Quote:
Originally Posted by iriroma
й is always soft! And щ is not a variant of ш!
Why?
Try to soften ш and you will get щ. Try to soften ж and you will get sound жь which is not used in Russian but still is pronouncible. Try to harden ч and you will get a sound like тш, which is also pronouncible. That is my criterion. I say Й is neither soft nor hard because it has no
imaginable couple.
Yeah, I have seen sentences like this. Nothing more than very questionable opinion with no argumentation IMHO.
BTW I disagree that vowels can not be soften. :) For me it is clear that ы and и make a hard-soft couple. The same are vowels in матч and мяч: they are different by itself, not only because of the soft and hard м. etc.
Я так думаю. :)