Thread: Unstressed "а" after ч, щ, ж, and ш

I'm a little confused here. I have the New Penguin Course and Russian for Beginners by Duff and Makaroff. Duff says that unstressed 'а' after ч and щ is pronounced like и (часы, щадить) and like ы after ж and ш (жакет, шарлатан).

Brown doesn't even mention this. He just talks about 'а' being reduced whenever unstressed. Is this just a difference of dialect? How do Russians from Moscow pronounce it and how do most Russians pronounce it?

I'm not sure I agree with old Duff, mein lieber G

Thanks Pravit. That's what I was hoping. It's just easier that way.

Wenn ich du w

Ja, ich wei

Originally Posted by Гюнтер

I'm a little confused here. I have the New Penguin Course and Russian for Beginners by Duff and Makaroff. Duff says that unstressed 'а' after ч and щ is pronounced like и (часы, щадить) and like ы after ж and ш (жакет, шарлатан).
Brown doesn't even mention this. He just talks about 'а' being reduced whenever unstressed. Is this just a difference of dialect? How do Russians from Moscow pronounce it and how do most Russians pronounce it?

Native speaker is here.
I do not know who is Brown, but he is right.
I believe "а" in my часы sounds a little like "и", and respectively
in щадить like "a",
in жакет like "и" ,
in шарлатан like "а".

площадь to me sound like plosh'it', as in the English word "sh*t". The a sounds like a cross between the i in sh*t and the u in shut.
Since I am using examples of how things are said in enlgish, I should mention I am talking about proper... I mean British English pronunciation.

площадь to me sound like plosh'it'

It a very "broad" vowelsound for sure. I think it sound like a mix of "eh and i"

hah! What is it with me and loosing the "s" in english grammar....

Originally Posted by TATY

площадь to me sound like plosh'it', as in the English word "sh*t".

Щ звучит звонко как "shch", а в остальном ты прав.
А знаешь как различать звонкие звуки от глухих?
Нужно положить руку на горло. При произнесении звонкого звука ты почувствуешь легкое дрожание голосовых связок, а глухого - нет.

Originally Posted by TATY

площадь to me sound like plosh'it', as in the English word "sh*t". The a sounds like a cross between the i in sh*t and the u in shut.

To me, it sounds not like "sh*t", but like the schwa. The schwa is the most common vowel sound in unstressed positions.
Some examples of it would be: the first and last a in "banana" and the u in "but" *if* it's in its "reduced" form (this means that there are two ways of saying "but", if you speak quickly and you're not stressing the word "but", then you'll use a schwa)

To me the second vowel in площадь sounds like a schwa, or at least close enough to not make a difference. Anybody agree?

Originally Posted by Lampada

Native speaker is here.
I do not know who is Brown, but he is right.

Nicholas Brown, the author of the New Penguin Russian Course.

Of course "часы" sounds like [чисы], because the unstressed 'a' is pronounced as 'и' after soft vowels in the first syllable before the stressed one. Take for example "лягушка" [лигушка]. In modern Russian ч is soft. On the other hand ж and ш are hard and the last time жара was pronounced [жыра] may be only in the beginning of XX c. But this fact somehow got into books on Russian phonetics. It is one of the funny facts I remember from my studies in the university.

Originally Posted by Propp

Of course "часы" sounds like [чисы], because the unstressed 'a' is pronounced as 'и' after soft vowels in the first syllable before the stressed one. Take for example "лягушка" [лигушка]. In modern Russian ч is soft. On the other hand ж and ш are hard and the last time жара was pronounced [жыра] may be only in the beginning of XX c. But this fact somehow got into books on Russian phonetics. It is one of the funny facts I remember from my studies in the university.

So let me get this straight. Unstressed 'а' after ч and щ in the syllable before the stress is like a short и and unstressed 'а' after ж and ш in any position just follows the normal rules for reduced 'а'. Right?

Originally Posted by Гюнтер

So let me get this straight. Unstressed 'а' after ч and щ in the syllable before the stress is like a short и and unstressed 'а' after ж and ш in any position just follows the normal rules for reduced 'а'. Right?

A sort of. I never heard people say [жыра] (жара) or [жыкет] (жакет), although some of them sometimes do say [лошыдь] (лошадь) [шырлатан] (шарлатан). Don't remeber other words (not so much of them left although).

The reduction of the vowel will give it a sounds closer to и and ы. You probably do it subconsciously a lot of the time and hardly notice it. One example is the verb передать. The e's basically sound like и. Piridat. But the piri part is said so fast (as its not stessed) that you probably do this anyway. You wouldnt sound it out pyeryedat, as its not stressed and you dont really place emphasis on this part of the word.

There are tons of rules for stress, and the resulting sounds, and most follow pattern thankfully. Usually E --> и, the o--->a, as well as the after certain consonants as mentioned above, ch, sh, shch, zh etc. The book is basically telling you about vowel reduction, which is the same thing as it changing the pronunciation. I learned the brief vowel reduction in my first year russian class, but never learned the individual cases of it until later in a phonetics course.

Prav, Prav,
>Wenn ich du w

Nah, I'll leave it to you. Hop to it, old man!

what you doin' here at this time of day?