Giovanni Schwartz wrote:Yeah! Kamico, why is that? Why do Americans associate hard sounds with bad and round sounds with good? Why Russian and German typically harsh sounding languages to our ear, and French and Spanish more pleasing? Any linguistic reasons for this?
Yep. German, and to some extent, Russian, are full of consonant clusters. Schwartz. Kampf. Pfeffer. Spanish, and to a lesser extent, French, have phonological constraints leading to more vowels and fewer clusters. Why English-speakers would find that phonologically pleasing, I'm not sure. Perhaps it has to do with ease of production? I don't speak Spanish, but I can pronounce it well. (Italian even better.) I speak some German, and still find many of the sounds ("ch" and "ue") to be somewhat difficult to produce, and I pride myself on having a good "accent."
Also, Germany and Russia were our geopolitical enemies, where France and Spanish-speaking countries were usually our allies. Years of Cold War villains in movies . . .
In addition to the political aspect, maybe there's also an Norman bias, since most of the common, low-class words in English are of Germanic origin (with their aforementioned consonant clusters) and most of the fancy, high-class words are of French or Latin origin (with their simpler syllables). E.g., "flask" vs. "bottle" or "strength" vs. "fortitude."
At least part of it must be due to individual psychology, though, because I've studied both German and Russian and I like how they sound. (I'm sure being able to understand the language helps, too.)
Katya wrote:At least part of it must be due to individual psychology, though, because I've studied both German and Russian and I like how they sound. (I'm sure being able to understand the language helps, too.)
I saw a French couple on the street in Boston--they were arguing about something and yelling very loudly. It was by far the ugliest language I've ever heard.
Katya wrote:At least part of it must be due to individual psychology, though, because I've studied both German and Russian and I like how they sound. (I'm sure being able to understand the language helps, too.)
I saw a French couple on the street in Boston--they were arguing about something and yelling very loudly. It was by far the ugliest language I've ever heard.
I remember being amused by the short blurb shouted by one hairy barbarian at the beginning of the movie Gladiator before Russell Crowe (still as a general) leads his army into the first fight seen in the movie. (at about 2:06 in this video) I wonder if that was just made up or researched.
Tangentially related: I was watching an episode of Bones the other day, when they started chatting with an old Chinese lady, and she was perfectly awkward, just like an old Chinese lady should be. For the record, I feel that some Chinese accents sound better than others.
