I can't trill my R's--or can I?

Factual Questions
1

I’ve studied Spanish in the past and developed pretty good pronunciation.

Except for RR, the trilled R. I am able to fudge it a little, but I can never do an extended trill as most people are able to do.

As a kid, my mom’s Spanish-speaking friend tried to teach me, but I couldn’t. For the last 10 years or so, I’ve tried off and on. Only once was I able to get a real trill, but it was very short. I don’t attribute this inability to being poor at languages, as I have mastered Japanese and have excellent pronunciation. I have also found Chinese to be little problem. It’s just this one darn sound.

My questions are:

  1. Are some people, including native Spanish speakers, simply unable to make this sound?

  2. If the answer to #1 is yes, how do they cope with that? Is it considered a speech impediment that sometimes can’t be overcome?

  3. If the answer to #1 is no (no one is organically incapable of it who starts early enough, i.e., natives), then could I have passed the window where I could possibly learn how to pronounce the sound? That is could I have started too late, and that’s too bad?

  4. If it is certain that I could learn the sound with the right speech therapy, please give me some hints as to how to do it.

I am thinking about getting into Spanish again, and I want to be perfect–thanks!

2

I’m not Spanish. I’m unable to say R, let alone RR. It’s very embarasing :frowning:

3

You might try this thread as a source. Apparently practice is your friend.

4

I should add what seemed to work best for me when I was living in Germany and learning the finer points of that language. In order to put my tongue in the correct position, I’d place an “H” in front of the “R” when pronouncing things. It doesn’t actually produce a trill, but it does put the tongue where it needs to be and causes that slight exhale which the trill requires, and seemed to work for me.

Hremember to practice hrolling often.

5

This same subject came up at my house a couple of days ago. I was talking to my seven year old about rolling Rs in Spanish, and I made the extended rolling-R sound. I also invited my wife to join in, and she said that she can’t do it. I was flabbergasted. Can’t do it? What on earth do you mean? I said it would be like someone saying they couldn’t make the sound of a T, or an N. You just have to put your tongue in the right place and do it. For some female-related reason, at this point my wife refused to even try.

If you can’t make the rolling R sound, how did you make the sound of a running motor as a kid? It’s the same thing.

6

CurtC I hope your wife made you suffer for that meanness :wink:
I can’t roll my R’s either, and it is partially because I form my R sound differently in the mouth than is usual. I don’t drop my R’s but I do form them more similarly to the W mouthing but with a growl and differing lip motion to make them sound like R. (if any SF dopefesters want to contend that I do drop my R’s please do). It is I believe more normal to make the R sound with mouthing simmilar to the L sound. I can make an approximate R with the L mouthing, but it sounds somewhat slurred to my ears. I have heard that the rolling R requires the L type mouthing with a somewhat loose tip of the tongue to create the trilling.

When I was young all my cars growled with a back of the throat grrrr of low gear ferocity :slight_smile:

7

I learned the “flap R” (that’s what many linguistics specialists call it) as a child. It was my emulation of my cats purring. I’ve never met a cat that wasn’t fascinated by my “purr”. AAMOF, I’ve been able to make friends - well, acquaintance is the most you can get from a significant percentage of cats, of course - :stuck_out_tongue: but I’ve often been able to calm frightened, angry, or hostile cats with it. And kittens usually melt right down. :wink:

When I am making it,

  1. My mouth is open a little bit

  2. (imagine one of those cross-section diagrams of a human head that are most often found in speech therapy texts, or just try to imagine what it would look like) My tongue is (vertically) positioned approximately midway between my teeth and my palate, a little bit back (behind) my teeth

  3. I start with an exhalation (IMO, DMC’s suggestion to start with an “h” sound is a very good idea, but you don’t want to get in the habit of it).

  4. Next I let the TIP of my tongue vibrate in the airstream; that’s it. But … you want to stop with the tongue tip touching the palate.

Good luck! Practice - lots of it - is indeed the key.

My problem speaking Spanish is that I usually let it “roll” (trill) too much. :smack:

8

Some ‘dialects’ do not always trill the double or initial ‘r’. Many Puerto Ricans pronounce the erre with the sound that an ‘r’ has in many French dialects - which is almost like the ‘hr’ or even ‘h’ sound. A Puerto Rican single ‘r’ sometimes sounds almost like an very brief ‘l’ to other Spanish speakers. (vivir sounds much like vivil’ with the ‘l’ stopped immediately after it is sounded- but civil will still have a more definite full ‘l’ sound).

This really may be particular to one location or group within Puerto Rico, and not a feature of Puerto Rican Spanish as a whole.

Also I once had a Peruvian Spanish teacher who was unable to make that sound, whether it was his dialect or a personal ‘impediment’, I’m not sure. In some areas, the indigenous languages impact pronuncation and grammar.

9

The American tourist in an ancient joke told a Scottish waitress, “You certainly do roll your 'r’s.”

She blushed and said, “Why, thank you, sir. You should see me in high heels.” :wink: