A GRAMMAR OF CZECH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE Karel Tahal

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Karel Tahal: A Grammar of Czech as a Foreign Language Although an average user of this type of manual is supposed to make “single-shot looks“ at chosen items, the explanations are arranged so as to make it possible to read them “from cover to cover“. Our GRAMMAR OF CZECH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE should give a compact overview of the Czech language system. Obviously, it is far from beeing exhaustive, but it can be regarded as a reliable companion even for further systematic studies as well as for practical acquirement of the Czech language. *** www.factumcz.cz 8
Karel Tahal: A Grammar of Czech as a Foreign Language SURVEY OF SPELLING AND PRONUNCIATION 1 THE SOUNDS OF CZECH České hláskosloví Mutual relations between the written and the spoken forms are principally based on the “one-to-one relation“, i.e. a letter (grapheme) corresponds to a certain sound (phoneme), and vice versa. Yet, the validity of the principle is not one hundred per cent, and for a foreign learner of Czech it is always advisable to start from the written form. The recommended procedure can save you a lot of difficulties, as the existing discrepancies between the written and the spoken forms are of the “heterographic – homophonous“ character. (It means that there can be encountered pairs of words with different spelling, but identical pronunciation, e.g. the two different written words objet (to drive around) and oběd (lunch) have identical pronunciation [objet]. The same holds true for the pairs let (flight) – led (ice), both of them being pronounced [let]; výška (height) – vížka (turret), vith the same pronunciation [víška]; být (to be) – bít (beat, thrash), both pronounced [bi:t], etc. On the other hand, there hardly exist words with identical spelling and different pronunciation (like the English “lead“, “bow“, “wind“). The following survey presents the system of the Czech sounds (phonemes) and their relation to the written counterparts (letters, graphemes) – first vowels, then consonants. It is obvious that the exact acoustic realization of phonemes (“the correct pronunciation“) should be learnt in practice, by imitating native speakers. VOWELS Vokály (= Samohlásky) There are five vowels in Czech: i, e, a, o, u . Their mutual relations can be illustrated by means of the following triangle, based on the horizontal and vertical positions of the tongue in the oral cavity: high vysoké mid středové low nízké i f r o n t přední e central střední a o b a c k zadní u In the written form, there is also the letter y, but it doesn´t represent any special sound, its existence having historical reasons. It is always pronounced in the same way as the vowel i. E.g. the words syn hory byt slyšet myslet son mountains apartment to hear to think are pronounced [sin] [hori] [bit] [slišet] [mislet] www.factumcz.cz 9
Page 1 and 2: Karel Tahal: A Grammar of Czech as
Page 7: Karel Tahal: A Grammar of Czech as
Page 59 and 60:
Karel Tahal: A Grammar of Czech as
Page 61 and 62:
Page 63 and 64:
Page 65 and 66:
Page 67 and 68:
Page 69 and 70:
Page 71 and 72:
Page 73 and 74:
Page 75 and 76:
Page 77 and 78:
Page 79 and 80:
Page 81 and 82:
Page 83 and 84:
Page 85 and 86:
Page 87 and 88:
Page 89 and 90:
Page 91 and 92:
Page 93 and 94:
Page 95 and 96:
Page 97 and 98:
Page 99 and 100:
Page 101 and 102:
Page 103 and 104:
Page 105 and 106:
Page 107 and 108:
Page 109 and 110:
Page 111 and 112:
Page 113 and 114:
Page 115 and 116:
Page 117 and 118:
Page 119 and 120:
Page 121 and 122:
Page 123 and 124:
Page 125 and 126:
Page 127 and 128:
Page 129 and 130:
Page 131 and 132:
Page 133 and 134:
Page 135 and 136:
Page 137 and 138:
Page 139 and 140:
Page 141 and 142:
Page 143 and 144:
Page 145 and 146:
Page 147 and 148:
Page 149 and 150:
Page 151 and 152:
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
Page 169 and 170:
Page 171 and 172:
Page 173 and 174:
Page 175 and 176:
Page 177 and 178:
Page 179 and 180:
Page 181 and 182:
Page 183 and 184:
Page 185 and 186:
Page 187 and 188:
Page 189 and 190:
Page 191 and 192:
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
Page 197 and 198:
Page 199 and 200:
Page 201 and 202:
Page 203 and 204:
Page 205 and 206:
Page 207 and 208:
Page 209 and 210:
Page 211 and 212:
Page 213 and 214:
Page 215 and 216:
Page 217 and 218:
Page 219 and 220:
Page 221 and 222:
Page 223 and 224:
Page 225 and 226:
Page 227 and 228:
Page 229 and 230:
Page 231 and 232:
Page 233 and 234:
Page 235 and 236:
Page 237 and 238:
Page 239 and 240:
Page 241 and 242:
Page 243 and 244:
Page 245 and 246:
Page 247 and 248:
Page 249 and 250:
Page 251 and 252:
Page 253 and 254:
Page 255 and 256:
Page 257 and 258:
Page 259:
show all

A GRAMMAR OF CZECH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE Karel Tahal

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?