You guys got it easy, they’re only a few, and if you have no clew about how they sound, then you could probably use some coaching. Or just pay some extra attention, some of the words you never understand the first time you hear them probably have some of these sounds, which can get a bit tricky to articulate when combined. If you want to hear a sample, just open that “Sounds of English and Spanish” animation that the University of Iowa so kindly made available for us all, here’s the link.
/x/ as in ajo, genio, reloj
Phonetic description: voiceless velar fricative
Whenever an English speaker says any of those words, chances are he is producing the /h/ of behave rather than the Spanish /x/. Those two sounds are pretty similar, the main difference is the friction –the Spanish /x/ has a lot, the English /h/ has very little. Note also that the English /h/ is glottal, this means the friction is slightly deeper, on the glottis, than the Spanish /x/, which articulated on the velum.
“aspirated s” as in espacio, costa, mosca
Phonetics description: voiceless glottal fricative
This sound is tricky. If you’ve just started learning Spanish, you probably think we do not say the “s” in those words, but we do! It is hard. I’d say it’s even harder than the “r”. English speakers have a similar sound, the /h/ of words like behave or have. But, the /h/ never happens at the end of a word or syllable (I dare you come up with a word finishing with that sound). The “aspirated s” never occurs at the beginning of a word or syllable, it’s just air expelled almost without any tongue movement. Don’t worry about it if you’re going to Spain, over there they only have one /s/, pretty much the same as the English /s/.
UPDATE: if you scroll down, you´ll see Peggy´s comment about the aspirated s. Turns out it is used in Spain, apparently in the south. Mexicans, on the other hand, don´t have this sound. There´s going to be a post about this in the near future.
“b” as in Evo, “d” as in
hada, “g” as in
egoPhonetic description: voiced bilabial/dental/velar
espirante
Yes, those three sounds do not exist in English. I’ve already written about them,
click here to read the post. I will probably write about them again, in the meantime, can anybody tell me what those three sounds have in common?
The aspirated "s" is heard in Spain. In southern Spain or Andalucia the aspirated "s" is very common. But, you did not mention that it is also not common to hear the aspirated "s" in Mexico.