This letter j has different pronunciations in different languages. How did this develop?

English: Soft g (as in gene)
Spanish: h (as in he)
Norwegian (also Yiddish and Hebrew): y (as in yes)

This letter j has different pronunciations in different languages. How did this develop?

English: Soft g (as in gene)
Spanish: h (as in he)
Norwegian (also Yiddish and Hebrew): y (as in yes)

There's also the French version, as in the word "Je" (as in "Je ne sais pas"). My guess is that it being a letter not used by the Romans it developed later, and developed regional eccentricities as a result since it lacked the common source material that the letters used in Latin had in abundance.

Just a guess though.

Well that's odd. I'd pronounce J in the French way described above although I'm a native English speaker. I've never heard anybody pronounce it the way it's described in the OP. :shrug:

Well that's odd. I'd pronounce J in the French way described above although I'm a native English speaker. I've never heard anybody pronounce it the way it's described in the OP. :shrug:

The French "j" is pronounced kind of like a buzzing "sh" or "zh". (For example, lyou can listen to it in "je ne sais quoi" here: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/je%20ne%20sais%20quoi)

Do you really pronounce "genes" and "jeans" differently?

I do know that the "j" sound in Spanish is relatively recent (past few centuries) and that it replaced the "X". That's why it's "Don Quixote" and not "Don Quijote" and "Mexico" not "Mejico".

There's also the French version, as in the word "Je" (as in "Je ne sais pas"). My guess is that it being a letter not used by the Romans it developed later, and developed regional eccentricities as a result since it lacked the common source material that the letters used in Latin had in abundance.

Just a guess though.

In Latin the letter "I" stood for either I or J, just as the letter "V" stood for U or V. They were determined by context (consonant vs. vowel). For example Julius was spelled Ivlivs,

Im French Canadian so "je prononce J la façon Québécoise" the quebec way

The French "j" is pronounced kind of like a buzzing "sh" or "zh". (For example, lyou can listen to it in "je ne sais quoi" here: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/je%20ne%20sais%20quoi)

Do you really pronounce "genes" and "jeans" differently?

I do know that the "j" sound in Spanish is relatively recent (past few centuries) and that it replaced the "X". That's why it's "Don Quixote" and not "Don Quijote" and "Mexico" not "Mejico".


You might be right here. I got a little confused I think.

When I think of the letter 'J' I would pronounce that jay (http://www.merriam-webster.com/audio.php?file=jay00001&word=jay&text=\%3Cspan%20class%3D%22unicode%22%3E%CB%88%3C% 2Fspan%3Ej%C4%81\).
When I think of the letter 'G' in genes I would pronounce it gee (http://www.merriam-webster.com/audio.php?file=gee00001&word=gee&text=\%3Cspan%20class%3D%22unicode%22%3E%CB%88%3C% 2Fspan%3Ej%C4%93\).

Which means I pronounce the letters differently in isolation but not when used in a word, it would seem.

The OP seems to be saying that 'J' is actually pronounced 'G' as far as I can tell. That seems wrong from a lay persons view like myself but is obviously right when tested. :confused:

Why is there a need for both of them?

This letter j has different pronunciations in different languages. How did this develop?
English: Soft g (as in gene)
Spanish: h (as in he)No, that is not the correct pronunciation of J or soft G in Spanish. It is like:The CH in German achtung The CH in Czech czech The Greek letter chi, written X, that we transliterate as CH, as in Archimedes The Cyrillic letter X that we transliterate as KH, as in Russian Mikhail The Scots Gaelic CH as in Loch Ness The Hebrew letter cheth כ as in Sholem AleichemPractice pronouncing the one Spanish word that ends in J, reloj (clock) and you'll see that it can't possibly be the same sound as an English H.
Norwegian (also Yiddish and Hebrew): y (as in yes)Yiddish and Hebrew are both written in the Hebrew abjad (an alphabet with no vowels--although Yiddish adds some makeshift vowel symbols). When transliterated into the Roman alphabet, the Y sound is written Y or I.

