Re: Pre-Kindergarten diphthong analysis

Distinguishing 'horse" and "hoarse" must be that NORTH/FORCE
distinction I've read about.  What are some sample realizations?



On 9/19/08, Philip Newton <philip.newton@...> wrote:
> On 19/09/2008, J R <tanuef@...> wrote:
>>  I remember insisting when I was younger that 'tree' must be spelled
>> 'chree',
>>  because the word began with /tS/, and we had learned that /tS/ was
>> spelled
>>  'ch'. I was told in resonse that it did not begin with /tS/, but with
>> 't'.
>>  While I was right, I was also wrong ... since /S/ is automatically
>> inserted
>>  into a /tr/ sequence, it makes sense to spell it with a 't' as well.
>
> Perhaps a better response for that situation might have been,
> "Spelling is based on a standard pronunciation; in this case, the
> standard pronunciation has /tr/ rather than the /tSr/ that's common
> around here, which explains why the word is spelled with |tr| and not
> |chr|".
>
> (That would also cover things such as people with pen-pin mergers, or
> father-bother, which-witch, or horse-hoarse, or .... -- recourse to a
> standard pronunciation in which such distinctions *are* made.)
>
> Cheers,
> --
> Philip Newton <philip.newton@...>
>
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Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>

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