Re: USAGE: [YAEPT] (was Re: "To whom")

On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 11:54:20 +1100, Tristan McLeay
<conlang@...> wrote:

>On 27 Jan 2005, at 1.29 am, Mark J. Reed wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Jan 26, 2005 at 09:58:44PM +1100, Tristan McLeay wrote:
...
>>> * I also realised at a similar time that when I noticed that I
>>> pronounced el (e.g. in elementary) as [&l],
>>
>> Ah, yes, alimentary school.
>>
>>> I'd stopped doing that, and started saying [el].
>>
>> [el]?  Not [El]?
>
>Well, Roger Mills reckons my /&/ sounds more like [E] in the first
>place :) (Listening to IPA samples on the web sometimes confirms that
>and sometimes doesn't ... it's a pity I don't know *which* samples
>actually (semi-)accurately render the cardinal vowels, though I have my
>doubts about the one that pronounces [9] as [r\=].)
I think transcription of the English vowel of the words _bet/bed_ suffers
from IPA being based on French pronunciation, since that vowel usually falls
inbetween the French vowels of _fé_ /fe/ and _fait_ /fE/. To me, most
English pronunciations of the vowel in _bed/bet_ sounds like [e_o] or [E_r].


Muke Tever is responsible for:
> Tristan McLeay <conlang@...> wrote:
>> I don't know that the glottal stop is phonemic (and I've heard
>> evidence
>> that the phoneme for US [4] is actually /t/, so 'meddle' and 'mettle'
>> are both homophones as (what I suppose is) /mEtl=/, contrary to
>> intuition).
>
> What's the evidence for making it /t/?  Usually it's described as part
> of the /d/ phoneme, as they still contrast before /n=/:
>     mitten /mItn=/ (probably [mIt_}n=] or [mi?n=])
>     midden /mIdn=/ (maybe [mi4n=], but probably [mId_}n=])
I've a hard time to produce [mIt_}n=] and [mId_}n=], since my mouth most
naturally wants to initiate the nasal with a nasal release [mIt_nn=,
mId_nn=]. I must have lost the ability to produce that sound at a very early
age... :)

That reminds me that I've heard somewhere that there are some exotic
languages that allow the combinations [t_}d] or [d_}t] at the beginning of a
word! My ears and my mouth immediately rebelled. I'm comfortable with [t:]
at the beginning of a word (as long as the contrast with [t] disappears
after words ending in voiceless consonants or after pause), but a sequence
of [d] and [t] is too weird for me.

kry@s:
j. 'mach' wust

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