Why Does Urdu Sound So Melodious? The 6 Sounds That Shape Urdu | Module 1 | Rekhta Learning

[00:00:08][music] Many celebrities have their signature styles which make them look different from others. For example, red lipstick has become a signature style of the Hollywood actress Taylor Swift. In Bollywood, Sadna who created magic on the screen in the 1960s became iconic with her hair bangs. Her hairstyle actually became known as sadakut and grew into a signature mark of her beauty. In this video, I'll talk about signature sounds of udu. You know, the sounds that are unique and that make Udu different from other South Asian languages on the spoken level. The grammar of Udu is based on the Kari dialect, which makes it similar to Hindi and other North Indian languages. But Udu's writing system and vocabulary are influenced by Persian and Arabic.

[00:01:00]Because of the language contact, Uru borrowed many words from Persian and Arabic. Many of them were related to poetry, history, and philosophy. But many are very common words that even uneducated people can use. For example, mazbut, fa, etc. Notice that these words have the sounds C, Z, G and F. Now these sounds do not exist in other North Indian languages.

[00:01:32]So along with these words came the signature sounds of Udu. And these sounds are written with the letters F Z and these sounds are pronounced in Udu like Arabic and Persian. And they give Udu a very unique acoustic flavor. Let's just start with the sound fu or the letter f. In udu, the sound fu is written with the letter f and is pronounced like the English sound fu as in film. Its place of articulation is lower lip and upper teeth. Fu fu. This sound appears in Udu words that historically came from Arabic, Persian and English. So three sources and they became part and parcel of the Udu language. Let's look at some of these words. Fun, f, feel.

[00:02:29]These words came from Arabic. Farad, fara, and faluda came from Farsy or Persian. Film, file, and phone came from English. All these words have the sound fu in them. These words are as udu as biryani is Indian or faluda is Indian.

[00:02:52]Many udu speakers may not even know the origins of these words. It's similar to English French contact that led to the adoption of many French words like royal or renaissance, liquor, restaurant etc into English. But udu also has the sound p which is common with Hindi. In udu these two sounds are pronounced very differently. This difference is not to be taken lightly because fun with a fu in udu means art but pun with a p means hood of the snake.

[00:03:30]Be careful a small misprononunciation can turn your art into a snake.

[00:03:35]Inshallah kayensha a noted poet and linguist of the late 18th century in his book dialaf gives examples of a chunyamal from Delhi who mispronounces fazabad as pabad.

[00:03:49]Recently many people have started to mix the two sounds because they seem to be confused.

[00:03:55]They pronounce f in words where there is actually p. For example, pull and pool are often heard as f and fool. So don't be fooled by the sound fu. It is not everywhere. Saami, an amazing mazaha poet has a funny poem on the mispronunciation of fur as p. When the female udu name Fasana which is which means story is pronounced with a P, it sounds very much like meaning to trap someone.

[00:04:42]Moral of the story is that if you don't want to be beaten up, pronounce your F correctly. Let's move on to the next sound. Z.

[00:04:51]This is the next signature udu sound z which sounds like the buzz of a honeybee like z. The sound is a bit confusing because it is written with four different letters in udu zad zo and zal. So the words zar, nazana, zif, and zafur [snorts] are written with different letters, but when they're pronounced, they're pronounced with the same sound z like the sound of a b. As I said, this sound appears in words of Persian, Arabic, and English origins. So again, three sources, Persian, zer, Arabic, zif, and English magazine. Udu also has a sound which is very similar or close to Z. But it's not the same. It is J. Try it with me. Z J.

[00:05:43]Zj. So in Udu, Lza with a Z sound has a different meaning from laah with the J sound. Recently I heard a beautiful in which the singer mixed up and laa and ruined the entire poem. I won't name the artist.

[00:06:02]means moment and means style. Listen to these two words and you will see the difference. Many people think that if it is udu it must be with the sound z and they embarrass themselves by pronouncing the word or the name jawed as zawed.

