Re: Schwa and [V]: Learning the IPA

Larry Sulky wrote:
> On 6/15/06, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
[snip]
>> Do you? This side of the Pond the sounds just ain't the same. The _u_ in
>> _but_ is [V] down in southern England & in Wales, and generally [U] in
>> northern England (I think Scots also generally have [V]). But the _a_ in
>> _about_ is an unrounded _central_ mid vowel.
>>
>
> Well, I keep thinking I do. For example, the vowel distinction between
> "put" (with [U]) and "putt" (with [V]) is clear and phonemic to me and
> to, I believe, the vast majority of Americans and Canadians.
I think there's some misunderstanding here. In southern England 'put'
and 'putt' have distinct vowels also, being /pUt/ and /pVt/
respectively. But in northern England where /V/ is pronounced [U], then
obviously two will be the same. But AFAIK this phenomenon occurs only in
part of England and not elsewhere in the anglophone world.

>> It is such statements made by north Americans in past threads that have
>> certainly given the impression that the two *phonemes* /@/ and /V/ have
>> fallen together in many parts of North America; indeed, your statement
>> above only confirms this.
>
> Ooooookay. I really misunderstood. I thought we were talking about [@]
> and [V] rather than /@/ and /V/.
It may be I have misunderstood as similar threads have occurred before,
I may have been thinking of them.

> But I still think I disagree. If someone tells me that they'll [kVt]
> something, I figure they'll use a  knife to do it. But if they say
> they'll [k@t] something, I have no idea what they're talking about.
Well, yes because you have [@] as a variant of /I/ in 'hobbit' - and
possibly as an allophone of other unstressed vowels. I would understand
[k@t] as 'curt'    :)

> For me the difference between [@] and [V] is usually phonemic. (I
> would probably recognise /b@t/ in unstressed position as "but", but
> not if stressed. And if someone pronounced the unstressed vowel in
> "hobbit" as [V], I would recognise it, but consider the pronunciation
> odd.)
Not sure that I would immediately recognize 'hobbit' with [V] for second
vowel. for me the word is ['hQbIt]

> Now, I can't think of any minimal pairs for these two vowels. Would
> that make the distinction non-phonemic, even though I recognise [kVt]
> and [nVb] as words but not [k@t] and [n@b]?
Sounds to me that you have [@] only in unstressed positions, which is
quite common in English, but you use it for unstressed forms of front
vowels as well as (some?) others. If [@] occurs only in unstressed
positions, I don't think it is really phonemic.

> ---SNIP---
>
>>
>> But I was not aware that anyone was talking about *phones*.
>
>
> My mistake. Sorry for the confusion.
On reflection, I may have been mistaken. In which case, sorry for the
confusion.

>>
>> The question was whether or not /@/ and /V/ are separate phonemes. It
>> has become apparent to me following similar threads over many years on
>> this list (look in the archives) that in some varieties of north
>> American English, at least, the two _phonemes_ have fallen together,
>> Indeed, your mail surely confirms this.
>
> I just don't see how it does. Sure, there are probably some dialects
> where it has, but they are surely in a small minority, and my
> impression at the outset of the thread was that it was being claimed
> that these phonemes had coalesced for _most_ North American English
> dialects.
Well, if you pronounce both the 'a' in 'about' and the 'u' in 'butt' the
same way, then surely you have a single phoneme - while those of us that
do not pronounce them the same, have /@/ and /V/ - unless one regards
our [@] as a weaken allophone of /&/ in that word!

Thinks: What really is the phonemic status of [@] in any English dialect?

> It may be that these phonemes have coalesced or redistributed
> themselves in some words. But if the national news reporters started
> saying [k@t] and [n@t] and [l@ki] for "cut" and "nut" and "lucky", or
No, no - this confusing phones & phonemes. but in any case, if you do
look in the archives at similar threads I think you will find some
Merkans have claimed that [k_h@t] & [n@t] is exactly what they do say. I
can only go on what I read on these lists.

