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How To Speak Arabic - And Not Know It
by Linda Smolik Lesson One: Walk into Starbucks and say, “One café mocha with sugar.” Congratulations, you have successfully acquired an Arabic vocabulary of three words! ![]() So what didyou really say at Starbucks? To start off, it’s not surprising that such popularized foods as coffee, mocha, and sugar found their way to Europe through the Arabs. The three are native to hot climates, particularly the Mediterranean, the Persian Gulf, and Asia. During the 8th century, the Islamic conquest brought the Golden Age of Arab culture, when migrants from the Persian Gulf and North Africa expanded their empire to Al-Andalus (Andalusia) in Spain. Scholars, scientists, mathematicians, poets, architects, and merchants developed one of the greatest civilizations during an era when many European countries suffered the Dark Ages, an outpouring of disease, poverty, and lack of education. In Al-Andalus, the Arabs introduced agriculture and trade, which involved the importation of plants and spices from their own native lands. And we all can see that to this day, as Folgers and Maxwell House have made their mark with arabica coffee (that is, coffee from the Coffea arabica species). Legend has it that Muslim clerics would drink coffee all night in the ![]() Good work. Lesson Two. If you ever failed algebra, forgot your algorithms, or struggled in chemistry, you might blame it on ancient history instead of your highschool teacher. Al-jabr (algebra), al-khowarazimi (algorithm),and al-kimiya (achemy/chemistry) all originated from the Arab civilization in what is now modern-day Iraq. After the Islamic conquest of Persia in the 7th century, Baghdad became the capital of scholarship in the Near East. Merchants, scientists, and other intellects from as ![]() Whew. Enough math. Just lay back, relax. What's that you say? You'd like some chai with lemon and a magazine? Since when do you speak Arabic so well? Chai, as you might know, is the very word in Arabic for "tea", also called atay in some dialects. Lemon comes from the Arabic laimun, still present in the modern vocabulary. Magazine originates from makhazin, meaning "storehouse", one of the many Arabic words that has also maintained itself in the French language, as magasin, or "shop". An English magazine is a storehouse of information or, in the case of firearms, it is a storehouse of ammunition. Many of the common English words with Arabic roots begin with the prefix al, the only definite article in Arabic, also adopted into the Spanish language. For example, almanac comes from ![]() So taking the al concept into consideration: “I al-ways eat fettuccini al-fredo with Al-bert. Did I al-ready tell you that we al-most went to Al-buqerque?” Wait—that doesn’t work. But if you want to talk crime, look no further. Let’s take the sentence, “He’s an assassin in Alcatraz.” What you really said in Arabic is, “He’s a hashish-eater in the pelican.” Perhaps if you were a hashish-eater you’d find yourself talking like that. The word assassin comes from hashishin, a name used to denote a certain branch of the Nizari sect of Ismaili Muslims. Although hashishin means "hashish-eater", they were very abstemious and it is unlikely that they ever used drugs. In fact, they called themselves assassiyun ("[those who are] faithful to the foundation"), and it is thought this word was deliberately mangled by detractors of the sect, pronouncing it as hashishin. |
The word alcatraz comes from the Spanish and Portugese word for "pelican", which derives from the Arabic al-qadus, referring to the bucket of a water-raising irrigation wheel. The bird was so named because it was thought to scoop water into its beak pouch to transport to its young in the desert. This word was later mistakenly applied to the Frigate-bird in the form albatross, not to be confused with albacore, another offspring of Arabic. The Portugese albacor comes from al-bukr, meaning, oddly enough, a young camel. Might want to check the ingredients in your tuna sandwich! That being said, let’s go to Lesson Three.
