Re: Schwa and [V]: Learning the IPA

Mark J. Reed wrote:
>>John Vertical wrote:
>>>>http://wso.williams.edu/~jdowse/ipa.html
>>>
>>>This is the site I find the most accurate. That [V] *is* rather
>>>exagerratedly far back,
>>
>>? I don't really understand. Is not the IPA [V] the unrounded version of
>>the low-mid _back_ vowel? I don't understand how a back vowel can be
>>exaggeratedly back.
>
>Yeah.  The so-called "cardinal" vowels - around the perimeter of the
>IPA chart - are, *by definition*, at articulatory extremes.  If your
>/V/ (or /u/ or /o/ or /Q/, or their oppositely-rounded numbers) isn't
>pronounced with your tongue as far back in your mouth as you can get
>it while still able to pronounce a vowel, then it ain't IPA [V].
(I don't have any idea 'ho Mark is quoting under me - that particular
message never seems to have reached my mailbox...)

Yes, yes, cardinal vowels definitely need to be exagerratedly far back;
sorry, I should've been clearer... According to every article about formant
/ tung X-ray reserch I've seen (but admittedly there's not been *that* many
of them), no languige on Earth uses the cardinal values of front rounded or
back unrounded vowels; they're always a bit more centralized than the
opposite set. So, if, on the backness scale, [i] were at 0 and [u] at 10,
[y] would typically be around 1-2 and [M] around 8-9.

Since this thred grew out of the issue that AmEng /V/ tends to be closer to
[3] ~ [6] instead, I was asking if anyone could tell if the [V] at this site
was the cardinal vowel, or the [V] that's actually used in Vietnamese /
those UKEng dialects / ...

BTW, while I can do exagerrated front rounded vowels just fine, with
exagerrated back unrounded I tend to be unsure when I start to pass into the
territory of uvular/pharyngeal approximants/fricativs instead.

---

Oh, and you probably won't care, but this thred is a royal WOB already
anyway. Inspired by Mark's example & judging by the aforementioned site, I
present to you: My Vowels.

Finnish:
<ä a> = [& A_+]. The latter tends to shift to fully central [a\] if /i e/
appear anywhere in the vicinity.
<e ö o> = [e_o 2\ O_r]. All 3 are lo'er than mid-hi and hi'er than mid-lo,
but /e/ is the hi'est and /o/ the lo'est. Also, allophonically [E 9 Q_r]
word-finally & in /ie y2 uo/.)
<i y u> = [i y u]

English. Go ahed & laff at my crazy furriner pronunssiayshhn:
(For [r], read [r\`_G].)
KIT - [I], after much practis not to say [i]
DRESS - [e_o], same as my Finnish /e/
TRAP & BATH - [&] or [&:] in seemingly free variation. Also in <marry> etc.
LOT & CLOTH - [Q], or possibly [Q_r]; but before velars, [O].
STRUT - [a\_q] or sumthing to that extent; I feel a need to make it
different from my Finnish /A/, but as I suck at laxing, I seem to have
settled for pharyngealization instead. It's aurally practically
undistinguishable from LOT, but articulatorily rather distinct. Bizarre,
yes.
FOOT - [U], also after much practis not to say [u]
NURSE - [r=:]
FLEECE - [i:]
HAPPY - [i]
FACE - [e_oi], same as my Finnish /ei/
PALM - [A:] with sometimes an extra articulation that feels like
lateralization. (Must be a spelling pronunciation thingy.)
THOUGHT - [O_r:], same as my Finnish /o:/
GOAT - [O_ru], same as my Finnish /ou/
GOOSE - [u:]
HUE - [ju:]; merges with GOOSE before /r l/, with the exception of initial
lone /l/.
FEW - [I8], bizarrely enuff. Besides all orthographical  <ew>, this set also
includes various international loanwords with <y> from Greek, and I think a
handful "long" <u>'s at seemingly random.
PSEUDO - [e_ou]. Again, applies to international loanwords. I know I've
passed over to ridiculous by this point, but so what...
PRICE - [a\I]
CHOICE - [OI_O]. The end remains slightly rounded, but it's definit'ly not
[Y].
MOUTH - [a\U]
NEAR - [i@r]
SQUARE - [E@r]. Also in <merry> etc.
START - [A:r]
NORTH & FORCE - [O:r], or as in THOUGHT. Oddly, the other rhotic vowels
never seem to unrhoticize.
POOR (the rhotic equivalent of GOOSE) - [UOr]
CURE (rh. eqv. of HUE) - [jUOr]
EUROPE (rh. eqv. of both FEW and PSEUDO) - [j8:r]

Also: my placement of stress / unstressed vowel reduction is shot to hell
unless I _really_ think about it; I tend to introduce geminate consonants in
long words; and I'm rather vulnerable to spelling pronunciations. Hence
things like ['h&.lU.sI"neiS:.n=], ['&s:.n=."d&~nt],
['p_ht_hE@.rou."d&k_h.t_hI85]... And as a final treat, my English tends to
be pronounced with extra creaky phonation. :b

John Vertical