From Tonight Show
DJ
mauve." intend to make fun of?
Thanks in advance.
Carmen L. Abruzzi
----------
In article <ip7D6.109320$Wb6.3...@news.hananet.net>, "DJ"
<king...@usa.net> wrote:
>What does "A gay husband actually knows the difference between taupe and
>mauve." intend to make fun of?
>
>
A stereotype of gay men as being interested in interior
decorating, which a "manly man" would never express an interest
in.
>Thanks in advance.
>
You're welcome in retrospect.
mplsray
"Carmen L. Abruzzi" <n...@mit.edu> wrote in message
news:9bj120$ds$1...@woodrow.ucdavis.edu...
I think there is a bit more to it than that: Gay men are thought to be
effeminate. The average woman in the United States (and I presume in Great
Britain and many other English-speaking countries) does indeed use more
color words than the average man. The stereotypical effeminate gay man would
be expected to make the same extended use of color words.
Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of _mouth_
instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
Recently, Jay interviewed Paul Hogan, of _Crocodile Dundee_ fame. Hogan made
a passing reference to buffaloes in Australia. Jay looked puzzled and said,
"There are no buffaloes in Australia, are they?" Hogan mentioned how he
"hypnotized" one in _Crocodile Dundee._ "You didn't even see the movie, did
you?" Jay continued to look puzzled.
My guess is that when Paul Hogan said _buffaloes,_ the only animal this
brought to Jay Leno's mind was the _North American buffalo_ (_Bison bison_).
--
Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
Mike Barnes
>In article <ip7D6.109320$Wb6.3...@news.hananet.net>, "DJ"
><king...@usa.net> wrote:
>>What does "A gay husband actually knows the difference between taupe and
>>mauve." intend to make fun of?
>>
>A stereotype of gay men as being interested in interior
>decorating, which a "manly man" would never express an interest
>in.
Or even external decorating.
--
Mike Barnes
Dennis Bathory-Kitsz
>
> What does "A gay husband actually knows the difference between taupe and
> mauve." intend to make fun of?
Answer already provided by Carmen. But I noticed Leno pronounced it
"muave" -- deliberate to make sure he appeared 'manly'?
Dennis
Mark Brader
> Recently, Jay interviewed Paul Hogan, of _Crocodile Dundee_ fame. Hogan made
> a passing reference to buffaloes in Australia. Jay looked puzzled and said,
> "There are no buffaloes in Australia, are they?" Hogan mentioned how he
> "hypnotized" one in _Crocodile Dundee._ "You didn't even see the movie, did
> you?" Jay continued to look puzzled.
>
> My guess is that when Paul Hogan said _buffaloes,_ the only animal this
> brought to Jay Leno's mind was the _North American buffalo_ (_Bison bison_).
Makes sense.
By chance (because it was right after Headlines and I haven't reused
the tape yet, and I have a cold) I have a tape of this bit at hand,
so for the edification of the newsgroup I present the relevant words:
LENO: Now, I was... you know, I always assumed Crocodile Dundee was a
character you had had for years and years in the back of your head.
But this was not the original name of the character, was it? You
had some others.
Hogan: Oh no, he had... his working title was Buffalo Jones.
LENO [sounding somewhat incredulous]: Buffalo Jones?
Hogan: Only because it was... I thought he was going to be, like, somewhere
between Buffalo Bill and Indiana Jones.
LENO: Yeah.
Hogan: But that was never going to be his name.
LENO: Well, there any buffalo in Australia?
Hogan: Oh yeah.
LENO: Oh, there are buffalo in [quieter] Australia? Shows what I know.
Hogan: Yeah. He hypnotizes them in the movie, right?
[Pause, as Leno presumably tries to remember the scene; audience
starts to laugh.]
Hogan: Never saw it, did you?
LENO [very quietly]: Huh?
Hogan [emphatic]: Never saw it!
LENO [quietly]: Why don't you try...
Hogan: Oh, what a mate you are!
[Bigger laugh.]
LENO [recovering]: No, no, I did see the movie! But it was a while ago!
Hogan: Oh, yeah, you were only a kid then.
LENO: I was a kid then, that's it, that's what it was!
--
Mark Brader, Toronto | I still remember the first time his reality check
m...@vex.net | bounced. -- Darlene Richards
R.N. Elliott
>
> Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of _mouth_
> instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
I did notice the misprononciation. However, to my ear, the word they
used rhymed with the first syllable of poverty and not with mouth. But
then, I'm in Canada where, I'm told, our "out" sounds like "boot" to the
American ear. To my ear, there is no word in the English language with
which the American "out" rhymes.
Ain't English wonderful?
N.
John Holmes
"mplsray" <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote in message
news:9bjjs...@enews2.newsguy.com...
>
> Recently, Jay interviewed Paul Hogan, of _Crocodile Dundee_ fame.
Hogan made
> a passing reference to buffaloes in Australia. Jay looked puzzled and
said,
> "There are no buffaloes in Australia, are they?" Hogan mentioned how
he
> "hypnotized" one in _Crocodile Dundee._ "You didn't even see the
movie, did
> you?" Jay continued to look puzzled.
Sadly I have to report that the buffalo (Charley, I think was his name)
that appeared in the film passed to his eternal reward* just a couple of
weeks ago.
*being stuffed and put in a museum.
--
Regards,
John.
ref
> mplsray wrote:
> >
> > Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> > mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of _mouth_
> > instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
>
> I did notice the misprononciation. However, to my ear, the word they
> used rhymed with the first syllable of poverty and not with mouth.