Next time you go to the county fair, try asking for qutn qandah and sharbah. Etymology, ah, how sweet it is! The two English words cotton and candy come directly from the similar Arabic equivalents (qandah was borrowed by the Arabs from Persian qand "sugar"). Sharbah, meaning "to drink", later entered the English language as sherbet, sorbet, and syrup. Between Starbucks, Budweiser, Chicken of the Sea, and the local candy shop, you could make a whole meal out of foreign language practice. If you do find yourself in the Middle East, you’ll see that the game of sheikhs is popular. Have ![]() Lastly, a little vacation advice. Perhaps you lust to see a zarafah, or giraffe, and go on a safari — from the word safar, ‘journey’ (coming to English via Swahili) or simply wish to trek in the Sahara, actually just the Arabic word for "desert". Be sure not to call your tour guide a “nice fellah,” unless he’s taking you for a ride on his tractor. Fellah means ‘farmer’ or ‘peasant’ in Arabic and derives from falaha "to till the soil" (but it is not related to English fellow, which is sometimes pronounced "fella"). At least in knowing our languages aren’t too different, we and our Arab neighbors can feel a little closer to one another. So let’s get together and sip a Kooka Koola, Coca Cola, or whatever your tongue might dictate. Some pleasures are simply universal. |
The voice organ can be regarded as a wind instrument consisting of an air pressure supply driving an oscillator, the output signal of which is fed into a resonator from which the sound is radiated to the air outside the instrument.
![]() In singing, the air pressure is much more carefully regulated than in normal speech, by a skilled control of the inspiratory and expiratory muscles. The air pressure provided by the respiratory system in singing varies with pitch and vocal effort, generally between 5 and 40 cm of water. The resulting air flow depends also on the glottal conditions. Air flow rates of 0.1–0.3 litres per second have been observed in singers. These air pressure and air flow ranges do not appear to deviate appreciably from values observed in untrained speakers. |
Voiced sounds.
The vocal folds originate at the angle of the thyroid cartilage, course horizontally backwards and are inserted into each of the arytenoid cartilages. By adduction (i.e. drawing these cartilages towards each other), the slit between the folds, called the ‘glottis’, is narrowed, and an airstream can set the folds into vibration. A vibration cycle can be described as follows. When the glottis is slightly open an airstream from the lungs can pass through it. This airstream throws the vocal folds apart and at the same time generates a negative pressure along the edges of the folds. The sucking effect of this negative pressure along with the elasticity and other mechanical properties of the folds closes the glottis again. Then the air pressure difference across the glottis throws the folds apart, thus starting the next vibratory cycle. The frequency of a vibration is determined by the transglottal air pressure difference and the mechanical properties of the folds. A high pressure difference or tense and thin vocal folds, or both, give a high vibration frequency; converse states give a low frequency. The mechanical properties of the folds are regulated by a series of muscles that vary the length and stiffness of the folds by manipulating the positions of the laryngeal cartilages. Thus these muscles are used to regulate the vibration frequency. As the vibration frequency determines the pitch perceived, these muscles are often referred to as the ‘pitch regulating muscles’. An increase of the subglottal pressure raises the amplitude of the sound produced and also increases the vibration frequency, raising the pitch. Thus, in order to perform a crescendo at a constant pitch a singer has to raise the subglottal pressure and simultaneously compensate for the pitch increase by adjusting the pitch-regulating muscles. By vibrating, the vocal folds repeatedly interrupt the airstream from the respiratory system. Thus they act as a valve oscillating between open and closed positions: the result is a chopped airstream corresponding to a complex sound, the fundamental frequency of which is equal to the vibration frequency of the folds. The glottis is schematically shown as a function of time in ![]() The horizontal portion of the curve corresponds to the closed phase of the glottal vibration cycle, and the triangular portion is the open phase. As the air flow generally increases more slowly than it decreases, the triangular part of the curve is asymmetrical in the figure. In trained voices the glottal closure is often observed to be more efficient than in untrained voices. Also, the vibration pattern appears to vary considerably less with pitch and vocal intensity in trained voices than in untrained ones (see Sundberg, Andersson and Hultqvist, 1999). The sound generated by the chopped transglottal airstream is built up by a great number of harmonic partials whose amplitudes generally decrease monotonically with frequency, roughly by 12 dB per octave at neutral loudness. It is noteworthy that this holds as an approximation for all voiced sounds. Partials of measurable amplitude in the source spectrum are generally found up to 4–6 kHz. This means that a tone with a fundamental frequency of 100 Hz may contain between 40 and 60 partials of appreciable amplitude. However, the amplitudes of the source spectrum partials vary with pitch and vocal intensity (see Sundberg, Andersson and Hultqvist, 1999). Voiceless sounds. The sound source in this case is noise generated by a turbulent airstream. The narrow slit required for the noise generation can be formed at various places along the vocal tract, the lowest position being at the glottis itself, which can be kept wide enough to prevent the folds from vibrating and narrow enough to make the airstream turbulent. This is the oscillator used in the ‘h’ sound. Another place used in some languages is the velar region, which can be constricted by the tongue hump. The resulting sound is used as the voice source in the German ‘ach’ sound. In most remaining unvoiced sounds the tongue tip constricts the vocal tract in the palatal, alveolar or dental regions as in the initial phonemes of ‘sheep’, ‘cheap’ and ‘sip’. In the ‘f’ sound the upper incisors and the lower lip provide the slit. |
Resonator.
