The Letter o

We've been covering mostly consonants, so far. Although we have learned two vowels, , "aa," and , "a", the majority of Hindi words have other vowel sounds besides these two. We therefore continue learning the Devangari vowels with , "o."

At first glance, , "o" looks very similar to a vowel we learned previously, , "aa." The obvious difference is that there is mark coming from the top of the character, directly over the rightmost vertical line. It is important to note that the slanted mark goes to the left, and is almost a perfectly straight line — it does not curve over in an arc, but rather goes diagonally towards the top left corner of the page.

The sound represented by , "o," is like the English long, "o" sound in, "hotel." There is a difference in pronunciation, however, that can be heard when comparing English and Indian speakers. The distinction here is that the Devanagari vowel , "o" is "pure," while the English, "o" is not. By, "pure," I mean that virtually no movement of the mouth, lips, and tongue occurs when , "o" is pronounced. This is not true of the English long "o" sound (Snell, 11).

To experience the difference, say the English word, "doughnut." Although the pronunciation varies in different areas, it is likely that you will discover that your cheeks and tongue move slightly, changing the, "o" sound as it is pronounced. This makes the word sound slightly like, "duh-oh-ooo-nut," although English speakers usually only hear what, to them, is a pure long, "o" sound. Hindi-speakers, on the other hand will tend to pronounce the, "o" sound shorter and with less changer during the pronunciation of the vowel, creating a word that sounds more like, "do-nut."

To remember this letter, it might be useful to concentrate on , "aa," being changed to , "o," by the addition of the slanted line on the top of the letter.

From now on, when transliterating Hindi words, I will use the English letter, "o" to represent and to stand for the long, "o" sound found in, "hotel." You might want to review the guidelines I have already presented for the sounds represented by, "a" and, "aa."

o maatraa Remember that , "o" is a vowel, and it therefore has two forms. The first form, which you just learned, comes at the beginning of a word. The second form, , "o," comes elsewhere in a word. Remember that this second form of the vowel is called a maatraa.

When you learned the vowel, , "aa," you learned that to form its maatraa you remove the "" part of the vowel, leaving, , "aa." While not all vowels form their maatraas this way, , "o," does follow this pattern. Therefore, if you remove the "" part of , "o," you are left with , "o," which is its maatraa.

It is important to rememember the importance of the slanted mark which appears above the letter, because in this case it changes the vowel from an, "aa" sound to an, "o" sound. If you don't remember the importance of this mark, you are likely to confuse , "aa" and , "o," and also , "aa", and , "o."

To make sure you know the difference, read the following lines aloud:

aa aa aa aa

o o o o

aa aa aa aa

o o o o

Now, read the following letters aloud. If you have trouble, practice reading the above lines again.