Well, this would be very puzzling, but maybe it isn't. Isn't mplsray from
Minnesota? And you're from Canada. We know (from watching Brittany
on _Big Brother_ last summer) that the Minnesota /aU/ of
"mouth" is very unusual, in that they use a central to back vowel as the
first element of the diphthong [AU], while most Americans use a front
vowel [a] or [&]. This will remind many Americans of the peculiar
Canadian diphthong used in "mouth", which also has a non-front vowel for
its first element, but they use something like [@U] or [VU], which is
where the aboot/aboat comes from.
Jay Leno is probably a cot/caught merging speaker, as he
is a native of Eastern Massachusetts, and has not eliminated all
traces of that regional accent from his speech. I would guess that Kevin
Eubanks, an African-American from Philadelphia, is a CINC speaker.
From all this I conclude the following: Jay probably said /mA.v/
and Kevin probably said /mOv/, and they probably both used a vowel
somewhere around [A.]. You heard that as your merged cot/caught vowel (I
think the merged vowel in Canada tends to be a rounded back vowel, as it
often is in Eastern Massachusetts). Ray naturally heard it as his "mouth"
diphthong which, by hypothesis, involves the low back vowel as its first
element. Note that a naive American would naturally pronounce mauve as
either /mA.v/ (in CIC accents, where /A./ represents the merged vowel)
or as /mOv/ (in CINC accents, where /O/ represents the vowel of "caught")
because of the general rule, violated by "mauve", that <au> should be
pronounced with the "caught" vowel.
> To my ear, there is no word in the English language with
> which the American "out" rhymes.
Eh? American "out" rhymes with: bout, about, kraut, clout, drought,
doubt, flout, gout, lout, out, pout, rout, scout, stout, spout, sprout,
tout, trout, as these are pronounced in American accents.
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of
> _mouth_ instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
I didn't hear it, but is it possible that they used the vowel of
"moth", /mOv/? That's the one I'd use, and it's the first one listed
in MWCD/ol.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |The General Theorem of Usenet
1501 Page Mill Road, Building 1U |Information: If you really want to
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |know the definitive answer, post
|the wrong information, and wait for
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |someone to come by and explain in
(650)857-7572 |excruciating detail precisely how
|wrong you are.
| Eric The Read
Mark Barratt
>[...] Note that a naive American would naturally pronounce mauve as
>either /mA.v/ (in CIC accents, where /A./ represents the merged vowel)
>or as /mOv/ (in CINC accents, where /O/ represents the vowel of "caught")
>because of the general rule, violated by "mauve", that <au> should be
>pronounced with the "caught" vowel.
I thought /A./ was used to represent the short 'o' in RP 'dog', and
that this sound did not occur in American accents. I suppose that,
since you're defining your use of it, you're not wrong, but wouldn't
another symbol be a better choice?
>> To my ear, there is no word in the English language with
>> which the American "out" rhymes.
>
>Eh? American "out" rhymes with: bout, about, kraut, clout, drought,
>doubt, flout, gout, lout, out, pout, rout, scout, stout, spout, sprout,
>tout, trout, as these are pronounced in American accents.
I'm glad to hear that 'out' rhymes with itself - the alternative might
involve serious brain strain.
mplsray
"ref" <rfon...@wesleyan.edu> wrote in message
news:Pine.GSO.3.95.101041...@mail.wesleyan.edu...
Sorry to pour cold water on your theory, but I am from Central Illinois,
though I have lived in Minneapolis since 1974. I still find people here who
tell me that they think I have a southern accent (by which they mean an
accent of that area which once constituted the Confederate States of
America). I once met a woman here who was originally from the state of
Virginia, and who thought that I spoke with a southern accent.
I don't think I do, in face, have a southern accent, but I can't deny that
many others have expressed that opinion.
I am quite certain that Jay Leno pronounced _mauve_ with the vowel of
_mouth,_ and that Kevin Eubanks did the same.
ref
> "ref" <rfon...@wesleyan.edu> wrote in message
> news:Pine.GSO.3.95.101041...@mail.wesleyan.edu...
> > On Wed, 18 Apr 2001, R.N. Elliott wrote:
> >
> > > mplsray wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> > > > mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of
> _mouth_
> > > > instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
> > >
> > > I did notice the misprononciation. However, to my ear, the word they
> > > used rhymed with the first syllable of poverty and not with mouth.
> >
> > Well, this would be very puzzling, but maybe it isn't. Isn't mplsray from
> > Minnesota? And you're from Canada.
[self-snipping the remainder of my bogus analysis]
> Sorry to pour cold water on your theory, but I am from Central Illinois,
> though I have lived in Minneapolis since 1974. I still find people here who
> tell me that they think I have a southern accent (by which they mean an
> accent of that area which once constituted the Confederate States of
> America). I once met a woman here who was originally from the state of
> Virginia, and who thought that I spoke with a southern accent.
>
> I don't think I do, in face, have a southern accent, but I can't deny that
> many others have expressed that opinion.
I've heard some Indianapolis accents that sounded very Southern-like to
me, but I think these were people with roots in southern Indiana. I've
only knowingly spoken to a few people from central or southern Illinois
and I'm not sure I've noticed the same thing. It's pretty clear that the
Chicago region belongs to a different accent/dialect group than the rest
of the state.
> I am quite certain that Jay Leno pronounced _mauve_ with the vowel of
> _mouth,_ and that Kevin Eubanks did the same.