The frequencies of the formants are determined by the shape of the resonator. In the case of non-nasalized sounds the resonator consists of the pharynx and mouth cavities. In vowels these cavities constitute a tube resonator which may be regarded as closed at the glottal end and open at the lip end. The average vocal tract length for males is generally considered to be 17·5 cm. A tube of that length and having a uniform cross-sectional area would display a series of resonances falling close to the odd multiples of 500 Hz. However, as the cross-sectional area of the vocal tract is not constant, the formants deviate from these frequencies. The vocal tract shape is determined by the positions of the articulators (i.e. the lips, the jaw, the tongue, the velum and the larynx). The positions of these articulators are continuously varied in singing and in speech, so that the formants are tuned to various target frequencies. Thus each vowel sound corresponds to a certain pattern of articulator positions. The dependence of the formant frequencies on the articulatory configuration is rather complex. Only a few factors have the same type of effect on all formant frequencies; for instance, all formants drop in frequency more or less when the vocal tract length is increased, by protrusion of the lips or lowering of the larynx or both, and when the lip opening area is decreased. Moreover, certain formants are more dependent on the position of a specific articulator than are others. The first formant frequency is particularly sensitive to the jaw opening: the wider the jaw opening, the higher the first formant frequency. The second and third formant frequencies are especially sensitive to the position of the tongue body and tongue tip respectively. The highest frequencies of the second formant (2–3 kHz) are obtained when the tongue body constricts the vocal tract in the palatal region, as in the vowel of ‘keep’. The lowest values of the third formant (around 1500 Hz) are associated with a tongue tip lifted in a retroflex direction. ![]() provides examples of articulatory configurations associated with some vowels. These guidelines apply to oral sounds; in nasalized sounds the dependence of the formants on the articulator positioning becomes considerably more complex. The nasal tract introduces minima in the sound transfer of the vocal tract resonator. The acoustical effect of nasalization varies between vowels, but a general feature is that the lowest partials are emphasized. For both oral and nasalized sounds the two lowest formant frequencies are generally decisive in the vowel quality perceived. Frequencies typical of male speakers are given in fig.56. Females have shorter vocal tracts and therefore higher formant frequencies. On average for vowels, the three lowest formant frequencies of female voices are 12, 17 and 18% higher, respectively, than those of male voices. Children, having still shorter vocal tracts, possess formant frequencies that are 35–40% higher than those of males (see Fant, 1973). The amplitudes of the partials emitted from the lip opening depend on the sound transfer ability of the vocal tract. This ability depends not only on the partials’ frequency distance from the closest formant, but also on the frequency distance between formants. Thus a halving of the frequency distance between two formants increases the sound transfer ability by 6 dB at the formant frequencies and by 12 dB midway between the formant frequencies, other things being equal. Another factor important to the amplitudes of the radiated partials is the sound radiation properties of the lip opening, which boosts the entire spectrum envelope by 6 dB per octave. For this reason, the amplitudes of all spectrum partials tend to increase with the pitch even when there is no change in vocal effort. |
Breathing.
