0

French word 'possible' -> [pɔsibl]. The IPA is written this way but all the audio examples I've heard use the regular IPA /o/ rather than /ɔ/. Anyone know why that is? I'm coming from an English background.

French audio for 'possible' [pɔsibl]

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Fr-possible.ogg

/o/ sound

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Close-mid_back_rounded_vowel.ogg

example in french that uses same phoneme

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Fr-R%C3%A9seau-fr-Paris.ogg

Then you have

/ɔ/ sound (used in the ipa spelling for possible but not pronunciation as far as i can tell)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/PR-open-mid_back_rounded_vowel.ogg

example in french that uses same phoneme

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d9/Fr-sort.ogg

Maybe my ears are not hearing the difference. I want to apologize I am new to this, I may be misusing [] and // and terminology.

Improve this question

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
0

Your question is of the same nature as this one and the answer too, I believe: Pronunciation of “au” in restaurant . Briefly, there is a main stream pronunciation (ɔ) and a variant (o); I think that the first clip is not [ɔ] but instead that it is [o]. Personally, I use for "possible" the o pronunciation you can hear in this first audio clip and it seems I never hear the 'would be' main stream one.

Improve this answer
2
  • Thank you for the link. Correct, the 'possible' clip is [o]. Yes, that would be strange that the [ɔ] is considered mainstream but you wouldn't have encountered it. So basically, neither is wrong?
    – aatroxed
    Commented Jan 13, 2020 at 21:46
  • @aatroxed No, they are close enough not to communicate to the listener anything else than a regional colour. This is tipycal of many words: For instance I use mainstream for "rose" which is [o] but when I hear the word pronounced with [ɔ] I j know it's just an alternative. It's just as for English "talk","walk", etc.; as you probably know in RP the pronunciation is normally like "warm" but you can hear a lot of pronunciations like "watch".
    – LPH
    Commented Jan 13, 2020 at 22:03
1

This O can be and is pronounced one way or another (and all shades of O in between) without any risk of misunderstanding.

Improve this answer

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.