Re: USAGE: front vowel tensing [was: English notation]

Lars:
> > Date:         Fri, 29 Jun 2001 13:00:37 -0400
> > From: Roger Mills <romilly@...>
> >
> > Tristan Alexander McLeay wrote:
> > ->So the /&/ goes to /ej/? Some american i talk about the phonetics of our
> > >englishes with claims he uses [&j] (but only allophonic) before /N/,
> >
> > Deja vu...... we went through this a while back IIR.  The [j] glide here
> > seems to result from the movement of the tongue from [æ] position to [N]
> > position.  Similary, many of us have a centralized off-glide [@] in the
> > sequence /...æn#/ as in "ban".
>
> I have a related question here. According to some authorities (hi And
> and Ray), <pays> is /pEiz/ but <says> is /sEz/ in normal British
> pronunciation.
>
> However, with some speakers I'm sure I hear a different continuant
> sound after the /E/ in the latter form. To my Danish ears, it sounds
> like my own postalveolar /D/. Can anyone else hear it, or am I crazy?
>
> (I have it in my own pronunciation as well, and I must have learnt it
> from someone --- but that could be my fifth grade English teacher who
> was certainly not a native speaker).
It seems to me that what you are describing is an allegro realization.
That is, your observation is correct, but you are not hearing a phonological
contrast.

--And.