Why が instead of の in 人が話す声が熊に聞こえると?

Question

I've read the news that reads:

人が話す声が熊に聞こえると、熊が近くに来なくなります。

Why が not の in this case? Is there a convention or a particular rule? Or do they have subtle differences?

Thanks!

Answer 1

I'm not sure about your current level of knowledge, so let me start with the basics.

人が話す is a (gapless) relative clause that modifies 声. 人が話す声 and 人の話す声 are interchangeable, and they both mean "the sound of someone talking". This phenomenon is known as ga-no conversion. There are exceptions, but basically が and の are surprisingly similar in a relative clause.

---

If you already understand all of this, but still feel 人の話す声が熊に聞こえると is better, then yes, I agree. In this particular case, to avoid using が twice in close proximity within the same sentence, I think it would have been slightly better to say 人の話す声が熊に聞こえると. But this is a very minor issue that would hardly ever be pointed out as unnatural, and there's usually no need to worry about it. The original sentence is perfectly accurate and natural as-is.