such as "Missyu", sometimes also "Mishyu" for "(I) miss you", similar in Polish to certain combinations of the "s"-sound in words like "swiat" etc.

This is how what is initially perceived as foreign, later on becomes familiar:-)

Wow i'm not all washed up and alone after all ,hmm got a spring in my step now.


That first amendment is great , no matter what my opinions are on your views I envy the fact you are able to speak your mind, you cant do it here for the fear of being banged up for not towing the politically correct l line.

Even in Poland you cant call a politician a moron or a gormless idiot without breaking the law.

So did I at the tender age of 23. LOL!

IF he says 'byc' with a strong American (inland northern) accent - I wouldn't be surprised if it sounded a lot like a B'tch. On the other and maybe he is just mumbles.....


They do that on the internet.

But you do...........


That's British English.

Actually, speaking of the 'United Kaliphate' did you know that more Americans speak Arabic at home than Polish (or indeed Italian).


And now here's a French lesson for you. 'Adieu' is used to indicate a permanent goodbye. For goodbye until next time it's 'au revoir'.

@ Ziemowit, actually he turns 30 this year, worrying isn't it - he's still young enough for us to adopt him, what do you think? You could give him French lessons and I could teach him some basic manners. Are you up for it? :))

At the risk of "setting the cats amongst the pigeons",I agree with Dirk.
I can't hear any difference between the way my family pronounce the Polish word "Byc" and the English word "B1tch"
The fact that some of you can hear a difference intrigues me.
Is the Polish word pronounced slightly differently in different regions of Poland?
My family came from Eastern and South Eastern Poland and I suspect Dirk's family did too(Deportations to Siberia).
Might this be relevant?
If not,then why can some of you hear a difference that some of us can't?

They don't, they just want to argue about the tiniest difference and say things like that the two don't sound identical 'at all.' There is the most minute different between c' and ch. They're not going by how it actually sounds, the topic of this thread....

OK, let test it in a field experiment:
Can you tell the difference?

youtu.be/EupGh16Mkgc

youtu.be/i9AT3jjAP0Y

They sound the same (or as close as makes no difference) to English speakers,
Polish speakers tend to hear the English ch as being closer to cz than to ć and so they don't sound quite the same, the English word sounds more like bycz to most with Polish as a first and primary language.

This is similar to the words written 'no' in both languages.
English speakers tend to think they sound the same, Polish speakers tend to hear the difference between 'no' (Polish) and 'noł' (how they hear the English word).

That is absolutely true. Mr Atch doesn't have a typical Polish accent when he speaks English though he does have AN accent but he says Polish 'no' and English 'no' almost exactly the same. I often have to ask him 'is that Polish 'no' or English 'no' :)


The bottom line is that native English speakers don't hear the difference and native Polish speakers do. May God strike me dead if I'm lying. You are super sensitive about being seen as Polish which is why you can't accept it and think we're arguing for the sake of it but it's a fact that if you had grown up in Poland you would hear the difference. You grew up immersed in the English language so you hear with 'English' ears.

Yeah, it's what used to be called the 'phonemic grid' in linguistics, one's primary language (which is not always the first acquired) largely determines how a person perceives sounds and there do seem to be limits on how much distinctions not found in the primary language will be perceptible when they hear or learn other languages.

With English and Polish this means that English speakers will never hear the distinction between sz and ś (or cz and ć etc) that clearly.

Polish speakers will never hear distinctions between 'pet' and 'pat' (especially in the middle of a sentence) that clearly (and they're liable to not hear final p, t or k as pronounced by many Americans at all).

There are also limits on things like how well speakers of non-tonal languages will ever be able to hear tonal distinctions in Chinese or Thai (for example). Polish learners are also generally terrible at long and short vowel distinctions in languages like Japanese where they are crucial

These are normal phenomena that for some reason become the focus of weird political debate here...

But I can hear the difference between the English and the Polish "No".
They sound completely different to me.The Polish "No" sounds like the French "Non" to me.
But I can't hear the difference between Byc and B1tch!

Yes that's the whole point. Spoken with an American or English accent, they sound different- but not when spoken with a Polish accent. Poles say the two words amost identically. They don't have an 'oh' sound in Polish, only an 'o' sound so Poles have difficult producing the 'oh' sound in the English word 'no' and say it pretty much the same way as Polish 'no'.

Another example is the English words 'want' and 'won't'. Poles frequently pronounce them identically. I have a Polish friend whose English is very fluent and clear but she told me she never says 'I won't'. Instead she uses 'I will not' as confusion arises because of her accent.

Agreed Atch.
My Dad used to pronounce the English "No" the Polish way too.

To cheer you up, it is a very close call. That difference is blurred in a course of a normal informal parlance. However if you talk about a proper pronunciation those two doesn't sound the same.


Nonsense.

I asked the Byc/B1tch question to several Poles today and they all said that they ABSOLUTELY sounded different.
Can't really argue with that.....
But I asked them to say the two words.....and my ears heard no difference...Lol!!

It's not nonsense, but a statement of fact! You're so blindsided by your own arrogance, you think nobody could possibly learn Polish as you've managed to acquire English:-)

As I language teacher of English, I can confirm this!

This might be a good test for bilingualish people, if they sound the same the person is dominant in English and if they sound different they're dominant language is Polish...

Another test about language dominance among Polish bilinguals is whether they can watch a movie in their other language with a Polish lektor, they're dominant in Polish or equally bilingual it doesn't bother them if they're dominant in the non-Polish language they can't stand it.