[00:06:20]Even more embarrassing is when the name jal meaning majestic is pronounced as zal which means completely different. It actually means disgraced. Is Udu the only language that borrowed words from Arabic and Persian? Not really. Many North Indian languages and dialects also borrowed from Arabic and Persian with with these sounds. But in these dialects, the sound is mostly pronounced like J. This has led to a perception that Z symbolizes some kind of you know education and high culture and and so forth. So in fiction and films you will see that uneducated workingclass characters are often shown to pronounce words with Z as J. Listen to Muhammad Rafi pronouncing Nazar as Najar in the film Ram or Sham for the illiterate and rusty character called Sham. You can also see this when fat alhan pronounces kaja namuin as kaja namudin or nijamin but he does it for a different reason.

[00:07:27]Let's not forget that he does this to sound more authentic because the poem is in the earliest stages of udu and thus had a different diction. See how Bano pronounces nazer as najar to create that authenticity of the dialect in which zo actually doesn't exist nar so it's not actually udu because in udu we don't say lagi it would be probably ly [snorts] and to capture that authenticity she pronounces z as j and pronounces nazer as najar or nar moving on let's move to the third sound the third signature sound appears in your dream. Well, I didn't mean that it is not real. It appears in the udu word which means dream. So without this sound, you cannot really achieve your a beautiful dream. The sound is listen to it.

[00:08:27]The sound is produced lower in the throat. It is written with the letter K.

[00:08:32]The sound appears only in words of Persian and Arabic origin. This sound does not exist in English. The wordan these three words are borrowed from Persian and have the sound. Now Arabic words like kales or karab or kazana also have the sound. Now this sound is different from the common udu hindi sound written with the chashmi. In udu kal with a means black spot on the face but kal means skin. So see a small difference can make such a huge difference in meaning. Similarly kudai means lordship from the word kuda but kudai means digging which is going around in Delhi all the time. Be careful with them as the slight difference has huge consequences for meaning. Some of the words with the sound are so common that they are found in Hindi and other north Indian languages as well. For example, khali karida hulasa kurak. These words you will find them in Indian languages whether they are Hindi or bjpuri or mahi or other dialects in up. Ordinary speakers of Hindi may not know the Sanskrit derived words for them. The Sanskrit derived word for khali is rt but you will never hear it in common usage as in j if you said it you will only get a weird look from your friends. Many udu names have this sound udu poet bollywood musician and famous poet and musician.

[00:10:17]Their names have the sound. The word also appears in the poetic word like what a beautiful couplet here means a devastated heart. But then what about udu words such as these that combine with Sanskrit origin t these words are not of Arabic or Persian origin. They actually come from Sanskrit yet they have the sound in them. It is rare to have a word that have t from Sanskrit and from Arabic. That is why when you open an Udu dictionary with the letters T and K together, you will only find a handful of words. So why did this marriage between Sanskrit in Arabic happen? Well, this happened because of the high prestige of Udu and Persian words. The pronunciation of C in these words began as a mistake. People wrongly thought that the words had C instead of C which is the actual sound in these words. With passage of time you know the wrong pronunciation became correct and today we have a blend of Arabic and Sanskrit sounds in one word. for example.

[00:11:36]So it has T and C.

[00:11:40]Isn't that a beautiful example of linguistic cross fertilization?

[00:11:44]Moving on to the next sound C.

[00:11:47]Now the fourth signature udu sound C is produced lower in the throat. The sound C is written with the letter K. The poet Anoir Mir Zapuri has used three words and that's amazing in the first line of this one share a bi with a nab with a and with a cough. In Udu the sound C is different from a similar sound C which is very common in Udu and Hindi. Let's listen to these words carefully.

[00:12:32]Come mad muk. Now with slight change in the pronunciation we get different words.

[00:12:43]Did you notice that these words are different only in one sound C and C? The difference in the pronunciation gives different words and meanings. In Bollywood songs, the pronunciation of this sound was critical to the quality of performance. And if you look at the classical playback singers, you see them doing the this sound with perfection. Unlike Akbal Albano, Manade and Muhammad Rafi, however, many new artists do not pay attention to the Udu diction and pronounce often pronounce as if it is the same as C. You will hear them say for what is.

[00:13:24]The standard Udu sound in Kaf has been variable for a long time. It has two major regional variations, Punjab and the Hyderabad.

