Bax von der Luisenstraße & others - Page 1

Luisenstraße- I have seen too many dogs that had their kennel name ends with & / or includes this B shaped letter. Can you please tell me the actual pronunciation of this letter? Some say it is pronounced as S, Is this right?

Thanks

Is written as double SS ,and pronounced like S..you can get it when you press down letter S in the iPhone or iPad ..there's a shortcut with a pc keyboard but can't remember

jdiaz1791- thanks a lot.

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The Greek Beta character is used to represent a special "double ess" sound in the German Language. The German name of the character is "esszet" and pronounced as "ess-tset" to an English speaker.
 
Just treat it as a special "ess" sound with a short and slight "hiss" during use and you will pronounce it correctly.

Best Regards,
Bob-O

....wow Keith, that link explains it all, nothing is ever as simple as we think it is....Bob-O check out what it says about the Greek letter reference.

Bob-O, Keith Grossman- thanks for your help.

Regards

Keith, that was a fairly good reference that you found. In my generation all children that I knew still learned the Fraktur alphabet as well as the Roman alphabet. The article could have gone a bit further. Fraktur developed during the transition from the Runic alphabet towards the Roman alphabet that was left behind by invading and occupying forces, and it is the basis for the handwriting style that most of my generation still use. If you can understand the Runic alphabet you can see the development of the "ess" character and understand how the double "ess" was formed into the esszet. Fraktur lent itself well for making all of the duplex consonants we once learned as children, but for many years now the letters are written separately in a more modern style so one has to remember the special sound from the combination. 

As with all established things, someone always has to stir the pot. The Germans have to continuously fight to keep the unique features of their language from being declared obsolete. A few years ago the esszet and the umlauted vowels were on the endangered species list and they all represent special sounds that are unique to the German language. I for one could not believe there was such a strong push to abolish them as I found it very hard to read documents that contained suggested replacements. I for one am glad that good sense ruled and the characters remain intact.

The application of esszet did change a few years ago, but that change is easy for me to remember and easy to apply - it actually made good sense! Evenso I am sure that I will misspell a word occassionally since I remember it written a certain way - but that's no big deal. I have lived stateside for so many years now, that my language skills are not so good anymore.

It is just a bit of historic trivia to know that during the dark days in Germany the use of Fraktur for printed materials was deemed not acceptable, so many people grew up without much relationship to it. I have noticed the handwriting of many of today's German children is virtually indistinguishable from that of most American and British children, so some tradition is slowly slipping away.

Tarekallam, there is one (1) more special sound in the word Straße - it's the "St" sound that should be pronounced as "Sht" so the pronuciation of that word should be "Shtrass-eh". That is where the duplex consonants of the past came in handy. Oh gee Bob-O; can you say enough already?  


Best Regards,
Bob-O

Thanks BOB-O more than welcome to say more.