Re: Elvish ideas ...

On Tue, 19 Aug 2003, Muke Tever wrote:

> From: "Thomas R. Wier" <trwier@...>
> > Quoting Chris Bates <christopher.bates@...>
> > > I'm checking my pronunciation again... there's definately a long u in my
> > > "suit"... "assume" pronounced asu:m feels english but maybe with an
> > > american accent to me... saying prezju:m that feels like a normal
> > > pronunciation to me too...
> >
> > I think Mark's point was that for the vast, vast (vast...)
> > majority of English speakers, vowels are allophonically
> > lengthened before voiced obstruents.  Thus, for a speaker
> > to have a long [u:] before a voiceless obstruent like in
> > 'suit' is contrary to all expectation. It suggests that
> > you have a phonemic distinction of length (/u/ v. /u:/)
> > in addition to one of quality (/u/ v. /U/).
>
> Arent all the tense vowels normally pronounced longer or diphthongized in
> many/most English dialects?   [Well, almost all the vowels.  I know I have [i]
> psilon in some places but usually for standard /I/.]
In many, but of course not all :) And so there are people who think the
length is the most important and mark the difference between 'bet' and
'bait' as /bet/ and /be:t/ or /beit/ (though i think that's mostly old
fashioned); there are people who think the quality is the most important
and so write /bEt/ and /bet/ and there are people who think it's a
combination of both (and so write /bEt/ and /be:t/ or /beit/).

Of course, what is the most important difference will depend on the
dialect. You (not *actual* you, *theoretical* you) might not hear the
difference between [bEt] and [bet], which would suggest that writing /bEt/
and /bet/ is probably inaccurate, whereas someone else mightn't hear the
difference between [bet] and [be:t], yet use [be:t] for 'bait', and so
writing /bEt/ and /bet/ for their dialect would be the most sensible.

My understanding, which is only based on hearsay and controversy from this
list, is that English* dialects tend to have quality and
quantity/diphthongness important, but American dialects are more able to
do away with the quantity/diphthongness. OTOH, that might just be a
difference of tradition in how to write them.

*This might be a rhotic vs non-rhotic thing but I'm not sure.

(For my dialect, diphthongs have the non-phonemic length thing happening,
but long* and short pure vowels, surprisingly enough, don't. But because
the diphthongs are first and foremost diphthongs, and because I didn't
notice the difference between 'suit' and 'soon' until this discussion, I
wouldn't mark in the length unless doing a particularly broad
transcription.)

* Which mostly but non-exclusively descend from vowel+r combinations.

--
Tristan                  <kesuari@...>

Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still
be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
                -- Snoopy