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[–] 32 points 13 hours ago (7 children)

Pretentious people really ruined it for those who are just interested in linguistics or just lived in catalonia or etc. Like apart from saying barcelona as barthelona, catalonia as cataluñaand any french word correctly, nobody gets mad about pronouncing words correctly. Like if i (try) to say a polish word correctly most likely a polish person is gonna be happy and nobody else will notice. If anything its not even pretentious people ruining it, its the people who get upset by that. This a comment about society.

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  • [–] 8 points 8 hours ago (1 child)

    To be fair, it's much more impressive to pronounce Wąbrzeźno.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 hours ago

    Heres my try: w is v, rz is a retroflex z(so a z pronounced kinda in a way how the "indian t" is pronounced) and the z that i cant type is like a soft z. Oh also the a which i once again cant type is nasal. Now how this would sound when i pronounce it, im not sure how correct it would be but at least i tried? Also sometimes the orthography is more confusing when the clusters are larger so yeah.

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  • [–] 7 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

    Yeah, I just find it more respectful to at least try to pronounce foreign words correctly. Sure I'll mangle it most of the time, but I prefer someone absolutely destroying a german word over just pronouncing it like an english one. Which is still destroying it, but in a way that feels worse to me because it just feels careless.

    I think my biggest pet peeve is when localized place names suggest a wrong pronunciation for no reason whatsoever. Like the german spelling for Tokyo is "Tokio" when just spelling it tokyo (or even tokjo to make it german-fied) would suggest a much more natural pronunciation that is also a syllable shorter.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 hours ago

    Yeah its really nice when you hear someone at least trying. Like i agree that hungarian having the opposite of polish with "sz" being pronounced as english "s" and "s" being english "sh" is stupid, its still nice to hear someone saying a hungarian name correctly. Another case like this is when someone makes a whole video about a politician, being Magyar Péter in this case and they keep pronouncing it as "mag-i-ar" which would take two seconds to look up and find out is incorrect. Of course im not expecting an english speaker to produce a completely accurate voiced palatal affricate but at least pronouncing is "madar", "magar" or best case "majar"(j as in jungle) would be much more correct. As for the Tokyo thing, same in hungarian. Its pronounced as tokijoo basically(written as Tokió) when hungarian is completely capable of having tookjoo(tókjó would be the written form in this case). Like our syllables can actually be pretty complex ane are basically a superset of japanese, why dont use that to pronounce things correctly?

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  • [–] 2 points 3 hours ago

    I think the response might have to do with the feeling "oh my god, this person is pronouncing Barcelona correctly and differently from how I pronounce it. How should I now continue this conversation? Should I imitate what they're saying or just ignorantly continue to use the wrong pronunciation. You know what, I lose either way. I better just make fun of them"

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  • [–] 2 points 2 hours ago (1 child)

    I assumed it was the Spanish accent or formal way of saying sss sounds? I remember when we learned spanish in school, we would use th when speaking the dialect from Spain.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 hour ago

    Uhhh its complicated. Technically the official pronounciation in spain is the "th" version but many speakers say it with an "s" instead especially in southern spain. And then most other places outside of spain also say it with an "s". But for example i lived in catalonia where as far as i know everyone says it with a "th" so thats why i pronounce it that way. There is some elitism in people who pronounce it that way even in among spanish speakers.

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  • [–] 11 points 17 hours ago (3 children)

    I've always heard that the largely Catalan folks in Barcelona really don't appreciate people pronouncing their name with a distinct Castillian accent.

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  • [–] 10 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

    Wait, you're telling me Catalans and the Madrid government might not be the best of friends?

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  • [–] 7 points 13 hours ago (1 child)

    It's honorable to try if your in that country. If your back home you're just making it harder for others to understand you, which is the purpose of language. It's less bad with things like parii and barthelona as people can guess those, it becomes more annoying with things like Deutschland and Nihon where most people won't understand where you went.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 hour ago

    A person with a lisp wouldn't struggle with the word "shirt".

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  • [–] 8 points 19 hours ago (6 children)

    For anyone who hasn’t learned the history, that speaking impediment is literally how the pronunciation came about, the king who had a speech impediment was so adored (as the story goes) that the people took on that pronunciation and it stuck. It’s not pretentious, it’s kindness and love.

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  • [–] 31 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (3 children)

    https://www.britannica.com/story/is-castilian-spanish-spoken-with-a-lisp

    The myth of the Spanish king’s lisp has been attributed to at least two monarchs: Ferdinand III, king of Castile from 1217 to 1252 and of Leon from 1230 to 1252, and Peter the Cruel, king of Castile and Leon from 1350 to 1369. In court historian Pedro López de Ayala’s Crónicas, the latter is said to have “spoken with a slight lisp,” an observation often taken out of context to support the theory of a Castilian speech impediment. But Ayala never claimed that others in court mimicked Peter’s way of speaking, nor was the lisp at all the subject of his writing.

    Ayala is one of Peter the Cruel’s only contemporaries to mention the king’s lisp; no historical evidence exists that suggests that it—or Ferdinand III’s alleged lisp, of which no record survives—influenced other Spanish speakers. Claims that Castilian Spanish is spoken with a lisp are based on rumor, not fact.

    Edit: > For anyone who hasn’t learned the history, that speaking impediment is literally how the pronunciation came about

    Oy vey.

