Qué, que, mas, más, bonbon, chocolate, understanding what one hears
"¡Qué chocolate más sorprendente!" is what I think I am hearing. Transcribing the sentence to paper, (well, electronic paper
I feel confident that I have the accents right, but I have another question: "Más" is used to make comparisons between or among objects. Can I translate it here to "most" even though there is no "el", "la", or "lo" ? In English I might hear a British person exclaim: "What a most surprising chocolate!" Is that the intent of "más" here? as another way to express "very"?
I have attached an eight and a half second snippet in which a saleswoman gives the name of this chocolate. I have not been able to catch the name...only the "Enrique" part. Perhaps someone is familiar with this "bon bon".
21 Answers
Janice, it is a relief to me, too, that other North American native English speakers besides me have trouble hearing native Spanish speakers. I've been spending quite a bit of time trying to decipher what sounds I'm listening for in English that don't exist in Spanish, and vice versa. This is proving one of the hardest things for me to get.
That said, and although I can't make out most of the words in the audio snippet, I think the sentence you're asking about is, "¡Qué sabor más sorprendente!" What a surprising taste!
That translation is based on this one: ¡Qué día más bonito! -> what a lovely day!
[url=http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/m%C3%A1s]http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/m%C3%A1s[/url]
The vowel joint between the end of a word and the beginning of another is a well known phenomenon among grammarians, called "sinalepha". I sometimes wonder why books ignore it, since it happens several hundred times a day in a normal conversation.
Lazarus wrote:
[The sentence "Quién es" is indeed pronounced as "quienés", because in Spanish, final vowels are always attached to the initial vowels of the next word.]
THAT is the most helpful comment in understanding/learning spanish I have read ALL WEEK.
Muchas Gracias!
Whew! Could I draw, I would insert a drawing of myself cowering...
hmmm...wonder what would happen with a negative %?
Quentin said:
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Oh, this could get tricky.
May I try? Before I do, I should say that I only just now, given the impetus of your reply, have looked beyong the (obvious) B I U S above this entry box (re: "entry box", sorry, I am sure there is a technical term for this space into which I am typing...But in yet another language...) I see that there is also an icon to help add a link. (I have added a few via the tried and true, but more laborious copy & paste function.) You showed me how to upload an [audio] file already, and now I see that the far right icon allows one to insert an image. That could come in handy for vocabulary questions!
On the other hand, there are no icons to change colors, fonts, etc., but your post hints that I can simply use the html. (again, I am guessing that "html", standard hyper-text mark-up language is what these codes between the less-than and greater-than symbols represent.
So here goes my first attempt:
!Le doy las gracias¡
!Le doy las gracias¡
!Le doy las gracias¡
Quentin said:
I can't get font size tags to work here, but if you had to use different font sizes the headings tags do work here.This sentence is written between h3 tags
This sentence is written between h2 tags
This sentence was written between h1 tags
This is a sample of a sentence containing
a smaller font
somewhere within the sentence text
Janice said:
Thank you, Daniel, MJ, Lazarus. I understand.(wish I could key these letters in a smaller font) .
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I can't get font size tags to work here, but if you had to use different font sizes the headings tags do work here.
This sentence is written between h3 tags
This sentence is written between h2 tags
This sentence was written between h1 tags
This is a sample of a sentence containing
a smaller font
somewhere within the sentence text
Janice said:
Thank you, Daniel, MJ, Lazarus. I understand.(wish I could key these letters in a smaller font) .
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To reinforce what Lazarus said about IPA, it can be very helpful. Granted, you will not find a lot of Spanish transcribed into IPA but you can find some. The basic problem with the Latin/Roman alphabet is that it's used for many languages that assign different values to the letters.The 'd' of English is not the 'd' of Spanish. If you were looking at a phonetic transcription (in IPA) they would use a different symbol (two, actually) which would help to alert you to the fact that they are different sounds. It's not really necessary to become adept at reading IPA transcriptions but, in the early stages of learning a language (when you are concentrating on its sounds) it is helpful to have a "language-neutral" system for indicating pronunciation.
Well I am encouraged about learning Spanish all over again! Lazarus, you understood only about 5% of the spoken English watching your first movie--after being fluent in reading and writing English. En serio! Thank you for sharing that. And for giving a link to an English translation of "Don Quijote de la Mancha" (even with errors), as well as to the Spanish audio. I was worried the Spanish would be too archaic, and it does have that certain flavor, but what a fun text!
On another topic:
Lazarus said: "The sentence "Quién es" is indeed pronounced as "quienés", because in Spanish, final [consonants] are always attached to the initial vowels of the next word."