If you're speaking of the English translation of the Bible, then the Ancient Hebrew names often contain the letter J (Judea, Joseph), but that's because it was taken from the Latin translation, which used J instead of I as an initial letter. In any case, we pronounce it as an English J, just as Spanish speakers pronounce it as a Spanish J and French speakers as a French J.
Well that's odd. I'd pronounce J in the French way described above although I'm a native English speaker. I've never heard anybody pronounce it the way it's described in the OP.Then you're not hearing French right. The French J (and soft G) is a ZH sound, as in English occasion, usual, Asia. Same as Portuguese J and soft G. The Russians write the sound as Ж, the Czechs as Ž, and the Hungarians as ZS.

French does not have a J sound like ours, which they transcribe as DJ, as in Djibouti.
In Latin the letter "I" stood for either I or J, just as the letter "V" stood for U or V. They were determined by context (consonant vs. vowel). For example Julius was spelled Ivlivs,Originally Latin only had I and V. We classify Y and W as consonants, but they are actually semivowels, halfway between vowels and consonants. After all, a Y is just a really really short I and a W is just a really really short U.

J was originally invented only for use in Roman numerals. It wasn't until much later that scholars established a definitive distinction between I and J (or U and V) in Latin writing. Nobody wanted to carve any more curvy letters than he had to into all those stone inscriptions. B and R are hard enough!

As the Roman monks taught other Europeans to write down their own languages, other uses were developed for U and J that were not simply extensions of Latin pronunciation.
I'm French Canadian so "je prononce J la façon Québécoise" the quebec waySo is Céline Dion. You and the Parisians pronounce J the same way. When she sings Luc Plamondon's songs in France the audiences don't giggle over her accent. We foreigners can hardly tell them apart. It's nothing like the vast differences between British and American English, or the Portuguese of Lisboa and Rio de Janeiro.

You might be right here. I got a little confused I think.

When I think of the letter 'J' I would pronounce that jay (http://www.merriam-webster.com/audio.php?file=jay00001&word=jay&text=\%3Cspan%20class%3D%22unicode%22%3E%CB%88%3C% 2Fspan%3Ej%C4%81\).
When I think of the letter 'G' in genes I would pronounce it gee (http://www.merriam-webster.com/audio.php?file=gee00001&word=gee&text=\%3Cspan%20class%3D%22unicode%22%3E%CB%88%3C% 2Fspan%3Ej%C4%93\).

Which means I pronounce the letters differently in isolation but not when used in a word, it would seem.

The OP seems to be saying that 'J' is actually pronounced 'G' as far as I can tell. That seems wrong from a lay persons view like myself but is obviously right when tested. :confused:

Why is there a need for both of them?

There is a distinction between what is in English called the "soft" g
and the "hard" g.

The soft g is pronounced like a "j". The g in "gene" is soft. So is
the g in the following words: gentleman, gesture, gist, algebra.

The hard g is a distinct sound not shared with j or any other letter
or combination of letters. The g in the following words words is a hard g:
Go, get, good, grace, algorithm.

Jean and gene are pronounced the same; jet and get are not.

I believe double gg is always hard.

Then there is the common "ng" combination sometimes pronounced soft
as in "angel" or hard as in "angle" or in a third way, as in ring, sing, bang,
dung, wrong.

The erratic convolutions of the pronunciation of the letter "g" are
one reason that I cannot for the life of me understand how anyone
can master English as a second language, and I have the highest
regard for those who do.

The soft g is pronounced like a "j". The g in "gene" is soft. So is the g in the following words: gentleman, gesture, gist, algebra.

The hard g is a distinct sound not shared with j or any other letter or combination of letters. The g in the following words words is a hard g: Go, get, good, grace, algorithm.G is often, but not always, soft before E, I or Y: gel, gin, gym.