> [pipVl] for "people",
But ain't that [p_hipl=] in any case? I don't the relevance to the
discussion.
===================

Mark J. Reed wrote:
 > On 6/15/06, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
 >
 >> I do not recall anyone questioning the existence of [U] in any American
 >> dialect. The only reason [U] has occurred in this current version of the
 >> [V] ~ [@] thread is that in England [sic]
 >
 >
 > "England [sic]?"  Are you emphasizing the fact that you mean England
 > proper, rather than all of Great Britain or the UK as a whole?

Precisely. Some furriners at least seem to confuse Great Brittan & England.

 >> This is generally the case in most places. As far as I know, no one has
 >> ever questioned this; but the pronunciation of the phoneme /u/ does very
 >> in the anglophone world between AFAIK [u\] ~ [u] ~ [M]
 >
 >
 > [M]?  Huh.  Who doesn't round their /u/'s?  And when are the rest of
 > the Wells volumes coming out in paperback?! :)

Don't  know the answer to the second question, but the answer to the
first is Australia. I remember when an Oz lady came to the door once; I
don't recall what i said, but I do remember her reply; [M:]?

I didn't understand immediately and took it for some antipodal grunt -
but when she repeat the sound it began to realize it was "Who?"    :)

[snip]
 > I wrote:
 >
 >>  > My realization that my /V/ is not IPA [@], either, is what started
 >>  > this thread. :)
 >
 >
 > And you replied:
 >
 >> Ah. One of the problems IMO is that the IPA [@] is itself not clearly
 >> defined!
 >
 > Well, that may be.  Based on its position in the IPA chart, however,
 > it's far too close to be the vowel I have for /@/=/V/.

OK.

 >> Traditionally, the 'a' an about and the 'e' in French 'le' have both
 >> been given the phoneme /@/. But the French sound is rounded, whereas the
 >> English sound is not.
 >
 > Well, dagnabit, why didn't my French teacher mention that little
 > tidbit?  Very helpful.

Mine didn't either   :)

 >> If one examines the 2005 version of the IPA vowel
 >> chart, the shwa symbol is given for:
 >> _both_ (a) the unrounded, close-mid central vowel (CXS [@\]);\
 >
 > Huh.  Is the 2005 chart online?

http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA/vowels.html

 >That's an odd change - CXS [@\] used
 > to be IPA [ɘ] (reversed E), rather than the traditional schwa symbol
 > [ə] (turned E).

OOPs - I wasn't awake this morning   :-(

You're right - CXS [@\] is IPA [ɘ]. Dagnabit, [ɘ] and  [ə] look too darn
similar before I've had my intake of caffeine   ;)

I notice [ɵ] has now moved to a closer/higher position than in the 1989
chart.

I does seem to leave [ə] rather vaguely defined IMO.

 >> Roger Mills wrote:
 >>  > But I wonder if RP uses [6] in "butt, putt, mutt, rut" etc.-- at
 >> least when I pronounce them with [6], they sound quite strange.
 >>
 >> Not, I think, most so-called RP speakers now. It seems strange &
 >> affected to me
 >
 >> From this pair of observances I will assume that my /@/=/V/ vowel is
 >
 > not, in fact, [6], as I earlier guessed.  I think it's time to do some
 > more investigatin'.

Not necessarily - I was thinking of [6] in these words in the context of
someone speaking RP - I do not think I would find it strange in the
context of an American accent (Yes, I know there is not one single
American accents, but several. John Cowan used to explain this to us.)
But 'twould be interesting to read what you come up with. In the
meantime, I'll be listening more carefully to Merkans on the TV and the
one or two living around our way    :)

--
Ray
==================================
ray@carolandray.plus.com
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"A mind which thinks at its own expense will always
interfere with language."         J.G. Hamann, 1760
--
Ray
==================================
ray@carolandray.plus.com
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"A mind which thinks at its own expense will always
interfere with language."         J.G. Hamann, 1760

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