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"o" before dark "l" in British English
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Guy Barry
Oct 6, 2012, 4:57:13 AM10/6/12
to
We've had quite a long discussion on alt.usage.english about this. I'm a
speaker from southern England with a slight London accent. I've always used
a vowel in words like "hold" and "roll" that can probably best be
transcribed as [A.U] - it's the same as the vowel in British "hot" but with
a [w]-glide at the end. This pronunciation appears to be common amongst RP
speakers now, and even younger members of the Royal Family - see here:
http://phonetic-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/evidence-of-vows.html
Dictionaries and pronunciation guides, however, continue to give the older
pronunciation /@U/ in these words, as in "hose". The presumption in the
cited article is that [A.U] should be regarded as an allophone of this
vowel.
Is this the most appropriate transcription? I make no distinction between
the vowel in "hold" and the one in "solve". Yet the first is conventionally
transcribed as /@U/, the second as /A./. Is it not more accurate to suggest
that my dialect has a single vowel written "o" before a dark "l"? It
actually came as a surprise to me that these two vowels were considered
different. In certain words like "bolt" and "troll" it seems that either
pronunciation is deemed acceptable anyway. Have the two vowels not merged
for many RP speakers?
--
Guy Barry
speaker from southern England with a slight London accent. I've always used
a vowel in words like "hold" and "roll" that can probably best be
transcribed as [A.U] - it's the same as the vowel in British "hot" but with
a [w]-glide at the end. This pronunciation appears to be common amongst RP
speakers now, and even younger members of the Royal Family - see here:
http://phonetic-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/evidence-of-vows.html
Dictionaries and pronunciation guides, however, continue to give the older
pronunciation /@U/ in these words, as in "hose". The presumption in the
cited article is that [A.U] should be regarded as an allophone of this
vowel.
Is this the most appropriate transcription? I make no distinction between
the vowel in "hold" and the one in "solve". Yet the first is conventionally
transcribed as /@U/, the second as /A./. Is it not more accurate to suggest
that my dialect has a single vowel written "o" before a dark "l"? It
actually came as a surprise to me that these two vowels were considered
different. In certain words like "bolt" and "troll" it seems that either
pronunciation is deemed acceptable anyway. Have the two vowels not merged
for many RP speakers?
--
Guy Barry
Peter T. Daniels
Oct 6, 2012, 7:53:49 AM10/6/12
to
On Oct 6, 4:57 am, "Guy Barry" <guy.ba...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> We've had quite a long discussion on alt.usage.english about this. I'm a
> speaker from southern England with a slight London accent. I've always used
> a vowel in words like "hold" and "roll" that can probably best be
> transcribed as [A.U] - it's the same as the vowel in British "hot" but with
> a [w]-glide at the end. This pronunciation appears to be common amongst RP
> speakers now, and even younger members of the Royal Family - see here:
>
> http://phonetic-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/evidence-of-vows.html
>
> Dictionaries and pronunciation guides, however, continue to give the older
> pronunciation /@U/ in these words, as in "hose". The presumption in the
> cited article is that [A.U] should be regarded as an allophone of this
> vowel.
If you have this vowel always and only before /l/, then it most
> We've had quite a long discussion on alt.usage.english about this. I'm a
> speaker from southern England with a slight London accent. I've always used
> a vowel in words like "hold" and "roll" that can probably best be
> transcribed as [A.U] - it's the same as the vowel in British "hot" but with
> a [w]-glide at the end. This pronunciation appears to be common amongst RP
> speakers now, and even younger members of the Royal Family - see here:
>
> http://phonetic-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/evidence-of-vows.html
>
> Dictionaries and pronunciation guides, however, continue to give the older
> pronunciation /@U/ in these words, as in "hose". The presumption in the
> cited article is that [A.U] should be regarded as an allophone of this
> vowel.
certainly is an allophone of some phoneme, with whose most frequent
pronunciation it is in complementary distribution.
> Is this the most appropriate transcription? I make no distinction between
> the vowel in "hold" and the one in "solve". Yet the first is conventionally
> transcribed as /@U/, the second as /A./. Is it not more accurate to suggest
> that my dialect has a single vowel written "o" before a dark "l"? It
> actually came as a surprise to me that these two vowels were considered
> different. In certain words like "bolt" and "troll" it seems that either
> pronunciation is deemed acceptable anyway. Have the two vowels not merged
> for many RP speakers?
vowel, not the "solve" vowel in AmE -- and "solve" and "hot" have the
"father" vowel.
anal...@hotmail.com
Oct 6, 2012, 10:04:52 AM10/6/12
to
On Oct 6, 4:57 am, "Guy Barry" <guy.ba...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
shouldn't we drop quaint notions like RP? Isn't SSBE (Standard
Southern Britsih English) a better term?
I remember an American(?) interviewer interviewing Jane Goodall (who
did some famous studies of chimpanzees) finding it humorous to hear
her say "Nottinghamshire". Almost anything to do with "proper"
Britain has become a source of hilarity now - so I say RIP RP (and
they say the younger Royals (I didn't have the heart to put quotes
around "Royals" ) don't speak SSBE anyways).
Dingbat
Oct 12, 2012, 3:59:10 PM10/12/12
to
On Oct 6, 10:04 am, "analys...@hotmail.com" <analys...@hotmail.com>
wrote:
wrote:
> I remember an American(?) interviewer interviewing Jane Goodall (who
> did some famous studies of chimpanzees) finding it humorous to hear
> her say "Nottinghamshire".
>
Notnemsher?
> did some famous studies of chimpanzees) finding it humorous to hear
> her say "Nottinghamshire".
>
anal...@hotmail.com
Oct 20, 2012, 4:24:20 PM10/20/12
to
what the American interviewer found unintentionally humorous was
Goodall's unawareness that to non-Brits in this day and age
"Nottinghamshire" sounds like something out of Tolkien.
Is that you Ranjit? - welcome back - long time no posts.
Peter T. Daniels
Oct 20, 2012, 4:30:04 PM10/20/12
to
On Oct 20, 4:24 pm, "analys...@hotmail.com" <analys...@hotmail.com>
wrote:
Have you actually never heard of Robin Hood?
wrote:
pauljk
Oct 21, 2012, 1:20:34 AM10/21/12
to
<anal...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3177128a-b190-45a8...@d17g2000vbv.googlegroups.com...
"non-Brits", and even that is not generally true.
pjk
Dingbat
Oct 25, 2012, 7:19:49 PM10/25/12
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