Pronounciation of Italian phrase

[hart.key]

Hello!

I'm Hart, and new to the boards. I was wondering if someone could tell me how to correctly pronounce (in and English accent if there's a difference) these phrases and words, just basically the proper way to say them when speaking English so I don't sound like an idiot:

Palazzo dei Priori

and

Volterra

- I'm hoping it's
puh-lah-zo day pree-or-ee

and

voll- tera ?

Thanks!!!

[Roby]

Welcome Hart to the forum.


Palazzo dei Priori

pa LAHT-tso dee pri -OR -ee

Volterra

vol TAIR-ra

I hope that this is helpful.
Roby

[Helyenne]

Hello!

I'm Hart, and new to the boards. I was wondering if someone could tell me how to correctly pronounce (in and English accent if there's a difference) these phrases and words, just basically the proper way to say them when speaking English so I don't sound like an idiot:

Palazzo dei Priori

and

Volterra

- I'm hoping it's
puh-lah-zo day pree-or-ee

and

voll- tera ?

Thanks!!!

I guess you are reading the Twilight Saga, isn't it?

[Devery]

Hello!

I'm Hart, and new to the boards. I was wondering if someone could tell me how to correctly pronounce (in and English accent if there's a difference) these phrases and words, just basically the proper way to say them when speaking English so I don't sound like an idiot:

Palazzo dei Priori

and

Volterra

- I'm hoping it's
puh-lah-zo day pree-or-ee

and

voll- tera ?

Thanks!!!

I would do it a little different than Roby...

Palazzo dei Priori: Pah-lah-tso Day Pree-orr-ee


Volterra: Vohl-tear-ra


Of course I'm being very liberal with my spelling. I hope it helps.

[polideuce]

Per quanto riguarda "Palazzo dei Priori" credo che sia più corretto quanto scritto da Devery, ovvero: "Pah-lah-tso Day Pree-orr-ee"
mentre per quanto riguarda "Volterra" penso sia più corretto quanto scritto da Roby: "vol TAIR-ra" (...nella versione proposta da Devry mi pare manchi la doppia "r")
Tempo fa sono stati postati diversi siti ove era possibile digitare una parola e sentirne la pronuncia...ed ecco che ne ho recuperato uno da un post di Cyn

http://www.text-to-speech.imtranslator.net/ così puoi ascoltare come si pronuncia e ripetere

[Devery]

I fixed the double "r." Anyways, English is screwy. It must be very hard to learn how to spell in English. I bet you almost have to memorize every word since it doesn't seem to have a rhyme or reason.

[umberto]

I fixed the double "r." Anyways, English is screwy. It must be very hard to learn how to spell in English. I bet you almost have to memorize every word since it doesn't seem to have a rhyme or reason.

Sì, è difficilissimo: it’s absolutely the hardest aspect of English! Every word must be memorized, because the combination of its sounds will be different in another word. I’ve always wondered: how can an anglophone child learn to write since there isn’t any exclusive relationship between the letter and its sound? Is it, maybe, an instinctive feature of the individual? I’m asking this beacause sometimes, when I try to speak English, I feel like a 5-year-old child…

[Devery]

I fixed the double "r." Anyways, English is screwy. It must be very hard to learn how to spell in English. I bet you almost have to memorize every word since it doesn't seem to have a rhyme or reason.

Sì, è difficilissimo: it’s absolutely the hardest aspect of English! Every word must be memorized, because the combination of its sounds will be different in another word. I’ve always wondered: how can an anglophone child learn to write since there isn’t any exclusive relationship between the letter and its sound? Is it, maybe, an instinctive feature of the individual? I’m asking this beacause sometimes, when I try to speak English, I feel like a 5-year-old child…

Uh, you seem to speak it better than most adults!

[isablu]

Caro Umberto, se davvero ti sentissi come un bambino di 5 anni allora saresti davvero fortunato, perchè è proprio l'età giusta per imparare le lingue ottimamente. Purtroppo, dopo i sei-sette anni questa innata capacità di apprendere con facilità un linguaggio si affievolisce sempre di più e l'apprendimento diventa più difficile. Quando sento l'inglese di un Londinese e poi di uno Statunitense, poi di un giornalista di AlJazeera e poi di un politico israeliano mi riconsolo e dico: OK anche io posso parlare con il mondo usando l'inglese senza problemi e senza paura di non essere capita. A volte invece sento parlare dei napoletani, dei sardi, dei veneti, dei siciliani etc. e non ci capisco niente!!!!!
isabella

[polideuce]

Anyways, English is screwy. It must be very hard to learn how to spell in English. I bet you almost have to memorize every word since it doesn't seem to have a rhyme or reason.