It is (almost) always hard in all other positions. Exceptions:The combination GH. We make jokes about this digraph, because sometimes it's silent, sometimes it sounds like hard G, sometimes it sounds like F, sometimes it sounds like K, and in at least one word in Irish English, lough, it is pronounced KH as in Mikhail. The combination OUGH is particularly entertaining because there are at least six ways it can sound in American English (though, through, rough, cough, thought, bough) and ten or more in British English. The word "jail" is spelled "gaol" in British English, but it is pronounced the same way as our spelling. Judgment and acknowledgment are alternative spellings of judgement and acknowledgement (or the preferred spellings, depending on which country you're in). There are a small number of other words, mostly from foreign sources, in which G is soft without preceding E, I, or Y.
I believe double gg is always hard.That statement is an exaggeration. :) Some Americans even pronounce suggest and suggestion this way, although the preferred pronunciations (in America) are sug-jest and sug-jes-chun
Then there is the common "ng" combination sometimes pronounced soft as in "angel" or hard as in "angle" or in a third way, as in ring, sing, bang, dung, wrong.I'm glad you remembered those, so I didn't have to add them to my list. It's difficult to guess which is right. "Anger" has a hard G but "singer" has just the nasal consonant with no separate G.
The erratic convolutions of the pronunciation of the letter "g" are one reason that I cannot for the life of me understand how anyone can master English as a second language, and I have the highest regard for those who do.In any language, learning to read and write is a separate course of study from learning to speak and understand conversation. In some languages like Czech and Finnish, the spelling rules have been so carefully crafted that once you know the alphabet it's very easy to read and only a little harder to write.

Then there are languages like French and English, in which spelling has not been reformed for hundreds of years, even though the pronunciation of the words has changed drastically. It's a little difficult to read French out loud and guess correctly at the sounds (about half of the letters are silent but you have to decide which half), and very much harder in English, but both languages are extremely difficult to write. You have to learn each word individually.

Then there are languages like Hebrew that use an abjad, a phonetic writing system with no vowels. Vowels are not phonemic so you can write the words without them, but when you're reading you don't know which vowels to use.

Many of the Indic languages use an abugida, a phonetic writing system in which each letter represents a consonant plus a vowel, so there are hundreds of them, but all the syllables built upon one consonant are similar-looking.

Cherokee and a few other languages, on the other hand, use a syllabary, a phonetic writing system in which each symbol represents an entire syllable, and there is no relationship between any one and any other, so there are 85 symbols to learn.

And of course there is Chinese, in which each symbol represents an entire "word." I put it in quotation marks because a word in Chinese is not the same as a word in English; they string them together into long compounds. Still, to be considered educated, a Chinese student has to learn at least 5,000 symbols. I recognize two or three hundred (of which I can write about fifty), which means I can't even read a children's book.

Japanese is surely the worst. Two thousand words are written in Chinese characters. The rest are written in a syllabary of fifty symbols. But there is a second syllabary used only for foreign words and abbreviations. And of course they all also know our Roman alphabet.

No, that is not the correct pronunciation of J or soft G in Spanish. It is like:The CH in German achtung The CH in Czech czech The Greek letter chi, written X, that we transliterate as CH, as in Archimedes The Cyrillic letter X that we transliterate as KH, as in Russian Mikhail The Scots Gaelic CH as in Loch Ness The Hebrew letter cheth כ as in Sholem AleichemPractice pronouncing the one Spanish word that ends in J, reloj (clock) and you'll see that it can't possibly be the same sound as an English H.Yiddish and Hebrew are both written in the Hebrew abjad (an alphabet with no vowels--although Yiddish adds some makeshift vowel symbols). When transliterated into the Roman alphabet, the Y sound is written Y or I.


My impression of the Spanish pronunciation of j was based on names like Jesus (Haysus) or Jaime (Hyme).

Marijuana!:rolleyes:

G is often, but not always, soft before E, I or Y: gel, gin, gym.
Not sure how useful this is because of the number of exceptions.





