Australian vowels - "zoo"
Larry G
listening to the accent. I find the way Australians pronounce vowels
fascinating.
One word I was particularly fascinated with and find hard to mimic is how
Steve Irwin pronounced the word "zoo". It seemed like there were two
variations of the "u" vowel happening there.
Any Aussies in the group care to tackle an IPA, or other, representation of
that one?
Larry
Areff
It might be something like [zuy], I think. There's this fronting of /w/
in various diphthongs, where the /w/ or /U/ is the second component of the
diphthong, in a number of commonly-heard British and Australian accents,
it seems to me. Something quite similar occurs in certain Southern US
accents. Indeed, there seems to me (AIJARA) to be a common vowel shift
among Australian (etc.), much of Southeastern US, and a good deal of
Southern England (esp. Cockney, Estuary and the like). Consider, for
example, the lowering of the /eI/ vowel, as in "g'day" (common AusE
greeting if the cinema is any guide). Slow it down several seconds and
you have a Southeastern US speaker saying the same thing.
--
Jonathan Jordan
news:c4sndq$2m8g91$1...@ID-201366.news.uni-berlin.de...
> Larry G wrote:
> > I was watching "the Croc Hunter" the other day and thoroughly
enjoyed
> > listening to the accent. I find the way Australians pronounce
vowels
> > fascinating.
You should try New Zealand.
> > One word I was particularly fascinated with and find hard to mimic
is how
> > Steve Irwin pronounced the word "zoo". It seemed like there were
two
> > variations of the "u" vowel happening there.
> >
> > Any Aussies in the group care to tackle an IPA, or other,
representation of
> > that one?
>
> It might be something like [zuy], I think. There's this fronting of
/w/
> in various diphthongs, where the /w/ or /U/ is the second component
of the
> diphthong, in a number of commonly-heard British and Australian
accents,
> it seems to me. Something quite similar occurs in certain Southern
US
> accents.
I think that in a lot of British accents, the whole vowel is fronted,
producing something like [u"] (which I think is my own pronunciation)
or [y], or maybe something slightly diphthongal like [I.y]. I'm not
sure what happens in AusE, though.
> Indeed, there seems to me (AIJARA) to be a common vowel shift
> among Australian (etc.), much of Southeastern US, and a good deal of
> Southern England (esp. Cockney, Estuary and the like). Consider,
for
> example, the lowering of the /eI/ vowel, as in "g'day" (common AusE
> greeting if the cinema is any guide). Slow it down several seconds
and
> you have a Southeastern US speaker saying the same thing.
That certainly fits with Labov's description of the Southern Shift.
I associate the lowering of (the first element of) /e/ with south-east
England to some extent, but especially with "broad" Australian English
("Strine") and Brummie. (Note that Brummie is not particularly
"southern" in some other respects - it uses a short [a] in "bath" and
tends towards [U] in "cut".)
The /u/-fronting thing isn't restricted to the South, though it is
quite noticeable in Estuary. It's also noticeable in Scouse, and
unlike in Estuary it happens there before /l/ as well, producing
things like [sky@l] for "school".
Jonathan
Peter Moylan
I see you're not getting any responses from Australians in this thread.
The problem is that our own pronunciation sounds "normal", so it's
hard to hear the variations. As far as I'm concerned, I pronounce the
vowel in "zoo" pretty much the same way I hear the vowels in "My name
is Sue, how do you do". There might be a little bit of a glide in
there, something like [zV"Uw].
I can say this much: I would feel deeply insulted if anyone thought
I spoke like Steve Irwin.
--
Peter Moylan Peter....@newcastle.edu.au
http://eepjm.newcastle.edu.au (OS/2 and eCS information and software)
Larry G
> Larry G infrared:
> >I was watching "the Croc Hunter" the other day and thoroughly enjoyed
> >listening to the accent. I find the way Australians pronounce vowels
> >fascinating.
> >
> >One word I was particularly fascinated with and find hard to mimic is how
> >Steve Irwin pronounced the word "zoo". It seemed like there were two
> >variations of the "u" vowel happening there.
