Regarding my previous post. Here in Norway we have 6 different ways of pronouncing the "r"-sound, I personally don't know of any other language that comes close to this. What sound you use usually varies according to the word and/or where you come from. The only "r"-sound that is not used is the Alveolar Approximant [ɹ] used in English.

The

Alveolar trill [r]
Alveolar flap / Alveolar tap [ɾ]
Retroflex flap [ɽ]
Voiced uvular fricative [ʁ]
Uvular trill [ʀ]
and even
Voiced retroflex fricative [ʐ]

are all used. But because of how words are built up in western languages compared to the short words of many Asian languages, one is still able to understand what words are being said often regardless of what form of "r" is used, within the norms of course

Bemused:

bartlett22183:
Indeed, Schleyer thought that /r/ was such a bedeviling phoneme that he left it out entirely of the original Volapük (although de Jong brought it back in in a few contexts), mingling /r/ and /l/. At least he tried to deal with the matter, however questionable his approach may be.

That's very interesting.
Purely as a hypothetical, and not because of any desire to reform Esperanto, what in your opinion would be the best way for an IAL to deal with the "r" issue?
I ask because you have stated several times that you have knowledge of several IAL's.

I apologize that I missed this post and did not follow up on it soon.

For myself, I fully acknowledge that I do not have what even I consider a satisfactory solution to the question of some phonemes in constructed international auxiliary languages (conIALs). I really don't. ConIALs fall roughly into three categories: a priori, a posteriori, and mixed. I would say that Esperanto falls into the mixed category with strong a posteriori tendencies.

As Mario Pei pointed out in his One Language for the World, young children in immersion environments can effectively master any human language on earth. Therefore, in theory, any language, assuming it has enough vocabulary for modern matters, could be "the" conIAL if it were just taught to the world's little children.

Obviously, this is not going to happen in any foreseeable future, and the majority of learners of a conIAL are and will be adolescents, post-adolescents, and adults, among whom language learning ability is significantly decreased for most. (This, of course, is before the Fina Venko for any conIAL.)

If one were going to invent a strictly a priori language, one could simplify the phonology. However, the number of phonemes common to literally nearly all the world's languages is so small that an a priori language which is restricted to that set might be almost unworkable in practice. That means that in actuality, for any practical conIAL, some adult learners, somewhere, somehow, at some time, are just going to have to exert some effort and struggle with something that is not common or familiar to them. Period. I see no way around this.

That means that we cannot satisfy everyone simultaneously everywhere. Like it or not, somebody is going to have to struggle with something, whether on the level of sounds or of morphology or of syntax or of whatever. This is one of the unfortunate facts of human existence when it comes to conIALs for adults.

If I were Zamenhof today, would I invent Esperanto just as he did? Probably not in all particulars, no. Nevertheless, because E-o does have a posteriori elements in its vocabulary derived from European languages, I see no way around including some kinds of /r/ and /l/ phonemes, even if I myself do not have decided ways to specify them in detail.

Is there a list of words out there that only have a difference between if it's an l or r, in Esperanto?

Ex. "right, light" in English.

I'm just wondering how much a clear pronunciation is necessary.

L_B_:

Fenris_kcf:

L_B_:Anybody know how to pronounce the 'r'?

No, we all do it wrong.

Really: What do you anticipate to get as response to this question? And why do you post in the English forum?

...
As for where to post, it's just that I can only understand English and Chinese,and I'm not so confident with my esperanto, so I posted it here.Are you suggest that I should post in the esperanto forum?

I was about to say "A look at the post count of 11 (and growing!) clearly shows LB is new to Esperanto. That's why she posted, to get an explanation for something she didn't understand," but I see she can take care of herself.

Welcome to Esperanto, LB. It's good to have more from the Middle Country among us. You'll have to ignore those of us who forget what it's like to be a new learner. I would also point you to the Chinese Forum, but I see you've already found it You're good, you're very good.

But Fenris is right in that every language I've ever studied has a slight variation on the R. I'd be interested to discover a single language that makes as much of a distinction as Arabic makes with its T and D sounds (I count at least 5) or three S sounds. (EDIT: Norwegian! Thanks Vikungen.) I think there is plenty of good analysis from other posters that I won't rehash what has been explained so well.