    I'm sorry, I'm not going to go back and forth with this person. I know I'm coming off like a "well, actually" dick here but that's not a pedantic minor difference. It was objectively false.

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  • [–] -1 points 16 hours ago (1 child)

    I think it's crazy that one king had a lisp, and a whole population copied him.

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  • [–] -5 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) (12 children)

    Okay, mi Castellano is a general disaster, but I'm pretty sure that the Barcellona region does indeed do what we call a 'signature lisp' in English.

    Tell you hwat, though-- my stepmom visited that region one time, and even tho she spoke excellent Castellano, they got all bitchy because it wasn't 'Spanish-enough.' So she duly worked on learning the local inflections and whatnot, just as a visitor, mind you! And they had the nerve to call her "slow."

    Bunch of wankers she ran in to, if you ask me.

    EDIT: And of COURSE, someone's already angry upon what I just said, lol.

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  • [–] 4 points 18 hours ago (1 child)

    Why are they all so angry at you?

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  • [–] -3 points 17 hours ago

    Oof, I don't want to be unfair, and act like a dumbass tourist, so...
    even as they're an angry swarm upon me right here, I do respect and understand their culture.

    I challenged what should not have been challenged, and I got the heat, if you follow me.

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  • [–] 11 points 19 hours ago (9 children)

    Maybe she should have learned Catalan instead of Castellano when visiting a Catalan region?

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  • [+] -13 points 19 hours ago* (8 children)

    Oh sure! Spend years learning a major side-branch of the language, all so she could talk without language bias to the locals for two weeks...?

    Idiot.

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  • [–] 7 points 14 hours ago (5 children)

    It's not a dialect or side-branch. It's an entirely different language, closer to Italian or French than Spanish.

    I'm a non-native speaker who lives in Barcelona - and even though my Castelliano is far from perfect, I've never got anything but niceness and appreciation.

    So your story seems either totally made up, or missing some important details.

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  • [–] -4 points 14 hours ago (4 children)

    Please don't make me laugh.
    If Barcelona is so VERY HARD to live in for non-natives, then that would be one thing, right?

    Women getting treated poorly in Europe and other parts of the world is unfortunately, real.

    Got any more nuggets of bullshit in your sling, mate?

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  • [–] 7 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

    Oh boy, an Englishman who acts like Spain exists to serve them like a fucking resort. We've never seen that here - starting to see why you have trouble, "mate".

    Having lived in other countries, people in Barcelona are far more tolerant of people who don't speak the language, especially compared to the Anglosphere. Where it seems most people don't even speak one language properly, much less multiple.

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  • [–] -3 points 13 hours ago (2 children)

    Oh, do please keep downvoting away. The breeze is slight, and your characterisation of me is so hilariously offbase that it's almost like an entertainment industry in itself, lol.

    What is this? Beat your wannabe strawman day?

    Lol, I'm not quite sure how to say that in Spanish, so... yeah. But please do GTFO with your complete bullshit prevarication upon what I already explained about my stepmom's experience.

    And here's a bonus-- this is not an uncommon experience for women who experience Barcelona, genio grandisimo as you seem to style yourself.

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  • [–] 4 points 13 hours ago (1 child)

    Llora mas, grosero.

    this is not an uncommon experience for women who experience Barcelona

    They're criticized about their Spanish?

    Funny, my house is full of women, not all of whom are native speakers. We often have visitors from other countries, who don't speak perfect Spanish. None of them have ever reported what you describe.

    But from my brief interaction with you, if your stepmother is anything like you, I understand.

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  • [+] -8 points 18 hours ago* (8 children)

    What I've learned from this post: Barceloneta are a complete bag of assholes & idiots.

    Which... kinda sucks, as someone who kind of loves hyping up and appreciating other peoples and cultures. Damn.

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  • [–] 16 points 18 hours ago (1 child)

    Man if you make such broad strokes off of a couple of internet comments then maybe you should take a break and do something else for a while.

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  • [–] -4 points 17 hours ago

    You may be correct, sir.
    And that would make sense, if not for my stepmom's experience (and other experiences I've heard over the years), which I just talked about above.

    But here's the thing-- we already know that various areas of Europe are completely wrapped up in their pockets of toxic, masochistic, exclusionary cultures, and *everything* that was said above just confirmed it to me for Barcelona in particular.

    Problem..?

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  • [–] 7 points 14 hours ago (5 children)

    "What, I just went into Belfast and said how much I appreciate the people as proud Englishmen? What a bag of assholes and idiots!"

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  • [–] -1 points 14 hours ago (4 children)

    Interesting scenario you chose right there.
    My stepmom (who already spoke Castellano like a pro) was simply trying to do tourist things and enjoy the experience. She wasn't trying to be the 'loud, typical Aussie / American / etc' type of tourist.

    Why is she the 'bad guy' in this situation...?

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  • [–] 6 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

    The scenario is that, coming into Barcelona and affecting a Madrid accent, isn't "hyping up and appreciating other peoples and cultures". In fact, it's like exactly not that. See if you can figure out why from the example I gave you.

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  • [+] -1 points 13 hours ago (3 children)
  • [–] 3 points 13 hours ago (2 children)
  • [+] -1 points 13 hours ago* (2 children)
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