> >
> >Any Aussies in the group care to tackle an IPA, or other, representation
of
> >that one?
>
> I see you're not getting any responses from Australians in this thread.
> The problem is that our own pronunciation sounds "normal", so it's
> hard to hear the variations. As far as I'm concerned, I pronounce the
> vowel in "zoo" pretty much the same way I hear the vowels in "My name
> is Sue, how do you do". There might be a little bit of a glide in
> there, something like [zV"Uw].
Yeah, that kind of represents it.
>
> I can say this much: I would feel deeply insulted if anyone thought
> I spoke like Steve Irwin.
Hehe, sorry. I know what you mean. I think it's kind of interesting. But,
I understand whenever I hear someone attempting to do an American accent,
and it comes out sounding rural Texan. The reason I'm fascinated with it is
that I can hear so many similarities with American Southern accents, even
though the two are of course very different.
There are many Australian accents I've heard from very British posh (Errol
Flynn is an Aussie) to very American sounding to that of Steve Irwin. Quite
a lot of variation actually from what I've heard. I'm surprised it isn't
more documented.
Larry
Peter Moylan
>There are many Australian accents I've heard from very British posh (Errol
>Flynn is an Aussie) to very American sounding to that of Steve Irwin. Quite
>a lot of variation actually from what I've heard. I'm surprised it isn't
>more documented.
In Australia - as in most other countries, I suppose - accent variation
has both a social component and a regional component, but what's
unusual about Australian English is that there's very little variation
from city to city. Even Australians have trouble guessing the origins
of other native-born Australians because there are so few regional
markers. The initial white settlement was primarily to a single
point (Sydney), unlike in the USA where different waves went to
different parts of the east coast, so there was an immediate "melting
pot" effect where multiple accents merged to form a lingua franca.
Within a few generations travel became easy enough to give us a
very mobile population. My own speech has been influenced by several
parts of the country, together with some foreign influence, and in
that respect I'm fairly typical.
The Macquarie Dictionary people have a project that attempts to map
regional variations, but as far as I can tell they're mapping only
the distribution of some words, which is different from mapping
accent.
The effect of social class is considerably greater, even though
we claim to have a classless society. I think linguists now distinguish
about four general layers, from "cultured" to "broad". The main
influence here is education rather than wealth, although I've noticed
that Toorak - one of the wealthiest and snobbiest suburbs in the
country - seems to have an accent that's considerably more "English"
than my own.
That much is documented. Something that's not as well documented,
as far as I know, is the variation in rural accents. It doesn't take
much travelling around the country to realise that there's a big
difference between rural accents and city accents. Furthermore,
the rural accents differ from region to region, although the city
accents don't (apart from some minor details).
A while back I had occasion to phone a cousin I hadn't seen since
childhood, and who lives in the town where my grandparents used
to live. I've moved about a lot, while he has lived in the same
small town all his life. I was immediately struck by the huge
difference between his speech and mine. It was almost like a
foreign language at first, but within a few seconds I was able to
adapt, because it was an accent I had known (but not spoken) in
my childhood. In fact, when I was a child I could tell the
difference between the accents of that small town and the next
town twenty miles down the road.
Sara Lorimer
> The effect of social class is considerably greater, even though
> we claim to have a classless society.
What is John Howard's accent?
--
SML
Dalg! Glidj! Blimlimlim!
http://pirate-women.com
Peter Moylan
>Peter Moylan wrote:
>
>> The effect of social class is considerably greater, even though
>> we claim to have a classless society.
>
>What is John Howard's accent?
At the end of the day, when all is said and done, I'd have to say
that he has a strong "John Howard" accent. OK, if you want to
put it into one of the standard boxes, I suppose it's "general
educated Australian"; but with a few rough edges that are very
noticeably Howardesque. When the radio comedians do a parody of
John Howard, they never have to explain who they're imitating.
For a slightly more upper-crust Australian English, listen to
our Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, the man born with a
silver foot in his mouth.
Rich Wales
> > One word I was particularly fascinated with and find hard
> > to mimic is how Steve Irwin pronounced the word "zoo".