I wish I had heard it.
ref
> ref <rfon...@wesleyan.edu> wrote:
>
> >[...] Note that a naive American would naturally pronounce mauve as
> >either /mA.v/ (in CIC accents, where /A./ represents the merged vowel)
> >or as /mOv/ (in CINC accents, where /O/ represents the vowel of "caught")
> >because of the general rule, violated by "mauve", that <au> should be
> >pronounced with the "caught" vowel.
>
> I thought /A./ was used to represent the short 'o' in RP 'dog', and
> that this sound did not occur in American accents. I suppose that,
> since you're defining your use of it, you're not wrong, but wouldn't
> another symbol be a better choice?
This has been a source of great confusion.
/A./ is indeed used to represent the short 'o' phoneme of RP "dog", and in
closely related accents (other England English accents, Australian, etc.).
It happens also to be the case that at least in RP (AIUI) the vowel
actually used, phonetically speaking, in "short o" is in the neighborhood
of [A.]. ([A.] is a low, back, rounded vowel.)
/A./ is not conventionally used to represent any vowel in the phonemic
transcription of *CINC* American accents, or so it seems. This is not to
say that the phonetic [A.] does not occur in American CINC accents. It
does -- typically used, not in "short o", but for the "aw" vowel used in
"caught" (distinct from "cot"). In other CINC accents "aw" is realized as
another vowel -- typically one closer to the vowel of RP "caught" (or
between [A.] and that vowel, [O]), and sometimes even as a vowel higher
than [O], as Daniel McGrath recently noted. In all these CINC accents it
appears to be a convention that the distinct "caught" vowel phoneme is
transcribed as /O/ (if IPA is used at all). I do not know whether it is
or ever was the case that phonetic [O] is the most frequently occurring
realization of the "caught" vowel in the totality of American CINC
accents. The convention of using /O/ to represent the phoneme would seem
to suggest this, but I have some reason to suspect that it might not be
so. In Postwar Prestige Standard (CINC) it is certainly the case that
only a low back vowel can be used in "caught", and using [O] would
immediately take an accent out of the PPS-CINC sphere. (The PPS-CINC
"caught" vowel seems to vary from unrounded back [A] to a slightly rounded
back [A.].) Of course, many Americans who use [O] in "caught" go on to
lead productive lives, and many of them have quite impressive careers;
don't get the wrong idea.
In the materials on US accents I've looked at, particularly in the nice
text by J.C. Wells of Estuary English fame, I got the sense that there is
no single convention for phonemically transcribing the merged cot/caught
vowel in the totality of CIC accents. Apparently the prudent thing to do
is to pick, for a particular accent group, the symbol that corresponds to
the phonetic value with which the merged cot/caught vowel is most often
realized. In one of the main CIC regions of the country, Eastern New
England, the merged vowel is typically realized as something closest to
[A.], and so it makes sense to use /A./ to represent it phonemically.
(Same goes for Canadian English.) In some Western CIC accents [A.] is
used, but in many others the merged vowel is most often an unrounded back
[A] or a centralized [A] (in the latter case it sounds exactly like
PPS-CINC "cot"; I think in PPS-CIC the general rule is to use this
centralized vowel).
I would say that the vowel I use in "dog" is like a lengthened, less
rounded version of the vowel heard in RP "dog".
Alec "Skitt" P.
>
> > I am quite certain that Jay Leno pronounced _mauve_ with the vowel of
> > _mouth,_ and that Kevin Eubanks did the same.
>
> I wish I had heard it.
I heard it, and Raymond is right.
--
Skitt (in SF Bay Area) http://i.am/skitt/
I speak English well -- I learn it from a book!
-- Manuel of "Fawlty Towers" (he's from Barcelona).
Donna Richoux
> "ref" <rfon...@wesleyan.edu> wrote in message
> news:Pine.GSO.3.95.101041...@mail.wesleyan.edu...
> > On Wed, 18 Apr 2001, mplsray wrote:
> >
> > > I am quite certain that Jay Leno pronounced _mauve_ with the vowel of
> > > _mouth,_ and that Kevin Eubanks did the same.
> >
> > I wish I had heard it.
>
> I heard it, and Raymond is right.
Perhaps his mental model was German, then, instead of French. Like Braun
and Auschwitz.
--
Best --- Donna Richoux
ecubero
_grove_.
At the time, I thought that Eubanks was repeating Leno's mispronunciation of
the word because he was unfamiliar with it and assumed that Leno's
pronunciation was correct.
"Evan Kirshenbaum" <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
news:usnj6u...@hpl.hp.com...
mplsray
"ecubero" <ecu...@rocketmail.com> wrote in message
news:9bl6qu$9skdv$1...@ID-62206.news.dfncis.de...
> To me their pronunciation of mauve had the vowel I use in _stove_ or
> _grove_.
> At the time, I thought that Eubanks was repeating Leno's mispronunciation
of
> the word because he was unfamiliar with it and assumed that Leno's
> pronunciation was correct.
>
> "Evan Kirshenbaum" <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
> news:usnj6u...@hpl.hp.com...
> : "mplsray" <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> writes:
> :
> : > Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> : > mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of
> : > _mouth_ instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
> :
> : I didn't hear it, but is it possible that they used the vowel of
> : "moth", /mOv/? That's the one I'd use, and it's the first one listed
> : in MWCD/ol.
> :
I would not have noticed it if Leno had pronounced it with the vowel in
_moth,_ since that is in fact how _I_ pronounce it.
