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- Pronunciation of 'ר' in Hebrew
Pronunciation of 'ר' in Hebrew
How do we pronounce 'ר' in Hebrew exactly? (Especially when it is at the beginning of a word like 'רוצה'). Is it similar to the way the french r is pronounced?
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If I remember correctly, when Modern Hebrew was at its early stage of existence, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda favored the Sephardic pronunciation of the resh (ר) which was like the Spanish R. However, since Ashkenazi Jews made up a majority of the migrants who mass migrated to Israel, they learned to speak Hebrew with a Germanic/Yiddish influence, therefore pronouncing the resh with a voiced uvular fricative sound. This transformed into the normal pronunciation of the Modern Hebrew that is spoken today. Using the Spanish R is considered "more classical", but if you want to sound like a Modern Hebrew Speaker, you should pronounce it with a voiced uvular fricative sound.
I've heard this consonant compared to the French "r", but I don't speak any French and I am quite familiar with German. German has an "r" that is also quite gutteral. They sound similar but they don't sound exactly the same. The German "r" sounds gentler to me and it sounds like it's maybe not quite as far back in the throat...
Is there anyone here who knows both German and Hebrew who can explain or compare these two for me?
Linguistix has best how to I've ever used on resh https://youtu.be/yNJtAibUeOc I'm not the only on Duolingo whose used his method.