| Previous lesson | Main page | Next lesson |
Lesson two. Subject: Basic rules concerning the spelling and the pronunciation – continued
The Polish e is between English a in man and e in men. It resembles also French, German, Spanish or Italian open e (è). It is (of course) always pronounced, unlike English e in, e.g, of course, and it is never reduced. Compare English men and policemen – can you hear the difference? There are no such differences in Polish at all.
There are not any kind of reduced vowels in Polish. If you can speak Italian or Spanish, you understand what it means. It may be interesting for you that there are reduced vowels in some other Slavic languages, for example in Russian. But Polish does not belong to this group. In fact, there are some reductions in a very fast, colloquial speech – but you’d better forget them as for now. Try to pronounce Polish vowels clearly in all positions.
Some new words for you: jeden ‘one’, jestem ‘I am’, jest ‘is’, Ewa (female Christian name), meta ‘goal, winning-post’, jej ‘her, hers’ (something that belongs to her). Try to say ten now. It does not mean ‘ten’ but ‘this’! Polish t should be dental, not alveolar. It has no “h”-like sound with it (it is not aspirated). The e is wider than the English one, but not as wide as a in tan. The n is dental, not alveolar like the English one. Can you read the Polish word ten correctly now?
The Polish o is similar to English aw in claws, Shaw, a in water or to British (not American) or(e), oor in more, door – but it is short. There are no long vowels in Polish at all. The Polish o also resembles British (not American!) o in hot, dog, but it is not so open. It is a rounded vowel, but not too much. I can say it sounds like French, German, Spanish or Italian open o (ò).
Now say some new words: dom ‘house, home’, nowa ‘new’ (about e.g. a new girl-friend), potem ‘next, then, after that’, kot ‘cat’, koza ‘goat’, moja ‘my, mine’ (e.g. girl-friend), jego ‘his’, Bogdan (male Christian name), Tomek (diminutive form of Tomasz, a male name), woda ‘water’, oko ‘eye’, nos ‘nose’, noga ‘leg’, stopa ‘foot’, podłoga ‘floor’, okno ‘window’, sosna ‘pine(-tree), Pinus’, on ‘he’, ona ‘she’, ono ‘it’, oto ‘here’ (is / are), to ‘this, it’, tamto ‘that’. The last word should be read just like is written, do not say “tanto”!
Both are pronounced the same. It means the difference between them is purely orthographic. Polish schoolchildren do not like them because of the spelling errors they cause (and because of the bad marks as a consequence). It should not be a great problem for you at this time – but you must remember to read ó just like u in all instances. The character ó is named “u” kreskowane (more often) or “o” kreskowane in Polish (notice that in Polish left quotation sign should be placed at the bottom, unlike in English). When I present the pronunciation for you using the square brackets, I will only use [u].
The vowel [u] (spelt u or ó) is short (like all Polish vowels), but it resembles long English u in Luke. We can say it is between oo, u in look, put and oo, u in moon, Luke, lucid then. It sounds like Spanish or Italian u or like French ou but it is less intensive. Here are some examples: tu ‘here’, but ‘shoe, boot’ (don’t say just English but!), Bóg ‘God’ ([buk]), Bug (name of a river in the eastern part of Poland), buk ‘beech-tree, Fagus’, mój ‘my, mine’ (e.g. boy-friend), kogut ‘cock, rooster’, suka ‘bitch, she-dog’, usta ‘mouth’, wnuk ‘grandson’ (I hope you have no problems with the initial cluster wn-; remember what is the pronouncing of the Polish w). Have you noticed that Bóg, Bug, buk are homophones? It means the three words are pronounced in the same way, as [buk].
The sounds ł and u/ó like being together. In those instances you should read them very carefully. In fact, some Poles simplify – in such or another way – the groups łu, uł, but it is unacceptable in the standard language. I am a Pole and I never do such simplifications. So, try to say: łuk ‘bow, curve, arc, arch’, stół ‘table’ (a piece of furniture), muł ‘mule’ and also muł ‘slime, mud, silt, sludge’, dług ‘debt, obligation’ ([dłuk]), długo ‘long, for a long time’, słój ‘jar, pot’, główka ‘small head’ (read [głufka], diminutive to głowa ‘head’), tułów ‘trunk, torso, thorax’ – notice the grup [ułu] here (and remember about final [f]). Finally, compare kuł ‘he was hammering (forging)’ and kłuł ‘he was stabbing, prodding, jabbing’. Can you hear the difference? You should.
It is near like English i, ee in machine, meet but it is always short. It resembles Italian and Spanish i as well as French one (but is less intensive). The groups ji, ij are also possible in Polish and may cause problems for you. Examples: i ‘and, as well as’, Iwona (female Christian name), sufit ‘ceiling’, kij ‘staff, stick’, bij ‘beat!’, moi ‘my, mine’ (e.g. parents; read it with two syllables: [mo-i], the pronunciation [moji] is also correct), igła ‘needle’, izba ‘room, chamber’.
Please remember that the letter i marks a vowel only when before a consonant or word-finally. This is a very important rule of the Polish spelling!!! In fact, there are few instances when the i is read i before another i – but as a rule when before a vowel, it does not denote the vowel i. More on it in the next lesson.
When you write ó in a word, there often exist related words with o. For instance: mój – moja – moi, słój – słoik (with the diminutive -k). The ó is very rare at the beginning of the word (e.g. ów ‘this, that’ ([uf])) and is never spelt word-finally.
When two vowels stand side-by-side, you should read each of them without mixing them into a diphthong. So, słoik (‘little jar’) is pronounced as a two-syllabic word: sło-ik. Between two vowels there can be pronounced also the glottal stop (only in a very slow speech – so forget it for the time being), and if one of the vowels is i, the semi-vowel j. It means that you can say [słojik] as well as [słoik] – as you wish. The spelling avoids using j before i.
When the letter ę stands at the end of the word, you may read it as if it was a simple e. There is another way of reading the final ę, but it is more natural to pronounce e, especially in everyday’s language. E.g. daję ‘I am giving’ ([daje]), stoję ‘I am standing’ ([stoje]). WARNING! Don’t say other ę’s this way! How to read them – you will learn it later on.
Here is the most simple way: say jestem + your name. You do not need to add ja: jestem means I am and you should omit the pronoun in Polish. What is ja for then? Do the conversation with me:
Grzesiek is a diminutive form to Grzegorz, my true name. Diminutives are very popular in Polish. The word a means ‘and, but’ and you can use it only when opposing two things. It is rather unstressed. Look at ja – you should use it here for emphasis (‘it’s me, not you’). Cf. and me, I am…
The following diagram contains at least 13 Polish words, written horizontally, vertically or diagonally, in any direction (so, words written from right to left or from bottom to top are also possible). Can you find them all? The list of these words is given in the next lesson.
| O | N | A | D | G | O | B |
| K | M | O | Ł | A | U | A |
| O | T | O | G | K | M | T |
| Z | W | O | D | A | I | P |
| A | T | A | M | T | O | Ł |
Please repeat the material until you are sure you can do all what you should.
| Previous lesson | Main page | Next lesson |