[00:13:34]While many Punjabi speakers pronounce it in the standard way like Akbal Bano did and she is herself a Punjabi many don't.

[00:13:42]Rahhat Fatal Khan for example um oftent times uh pronounce C as C. Younger poets from Punjab in Pakistan and India use C version more than the C version.

[00:13:56]Hyderabadis give the sound a very different unique flavor. they pronounce it as so with becomes and becomes there's a very funny um incident which is narrated about the poet Majaz once Majaz went to Hyderabad to attend an event before he was to leave someone came up to him and requested him to stay for a few more days he said major or Maj in his initable style said in udu means destruction but means celebration.

[00:14:48]Moving on to the next sound. This udu sound appears in the word for gargle.

[00:14:56]is pronounced lower in the throat where the other udu sound and are pronounced.

[00:15:02]The sound appears in many common as well as literary words of Arabic origin. For example, galib you know the poet u which the word comes from Arabic. Uh the Arabic word which means food or the Persian word also has the sound. The Persian word gar you know the dress a type of female dress also has a sound g. But this sound is different from another similar sound g found in other udu words such as galistna or gumla. Some words with this sound are commonly used in other languages as well. For example, you will find these words in Hindi as well. But they are mostly pronounced as G not G.

[00:15:48]Galat meaning wrong in Hindi and other dialects is pronounced as galat. Gib meaning poor is pronounced as gibb.

[00:15:59]Gulam is pronounced as gulam. Gib is pronounced as g lost. I have often heard some people who are lovers of udu poetry but do not take the care to learn the diction and pronounce gazal as gajal. I think that learning the correct pronunciation is not any less important than learning the meter of the poems and the meanings of the words. Remember once we said that meanings and language are not two separate entities. Meanings and language are intertwined with one another.

[00:16:36]Moving on to the next sound.

[00:16:38]The last signature udu sound is similar to the English and French sound as in pleasure, vision, rouge. It is written with three dots on the letter R. It is different from the sound Z which we have talked about. Even in English, this sound is not Indo-Germanic but came from French in the same way as it came to udu from Persian. Now this sound does not exist in Arabic. It's not a commonly used udu sound. It however is used in poetry. Classical as well as modern poets have used it. Here are a few words with this sound.

[00:17:18]Mijka for eyelashes.

[00:17:21]Pmura for dejected and jala jav and jolida. Galib has used mija quite a lot in his poetry and I think just for those poets I think we should preserve the sound.

[00:17:46]Another great classical poet used the word uh in his couplet.

[00:18:00]But modern poets have also used words with this sound. For example, father of the well-known poet Jagnath used the same word in this couplet.

[00:18:17]Beautiful. To hear this sound in Udu, you will have to dive deeper into the realm of fine and often complex sensibilities. I can assure you that you will not hear it in ordinary conversations. But still, it's part and parcel of the Udu language. Non-duo speakers when they learn udu pay attention to these sounds and try to learn them. A great example is the actor Tom Alter uh who is of um British origin but has performed in many um Indian films. His pronunciation of this sound or all these sounds actually is absolutely perfect.

[00:19:06]Um you can also find other examples uh of people learning udu from other countries but doing it really really well. Kosar Mazari a friend of mine and a poet and critic uh who works in jam Islamia uh on my request composed one sh with all the six sounds and I really like it.

[00:19:29]means body has zah has karami has and jala has the persian sound ja. Now time to wrap up. In this video I have discussed six unique sounds of udu. [music] These sounds are like the lamposts of udu and serve as markers [music] of udu. I have shown how these sounds are different from other similar sounds [music] that exist in Udu as well other other languages. I have shown the pronunciation of these sounds [music] using popular udu genres such as films and mash. The power and impact that these sounds in popular poetry show how critical they are for the treasure trove of Udu poetry at large. [music] If if Latam Mangeshkar, Manade and Kashor Kumar could perform them, I'm sure [music] we can too. Our goal is much more ambitious than that of the singers. We want to enjoy the linguistic beauty and the meanings of metaphors [music] and simileies and the subtle meanings of life in Udu poetry. Let the sounds [music] of Udu speak to your heart and let them speak for you to other hearts.

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