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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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USns what knows how ta tawk doesn't so much minds ifn y'all leave out pernouncin the Rs, jus don' be puttin them in there where they don' blong when y'all're writin down how somethin is pernounced.
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Joined: Nov 2007
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
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USns what knows how ta tawk doesn't so much minds ifn y'all leave out pernouncin the Rs, jus don' be puttin them in there where they don' blong when y'all're writin down how somethin is pernounced. If I understood you, Kipling is a great example of the practice being appealed against. Like many non-rhotics he would write "ar" for the long a sound similar to the one in "father" when transliterating Hindustani words with "आ" in them although since he grew up speaking Urdu, he would probably have been thinking of the Urdu equivalent which I don't know. He seems to do this only when the transliteration might otherwise leave the length of the "a" unclear, or perhaps only when the Moon was waxing gibbous and the wind was blowing from the southeast, I carn't be sure.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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The practice is close to ubiquitous in the non-rhotic world. It's even bullied its way in to official transliterations of some languages. An example is the standard spelling of the Korean family name 팍, which could easily be transliterated Pahk with no confusion at all, is, instead, transliterated Park, and frequently pronounced that way in the rhotic-speaking anglophone world.
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Joined: Oct 2005
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addict
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addict
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I call it the Laura Norder phenonmenon.
Based on experience in life and on several forums (esp. BBC Radio 4's Word of Mouth), I have come have the following "totally unscientific personal opinions/assumptions". NB: In no way, am I saying that this is factual, it is just a personal opinion that I built up over time and limited specific observations.
1) Americans are taught that their local dialects/pronunciations are wrong, shameful, etc. I consider this in many ways to be a bad thing, except...
1a) Most Americans regardless of how "oddly" they pronounce a word, will agree (to some extent) on what the "standard" pronunciation(s) is(are), what it rhymes with, and if asked to write it phonetically would come up with something similar. My father (when speaking naturally) says "go 'round the carner to put out the far", but he would be embarassed if you pointed out that he had not said corner and fire and would never say that there is an ah sound in either.
1b) It possible to have a semi-reasonable discussion of pronunciation among most Americans where you can at least agree on what you disagree about.
2) British people are taught that their local dialects/pronunciations are something to be proud of, which in many ways is a good thing, except...
2a) Some (few?) British people will defend to the death that their local one is the correct standard and will not allow the existence of difference yet, much like the Red Queen, insist that everyone else's dialect is also correct.
2b) Some (few?) British people are very difficult to discuss pronunciation with as it is their way or the highway even if they agree that a difference could exist but only "in theory". For example:
2b) i) Law and lore rhyme and should be written the same phonetically - lor. (hence law and order becomes Laura Norder)
2b) ii) The sound represented by schwa has an r as an integral part of it, i.e. the R-colored vowel (aka schwer) is not schwa and a hint of r sound - it is schwa itself! (It was the presenter of the program who is a professor of English who insisted on this point.)
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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2b) i) Law and lore rhyme and should be written the same phonetically - lor. (hence law and order becomes Laura Norder)
2b) ii) The sound represented by schwa has an r as an integral part of it, i.e. the R-colored vowel (aka schwer) is not schwa and a hint of r sound - it is schwa itself! (It was the presenter of the program who is a professor of English who insisted on this point.) say what?
formerly known as etaoin...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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British people are taught that their local dialects / pronunciations are something to be proud of
This is the opposite of my observation. I have known quite a few from across the pond who had it hammered into them in grammar school and beyond that their accent and dialect were things to be ashamed of mightily.
Trying to describe how a word is pronounced by resorting to rhymes is a less than optimal solution. For me, cot and caught to not rhyme, but for many they do. Same with pin and pen (for me). The best we can hope for in transcribing pronunciations is to use the IPA in conjunction with a detailed phonology of the language / dialect in question. All the rest leads to madness.
My dialect has both a schwa (e.g., sofa /'soʊfə/) and an r-colored schwa (e.g., finger /'fɪŋgɚ/. They are quite distinct. Cf. the popular transcriptions of US um and UK erm which are both basically /əm/.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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the Laura Norder phenonmenon Oh, HA! That's funny! But--[skuh-WAWWWWK]! Law and lore do NOT rhyme, any more than all and awl do, i__ega_dless of the added r. And I shall defend to the death my right to say so.
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Carpal Tunnel
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though I hear gararge frequently, I can't remember ever hearing "lor" for law.
all and awl are much, much closer.
formerly known as etaoin...
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Feb 2008
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the Laura Norder phenonmenon Oh, HA! That's funny! But--[skuh-WAWWWWK]! Law and lore do NOT rhyme, any more than all and awl do, i__ega_dless of the added r. And I shall defend to the death my right to say so. You may, but no one will understand you doing it, hahahaha 
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Joined: Feb 2008
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old hand
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old hand
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though I hear gararge frequently, I can't remember ever hearing "lor" for law. Australians add an 'r' to the pronunciation of 'law' if it is followed by a word beginning with a vowel. There's a name for it, it's called the linking R I think? As in the example given, Law and Order. We really do say it "Laura Norder" (dropping the 'd' in 'and' and moving the 'n' to the beginning of the next word as well). We do the same with the word 'drawing',' pronouncing it as 'droring'. The Schwa sound is very important in Australian English, but even more important in Kiwi. They pronounce pretty much every short 'i' sound as 'ə'. So for them ship and sheep are not homophones, though for Aussies they are much closer, not quite the same, but if an Aussie says "ship" they are likely to be misheard by a Kiwi as "sheep". But then Kiwis think everything revolves around sheep anyway. I never realised that "um" is pronounced "əm" (or "erm" in non-rhotic British transliteration) by Americans. I always thought it was "um" (that is, IPA "ɶm" or "ɑm"). That's how we say the exclamation meaning, "err, ahh, I'm not sure."
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