It turns out that the pronunciation with that vowel, as opposed to the _o_
in _stove,_ is a relatively rare one. I consulted several dictionaries and
was able to find it only in The Random House Webster's College Dictionary,
Webster's Third, and Merriam Webster's Collegiate, at www.m-w.com . The fact
that it is shown as the first pronunciation in Merriam Webster's Collegiate
means nothing: Unless a pronunciation is preceded by the word _also,_ it is
considered to be as commonly used as other pronunciations which accompany
it.
In fact, in Webster's Third, the pronunciation with the _o_ in _stove_ is
shown first and is followed by the word _also_ and then the other
pronunciation. I don't know why the Collegiate edition did not follow suit.
Interestingly enough, I speak French, but it did not occur to me to
pronounce _mauve_ in the French manner, even after having last Tuesday
discussed with a friend in a French discussion group the French word
_guimauve,_ "marsh mallow (the plant _Althaea officinalis_)" which is formed
from the word _mauve,_ "mallow." The color got its name, according to
Webster's Second (that is, Webster's New International Dictionary of the
English Language, 2nd edition), "from the similarity of the color to that of
the petals of common mallow, _Malva sylvestris,_"
_Guimauve_ is listed in the OED2, although it's preceded by the symbol ||,
meaning "not naturalized, alien."
ref
> To me their pronunciation of mauve had the vowel I use in _stove_ or
> _grove_.
> At the time, I thought that Eubanks was repeating Leno's mispronunciation of
> the word because he was unfamiliar with it and assumed that Leno's
> pronunciation was correct.
I think the only pronunciation being discussed here that can definitely be
called a "mispronunciation" is the "mouth" one, /maUv/. MW gives, in this
order, /mOv/ /moUv/ . /O/ is the vowel of "caught" (in CINC accents), and
/oU/ is the vowel of "stove".
We could end it there, except we can't. The official guidelines of
Postwar Prestige Standard call for the use of the "stove" vowel only.
Moreover, two other online dictionaries give only the "stove"
pronunciation: Cambridge (representing, I think, British RP and
half-understood American norms), and AHD4 (representing postwar American
norms).
R H Draney
>
> > mplsray wrote:
> > >
> > > Did you notice that Leno and his bandleader Kevin Eubanks _both_
> > > mispronounced _mauve_? They pronounced it with the vowel sound of
_mouth_
> > > instead of the vowel sound of _stove._
> >
> > I did notice the misprononciation. However, to my ear, the word they
> > used rhymed with the first syllable of poverty and not with mouth.
>
> is a native of Eastern Massachusetts, and has not eliminated all
> traces of that regional accent from his speech. I would guess that Kevin
> Eubanks, an African-American from Philadelphia, is a CINC speaker.
>
> From all this I conclude the following: Jay probably said /mA.v/
> and Kevin probably said /mOv/, and they probably both used a vowel
> somewhere around [A.]. You heard that as your merged cot/caught vowel (I
> think the merged vowel in Canada tends to be a rounded back vowel, as it
> often is in Eastern Massachusetts). Ray naturally heard it as his "mouth"
> diphthong which, by hypothesis, involves the low back vowel as its first
> element. Note that a naive American would naturally pronounce mauve as
> either /mA.v/ (in CIC accents, where /A./ represents the merged vowel)
> or as /mOv/ (in CINC accents, where /O/ represents the vowel of "caught")
> because of the general rule, violated by "mauve", that <au> should be
> pronounced with the "caught" vowel.
This is the first word I tried when I found the Franklin talking
dictionary...through the *extreme* compression of the digitally generated
voice, it appears to emerge as /mOv/...I've always pronounced it /moUv/
myself (reporting background as native southern Californian with extensive
exposure to "US professional broadcaster dialect" in childhood)....
Since I missed this Leno episode, how did they pronounce "taupe"?...r
GrapeApe
>> and Kevin probably said /mOv/, and they probably both used a vowel
>> somewhere around [A.].
another possibility:
Leno could have mispronounced.
Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation inflected as a question.
Spehro Pefhany
> another possibility:
> Leno could have mispronounced.
> Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation inflected as a question.
That would fit what I heard. Leno would have been reading it from the
teleprompter; Eubanks would not have been.
Best regards,
--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Spehro Pefhany --"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward"
sp...@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com
Contributions invited->The AVR-gcc FAQ is at: http://www.BlueCollarLinux.com
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Mark Barratt
>Interestingly enough, I speak French, but it did not occur to me to
>pronounce _mauve_ in the French manner,
I'm a little puzzled by this. I don't think I've ever heard 'mauve' in
French, but I would expect it to be pronounced pretty much the way I
would pronounce it in English, to rhyme with 'stove'[1]. Do you
distinguish 'au' and 'o' in French? I think I read somewhere that many
French speakers do not, although they're supposed to be different (not
that I could tell).
1. Except that my English long 'o' is diphthongised - [oU] rather than
[o]
Donna Richoux
>
> I would not have noticed it if Leno had pronounced it with the vowel in
> _moth,_ since that is in fact how _I_ pronounce it.
I wonder if the word has been confused with another old-fashioned term,
Maude. That one probably is pronounce like "moth" and "cot" by some, and
like "caught" by others. I don't think anyone says it like "mode" nor
like "mowd." But it's not a name one hears often now.
> Interestingly enough, I speak French, but it did not occur to me to
> pronounce _mauve_ in the French manner, even after having last Tuesday
> discussed with a friend in a French discussion group the French word
> _guimauve,_ "marsh mallow (the plant _Althaea officinalis_)" which is formed
> from the word _mauve,_ "mallow." The color got its name, according to
> Webster's Second (that is, Webster's New International Dictionary of the
> English Language, 2nd edition), "from the similarity of the color to that of
> the petals of common mallow, _Malva sylvestris,_"
A few months ago I posted a fair amount about the history of "mauve."
