Re: A bunch of phonological questions

On Sun, 18 Sep 2005 18:15:31 -0400, Roger Mills <rfmilly@...> wrote:
>
> > > Quoting John Vertical <johnvertical@...>:
> > >
> > > > Hi all, here're some unrelated phonological & phonetical questions
> > > > I've thought up lately. I'll be thankful for any answers...
> > > >
> > > > 1. Low vowels
> > > > Do any natlangs contrast the three of /& a A/? Yes, a couple of
> > > > conlangs do that, but I've never heard of any natlang examples?
> > >
> it's possible that Bostonian English has all three phonetically, but I
> suspect not contrastively:
>
> & in pack, mat etc.
>
> But the others are probably allophones of a single sound:
> a in park, mart, car etc (conditioned by the r)
> A in father, rather
Some Deep South have (used to have?)
[a] in Mike [ma:k]
[a_"] in Mark [ma_":k]
[A] in mock [mA:k]
The vowel in pack is, of course, a phonetic diphthong for those speakers.

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