The demands on the breathing apparatus differ significantly between speech and singing. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, phrases in neutral speech are generally short, typically using no more than 15–20% of lung capacity. In singing, on the other hand, phrases tend to be considerably longer, using twice as much and occasionally nearly 100% of lung capacity. As the recoil forces of the respiratory apparatus vary with lung volume, a singer needs to supply different degrees of respiratory muscle force depending on lung volume. Secondly, the mean over-pressure of air in the lungs, which controls the loudness of phonation, is basically constant in neutral speech, although it is raised for emphasized syllables. In singing, as higher pitches require higher pressures, this air pressure needs to be varied with pitch. As lung pressure affects pitch, failures to reach target pressures result in singing off the pitch. Singers generally use the diaphragm muscle for inhalation, which is reflected in an expansion of the abdominal wall. However, the strategy used for achieving the necessary control of the respiratory apparatus differs between singers. Some contract the abdominal wall, thus raising the level of the diaphragm in the trunk before phonation, while others keep the abdominal wall expanded and thus the diaphragm low in the trunk at the initiation of a phrase. Some even contract both abdominal wall muscles and diaphragm during singing. It is frequently assumed that these different strategies affect the function of the vocal folds and hence the voice timbre (see Thomasson and Sundberg, 1997). Vibrato. One of the typical peculiarities of opera and concert singing is vibrato. In Western operatic singing its acoustical correlate is an undulation of the frequencies and amplitudes of the partials. The undulation is almost sinusoidal and has a rate of about 5–7 Hz in good voices. The rate is generally constant within a singer, although it tends to slow down with advanced age. The magnitude of the frequency excursions is of the order of ±70 cents, but greater variation occurs for expressive purposes and at advanced age. Vibrato tends to increase in regularity as voice training proceeds successfully. The frequency and amplitude undulations are synchronous but not necessarily in phase, depending on the frequency distance between the strongest spectrum partial and the nearest formant. If the strongest partial is slightly below the strongest formant, an increase in frequency will cause the amplitude to increase, so that frequency and overall amplitude will vary in phase. The opposite occurs if the partial is slightly higher than the frequency of the strongest formant. The physiological origin of vibrato is not well understood. EMG (electromyographic) measurements in laryngeal muscles have revealed rhythmical contractions, synchronous with the vibrato undulations, of the pitch-raising cricothyroid muscle. This suggests that the laryngeal muscles produce the vibrato. The neural origin of these rhythmical contractions is unknown. Possibly as a consequence of this, the transglottal air flow varies with the frequency variations, and the resulting vibrato notes tend to consume more air than vibrato-free notes (see Large and Iwata, 1971). In popular singing subglottal pressure seems to be the vibrato-generating mechanism. In some singers the variations in the muscle activity affect the larynx height and even other parts of the voice organ. Pitch seems to be perceived with comparable accuracy regardless of the presence of vibrato for a single note. The perceived pitch agrees within a few cents with the pitch of a vibrato-free note with a fundamental frequency equal to the average frequency of the vibrato note. Register. The term ‘register’ is used for groups of adjacent notes that sound similarly and are felt to be produced in a similar way. However, there are a great number of conflicting terms and definitions in common use. In untrained voices in particular a change from one register to another may be accompanied not only by a marked shift in tone quality but also by a ‘register break’, a sudden jump in pitch. In both male and female adults register shifts typically occur in the range of approximately 300–450 Hz. The register above this shift is mostly referred to as ‘falsetto’ in male voices and ‘middle register’ in female voices, while the register below the shift is known as ‘chest register’ or ‘modal register’. A further shift occurs below 100 Hz; this register is called ‘vocal fry’. Registers are associated with certain vocal fold configurations. Thus, in chest/modal register the folds are thick while in falsetto they are thinner. Acoustically, the lowest spectrum partial, other things being equal, has been found to be more dominating in falsetto than in chest/modal register. Also, the ‘heavy’ register in male and female voices has been reported typically to contain stronger high partials than the ‘light’ register. The physiological origin of register is confined to the voice source. According to some experts, a difference between the falsetto and the normal voice in males is that the vocal folds never reach full contact with each other during the vibration cycle in falsetto. Transitions between registers have been found to be accompanied by changes in the EMG signals from laryngeal muscles, and by changes in transglottal air flow. There is reasonable agreement on the importance of the laryngeal muscles to registers, though it has been suggested that a purely acoustical interaction between the glottal oscillator and the resonator is a contributory factor. |
Singer’s formant.
