Polish sounds
Eva 2011-04-18 10:11 | Polish sounds Hello! I'm coming from Germany and trying to learn some Polish, since my grandpa was from Schlesien. I have many problems with that language. I'm just starting and have problems with remembering the words that have Polish sounds, such as dz, rz, o with a coma and so on. Is that a big mistake to skip the comas, dots and so on? Will it be incomprehensible? Thanks for any info :) |
Sonia 2011-04-18 10:18 | Hej, well I had similar problem, but I think it's not such a big mistake since I have seen some chats on messengers, like Polish gg or MSN, and the ppl there don't use all these Polish signs so often and still are able to communicate :) |
Eva 2011-04-18 10:28 | [quote:Sonia]Hej, well I had similar problem, but I think it's not such a big mistake since I have seen some chats on messengers, like Polish gg or MSN, and the ppl there don't use all these Polish signs so often and still are able to communicate :)[/quote] O thanks for immediate reply :) Well, I still have some doubts. As you say it is understandable to skip the signs, but I guess it's not correct...Do you know if there are some words that have different meaning when written with or withouat a sign, such as ą, ó, ł etc? |
 sara.w 2011-05-13 17:32 | Hi, I think that diacritics (these signs like comas or dots above letters) are quite important, and sometimes it may be hard for someone to guess what you meant. I have some examples for you, which are very similar in spelling, although one word has a diacritic sign, and the other one doesn't, e.g. 1. sąd - sad (a court - an orchard) 2. bez - beż (without or lilac - beige) 3. bak - bąk (a fuel tank - a gadfly) 4. moc - móc (power - to be able to) 5. kąt - kat (an angle - an executioner) Although Polish people nowadays skip the diacritics (especially while chatting via the Internet) I think it is essential for a foreigner to learn these signs, because it will be hard for you to understand e.g. books, newspapers etc. Good luck with Polish! |
j.stanek 2011-05-13 21:41 | Polish diacritics are not only important, but simply essential, when you learn Polish. Skipping them changes meaning (pretty easy to guess in written Polish), but first of all it changes pronunciation, which makes communication really hard. I’m not sure if everyone understands what you mean if you say “piec” instead of “pięć”. Good solution would be treating ś, ź, ć, ą, ę etc. as totally separate letters having their own sounds and practicing their pronunciation a lot. Eva, that could also help you remember the correct spelling of many words. |