You can find quotes and URLs in my post of 1 Dec 2000.
The name definitely came from France. "Mauve" in French referred
originally to the mallow plant, Malva, and later to a dye made from its
roots and stems. It doesn't make sense to attribute the color to the
petals as your source has above, because the color of Malva petals are
bright pink. Mauve is of course more of a lavender or light purple.
The color of one of the first synthetic dyes, aniline, was described as
mauve. Cloth of that color sparked an enormous sensation in Victorian
England, which is when the word became widely known in English.
Donna Richoux
I think Ray was talking about the difference, in English, between taut
(or taught) and tote. Or auk and oak. Exhaust and host.
--
Hoping for the best --- Donna Richoux
ref
Hey, you're getting good at CINC Sensitivity!
ref
> mplsray <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote:
>
> >
> > I would not have noticed it if Leno had pronounced it with the vowel in
> > _moth,_ since that is in fact how _I_ pronounce it.
>
> I wonder if the word has been confused with another old-fashioned term,
> Maude. That one probably is pronounce like "moth" and "cot" by some, and
> like "caught" by others. I don't think anyone says it like "mode" nor
> like "mowd." But it's not a name one hears often now.
I think the 1970s TV sitcom with Beatrice Arthur is being shown regularly
on one nostalgia cable channel or other. But yes, an uncommon name.
"Maude" is given the "caught" vowel in US CINC accents; it follows the
usual rule regarding spelled <au> words. Thus "Maude"/"mod" are a
distinct pair in CINC accents.
Your comments reveal a possible lack of awareness of the following:
In my, and I believe most, US CINC accents, "moth" gets the "caught"
vowel, because it is in the "exceptional
class" of monosyllabic spelled short <o> words that take the "caught"
vowel because of the consonant that follows the vowel. IOW, moth sounds
like it should be spelled "mauth". In my accent, "broth", "cloth",
"froth", "moth", "Chris Noth" [an actor], "Roth", "sloth" all get the
"caught" vowel, while, for example, "clot", "not", "rot", "slot" get the
"cot" vowel. An exceptional case to this exception is "Goth", which gets
the "cot" vowel, for some reason[1]. The "moth" exception might be
compared to the southern England pronunciation of words like "path" with
/A/ rather than /&/.
[1]I believe because the pronunciation of "Goth" is being derived from the
pronunciation of "Gothic".
mplsray
"Donna Richoux" <tr...@euronet.nl> wrote in message
news:1es44sr.6yqi9lx1tg00N%tr...@euronet.nl...
Donna's right, I used "in the French manner" as another way of saying "with
the vowel of _oak_ instead of the vowel of _auk._" When speaking French, I
say _mauve_ using /o/.
If there is a difference between the pronunciations of _au_ and _o_ in
French, I have yet to encounter it. In fact, last year I made up a list of
French words which are homonyms of their letter _o,_ pronounced /o/, many
of which are spelled using _au_:
au and its plural aux, "to the"
aulx, one of the plural forms of ail, "garlic"
eau and its plural eaux, "water" and "waters"
haut and its plural hauts, "high"
ho, the interjection
o, the letter
oh, the interjection
ô, the interjection, "o"
os, "bones," the plural of os (the latter being pronounced /os/)
In addition, I've seen on the Internet the family name _Heau_ and a
geographic name element _Heaux_ (as in "Les Heaux de Brehat, France.")
Note that there are no _-s_ plural forms for some of the words on the list,
because of French spelling conventions: "There are two o's in the name
'Google'" would be translated into French as "Il y a deux o dans le nom
'Google.'"
I would think this must be a homonym record.
ref
> If there is a difference between the pronunciations of _au_ and _o_ in
> French, I have yet to encounter it.
Perhaps there are regional French accents in which they are still
distinguished? It seems sensible to assume they were once pronounced
distinctly.
The issue of whether "cot" and "caught" are to be pronounced alike seems
to be the same sort of thing (a difference between the pronunciations of
_au_ or _aw_ and _o_).
mplsray
> mplsray <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote:
>
> >
> > I would not have noticed it if Leno had pronounced it with the vowel in
> > _moth,_ since that is in fact how _I_ pronounce it.
>
> I wonder if the word has been confused with another old-fashioned term,
> Maude. That one probably is pronounce like "moth" and "cot" by some, and
> like "caught" by others. I don't think anyone says it like "mode" nor
> like "mowd." But it's not a name one hears often now.
>
_Maude_ is a French name. (It derives from _Mathilde_ according to one
online source.) No, there was no confusion of _mauve_ with _Maude._ Rather,
those two words are following some sort of general rule of sound differences
between French and English. I don't know the details of the rule, but one
can see it in practice when one considers the following cognates (the
English word in each pair did not necessarily come from the French word). I
have indicated the pronunciation for the French vowel in question after the
word:
applaud, applaudir, where the au is pronounced /o/
chocolate, chocolat, where the first o is pronounced /O/
doctor, docteur, /O/
mock, se moquer de, /O/
Montreal, Montréal, /O~/
Morocco, Maroc, /O/
Rock, Roc, /O/
Shock, Choc, /O/
Toxic, Toxique, /O/
Clearly, given these examples, the /oU/ pronunciation of the English word
_mauve_ is an exception to the rule.