...già; a parte la mia abissale ignoranza dell'anglica grammatica, aspetto che potrei sistemare con un po' di studio, la pronuncia dei vari suoni della lingua inglese mi inibisce dal parlarla...ho sempre paura che dicendo "three" non mi si capisca e si intenda "albero" o "libero", perché non emetto il suono corretto.

[Andrew]

Sì, è difficilissimo: it’s absolutely the hardest aspect of English! Every word must be memorized, because the combination of its sounds will be different in another word. I’ve always wondered: how can an anglophone child learn to write since there isn’t any exclusive relationship between the letter and its sound? Is it, maybe, an instinctive feature of the individual? I’m asking this beacause sometimes, when I try to speak English, I feel like a 5-year-old child…

We learn at school, from about 5 years old up until 9 or 10. Even then, after four years of pretty much daily practice, many people my age can't spell properly, or make the correct choice between your/you're, or their/there/they're, or use apostrophes properly, or do any number of grammatical tasks in English. It's quite sad sometimes. If it makes you feel better, Umberto, your written English is indistinguishable from a native speaker's (and is probably better than many!)

You Italians are lucky for having a language that's so phonetically regular. (although, I have noticed that I pick up French phonetics pretty easily, and they're nearly as irregular as English, so maybe that's an advantage...) Our Italian teacher told us that Italian borrowed the English word for 'spelling' because it just wasn't a concept that arose in everyday life when writing Italian

[umberto]

Sì, è difficilissimo: it’s absolutely the hardest aspect of English! Every word must be memorized, because the combination of its sounds will be different in another word. I’ve always wondered: how can an anglophone child learn to write since there isn’t any exclusive relationship between the letter and its sound? Is it, maybe, an instinctive feature of the individual? I’m asking this beacause sometimes, when I try to speak English, I feel like a 5-year-old child…

We learn at school, from about 5 years old up until 9 or 10. Even then, after four years of pretty much daily practice, many people my age can't spell properly, or make the correct choice between your/you're, or their/there/they're, or use apostrophes properly, or do any number of grammatical tasks in English. It's quite sad sometimes. If it makes you feel better, Umberto, your written English is indistinguishable from a native speaker's (and is probably better than many!)

You Italians are lucky for having a language that's so phonetically regular. (although, I have noticed that I pick up French phonetics pretty easily, and they're nearly as irregular as English, so maybe that's an advantage...) Our Italian teacher told us that Italian borrowed the English word for 'spelling' because it just wasn't a concept that arose in everyday life when writing Italian

Actually, we have a verb, “compitare”, which simply means “to spell”, but hardly ever do we use it: lots of people ignore this word, maybe it’s because – as your teacher told you – it expresses an unusual concept… There’s another thing that I hadn’t understood: in movies, children often take part in spelling competitions (such contests don't exist in Italy), and I had always asked myself why, then I got it…

[Devery]

Why don't you think they have spelling bees?

[umberto]

Why don't you think they have spelling bees?

Because, thinking about that in Italian, I couldn’t fancy the difficulty of spelling, even for a child who’s just begun learning to read and to write. In Italian every letter is (almost) perfectly related to its sound. This doesn’t happen in English, whose phonetics is much more complex thus much harder than the Italian one; as a consequence, I understood the difficulties into which an anglophone seven/eight-year-old child may run trying to spell a word. In Italian - you know - the sound [f ] is represented by F, and that’s all; in English [f ] may be represented by F, PH and GH (probably PH of “philosophy” and GH of “enough” aren’t exactly the same sound, but I think you get what I mean); of course, GH of “enough” is not the GH of “ghost”, and the diphthong OU of “enough” is not the OU of “fought”, where you still have a GH, which is different from the GH of “ghost”… Believe me, it’s a no way out labyrinth!!!

[Peter]

Absolutely brilliant, umberto!!