How very many pathways each of these little reglas opens up for me! (And I have a great grammar book. But you sometimes share stuff not in it.)
And finally, Janice said: "Even when I ... read, I hear my own awful accent in my head!"
I hear myself, too, lady, unless I pretend someone else is reading to me. Then it is not hard for me to hear someone else's voice. If you have tried and can't do that then I really haven't been appreciating how much easier it is for me to pick up sounds than it might otherwise be! But if you can hear a song sung by a favorite artist in your head, then I think you'll be able with a bit of practice to translate that skill into "being read to," once you decide on a voice or few you eventually want to sound like.
This is such an exciting discussion! Thank you Lazarus, thank you MJ.
I have always wondered why people -- starting at about the age of puberty -- have such a hard time learning to speak another language without an accent . Then I read somewhere that maybe our brains -- able to hear all sounds and make sense of all grammar when we are born -- start to selectively throw away the sounds that we never hear. I have tried a few little experiments of my own with friends who do not speak English natively but do speak it very well. I wanted to see if they would really notice/hear some different sounds that I have read about which exist in my but not their respective language.
And do we not have the experience that it is often easier to understand someone of our mother tongue when that someone speaks another language that we too speak(I refer to someone who speaks the other language well, it must be understood) . I figure that such a person probably can't make a sound I can't hear.
It is just amazing! which is why I wrote to you once some time ago, Lazaus, that you would perhaps be surprised at what we actually hear when listening to audio in Spanish. And this is also why I try not to read except as a last resort.
Certainly our alphabet does not do the many sounds of our languages any justice!
MJ, we will just have to learn everything But isn't it fun. And you have only been at this since last August! Shame on you for complaining that you don't yet hear it all clearly!! Me! I am going to have to pay a visit to a speech pathologist Even when I have to read, I hear my own awful accent in my head! We should all be so lucky as to have your musical ear.
MJ said:
LOL, Lazarus, for the first few months I heard native Spanish speakers it sounded to me like everyone was talking with mashed potatoes in their mouths.
Years ago, after having studied and used English for God knows how many years (over 11 years), being able write pretty much like I do now, and reading as fast and easily as in my mother tongue, I watched a movie in English for the first time. I understood less than 5%. For all I know, they were speaking Russian. One year after that, and after a lot of practice, I could understand virtually 100% of everything I watched.
MJ said:
For instance, in Spanish, many people tend to slur over their de's, a's, and ese's, don't pronounce lots of their letter s's, and string certain vowel sounds and even words together as though they were one. "Quién es...'" sounds to me like, "quines", stuff like that.
To me, it is English spearks who slur over all their consonants and vowels, but that's because our brains are tuned to our respective languages. I can tell you that, objectively, Spanish is a much clearer language than English: it is a lot easier for a computer or for someone analysing sonographs to decode Spanish than English, but of course, different accents and people sound more or less clear. Our "d" is not your "d" (actually, we have two and you have one), so your brain doesn't feel it is a "d", but something else. The sentence "Quién es" is indeed pronounced as "quienés", because in Spanish, final vowels are always attached to the initial vowels of the next word.
Try this: Get "Don Quijote de la Mancha" (online, if you want), and go here: [url=http://www.educaragon.org/arboles/arbol.asp'guiaeducativa=41&strseccion=A1A68]http://www.educaragon.org/arboles/arbol.asp'guiaeducativa=41&st...[/url]
Even though you don't understand everything, read the words as they are read in the recording, and get used to the sounds, which are fairly clear and distinct in this page (they pronounce the z the Castillian way, but that doesn't matter). See if that helps.
http://mgarci.aas.duke.edu/cibertextos/EDICIONES-BILINGUES/INGLES/D... (with translations, but mistakes)
http://mirror.pacific.net.au/gutenberg/etext99/2donq10h.htm
LOL, Lazarus, for the first few months I heard native Spanish speakers it sounded to me like everyone was talking with mashed potatoes in their mouths. I've been spending quite a bit of time learning Spanish since last August, and just now am starting to decipher more words than not when I see a Spanish TV program, and can see people's lips. And I even spent some time living in Tijuana, Mexico, last year.
I should have an ear for languages, as I have a pretty good ear for music. But it still is amazingly difficult to hear words I don't know the English for--and sometimes it's tough even then. Part of the trouble may be different phrasing in Spanish and English. For instance, in Spanish, many people tend to slur over their de's, a's, and ese's, don't pronounce lots of their letter s's, and string certain vowel sounds and even words together as though they were one. "Quién es...'" sounds to me like, "quines", stuff like that.
lazarus1907 said:
As I said, as soon as the sounds gets "blurry" to my ears, chances are it is Catalan.
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