Rich Lafferty
Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation so as not to
correct his boss on national television.
-Rich
--
Rich Lafferty ----------------------------------------
Nocturnal Aviation Division, IITS Computing Services
Concordia University, Montreal, QC
ri...@bofh.concordia.ca -------------------------------
Skitt
"Rich Lafferty" <ri...@bofh.concordia.ca> wrote in message
news:slrn9dug6...@bofh.concordia.ca...
> In alt.usage.english,
> GrapeApe <grap...@aol.comjunk> wrote:
> > >> From all this I conclude the following: Jay probably said /mA.v/
> > >> and Kevin probably said /mOv/, and they probably both used a vowel
> > >> somewhere around [A.].
> >
> > another possibility:
> >
> > Leno could have mispronounced.
> > Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation inflected as a
question.
>
> Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation so as not to
> correct his boss on national television.
That reminds me that one of the contestants on the "Millionaire" show
corrected Regis' pronunciation of an answer word. I forget which word it
was. There have been other words Regis has pronounced in a non-standard
way, but the contestants didn't correct him.
Isabelle Cecchini
"mplsray" <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> a écrit dans le message
news: 9bn1q...@enews4.newsguy.com...
>
> If there is a difference between the pronunciations of _au_ and _o_ in
> French, I have yet to encounter it.
I think there is one. "Sole" --the fish-- and "saule" --the willow-- are
quite different. "Sole" is pronounced with /O/ whereas "saule" is
pronounced with /o:/. Other minimal pairs which follow the same pattern
are "homme" and "heaume", "sotte" and "saute", "roc" and "rauque". The
spelling "au" regularly points to the pronunciation /o:/. That fact was
drilled into me in primary school; the only exception to that rule is the
name "Paul", pronounced with /O/, the feminine form "Paule" following the
rule.
The "o" spelling is more difficult. It is normally pronounced /O/ in a
closed and stressed syllable. If a circonflex accent is present, it is a
sure sign that the pronunciation is /o:/; there is a difference between
"notre" --with /O/--, and "le nôtre" --with /o:/--, whereas "nos" is with
/o:/, but then it is an open syllable. Other difficult words come from the
Greek: "gnome" and "chrome", for example, are pronounced with /o:/. One
last thing: the endings "ose" and "ause" are pronounced in the same way,
with /o:/, for instance in "cause', "chose", "rose", "pause" and "pose".
They do things differently in the South, of course, and sometimes in the
North of France too. But those are the rules for standard French.
Isabelle Cecchini
ref
This is quite interesting. I'm not sure you can derive a "rule" from
those examples, but some of them at least hint at a historical fact. I
think the reason that "mauve" gets /oU/ in (prestige and some other)
English accents is that "mauve" is a relatively
recent import into English that has sort of retained its French-ish
quality even though it's been "naturalized"; the pseudo-modern-French
pronunciation gets used. Same goes for "taupe".
"Taupe" is dated 1909 by M-W; "mauve" is dated 1859. (Unlike "mauve",
only one pronunciation is given for the more recent "taupe", /toUp/.)
Certainly "mock", an *old* import into English from French, gets the "cot"
vowel, for example; while "applaud" gets the "caught" vowel; applaud is
also an old import. This suggests strongly to me that in pre-Modern
French <o> and <au> were not merged.
Thanks for bringing "chocolate" to my attention. This interesting word is
exceptional in at least my CINC accent (and indeed in Postwar Prestige
Standard CINC) in that it takes the "caught" vowel
(in the first syllable): /tsOk l@t/, not /tSAk l@t/. This word is
exceptional also in the US/UK schema, much like the exceptional class of
monosyllabic words (e.g. "moth", "loss", "dog"), for RP "chocolate" has
the RP "cot" vowel. So I wonder how it is that "chocolate" would have
picked up the "caught" vowel. I wonder in fact if it might have something
to do with French-influenced vowel confusion; as you note French
"chocolate" has their /O/. Chocolate enters English from Spanish (there
from Nahuatl) in 1604, but I wonder if for an influential period of time
there was some association between chocolate and Francophone European
culture.
Carl Burke
[snippage]
> ... An exceptional case to this exception is "Goth", which gets
> the "cot" vowel, for some reason[1]. The "moth" exception might be
> compared to the southern England pronunciation of words like "path" with
> /A/ rather than /&/.
>
> [1]I believe because the pronunciation of "Goth" is being derived from the
> pronunciation of "Gothic".
Although I'm a CINC speaker, I have "Goth" with the "caught" vowel
and "Gothic" with the "cot" vowel. (The "Goth-Talk" sketches on
Saturday Night Live, in which "Goth" and "Talk" have the same vowel,
show that same usage. At least, they do when I hear them.)
--
Carl Burke
cbu...@mitre.org
Robert Lieblich
[ . . . ]
> That reminds me that one of the contestants on the "Millionaire" show
> corrected Regis' pronunciation of an answer word. I forget which word it
> was. There have been other words Regis has pronounced in a non-standard
> way, but the contestants didn't correct him.
Again, you have to wonder what the hell is going on with the
producers of this thing. How hard is it to rehearse with Regis the
reading of the questions? He asks maybe twenty per show, and most
of them have nothing difficult in them. He nevertheless butchers on
average one pronunciation per show. Is the idea to impress us with
his "common touch"? To me it just makes him look ignorant.
