What are the differences between cypriot accent and greece accent?

By: | Post date: 2016-04-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Modern Greek

I’m not going to do this question justice.

Phonological differences in the dialect that carry across to the accent:

  • Lots of /n/s that have dropped off in standard Greek, and longer [n]s than in standard Greek. So it sounds nasal: not French, nasal vowel nasal, but lots of nnnns nasal.
  • Different stop contrasts. Standard Greek contrasts voiceless [t] and prenasalised [ⁿd], which increasingly ends up as [d]. Cypriot contrasts [tʰ] (initial geminate t), geminate [tː], and prenasalised [ⁿd]. That means that in the dialect, there are unfamiliar geminates and aspirates; and when speaking standard Greek, the stops sound wrong.

More singsong than Standard Greek (which isn’t hard, Standard Greek is pretty rat-tat-tat). Because of the geminates and the long [n]s, somewhat slower and more deliberate sounding (again, in contrast to  Standard Greek rat-tat-tat).

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