Trouble making b/v sounds
I've found the following description on LearnSpanish. I've numbered 3 items that I have difficult time implementing. Do you think this description is accurate?
The Spanish "b" (be larga) and "v" (be corta) are pronounced exactly alike (1). These letters have two separate sounds, hard and soft (2). At the beginning of a word and after "m" or "n", the hard Spanish "b/v" closely resembles the "b" in the word "boy," except that the lips are held tense. In other situations, the "b/v" is pronounced like an English "b" in which the lips are not allowed to touch (3).
(1) In the accompanying set of flashcards, I definitely hear a difference in sound between the b and the v. The b sounds a lot like an English p, while the v sounds much softer. A bit like the Dutch 'w'.
(2) I can't hear much of a difference in sound between the hard and soft versions in words like: Vivir, beber or bebucha.
(3) How on earth can you make an English 'b' sound without making your lips touch?
7 Answers
(1) In the accompanying set of flashcards, I definitely hear a difference in sound between the b and the v.
The people in those recording are trying to pronounce some sounds far too much in some of the words (probably influenced by English or other languages), to the point that is borderline artificial; that can happen when you pronounce too slowly and clearly. Without having a mic in front of your mouth you don't do that.
(3) How on earth can you make an English 'b' sound without making your lips touch?
People whose native language is not English or Spanish asks the same question about how to pronounce the TH in "thus": you constrain the space with your tongue just enough to create turbulence.
(3) How on earth can you make an English 'b' sound without making your lips touch?
You can't, at least I never have and I can't now, and I have asked mark, he can't either. If you try you sound like a bad ventriloquist 'Gottle of geer anyone?
You can hear it on this Wikipedia page.
Hold on! Wikipedia is using the symbol ? for two voiced bilabial sounds: the fricative and the approximant, and the recording is for the fricative one, not the approximant, which is the Spanish one. If you scroll down to see the phonetic transcription of "lava" ([?la??a]) you will see a little diacritic that looks like a little T (??), meaning that the sound is approximant, unlike the recording.
Sometimes there can be an "explosive" puff of air after the sound in English, which is much less pronounced in Spanish.
Let's be more accurate on this: the /b/ sound that we share in English and Spanish does not sound exactly the same because:
- In English, the vocal chords do not vibrate when the lips are closed, and as soon as the air is allow to come out, the vocal chords begin to vibrate. You require a significant amount of air to produce a clear sound in this case.
- In Spanish, the vocal chords begin to vibrate as soon as the lips are closed, and remain vibrating until the end of the sound, after the air comes out. Because of the sonority of the vocal chords, no significant puff is required to produce a clear sound.
Hi. Check out this link.
Specifically, look under Modo and its sub-level Oclusivas for the hard "B" sound (the "[b]" symbol). You can find the soft "B" which is also under Modo but in the sub-level Espirantes (the symbol looks something like this: [?]). I think this site helps a lot with pronunciation because it shows the formation of the tongue and mouth using computer graphics and an actual person. I hope it helps.
P.S. Language geniuses, if you catch any errors with what I said, please feel free to correct me.
Telling someone to pronounce a fricative in the manner of a plosive but with a different formation is one of the weirdest things I've heard, and it makes no sense whatsoever.
Yes. It's sooo much better to say it's pronounced in the manner of a labiodental but without the teeth being involved.
At least taking 'b' as a point of departure gets you thinking bilabial.
I honestly think that the description you read on LearnSpanish is awful. Telling someone to pronounce a fricative in the manner of a plosive but with a different formation is one of the weirdest things I've heard, and it makes no sense whatsoever.
I believe that the first question has been answered well, so I won't address it.
2.) To be honest, I couldn't hear much of a difference in those flashcards either. However, I believe that it's due to low audio quality, which dulls the sounds quite a bit. And, possibly due to the aforementioned audio quality, I believe that some of the sounds were coming out with an English influence, or else just plain wrong.
3.) I'll quote from one of my other posts, and hopefully it'll make more sense than the other gobbledygook that you had before.
If the letter is at the start of a word or after an "l," "m," "n," or "s," then it makes the "b" (/b/) sound like in English. But there's no puff of air after it in Spanish like there is in English.
If it's anywhere else, the sound is one that doesn't exist in Spanish, /?/. This sound is produced in a manner similar to the English "v" (/v/), but instead of touching the bottom lip to the upper teeth, both lips are in front of the teeth (like when making the "b" sound) and air is blown through them in a voiced manner. You can hear it on this Wikipedia page.
As for the "hard b" sound, it's very similar to the English "b" sound. Sometimes there can be an "explosive" puff of air after the sound in English, which is much less pronounced in Spanish.
How on earth can you make an English 'b' sound without making your lips touch?
I have never thought of it that way...I have always thought of it as saying v but slightly touching the top lip for a split second...thus making it half way inbetween a v and b....(but its emphisis on the slight...and to an untrained ear sounds like a soft B)