It is (almost) always hard in all other positions. Exceptions:[list]The combination GH. We make jokes about this digraph, because sometimes it's silent, sometimes it sounds like hard G, sometimes it sounds like F, sometimes it sounds like K, and in at least one word in Irish English, lough, it is pronounced KH as in Mikhail. The combination OUGH is particularly entertaining because there are at least six ways it can sound in American English (though, through, rough, cough, thought, bough) and ten or more in British English.
GH is an insane archaicism.





The word "jail" is spelled "gaol" in British English, but it is pronounced the same way as our spelling.
I am thoroughly anglophile in most respects, but this absurd construction
sometimes makes me wish we had taken the war the the UK in 1783 instead
of letting them off as lightly as we did.





Judgment and acknowledgment are alternative spellings of judgement and acknowledgement (or the preferred spellings, depending on which country you're in).
I prefer keeping the extra "e".





There are a small number of other words, mostly from foreign sources, in which G is soft without preceding E, I, or Y.
I'll have to think about how samll the number is : egret, egress,
egalitarian, begin, beget, begrudge, cygnet, cigar, and degrade
occur off the top.





That statement is an exaggeration. :)
Right you are.





Some Americans even pronounce suggest and suggestion this way, although the preferred pronunciations (in America) are sug-jest and sug-jes-chun

I have been north to south, coast to coast, midwest and southwest,
and I have never heard of anything besides suJestion





I'm glad you remembered those, so I didn't have to add them to my list. It's difficult to guess which is right. "Anger" has a hard G but "singer" has just the nasal consonant with no separate G.
"Nasal consonant" was the elementary term I sould not think of, thanks.

As for s-i-n-g-e-(r) don't forget the soft G as in the words having to do
with to lightly scorching something.





In any language, learning to read and write is a separate course of study from learning to speak and understand conversation. In some languages like Czech and Finnish, the spelling rules have been so carefully crafted that once you know the alphabet it's very easy to read and only a little harder to write.

Then there are languages like French and English, in which spelling has not been reformed for hundreds of years, even though the pronunciation of the words has changed drastically. It's a little difficult to read French out loud and guess correctly at the sounds (about half of the letters are silent but you have to decide which half), and very much harder in English, but both languages are extremely difficult to write. You have to learn each word individually.

Then there are languages like Hebrew that use an abjad, a phonetic writing system with no vowels. Vowels are not phonemic so you can write the words without them, but when you're reading you don't know which vowels to use.

Many of the Indic languages use an abugida, a phonetic writing system in which each letter represents a consonant plus a vowel, so there are hundreds of them, but all the syllables built upon one consonant are similar-looking.

Cherokee and a few other languages, on the other hand, use a syllabary, a phonetic writing system in which each symbol represents an entire syllable, and there is no relationship between any one and any other, so there are 85 symbols to learn.

And of course there is Chinese, in which each symbol represents an entire "word." I put it in quotation marks because a word in Chinese is not the same as a word in English; they string them together into long compounds. Still, to be considered educated, a Chinese student has to learn at least 5,000 symbols. I recognize two or three hundred (of which I can write about fifty), which means I can't even read a children's book.

Japanese is surely the worst. Two thousand words are written in Chinese characters. The rest are written in a syllabary of fifty symbols. But there is a second syllabary used only for foreign words and abbreviations. And of course they all also know our Roman alphabet.
Good short essay, thanks.

My impression of the Spanish pronunciation of j was based on names like Jesús (Haysus) or Jaime (Hyme).But that's just the way Americans pronounce them. In Spanish they're pronounced khe-SOOS (not khay-SOOS, that would be spelled Jeisús) and KHAI-me. Most Americans pronounce José as ho-ZAY, but it's kho-SE.

Americans have been learning the KH sound, since over the past few decades so many Slavic and Arabic names and words have become commonplace. But for some reason they don't transfer it to Spanish names and words.
Marijuana!It's become an English word so the J is silent. But in the old days it was often spelled marihuana, in an attempt to get people to pronounce the consonant, albeit incorrectly. In Spanish it's mah-ree-KHWAH-nah, although today it's more commonly referred to as mota in Mexico.

