I understand that every language has tricky words, meaning, words that do not follow the normal sounds or conventions of most words or letters. However, I do want to ensure I am being taught this word correctly so that I can practice learning it correctly.
The word: лёгкий
The course I'm taking pronounces it to where it almost sounds like: loo-skee or luiskee
What is correct? Or is this correct?
The transcription is [l'oxk'ij'], where x is for fricative guttural sound and apostrophee is for palatalisation of the previous consonant. [o] is under stress. Palatalisation of x is facultative. [j] is quite frequently omitted, as in all the forms with [ij] at the end, but it is not the most correct way of pronunciation. The word is tricky, because it has *[γk']->[xk'] where *[gk']-> *[kk']-> [k'] is expected. It is a trace of the ancient state of the language where г was pronounced as fricative sound, [γ]. "->" is for "became". Dissimilation could also happen - plosive-plosive became fricative-plosive for distinction.
Quite often you can find answer to such questions here. So, the phonetic transcription is [ˈlʲɵxʲ.kʲɪj] which roughly can be transmitted as liokhkiy ("kh" like Scotsmen spell "ch" in Loch Ness).
Have you ever used Forvo? It's a site where you can listen to native speakers pronouncing various words in their languages. Here's лёгкий:
http://forvo.com/word/%D0%BB%D1%91%D0%B3%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9/ http://forvo.com/word/%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B3%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9/
By the way, I feel your pain. As a learner of Russian I, too, have mispronounced this word a few times myself! Specifically, I pronounced г as /g/ instead of /x/.
In Moscow version of Russian it is pronounced close to lioghky. Soft L. Then "'о" which together will produce sound like l'o. Close to sound depicted by ё letter. GH is actually somewhere between G and H. Closer to just H. In some cases you will just hear air exit like in "kh" sound.
The Russian phonetical transcription of this word is
[л'охк'ий'] where the apostrophe denotes the softness.
It is read totally following the rules of reading.
You can listen to the correct pronunciation here.
