Talk:Yaqui language

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[edit] Phonology

The phonology section of the article does not make sense to me. The vowels, in particular, are inconsistant. The article says they are pronounced like Spanish vowels (which is rather vague) and then proceeds to give them IPA symbols that approximate fairly well with Spanish, but gives an idiomatic English 'sounds like' that gives different sounds. I would imagine that the English sound alikes are in error. However, it may be that northern varieties have adopted anglicised vowel sounds. The section on consonants is a lot better, but I'm sure could be clearer. — Gareth Hughes 16:10, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

The (American) English sound alikes are "similar" to "standard" Spanish values (for those who are not familiar with Spanish vowel values), and are certainly close enough to the true Yaqui pronunciation to be understood. However, the "Spanish values" are more accurate. (With the caveat, of course, that some Spanish vowel values in northern Mexico vary considerably from other Spanish-speaking areas. For example, the Sonoran Spanish "e" is quite close to IPA /æ/. The chart reference is to "standard" Spanish.) Does this clarify?

And no, the northern and southern varieties of Yaqui are quite similar in sounding of vowels, with anglicization of pronunciation being a fairly minimal force inasmuch as the English "correction" taught in school is based on an assumption of Spanish rather than Yaqui mispronunciation.