"Areff" replied:
> It might be something like [zuy], I think.
My own perception is that this vowel sound starts out as an unrounded
low back vowel, then glides into an unrounded low front vowel.
In other words, it starts out kind of like "oo", but with relaxed and
partly open lips -- and then the tongue moves forward while the lips
remain in the same position.
This is similar to what Areff suggested, I think, but with loose lips.
Rich Wales ri...@richw.org http://www.richw.org
Rich Wales
> I can say this much: I would feel deeply insulted if
> anyone thought I spoke like Steve Irwin.
The most distinctive feature I've noticed in Steve Irwin's speech
(compared to other Australians I've known and heard) is that his
/a/ sound has noticeably tense, rounded lips. This also applies
to his pronunciation of the /aI/ diphthong -- making the pronoun
"I", in his dialect, sound almost like "oy" from a North American
perspective.
I could easily imagine a caricature of Steve Irwin saying some-
thing like, "Oy'd give moy loyf for moy crawcodoyles!" :-}
I have no idea if this particular feature sticks out in Steve
Irwin's speech as perceived by other Australians. (Peter, what
do you think?)
Robert Bannister
I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin, but I understand Britain is about
to be treated to "Kath and Kim". It's very funny, but I think the
pronunciations will have many people puzzled unless they use subtitles.
--
Rob Bannister
Rich Wales
> I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin . . . .
A short sample of Steve's speech can be found on his web site.
Go to the following page:
http://www.australiazoo.com.au/crocodile_hunter/about_steve_terri/index.html
and click on the "personal welcome message from Steve" link at
the bottom. The audio quality isn't great, but you'll get the
idea.
Sara Lorimer
> I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin, but I understand Britain is about
> to be treated to "Kath and Kim". It's very funny, but I think the
> pronunciations will have many people puzzled unless they use subtitles.
Sometimes the TV news here in the US will use subtitles when
interviewing Australians, Brits, Jamaicans, etc. (Usually "man in the
street" snippets -- not educated experts on whatever subject.) Does
Australian TV subtitle Americans?
Larry G
> Robert Bannister wrote:
>
> > I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin, but I understand Britain is about
> > to be treated to "Kath and Kim". It's very funny, but I think the
> > pronunciations will have many people puzzled unless they use subtitles.
>
> Sometimes the TV news here in the US will use subtitles when
> interviewing Australians, Brits, Jamaicans, etc. (Usually "man in the
> street" snippets -- not educated experts on whatever subject.) Does
> Australian TV subtitle Americans?
I think that's so strange when they do that with someone from Australia. It
seems clear enough to me, maybe excepting some of the abbreviated words.
On last season's Bachelor, the one with Meredith and Ian, they had her
meeting Ian's brother in New York. When he talked, the guy just seemed to
have a generic NY/NJ accent to me, and they subtitled him. I thought it was
ridiculous.
Later, Ian revealed that his parents were immigrants to Brazil (his father
American, his mother Swedish). It just goes to show you how much our
perceptions and prejudices color the language issue. Ian's brother sounded
like a guy from NYC or New Jersey to me, but because Portuguese was his
first language, subtitles were used thinking we wouldn't understand his
Brazilian accent. (???)
Larry
Robert Bannister
> Robert Bannister wrote:
>
>
>>I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin, but I understand Britain is about
>>to be treated to "Kath and Kim". It's very funny, but I think the
>>pronunciations will have many people puzzled unless they use subtitles.
>
>
> Sometimes the TV news here in the US will use subtitles when
> interviewing Australians, Brits, Jamaicans, etc. (Usually "man in the
> street" snippets -- not educated experts on whatever subject.) Does
> Australian TV subtitle Americans?
>
with an Australian Aboriginal woman who was speaking English - she was
hard to understand - we also get them occasionally for British people
with outlandish accents.
--
Rob Bannister
W Australia
Peter Moylan
I think you're right. It's hard to pin down exactly what his accent
is, but there does seem to be a bit of an "oy" in his "I" vowel.
