Comments on: Living off the wind of some

By: Dick

Dick — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:52:28 +0000

@Jasper Sprengers: I suppose adds like this one, and perhaps even all Dunglish, ought to be pronounced with tongue in cheek.

By: Larry

Larry — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:14:51 +0000

And some varieties of English don’t do final voiced -s in some contexts (’Chicago Bearss’).

By: Luc

Luc — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 20:59:57 +0000

Vergeet niet dat heel wat niet-Engelsen het verschil doodleuk niet horen. Verrassend, maar waar. Ik heb het zelf meegemaakt op de Engelse vakgroep: in het talenlab zei een student consequent ‘boys and girls’ (met harde s). Hij werd erop gewezen dat het als /z/ moest klinken, keek verbaasd en zei ‘zo zeg ik het toch’. Tja, het kwam niet goed met de uitspraak, hij is niet uniek.

By: Jasper Sprengers

Jasper Sprengers — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 08:12:18 +0000

The difference in auditory perception of the Dutch versus the English fricative has less to do with phonotactic distribution (when do you pronounce the letter s as /s/ and when as /z/) but with the “default” position of the tongue, which for Dutch is further back and hence makes it sound louder.
There are easy exercises to make your s thinner, but most teachers don’t seem to bother.

By: Larry

Larry — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:01:13 +0000

‘The cure is to pronounce the ’s’ at the end of a word like a ‘z’. Why they can’t seem to teach that in English classes is beyond me.’

Except of course when the word-final ’s’ really IS /s/, as it is after a voiceless consonant, and in some words spelled with -se (lease, practise, use [noun], goose). Tricky stuff.

‘the painful reminder that we really can’t live off wind energy’

Not off wind energy alone, no.

By: Jeroen Mirck

Jeroen Mirck — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 20:26:39 +0000

Oh noes! I made a water joke, not a wind joke!

By: Jeroen Mirck

Jeroen Mirck — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 20:25:27 +0000

I was about to suggest this commercial, but I should have “felt on my water” that you already blogged it. And you did.

By: huphtur

huphtur — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:39:00 +0000

HAHAHAHA! So awesome. My sister told me about this ad being on Dutch TV. Good stuff.
Ttotally tweeted the clip on my Dutch Idioms twitter feed: http://twitter.com/dutchidioms