I work with two charming Indian woman. Both say "wolunteer" instead of "volunteer." Yet, there is no pronunciation problem when saying "variable" or "Vishnu" or "very." There may be other words where the "v" is pronounced as a "w," but I haven't pursued that.

I found this on WikiHow: "...in Indian languages, the sound "V" doesn't exist, and so you probably don't hear it in English either." But then, both of my coworkers say India has two national languages, so they learned (British) English right along with Hindi.

Why is the "w" sound used instead of the the "v" sound in "volunteer" but not for other words that begin with "v"?

Last Edited on 17-Aug-2008 11:45 AM

After my small niece begged pennies from her uncle(-in-law), who was from Bombay, for the "sewing machine," she began calling the coin-operated gum-ball dispenser the "wing-ding machine." His pronunciation was "wending machine."

While India has only two official languages that all government communication must be in, it has over 1500 languages, with 350 of them major. My brother-in-law used to write to his father in Hindi, to his mother in Sindhi. In 1965, I sat in the Indian pavilion at the NY World's Fair for a while listening to five Indians conversing on the far side of the room. They used English. Then two of them went away; the three remaining continued in English. When one of those left, the other two switched to another language.

What gets me is when two sounds get reversed. Anchy and Maria, Cuban fifteen-year-olds who'd learned English by being immersed the year before (in boarding school in Indiana), said "biolo-yee" and "al-yuh-bra" but "Joo-goslavia." If they could pronounce both, why didn't they put them where they belonged?

That's an interesting story about the switching-on-and-off-English-in-conversations, Pogo. The many Indians who come into our library speak English and Hindi, plus whatever dialect from their home region. I asked Manisha why she doesn't speak anything but English with them, and she responded with "Why? We all know English, and we live in the United States now." I've heard her speaking another language, though, when she is on her cell phone talking with friends or family. And she's in charge of selecting all the Hindi- and Urdu-language movies we buy, so then translates for me when I catalog them.

I remember my German grandparents who spoke German at home, a mix of German and English with friends and relatives, and as much English as they could when out in the world.

Last Edited on 18-Aug-2008 10:26 AM

It really hurts, by the way, when I hear English speakers refer to Richard WAG-ner instead of Richard VOG-ner.
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Rich Turner (The Curmudgeon Himself)

The /th/ sounds are usually harder as they are actually quite rare. With these sounds you have to run your finger across your top teeth and say put your tongue there. Once a student gets a sound, it's a case of practise, practise, practise.

Last Edited on 24-Aug-2008 5:28 AM

Also, native-languages.org says, "Sometimes, especially before an a, v is pronounced like w in way instead."

The word "volunteer" that Manisha pronounces with an initial w does sound like "vah-lun-teer," with the v before an a. I'll have to test her on some va- words.

Good thing Manisha is a patient person.

Last Edited on 24-Aug-2008 1:49 PM