Soft sign after "ш"

I'm just beginning to learn russian and one of the books I am using said that ш, ж and ц are always pronounced hard. What about words like мышь ?

Do I ignore the rule and pronounce it soft? Or do I ignore the ь?

Pronounce it hard. Always.
edited:
Спасиб., TATY!

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Originally Posted by kevinfitch

I'm just beginning to learn russian and one of the books I am using said that ш, ж and ц are always pronounced hard. What about words like мышь ?

Do I ignore the rule and pronounce it soft? Or do I ignore the ь?

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Hi kevinfitch.
We don't ignore the rule because ш is always hard: ш and шь are pronounced equal. Ц and Ж are always hard too.

For example, the finale ж in нож and the finale жь in не трожь sound equal (like a hard sound; and ж becomes ш, because of the reduction). So they sound [nosh] and [nitrosh].

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Originally Posted by Leof

Pronounce it hard. Always.

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Thanks...or, спасибо

Nouns of feminine gender having [ш] sound at the end always have ь at the end in writing. Maybe this rule will be of some help too.

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Nouns of feminine gender having [ш] sound at the end always have ь at the end in writing.

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Если более точно, то у существительных женского рода после шипящей согласной на конце слова всегда пишется мягкий знак.
Дочь, печь, речь, рожь, мышь...
При этом буквы "ш" и "ж" все равно читаются твердо.

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Originally Posted by Игорь

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Nouns of feminine gender having [ш] sound at the end always have ь at the end in writing.

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Если более точно, то у существительных женского рода после шипящей согласной на конце слова всегда пишется мягкий знак.
Дочь, печь, речь, рожь, мышь...

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И Щ...

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Originally Posted by Rtyom

Nouns of feminine gender having [ш] sound at the end always have ь at the end in writing. Maybe this rule will be of some help too.

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Hmm... very interesting. *)