English "r" and small children

Someone   Sunday, February 06, 2005, 20:54 GMT
Has anyone noticed that little kids can't seem to pronounce the English "r" right? For example, they might say "doe" instead of "door". At least that's what my little brother used to say when he was at a pre-school age.
Tom K.   Sunday, February 06, 2005, 21:12 GMT
Yeah, that's a difficult letter to learn. Children do take a while to figure it out, and if you've ever heard a chorus of pre-schoolers singing songs you know what I mean. This is probably why adult learners of English hardly ever get it right, because it's so different from other sounds.
Ed   Sunday, February 06, 2005, 21:22 GMT
<<kids can't seem to pronounce >>

Don't seem... ;-)
Fredrik from Norway   Sunday, February 06, 2005, 22:05 GMT
The uvular -r (French -r) is much easier to pronounce. And the story goes: The uvular -r was created when a French king was unable to pronounce the tongue -r, which was used in France then, too. And the servile courtiers copied his uvular -r and it spread like a fashion all up to western Norway!
Kirk   Sunday, February 06, 2005, 23:16 GMT
Ed, "can't seem" is fine the way Someone used it. At least to my native speaker intuition it sounds perfectly normal.
Damian   Monday, February 07, 2005, 00:18 GMT
Ok...Kids and the letter "R"....

If any of you wead any of the "Jutht William" thtowies by Wichmal Cwompton then you will wemember that the thpoilt wee kid Violet Elithabeth had tewwwible twouble with her "Rs"...they all came out like a "w". She wath alwayth wowing with William and she weally annoyed him tho much that he twied to avoid her at evewy opportunity he could, but she perthithted in her endeavourth to make hith life ath mithewable as she could. In addition, ath you can thee, she had a lithp, tho that made matterth much worth for herthelf. The thtorieth don't go further than their childhood tho we don't know whether she cawwied her thpeech impediment into adulthood.

Actually, it is not confined to kids.....some people have this problem throughout their lives. A good example is the TV personality Jonathan Ross. He weally does pronounce his "Rs" as a "W" still. I don't think he lisps though.
Easterner   Monday, February 07, 2005, 00:40 GMT
This is not confined to the English "r", it is the same for Hungarian too, our strongly rolled "r"-s are pronounced by most children up to about the age of three or four as a /y/ sound. Seems like you have to train your tongue to produce that particular sound, regardless of whether it is rolled or produced with a tap of the tongue against the palate.
Ed   Monday, February 07, 2005, 01:07 GMT
<<Ed, "can't seem" is fine the way Someone used it. At least to my native speaker intuition it sounds perfectly normal.>>

Hmm, to me it just doesn't make sense.
Tiffany   Monday, February 07, 2005, 01:23 GMT
Ed, sounds fine to me as well.

Another person who cannot pronounce their R's: Barbara Walters. We call it a lisp.
Ed   Monday, February 07, 2005, 01:37 GMT
Tiffany, are you sure that's what the lisp is? I think it's when people say "th" instead of "s". Like, thound instead of sound.
Tiffany   Monday, February 07, 2005, 01:46 GMT
The strange thing is, I call any speech impediment where one sounds takes over another as a lisp. So there is a s-th lisp and an r-w lisp too. I don't know the exact definition of a lisp, though you are probably right and i've been using it incorrectly for years now. The only reason I can think of for this is that my next door neighborhood had the r-w replacement and I couldn't think of anything but "lisp" to call it.
Ed   Monday, February 07, 2005, 01:52 GMT
And Barbara doesn't have a speech impediment. She's just from Massachussets (spelling).
Jim   Monday, February 07, 2005, 02:08 GMT
I've noticed the phenomenon Someone is writing about but the example word, "door", isn't the best. There is no /r/ in "door" for me.

Tiffany,

I'm afraid you have been wrong all these years.

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=46515&dict=CALD

If you've got a lithp, /s/ becomes /th/ and /z/ becomes /TH/. You may or may not pwonounce uvver fings wong but vat'd be annuvver sbich impeediment.
Tiffany   Monday, February 07, 2005, 04:00 GMT
Jim, yes, I thought I was. Is there a proper name for the r-w speech impediment?

Ed, I used to live in Massachusetts. No one I know there speaks like Barbara Walters, even if they have a Bostonian accent. If that really is a Bostonian accent, it's a huge exaggeration of it.
Jim   Monday, February 07, 2005, 04:11 GMT
I'm sure there is some name for it but I don't know it. Hey, we could call it a "lirp".