To be fair, I should add that I haven't often heard him speaking.
Most of what I know about Steve Irwin comes from a recent
controversy where he was filmed feeding a crocodile while holding
his baby son. He got into as much trouble as that other idiot
who dangled a baby over a high balcony.
It often seems to happen that an Australian is well-known outside
the country, but hardly known to the Australian aue regulars. The
explanation for this lies in the phenomenon of TV snobbery that
exists in this country. We have two non-commercial TV networks
(ABC and SBS), and several commercial networks, and rarely do the
twain meet. The people who watch non-commercial TV find the
commercial offerings mindless and boring. On the other side, those
who like commercial TV won't even sample ABC or SBS because they
think they're too highbrow.
It was only several years after seeing "Neighbours" mentioned on
this newsgroup that I discovered that it was also shown in Australia?
Likewise, you'll find me almost entirely ignorant on the subject
of Kath & Kim; I watched one short snippet once, and that was enough
to put me off for a lifetime.
Robert Bannister
> It often seems to happen that an Australian is well-known outside
> the country, but hardly known to the Australian aue regulars.
I had never heard of Clive James until I went to England. I can't say
'discovering' him was a pleasant experience.
Re: TV snobbery - I just can't stand adverts. I don't dislike the
programmes on commercial TV, but I can't watch them. I'm sure the habit
of watching a show for 10 minutes or less between ad breaks is a cause
of Attention Deficit Disorder in kids.
--
Rob Bannister
Peter Moylan
>Peter Moylan wrote:
>
>> It often seems to happen that an Australian is well-known outside
>> the country, but hardly known to the Australian aue regulars.
>
>I had never heard of Clive James until I went to England. I can't say
>'discovering' him was a pleasant experience.
I didn't mind him; like the parson's egg, he was good in parts. It
did surprise me when someone pointed out that he was Australian.
I couldn't place his accent, but I wouldn't have thought it was
any sort of Australian.
>Re: TV snobbery - I just can't stand adverts. I don't dislike the
>programmes on commercial TV, but I can't watch them. I'm sure the habit
>of watching a show for 10 minutes or less between ad breaks is a cause
>of Attention Deficit Disorder in kids.
My wife is a fan of cop shows, which is one thing the commercial
producers do well. (Or so I'm told.) When she wants to watch one
on commercial TV she records it on videotape, which allows her to
skip over the ad breaks.
Last week one of the commercial stations showed "Flowers for
Algernon", and I wanted to see whether the film was as good as the
original story. It wasn't bad, but all those toilet breaks drove
me crazy. I don't know how some people manage to watch many films
unde those conditions. Perhaps that's the reason for the popularity
of the places that rent out videotapes and DVDs.
Re ADD: I've heard of some research that blames the medium rather
than the content. Apparently there's something about the light
emission from a TV tube that, unlike the reflected light from a matte
surface like a book, interferes with the brain's ability to
concentrate. Emotional content is retained, but facts just go in
one eye and out the other, so to speak. Because of this, TV is a very
good medium for advertising and political speeches, but absolutely
useless for educational material.
I've become very much aware of this on the occasions when I've
watched the TV news and my wife has missed it. When she asks what
was on the news, I find that I've forgotten almost all of it. The
news in newspapers, on the other hand, stays in my memory.
Dylan Nicholson
> "Sara Lorimer" <sl560_del...@columbia.edu> wrote in message ...
> > Robert Bannister wrote:
> >
> > > I've never heard or seen Steve Irwin, but I understand Britain is about
> > > to be treated to "Kath and Kim". It's very funny, but I think the
> > > pronunciations will have many people puzzled unless they use subtitles.
> >
> > Sometimes the TV news here in the US will use subtitles when
> > interviewing Australians, Brits, Jamaicans, etc. (Usually "man in the
> > street" snippets -- not educated experts on whatever subject.) Does
> > Australian TV subtitle Americans?
>
> I think that's so strange when they do that with someone from Australia. It
> seems clear enough to me, maybe excepting some of the abbreviated words.
