Treatment of Foreign Sounds
Because Russian borrows terms from other languages, there are various conventions in dealing with sounds not present in Russian. For example, while Russian has no, there are a number of common words (particularly proper nouns) borrowed from languages like English and German that contain such a sound in the original language. In well-established terms, such as галлюцинация ('hallucination'), this is written with ⟨г⟩ and pronounced with /g/ while newer terms use ⟨х⟩, pronounced with /x/, such as хобби ('hobby').
Similarly, words originally with in their source language are either pronounced with /t(ʲ)/), as in the name Тельма ('Thelma') or, if borrowed early enough, with /f(ʲ)/ or /v(ʲ)/, as in the names Фёдор ('Theodore') and Матве́й ('Matthew').
There are also certain tendencies in borrowed words. For example, in loanwords from French and German, palatal and velar consonants tend to be soft before /u/ so that, for example, Küchelbecker becomes Кюхельбе́кер .
Read more about this topic: Russian Alphabet
Famous quotes containing the words treatment of, treatment, foreign and/or sounds:
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—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“A regular council was held with the Indians, who had come in on their ponies, and speeches were made on both sides through an interpreter, quite in the described mode,—the Indians, as usual, having the advantage in point of truth and earnestness, and therefore of eloquence. The most prominent chief was named Little Crow. They were quite dissatisfied with the white man’s treatment of them, and probably have reason to be so.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“For my name and memory I leave it to men’s charitable speeches, and to foreign nations, and the next ages.”
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626)
“I that so long
Was Nothing from Eternity,
Did little think such Joys as Ear and Tongue
To celebrate or see:
Such Sounds to hear, such Hands to feel, such Feet,
Such Eyes and Objects, on the Ground to meet.”
—Thomas Traherne (1636–1674)