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PK 2813 P4 .OLLOQUIAL 1919 ,\ MAIN INHALESE READER ;!U-:ra a OAiNiEL jONES UC-NRLIf UNCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS A COLLOQUIAL SINHALESE READER Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/colloquialsinhalOOpererich A COLLOQUIAL SINHALESE READER IN PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION (WITH AN INTRODUCTION ON THE PHONETICS OF SINHALESE) BY H. S. PERERA, B.A. HonoraryAssistantin thePhoneticsDepartment, University College^ London AND DANIEL JONES, M.A. ReaderinPhoneticsinthe Uni-versityofLondon MANCHESTER AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 12 LIME GROVE, OXFORD ROAD LONGMANS, GREEN & CO. LONDON, NEW YORK, BOMBAY, ETC. I9I9 PublishedbytheUniversityof Manchesterat THEUNIVERSITYPRESS(H. M. McKechnie, Secretary) 12 LimeGrove, OxfordRoad, MANCHESTER LONGMANS, GREEN &CO. London: 39 PaternosterRow NewYork: 443-449 Fourth AvenueandThirtieth Street Chicago: Prairie AvenueandTwenty-fifth Street Bombay: 8 HornbyRoad Calcutta: 6 Old CourtHouse Street Madras 167 MountRoad : PA PKEFACE For the benefit of readers to whom phonetics is a new subject we would explain that phonetics is the science of pronunciation. The primary object of this science is to analyse themechanism ofspeech with thegreatestpossible accuracy. Phonetic theory is mainly-concerned with describing how speech-sounds are made,and with instructinglanguage learners how to learn toproduce foreign sounds. Phonetic transcription is an adjunct to the study of phonetics. It is a special kind of writing based on the principle "one letter per phoneme. "^ Its object is to inform the reader what sequences of sounds are used in particular words and sentences. This book is not primarily a treatise on the phonetics of Sinhalese, but we have thought that a useful purpose wouldbe servedbygiving a certainamountof information on this subject in the Introduction. Learners of the language mustremember that in order to profit by the texts it is essential that they should first be able to make the isolated Sinhalese sounds. To do ^ See Introduction, §6. ^69355 A COLLOQUIAL SINHALESE READER vi this with complete success requires a certain study of phonetic theory under the guidance of a teacher. Learners of Sinhalese using this book should read the texts aloud, taking each sentence at first slowly and gradually increasing the speed. They should endeavour to work them up to the rate of five or six syllables per second, which is about the average rate at which a Sinhalese speaks. H. S. PERERA DANIEL JONES. University College, London, January 1919.