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Lesson Transcript

Sherah: Hebrew Pronunciation Season 1 Lesson 1 - Are You Practicing for an Opera or Learning Your Hebrew Vowels?
Amir: Shalom, hello everyone. Bruchim habaim.
Sherah: Sherah here. Pronunciation series lesson 1 on Hebrew vowels. Hello and welcome to the first Pronunciation lesson at HebrewPod101.com, where we study modern Hebrew in a fun and educational way.
Amir: So brush up on the Hebrew that you started learning a long ago or start learning Hebrew today.
Sherah: Thanks for being here with us. In this lesson, our focus will be the pronunciation of Hebrew vowels.
Amir: -a, -e, -i, -o, and -u
Sherah: Sounds very familiar, doesn’t it?
Amir: Well, actually, the vowel sounds in Hebrew aren’t that different from English vowels.
Sherah: That’s absolutely true.
Amir: The biggest difference is that they aren’t actual letters.
Sherah: That takes some getting used to, for sure.
Amir: Yep! The Hebrew alphabet is made up of only consonants. In the beginning, there wasn’t even notation for vowels. They were the vowel sounds, of course, but they just weren’t written.
Sherah: That would be pretty weird if there weren’t even vowel sounds. Shalom would be “shlm.”
Amir: For sure. So eventually, it did become a problem that the vowels weren’t notated, and then they decided to add vowel sounds around the letters, so that there would be no doubt what the vowels were.
Sherah: These vowel sounds are mostly below the letters, but there is one that appears on the top left-hand side of the letter. That’s the -u sound.
Amir: Although we’re going over the vowels in this lesson and we’ll explain what the main vowels look like, you have to remember that you won’t see the vowel signs in most written Hebrew.
Sherah: Right. Once you get to know the basic vowel patterns, you won’t need the vowel symbols either.
Amir: Don’t worry about learning the names of the vowels for now. If you plan to become a Hebrew professor one day, you might need them, but for now, just worry about which symbols correspond to which sound.
Sherah: I totally agree with that. You know, I didn’t even know the names of the vowels until I started preparing for this lesson.
Amir: Wow! And you’d been speaking Hebrew for over 10 years now.
Sherah: Yeah! Impressive, isn’t it? So now, it’s time to help you pronounce the vowel sounds properly in Hebrew.
Amir: First of all, pronouncing Hebrew is only difficult if you refuse to open your mouth.
Sherah: Yeah, that’s something that you might wanna keep in mind.
Amir: You must open you mouth and explore the sounds that come out with a different vowel consonant combinations.
Sherah: By the way, how many vowel sounds are there in Hebrew?
Amir: There are 15 different symbol combinations.
Sherah: Ouch!
Amir: I know it sounds like a lot, but really, these symbols only represent 5 different basic vowel sounds.
Sherah: So why have 15 different symbols?
Amir: Well, that’s because in classical Hebrew, the different vowels did actually have different sounds and different length. However, over the centuries, the pronunciation shifted to what they are today.
Sherah: Were there a lot of similarities between English and Hebrew vowels?
Amir: Definitely! Fortunately for us, there aren’t any vowel sounds that will be unfamiliar to English speakers.
Sherah: Okay, well, that can be helpful. Let’s start.
Amir: Okay. For now, we’ll group them into the same-type vowels and describe what the most used vowels look like. And in later lessons, we’ll go more into detail. A-type vowels which are a sound pronounced /a/; E-type vowels, /e/; I-type vowels, /i/; O-type vowels, /o/; and U-type vowels, /u/. Okay, get ready to pronounce.
Sherah: The first sound is easy. Just open your mouth like you’re at a doctor and say “ah.”
Amir: Ah.
Sherah: These vowels are recognized by their lines under the letter. One is a straight horizontal line, the second is like a small “t” and the last is a small horizontal line with two dots next to it.
Amir: Now that you’re picturing these vowels, I’m gonna say a series of words and I will leave a pause after each word.
Sherah: Your job is to repeat each word after Amir.
Amir: I’ll go through the words with each vowel so you can practice. We’ll begin with the A-type vowels. Ready? Go! Adam.
Sherah: Which is “man.”
Amir: ַba'al
Sherah: Which is “husband” or “owner.” It’s actually pretty funny that this word means both these things. Well, once upon a time, wives were more like property than a partner.
Amir: That’s true. How about one that has all three A-type vowels in it? ahavah.
Sherah: That’s a great one to know. It means “love.” You’ll notice that even though that word has all three A-type vowels. They all sound the same.
Amir: Okay. Now, for the sound -e. Mouth open everyone and with me, -e.
Sherah: It’s basically the same here. Open, relax mouth, and pronounce -e as you would pronounce elephant, -e.
Amir: -e
Sherah: These vowels are made up of dots. The first is three dots in the shape of an upside down triangle and the second is two dots and a horizontal line under the letter.
Amir: So let’s get to our examples. We’ll start with “earth” - eretz.
Sherah: That’s easy, eretz.
Amir: Another word is hem.
Sherah: This means “they.”
Amir: Next stop, we have the sounds for the I-type vowels.
Sherah: We pronounce this vowel like a “ee” in English, -i.
Amir: That’s right. The vowel is simple. It’s just one dot under the letter it follows.
Sherah: There’s only one symbol for it.
Amir: Okay. Again, you’ll repeat after me and I will leave a silence after each word. Let’s go. Im
Sherah: Which is “with.”
Amir: Ish
Sherah: Which is “man.” I think we get the idea, so let’s move on to -o.
Amir: Form your mouth like you’re making an “O” sound.
Sherah: -o
Amir: -o
Sherah: The -o vowels are represented by a single dot on the top left hand side of the letter they follow. Another version is with the letter vav (וֹ) which usually represents the sound /v/. To represent the vowel -o, it has a single dot at the top.
Amir: Here are some words to repeat after me again, lo.
Sherah: Which is “no.”
Amir: yom
Sherah: Which is “day.”
Amir: Next we have -u.
Sherah: It’s like a “oo” in English.
Amir: -u
Sherah: The -u vowels are represented by either three dots formed in a diagonal line under the letter or the letter vav (וּ), with a single dot on the left side.
Amir: Right, so let’s try this word, kulam.
Sherah: That means “everyone.” I’ve always thought that was a pretty cool word.
Amir: sus
Sherah: “horse”
Amir: So these are the basic sounds of the vowels in Hebrew.
Sherah: Yes. As we mentioned earlier, there is more than one way of writing these sounds.
Amir: This is because the different vowels actually did have different sounds originally.
Sherah: Take a look at the lesson write up to see what these vowels look like. And again, don’t stress about learning their names yet.
Amir: If you haven’t used them in over 10 years, I’m sure they won’t either.
Sherah: Yeah. Well, that just about does it for this lesson, but before we go, we wanna tell you about a way to drastically improve your pronunciation.
Amir: The voice recording tool.
Sherah: Yes. the voice recording tool in the Premium Learning Center.
Amir: Record your voice with a click of a button.
Sherah: And then play it back just as easily.
Amir: So you record your voice and then listen to it.
Sherah: Compare it to the native speakers.
Amir: And adjust your pronunciation.
Sherah: This will help you improve your pronunciation quickly. Thanks for listening!
Amir: Shalom! Lehitraot.
Sherah: Bye!

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