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Re: OT: Latin subject-verb agreement

From:T. A. McLeay <conlang@...>
Date:Sunday, December 23, 2007, 21:51
Jeff Rollin wrote:
> In the last episode, (On Thursday 13 December 2007 21:24:43), T. A. McLeay > wrote:
>> Likewise, it's worth noting that "aren't" could develop from "amn't" by >> purely phonetic processes in non-rhotic dialects---the orthography, as >> ever, misleads---and then be generalised to rhotic ones, much as >> Americans put an /r/ in Burma and Myanmar that was never there before. >> >> -- >> Tristan. > > AFAIK the /r/ in "Myanmar" and the first /r/ in "Burma" have always been there > (for people with rhotic accents, anyhoo); I suppose it's possible some people > pronounce "Burma" as "Burmar" though.
The Burmese words for "Burma" and "Myanmar" contain no /r/.* For instance, "Myanmar" is "Myanma" in Burmese, and "Burma" is "Bama". The <r> represents a low tone because low tones are long and long /a:/ is represented in non-rhotic English as <ar>. Americans pronounce an /r/ that does not exist in the original word, because it is based on an orthography not intended for them. [*]: Historically the my- of "Myanmar" was mr-