Re: YAEPT: Enuf is Enuf: Some Peepl Thru with Dificult Spelingz

On 13/07/06, Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...> wrote:
> On 7/12/06, Tristan Alexander McLeay <conlang@...> wrote:
> > Yeah... I kinda knew that, but I think I got so court up in reacting
> > against "krrent" which is so completely counter-intuitive &
> > american-centric that it's not funny.
>
> Sorry.  I sometimes forget these things.  It was in any case an
> orthography I cooked up on the spur of the moment as I was typing the
> email.
Yeah, I know

> > [*]: It's not so much the fact that Americans don't distinguish the
> > qualities in "curry" and "furry" that doesn't cease to suprise me:
> > it's the fact that they don't distinguish the lengths. Are you sure
> > it's not something like [kr=i] vs [fr=ri]?
>
> I assume you're kidding, but trust me: there is absolutely no
> distinction.  It would never have occurred to me for any reason not to
> make those words a perfect rhyme.
No, not really kidding. Just as surprised as you are that I make a
difference that you make none... I also hear American English through
AusE-colored glasses, and so I hear things that aren't really there
(for instance, because the AmE /&/ is longer that AusE /&/, but
shorter than AusE /&:/, it sounds to me like "mass" and "pass"
shouldn't be a minimal pair for Americans: When one says "mass", the
AmE/&/ sounds like AusE/&/, whereas when one says "pass", the AmE/&/
sounds like AusE/&:/, and I hear a difference of length where there is
none).

...

> > I think /Z/ is better unified with /z(j)/ than /S/, with which it
> > alternates: /pr@Zu\:m/ vs /pr@zamS@n/, and I can't think of any
> > minimal pairs.)
>
> I assume that's "presume", which has an ordinary [z] for me - but even
> if it were [Z], it's not /Z/ but /zj/, where the /j/ comes from the
> /ju/.
I see no basis for distinguishing the two IML, given they're
pronounced the same, almost always have the same origin etc. I'm happy
to consider them /zj/, and happy to consider them /Z/, but don't
understand some should be one and others the other.

(Philip Newton mentions [si:zj@] sounding like "'s easier"; to me, it
seems recoverable and sounds (I think) no stranger than [pr@zju\:m],
and the same with [tju\:t] "tute" vs [tju\:z] "choose".)

Still, point is, for your orthography /zj/ and /Z/ is a better merger
than /Z/ and /S/ considering that there exist such correspondences in
at least my dialect :)

> > I think it's just a "what have we got left" thing. In terms of your
> > original specification (similarity with continental readings), the
> > reading of "u" is also counterintuitive.
>
> Eh.  Reading <u> as /U/ has precedent in Classical Latin and Arabic,
> at the very least.
I thought u=/V/ in your orthography, no? as in "wuns", "uthr", "uv"?
But actually, that's probably just failure to distinguish /U/ from /V/
in the orthography, and not anything more insidious.

...

> > Simplifying the task of reading & difficulting the task of writing.
>
> I'd say it's the other way around.  Only one symbol to remember for
> e.g. the two sounds /a/ and /&/.  But then when I see an unfamiliar
> word written with an <a> I don't immediately know how to pronounce it.
Gah! I got "reading" and "writing" backwards, there. I did of course
mean exactly what you said.

...

> Much.  "suprise" would be easy enough, but "dater" looks like the
> agentive of "to date"...
>
> ... which wouldn't matter to you non-rhotic types, I suppose, since I
> guess those are homophonous for you? :)  It's amazing how hard it is
> to think panlectically, even when one is aware of the issues.
Well, I tend to pronounce "data" as /da:t@/ ["da_":da_"], with the two
vowels differing only by length. "Darter" would be pronounced the
same. Some people do say it with /&i/. Based on the speech of fellow
students, lecturers & tutors from the Psych & Comp. Sci. depts at my
Uni, I think the /a:/ is probably more common amongst Psych and the
younger & oldest Comp. Sci. people.

> Anyway, such spellings as "dater" for "data"  would also appear to
> convey a common low-prestige pronunciation over here which one might
> characterize as hyper-rhotic,
We could just as easily spell "car" as "ka", with rhotic speakers
putting on the appropriate diacritic. Make it look like it's after the
letter-ish (such as the Vietnamese horn or the IPA rhoticised
diacritic) and it might eventually hardly be noticed it's a diacritic.
Só ú can hav ứ  dáta and ứ  dáta̛, and í'll hav mí dâta and mí dáta.
If I've got your pronunciations right :) [I'd actually spell "your" as
"yô" for my pronunciation, so the system isn't perfect.]

--
Tristan.

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