Re: Status of Italian rising

On Mon, 9 Dec 2002 12:30:37 -0700, Dirk Elzinga <Dirk_Elzinga@...>
wrote:

>At 5:22 AM -0500 12/9/02, Jeff Jones wrote:
>>
>>I don't understand why linguists do some things either! Aren't
>>approximants vocoids? (well, I know *lateral* approximants have been
>>considered to be non-vocoids (I assume that's what's meant by "contoid"),
>>but this has never made sense to me from the purely phonetic viewpoint,
>>either acoustically or in terms of articulation.) It seems to me that
>>phonetics and phonology don't have to correspond, and that phonology is
>>language dependent. Your analysis looks OK to me, though, and I didn't
>>see anything wrong with your translation.
>
> The labels "vocoid" and "contoid" are assigned to segments based on their
> function in syllable structure,
BLOODY HELL!!!!!!!!!!!! I am really incensed!
All my references say that "vocoid" is a purely *phonetic* term, with
"vowel" used as the language-dependant term, e.g. "... utilize the term
_vocoid_ to represent the sounds in their phonetic character without regard
to their distribution in sequences or their usage as consonants or vowels."
How can we discuss anything if the GHODDAMM LINGUISTAS keep redefining all
the terms randomly?? Who do they think they are, fucking IBM????

> but I find them to be misleading;
to say the least!

> you can have "vocoids" which are not very vowel-like, for instance.
> I prefer the terms "peak" and "margin"; the peak of a syllable is the
> point of highest sonority, and the margins surround the peak and are of
> lower sonority. Thus [l] is the peak of the second syllable of 'little'.
Now that makes sense to me. Is it just because you're American?

> Now the interesting question is whether both elements of a diphthong are
> part of the peak, or if there is a peak-margin sequence (or margin-peak
> for rising diphthongs).
Yes, that would be an interesting question, if I were in the mood for it.

>Dirk
>--
>Dirk Elzinga                                     Dirk_Elzinga@byu.edu

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