When some guy won the two million plus recently, the half million
dollar question was "What is the approximate circumference of the
earth? I learned that in third grade.[1] Much earlier in the
show's run, there was a million-dollar question asking the distance
of the Earth from the sun in miles. In these two cases, the
contestants got the right answer, but I've seen similar things (like
which planet is closest to the Sun) missed. Maybe they do need to
reassure the ignoranti that Regis is one of them, lest the show be
accused of elitism.
Well, at least I stopped watching "theweakestlink" after the dozenth
time that frightfully annoying woman said "theweakestlink" -- and
that's just how she pronounces it.
[1]The big buck question was "Who invented the personal helicopter?"
or something like it. "Igor Sikorsky" was the only answer that
looked even remotely plausible. The contestant was very confident
of his answer; I kept thinking it looked so easy that there must be
some trick to it. But there wasn't.
Skitt
"Robert Lieblich" <lieb...@erols.com> wrote in message
news:3ADF6A3F...@erols.com...
>
> [1]The big buck question was "Who invented the personal helicopter?"
> or something like it. "Igor Sikorsky" was the only answer that
> looked even remotely plausible. The contestant was very confident
> of his answer; I kept thinking it looked so easy that there must be
> some trick to it. But there wasn't.
I know! I was looking for the trick also. It was just too easy for the
top prize question.
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Again, you have to wonder what the hell is going on with the
> producers of this thing. How hard is it to rehearse with Regis the
> reading of the questions?
My guess is that the rules (laws? or at least broadcast standards)
prohibit *anybody*, including the host, who doesn't absolutely have to
know from knowing what the questions are (or even the subjects) until
they are chosen to be asked. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if the
questions weren't selected randomly from a large set of level-
appropriate questions at the time it's asked.
Of course, they could replace his pronunciation mistakes in post
production.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |Its like grasping the difference
1501 Page Mill Road, Building 1U |between what one usually considers
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |a 'difficult' problem, and what
|*is* a difficult problem. The day
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |one understands *why* counting all
(650)857-7572 |the molecules in the Universe isn't
|difficult...there's the leap.
| Tina Marie Holmboe
ref
Hmm.... This is very curious indeed. /gAT/ for "Goth" may be restricted
to a subset of Postwar Prestige Standard Accents (CINC), althouth I also
believe it is standard in all New York City Region Accents.
I haven't seen the SNL sketch. Clearly the two vowels are assumed to be
the same, but it could be that the primary speakers are CIC and are using
a vowel that you resolve to your caught. This happens to me with certain
words, particularly proper names.
David McMurray
> Robert Lieblich <lieb...@erols.com> writes:
>
> > Again, you have to wonder what the hell is going on with the
> > producers of this thing. How hard is it to rehearse with Regis the
> > reading of the questions?
>
> My guess is that the rules (laws? or at least broadcast standards)
> prohibit *anybody*, including the host, who doesn't absolutely have to
> know from knowing what the questions are (or even the subjects) until
> they are chosen to be asked. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if the
> questions weren't selected randomly from a large set of level-
> appropriate questions at the time it's asked.
Given your guess about the rules, I would have thought you wouldn't be
surprised if they *were* selected randomly.
Perhaps nothing surprises you, of course. (Your writing "it's" rather
than "they're" surprised me, however.)
--
David
Evan Kirshenbaum
> On Thu, 19 Apr 2001, Carl Burke wrote:
>
> > ref wrote:
> > [snippage]
> > > ... An exceptional case to this exception is "Goth", which gets
> > > the "cot" vowel, for some reason[1]. The "moth" exception might be
> > > compared to the southern England pronunciation of words like "path" with
> > > /A/ rather than /&/.
> > >
> > > [1]I believe because the pronunciation of "Goth" is being
> > > derived from the pronunciation of "Gothic".
The word "Gothic" derives from "Goths", an ancient people. The
current sense is a back-formation. According to MWCD/ol, the original
sense was/is pronounced /gAT/, although it would have been an /o/ in
Middle English.
> > Although I'm a CINC speaker, I have "Goth" with the "caught" vowel
> > and "Gothic" with the "cot" vowel. (The "Goth-Talk" sketches on
> > Saturday Night Live, in which "Goth" and "Talk" have the same
> > vowel, show that same usage. At least, they do when I hear them.)
>
> Hmm.... This is very curious indeed. /gAT/ for "Goth" may be
> restricted to a subset of Postwar Prestige Standard Accents (CINC),
> althouth I also believe it is standard in all New York City Region
> Accents.
I (b. Chicago, 1964, fl. Chicago, 1964-1982, Silicon Valley, 1982-
present) pronounce it /gAT/, and I can't recall hearing it another way
from someone I'm sure was a CINC speaker. (I'm not sure I've ever
heard it another way, but since we unconsiously adjust for accent,
it's hard to be sure.)
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |A specification which calls for
1501 Page Mill Road, Building 1U |network-wide use of encryption, but
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |invokes the Tooth Fairy to handle
|key distribution, is a useless
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |farce.
(650)857-7572 | Henry Spencer
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>
> > My guess is that the rules (laws? or at least broadcast standards)
> > prohibit *anybody*, including the host, who doesn't absolutely
> > have to know from knowing what the questions are (or even the
> > subjects) until they are chosen to be asked. In fact, it wouldn't
> > surprise me if the questions weren't selected randomly from a
> > large set of level- appropriate questions at the time it's asked.
>
> Given your guess about the rules, I would have thought you wouldn't
> be surprised if they *were* selected randomly.
That wouldn't surprise me either. The two sentences would mean the
same thing to me, but have slightly different force. I think that
your way of saying it attributes a somewhat lower likelihood estimate.
