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Old March 27, 2017, 04:52 AM
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aleCcowaN aleCcowaN is offline
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Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina
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Native Language: Castellano
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Quote:
Originally Posted by toronto416 View Post

When he gets to "a los ojos" I don't hear him saying any such thing. Can someone tell me how he is pronouncing these words - is he joining them together? Or am I simply deaf?
Amazing! Because he is speaking exactly as each and every English speaker does it all the time. You know, with shortened words, tens of midway sounds, both vocals and consonants, changing sounds depending on the syllable is stressed or not, and all those niceties that are the nightmare of those who like me are weak in that part of our brains that organizes sounds into syllables.

What that supposedly Spanish speaker says is:

"a loh'ohs"

and even that "hs" is almost imperceptible, more like a nuanced s.

There's a phenomenon there I tend to associate with French liason, when in fact is quite the opposite: Two words get joined when the first one ends in consonant and the second one starts with a vowel. Even more: the consonant "denatures" in the process. That's how "los-o-jos" becomes "lo-ho-jos", with h pronounce in the English style, even milder. But it doesn't end there: as one s is transformed, the next s is so closed that it follows (I forgot the name of that) and "lo-ho-jos" becomes "lo-ho-joh". Then English intervenes and provides its rule of non stressed vowels being played down or dismissed plus other forms of "liason" that are un-Spanish. So "lo-ho-joh" becomes "lo-ho-j.h" and finally "lo-ho-hs". This happens with people in the United States or trying to sell in that market. Porto Ricans have one foot in each speaking area, so it sounded to me a bit like them.

A practical example of what Spanish speakers have to deal with daily to learn English. Whowudv'thunk?
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