Thread: Proper Pronuncition or Joke?

Originally Posted by Marcus

That's considered a speech impediment in Russian. The overwhelming majority of Russians pronounce an alveolar flap or trill. And your conclusion doesn't seem to be обоснованным.

Well, it wasn't really a conclusion - it was more like a guess. But all the Russians I've talked to, in real-life, seem to pronounce letters more towards the back of their mouths - but I could be wrong.
Another guess I have is that all Russians don't have the same kind of accent. People in different parts of the USA talk differently and I get the feel that it's a lot the same in Russia, especially since Russia is so much bigger.
But I still say he sounds like somebody from New Jersey.

Originally Posted by UhOhXplode

Another guess I have is that all Russians don't have the same kind of accent. People in different parts of the USA talk differently and I get the feel that it's a lot the same in Russia, especially since Russia is so much bigger.

Although Russia is much bigger by its area, it has much fewer pronunciation differences between its regions than the U.S. have.
Yes, you are right, some differences exist.

The most noticeable are northern and southern accents, while the central accent is considered to be standard.

The northern accent is spread to the north of Vologda and Kostroma in the north of the European Russia (but not in its Asian part). The most prominent feature of the northern accent is lack of unstressed "о" reduction. In the central and southern parts, for example, "молоко" is pronounced as "малакО" (with reducing all the unstressed о's to a schwa or to a weakened "а"), IPA: [məlɐˊko]. In the European North it would sound clearly as "молокО" with all distinct о's.

The southern accent is typical somewhere to the sound of the Don River, and in some areas close to Ukraine. It has the same vowel reduction as the standard Central Russian. But its most prominent feature is the fricative "г", which is pronounced as [ɣ] in IPA (technically, it is a voiced counterpart of the Russian "х").

So, to illustarte the differences, we can consider examples of "гора", "нога" and "дорога":
Central (starndard pronunciation): [gɐˊra], [nɐˊga], [dɐˊrogɐ];
Northern pronunciation: [goˊra], [noˊga], [doˊrogɐ];
Southern pronunciation: [ɣɐˊra], [nɐˊɣa], [dɐˊroɣɐ];

There are also some other subtle nuances (involving St Petersburg vs Moscow pronunciation standards), but they are very slight and not even always noticed by native speakers. E.g., people in St Petersburg pronounce unstressed "е" as more or less clear [e] sound, while in other parts of Russia (including Moscow) it sounds more like [i] when unstressed. I know it theoretically, but I never paid attention when I visited St Pete. In general, Russian pronunciation is much more uniform as compared to English. You cannot tell somebody's birthplace from his accent (except the cases with North and South). Even if he speaks with the southern accent, you may not notice it unless he pronounces at least one word with "г"