> Perhaps nothing surprises you, of course. (Your writing "it's" rather
> than "they're" surprised me, however.)
The sentence started life in the singular and only incompletely
increased its number.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |If I am ever forced to make a
1501 Page Mill Road, Building 1U |choice between learning and using
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |win32, or leaving the computer
|industry, let me just say it was
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |nice knowing all of you. :-)
(650)857-7572 | Randal Schwartz
ref
> ref <rfon...@wesleyan.edu> writes:
>
> > On Thu, 19 Apr 2001, Carl Burke wrote:
> >
> > > ref wrote:
> > > [snippage]
> > > > ... An exceptional case to this exception is "Goth", which gets
> > > > the "cot" vowel, for some reason[1]. The "moth" exception might be
> > > > compared to the southern England pronunciation of words like "path" with
> > > > /A/ rather than /&/.
> > > >
> > > > [1]I believe because the pronunciation of "Goth" is being
> > > > derived from the pronunciation of "Gothic".
>
> The word "Gothic" derives from "Goths", an ancient people. The
> current sense is a back-formation.
By "current sense" you obviously mean the "goth" subculture. Yes, it's
from "gothic" -- indeed one can find usages of "gothic" meaning "having
to do with the 'goth' subculture" which may predate "goth" itself -- but I
think that it's a back-formation that reflects the previous existence of
noun "Goth" in the language.
> According to MWCD/ol, the original
> sense was/is pronounced /gAT/, although it would have been an /o/ in
> Middle English.
Right; they don't give /gOT/ which they often do for words where there's
CIC/CINC variation. This *might* mean that, in their judgment, "Goth" is
/gAT/ even in most mainstream CINC accents.
When I replied to the other posting, my brain didn't even process the fact
that "Goth" and "talk" wouldn't rhyme per se even if they had the same
vowel. So I don't think it's at all obvious that a sketch called "Goth
Talk" implies that the creators of the sketch intended for the two words
to have the same vowel. I accent that whoever I was responding to hears
the two vowels as the same; I haven't watched SNL in a long time and I
haven't seen the sketch being referred to.
Carl Burke
> On Thu, 19 Apr 2001, Carl Burke wrote:
> > ref wrote:
> > [snippage]
> > > ... An exceptional case to this exception is "Goth", which gets
> > > the "cot" vowel, for some reason[1]. The "moth" exception might be
> > > compared to the southern England pronunciation of words like "path" with
> > > /A/ rather than /&/.
> > >
> > > [1]I believe because the pronunciation of "Goth" is being derived from the
> > > pronunciation of "Gothic".
> >
> > Although I'm a CINC speaker, I have "Goth" with the "caught" vowel
> > and "Gothic" with the "cot" vowel. (The "Goth-Talk" sketches on
> > Saturday Night Live, in which "Goth" and "Talk" have the same vowel,
> > show that same usage. At least, they do when I hear them.)
>
> Hmm.... This is very curious indeed. /gAT/ for "Goth" may be restricted
> to a subset of Postwar Prestige Standard Accents (CINC), althouth I also
> believe it is standard in all New York City Region Accents.
It might be standard around New York City. It doesn't seem to be standard
around Washington, DC. I can't speak for its pronunciation in my birth
accent (Rochester, NY), because the Goth subculture postdates my years there.
> I haven't seen the SNL sketch. Clearly the two vowels are assumed to be
> the same, but it could be that the primary speakers are CIC and are using
> a vowel that you resolve to your caught. This happens to me with certain
> words, particularly proper names.
That's quite possible. All I can really say is that "Goth" and "Gothic"
have different vowels to me. Perhaps I'm taking the "Gothic" vowel
from "Gotham", which I had heard on television while growing up, but for
"Goth" my first exposure was written and I assumed a pronunciation based
on the local rules for words like moth and broth.
--
Carl Burke
cbu...@mitre.org
GrapeApe
>> Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation inflected as a question.
>
>Eubanks could have repeated this mispronunciation so as not to
>correct his boss on national television.
Actually, to politely correct and question would be Eubanks way of bringing up
a possible discrepancy, to allow his boss to cover his own mistake, as opposed
to just directly correcting Hay.
GrapeApe
>corrected Regis' pronunciation of an answer word. I forget which word it
>was. There have been other words Regis has pronounced in a non-standard
>way, but the contestants didn't correct him.
It doesn't really matter if Regis says it correctly or not; just as often the
staff researching the questions have used a more obscure spelling as well.
GrapeApe
>producers of this thing. How hard is it to rehearse with Regis the
>reading of the questions? He asks maybe twenty per show, and most
>of them have nothing difficult in them. He nevertheless butchers on
>average one pronunciation per show.
Perhaps there is rehearsal, and you are hearing the results of that quality
rehearsal. Check the spelling of the people who write the questions sometimes.
Mark Brader
> [1]The big buck question was "Who invented the personal helicopter?"
> or something like it. "Igor Sikorsky" was the only answer that
A closer approximation to the question was that it asked for the first
mass-produced helicopter.
> I kept thinking it looked so easy that there must be some trick to it.
Sure, because you find helicopters interesting. It was easy for me too,
but two questions earlier there was one I had no idea about, which would
have been equally easy for someone else. (In fact, I think the contestant
used his phone-a-friend on it.) That's the nature of the show.
--
Mark Brader | "Sir, your composure baffles me. A single counterexample
Toronto | refutes a conjecture as effectively as ten... Hands up!
m...@vex.net | You have to surrender." -- Imre Lakatos
My text in this article is in the public domain.