Well my wife, having grown up largely in the US, and now having lived
here for 4 years, still claims to have trouble with some Australian
accents, although certainly less than she did when she first moved.
I don't think I've seen subtitles here for American speakers, but I
have for some NESB-speakers that I could understand just fine. There
are certainly native-English accents (usually from the northern parts
of the UK) I have more trouble with.
Dylan
Mike Lyle
> Larry G infrared:
> >I was watching "the Croc Hunter" the other day and thoroughly enjoyed
> >listening to the accent. I find the way Australians pronounce vowels
> >fascinating.
> >
> >One word I was particularly fascinated with and find hard to mimic is how
> >Steve Irwin pronounced the word "zoo". It seemed like there were two
> >variations of the "u" vowel happening there.
> >
> >Any Aussies in the group care to tackle an IPA, or other, representation of
> >that one?
>
> I see you're not getting any responses from Australians in this thread.
> The problem is that our own pronunciation sounds "normal", so it's
> hard to hear the variations. As far as I'm concerned, I pronounce the
> vowel in "zoo" pretty much the same way I hear the vowels in "My name
> is Sue, how do you do". There might be a little bit of a glide in
> there, something like [zV"Uw].
>
> I can say this much: I would feel deeply insulted if anyone thought
> I spoke like Steve Irwin.
As an expat, I find that Australian speech has changed a lot over the
years. The tendency to glide in extra vowels mentioned in the case of
Steve Urwin's "zoo" is a conspicuous example: some people's
realisation of the word "no" now often seems to contain three
successive vowel-sounds. In my youth it contained barely two!
Mike.
Rich Wales
> Well my wife, having grown up largely in the US, and
> now having lived here for 4 years, still claims to
> have trouble with some Australian accents, although
> certainly less than she did when she first moved.
The first time I saw Paul Hogan, on a TV ad for Australian tourism
in the US about 20 years ago, I had never heard of the man before
and assumed he had introduced himself as "Paul Hagen". It wasn't
until quite sometime later that I discovered my error.
Donna Richoux
> Does anyone really talk like 'Prue and Trude' I wonder:
>
> http://www.abc.net.au/kathandkim/threw.htm
It's nothing like I ever heard.
I see it's from an Australian sitcom. Our Oz participants can probably
explain the regional and class associations. I found someone's note on
the Web:
Jane Turner and Gina Riley both play double roles in
this episode. As well as playing Kath and Kim, they
also play the two shop keepers Prue and Trude, who
are based on characters from some of Jane and Gina's
skits in "Something Stupid".
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Peter Moylan
>Likewise, you'll find me almost entirely ignorant on the subject
>of Kath & Kim; I watched one short snippet once, and that was enough
>to put me off for a lifetime.
Yesterday was apparently the date of the annual love-fest where
Australian TV producers get together and congratulate one another.
Or maybe it's done by votes from the readers of some TV magazine;
I never bothered to check the mechanism. Anyway, I heard on the
radio this morning that the two top comedies for the year were
"Kath and Kim" and "CNNNN". That doesn't mean that comedy is dead
here, because there were some good comedy shows this year. It's
probably just a flaw in the voting process.
CNNNN, as you can probably guess, is a parody of CNN. I enjoyed it
for the first couple of episodes, but after a while it got boring.
It was too much like the real thing.
Richard Bollard
Moylan) wrote:
>Yesterday was apparently the date of the annual love-fest where
>Australian TV producers get together and congratulate one another.
>Or maybe it's done by votes from the readers of some TV magazine;
>I never bothered to check the mechanism. Anyway, I heard on the
>radio this morning that the two top comedies for the year were
>"Kath and Kim" and "CNNNN". That doesn't mean that comedy is dead
>here, because there were some good comedy shows this year. It's
>probably just a flaw in the voting process.
>
There are two types of awards. The readers of TV Week (all 17 of
them?) vote for the popular awards whereas the industry vote for the
peer awards. The ABC only ever wins the peer awards.
If you believe the hype, the greatest thing you can get in Australia
is a "gold logie". No relation to golden staph.
--
Richard Bollard
Canberra, Australia