It's a made-up word in Mexican Spanish, traditionally assumed to be a compound of the name María Juana, the Spanish form of Mary Jane. The same way Tijuana is a compound of Tía Juana, Aunt Jane. But no one really knows for sure, so it's referred to as a "folk etymology."

"J" as a letter is not pronounced "gee", it's "Jay".

But that's just the way Americans pronounce them. In Spanish they're pronounced khe-SOOS (not khay-SOOS, that would be spelled Jeisús) and KHAI-me. Most Americans pronounce José as ho-ZAY, but it's kho-SE.

Americans have been learning the KH sound, since over the past few decades so many Slavic and Arabic names and words have become commonplace. But for some reason they don't transfer it to Spanish names and words.It's become an English word so the J is silent. But in the old days it was often spelled marihuana, in an attempt to get people to pronounce the consonant, albeit incorrectly. In Spanish it's mah-ree-KHWAH-nah, although today it's more commonly referred to as mota in Mexico.

It's a made-up word in Mexican Spanish, traditionally assumed to be a compound of the name María Juana, the Spanish form of Mary Jane. The same way Tijuana is a compound of Tía Juana, Aunt Jane. But no one really knows for sure, so it's referred to as a "folk etymology."

Your explanation reminded me that there seems be a similar situation in pronouncing Hebrew words in English. A simplie example is the holiday Hanukkah or Chanukah, where the initial sound is the gutteral, and is pronounced like an H in English.

Your explanation reminded me that there seems be a similar situation in pronouncing Hebrew words in English. A simplie example is the holiday Hanukkah or Chanukah, where the initial sound is the gutteral, and is pronounced like an H in English.Yes. The same is true of Chassidim, which many Americans both pronounce and spell as Hassidim.

Here are some of the phonetic histories:

The French j and Spanish j, although pronounced differently, are ultimately descended from the same noise, which had the pronunciation of 'dg' in 'bridge'. This was originally a result either of a change from the semivowel i/y in Latin (spelt 'i' and later 'j') or from a palatalisation of 'g' (which happened when it precede 'e' or 'i'). This sound is actually two sounds, the 'd' or 'dog' and the 'si' of 'vision' pronounced as an affricate. The French, the Portuguese and the Spanish all lost the 'd' of this, changing it from an affricate to a 'simpler' fricative. (Italian has kept this spelt 'gi'.)

French and Portuguese stop there, but Spanish did two extra things: first, it de-voiced its fricatives, turning this noise into the 'sh' of 'ship'. However, Spanish had three phonemes that sounded somewhat similar, the 's' descended from 'ts', which was dental, the 's' from Latin 's', which was alveolar, and the 'sh' just described, which was post-alveolar. Over time, to differentiate the sounds, the post-alveolar 'sh' was moved further back in the mouth, and became the velar sound of German 'achtung'. (In some areas the dental 's' was moved forward, and became 'th').

That explains the different pronunciations of 'g' and 'j' in Spanish, French, Portuguese and Italian.

The 'y' sound of 'g' in many languages comes from the palatalisation of the hard 'g' noise before front vowels, which makes it a palatal voiced fricative (like some variations of Spanish 'y' in 'yerba' as opposed to 'hierba'). Sometimes this 'unstable' sound becomes a semivowel 'y' noise (as in English 'yet').

Hope that helps.

This letter j has different pronunciations in different languages. How did this develop?

English: Soft g (as in gene)
Spanish: h (as in he)
Norwegian (also Yiddish and Hebrew): y (as in yes)

I kind of like the French pronounciation the best:

English: g-iffy lube
Spanish: h-iffy lube
Norwegian, Yiddish and Hebrew: y-iffy lube
French: zh-iffy lube

Spanish: h-iffy lubeNo: khiffy. And since Spanish has no short I, they would say khee-fee.