The ‘singer’s formant’ is a peak in the spectrum envelope typically appearing near 3 kHz in all voiced sounds as sung by Western operatic singers except sopranos. It corresponds acoustically to a high spectrum envelope peak which is present in all vowels and generally centred at a frequency of 2500–3500 Hz. In vocal pedagogy it is often referred to as ‘singing in the mask’, ‘focussing’ etc. Mainly a resonatory phenomenon, the singer’s formant is achieved by clustering formants 3, 4 and 5 into a rather narrow frequency band. This seems to explain why sopranos lack a singer’s formant: they mostly sing at high fundamental frequencies, i.e. the frequency distance between adjacent partials is typically quite wide, equalling the frequency of the fundamental. This means that a partial would fall into the frequency band of the formant cluster producing the singer’s formant only for certain pitches, causing a salient timbre difference between different pitches. If the pharynx is wide enough, the larynx tube can act as a separate resonator, the resonance frequency of which is rather independent of the rest of the vocal tract; it may be tuned to a frequency lying between those of the third and fourth formants in normal speech. The condition of a widening of the pharynx seems to be met when the larynx is lowered, a gesture occurring typically in male professional Western operatic singing. At high pitches the demands on a wide pharynx are increased, and extreme lowering of the larynx is frequently observed when males sing high-pitched notes. In such cases the term ‘covering’ is sometimes used. The widening of the pharynx and the lowering of the larynx affect the frequencies not only of the higher formants, but also those of the lower formants. As an acoustical consequence of such articulatory modifications, the frequency of the second formant drops in front vowels. This alters the vowel quality to some extent, so that, for instance, the vowel in ‘sheep’ is ‘coloured’ towards the German ‘ü’ sound. The perceptual function of the ‘singer’s formant’ seems to be to make the voice easier to hear above a loud orchestral accompaniment. It has also been suggested that it helps the singer to be more audible in large auditoriums. High-pitched singing. Vowel quality is associated with specific combinations of the two lowest formant frequencies, and these frequencies are maintained regardless of the fundamental frequency. Normally the fundamental frequency is lower than the frequency of the first formant, which varies between about 250 Hz (close to c') and 1000 Hz, depending on the vowel. When the fundamental frequency is higher than the normal frequency value of the first formant, singers tend to increase the latter so that it remains higher in frequency than the fundamental. This partial is the strongest in the source spectrum, and, if it coincides with the first formant frequency, its amplitude will be maximized without raising extreme demands on vocal effort. The degrees of tongue constriction and, in particular, of jaw opening represent important articulatory tools for achieving the necessary increases of the first formant frequency. Though this increase affects vowel quality, this disadvantage is limited since in high-pitched singing the vowel quality cannot be maintained even with correct formant frequencies owing to the great frequency distance between the partials as compared with the number of formants (see Sundberg and Skoog, 1997). Voice categories. Male and female voices tend to differ significantly with regard to their formant frequencies as well as pitch range, and this factor seems also to be significant in differentiating tenors, baritones and basses. Thus when singing the same pitch, voices of these types can be distinguished by their vowel formant frequencies. In most vowels a bass is likely to show the lowest formant frequencies and a tenor the highest; and all formants, not only the two lowest, are relevant. The formant frequency differences between male and female voices resemble closely those observed between bass and tenor voices, which suggests that the dimensions of the resonating system are of major importance. In addition, the centre frequency of the singer’s formant seems to be typically higher in voices with a high pitch range than in voices with a lower pitch range. Thus, centre frequencies at about 2400 and 3000 Hz tend to give a bass-baritone-like and a tenor-like voice quality respectively. Overtone singing. In some Inner Asian cultures the voice is used in a rather special manner, in that the tones produced are perceived as possessing two different pitches. This can be explained as follows. If the frequency of a formant coincides with that of a partial, this partial is likely to be much stronger than the adjacent spectrum partials, other things being equal. If two formants are tuned to the near vicinity of a partial, the effect can be greatly enhanced, so that the partial is perceived as a second pitch of the tone along with the fundamental. This strategy of tuning two formants to a partial is applied in overtone singing. The second and third formants (sometimes the first and second) are tuned to closely spaced frequencies, thus enhancing a specific partial. The fundamental frequency is either low, <100 Hz, produced with a growl or vocal fry quality, or is higher, often with a pressed quality. By these means the amplitude of the fundamental is reduced, and hence the dominance of the amplified overtone is enhanced. In tuning formants the lip opening, the position and elevation of the tongue tip and, in some cases, nasalization seem to play important roles. |
Rob says:
S-dawg be sizzin up da sluuttsss stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: well, yes and no. stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: Rob, you have to realize that I'm growing up. stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: I can't just.. you knwo, fuck da bitches all day. Rob says: what about the night time? Can you during the night? stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: ...That can be arranged. stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: I just.. have to be up for wor-... you know what> Bitch me. stephen- Who Wants A Dose Of The Clap? says: I want a slut. |
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James Blonde has been wearing long johns for 3 weeks, it feels cozy.
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How about using bus or train, asks James Blonde.
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James Blonde hopes you carry weights while walking.
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