Re: Latin vowel inventory
From: | Thomas R. Wier <trwier@...> |
Date: | Wednesday, July 30, 2003, 21:27 |
Quoting Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>:
> Quoting Tristan McLeay <zsau@...>:
>
> > The less common diphthongs oe and eu are best pronounced as they are
> > written (o+e, e+u). In 'cui', 'hui' the ui is to be pronounced as a
> > dipthong, somewhat as in 'ruinous'; but 'qui:' is [kwi:].
>
> I have three syllables in "ruinous", and like to think that I in this mimic
> most nativers I've heard. And I've heard Americans complain about Tolkien
> describing the Quendian diphthong /ui/ as like the _ui_ in "ruin", despite
> the later not being a diphthong.
>
> So, is there some (obsolete?) variety of English English that have a
> monosyllabic pronunciation of "ruin", or have I, due to people like the
> abovementioned Americans, acquired an unusual pronunciation here?
No, you are correct. Again, it's just a dumbing down, this time
on the part of Tolkien, to reach an audience essentially ignorant
of phonetics.
=========================================================================
Thomas Wier "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637