Dear all,

There are two articles by SK Chatterji written 25 years apart titled "The Pronounciation of Sanskrit" , same title, different articles.  I'm attaching them for whoever is interested.  

Harry Spier

On Sun, Sep 26, 2021 at 1:28 PM Hock, Hans Henrich via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info> wrote:

Dear All,

As I recall, the issue of how Sanskrit is pronounced in modern (i.e. early 20th-century) India is addressed in an article by Suniti Kumar Chatterji –

Chatterji, Suniti Kumar. The pronunciation of Sanskrit. Indian Linguistics, (1961) vol. 21, pp. 61-82. Originally: K. B. Pathak commemoration volume, 330-349. Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1934.

For the ancient period, there are the Prātiśākhyas of course (the source for Allen’s and Verma’s publications; Vidhata Mishra largely repeats Verma). On the earliest recoverable pronunciation of syllabic ṛ as [ara] (with both [a]s a quarter mora), I have published a paper: Were ṛ and ḷ velar in early Sanskrit? Vidyā-Vratin: Professor A. M. Ghatage felicitation volume, ed. by V. N. Jha, 69-94. (Sri Garib Dass Oriental Series, 160.) Delhi: Sri Satguru Publications, 1992

To teach retroflex to American students I ask them to pronounce their r and, while they are doing so, press the tongue hard against the roof of the mouth, which produces a retroflex stop ṭ that is quite distinct from their t sound.

In general, I have found it useful to adopt one of the regional variants of modern Indian pronounciations (I use the northern one with ri for ṛ and gy for jñ (while properly warning the students that these are modern pronunciations). By becoming familiar with this way of pronouncing Sanskrit students will find it easier to follow Indian Sanskritists when they are speaking/pronouncing Sanskrit. I also urge students to keep their aspirates and nonaspirates and their dentals and retroflexes as distinct as possible, telling them that when I was beginning to study Sanskrit I sometimes spent fruitless hours locating something in the dictionary because of looking up under the “wrong t”.

I hope some of you will find these remarks interesting.

All the best – stay safe,

Hans Henrich

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