Possible Record for Slow on the Uptake
Louann Miller
immersion anthropologist is named Margaret Mader.
I wonder what Heinlein would have thought of the current theory-
approaching-consensus that most of Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa" was
based on practical joking by local (teenaged girl) informants and a gross
failure to cross-check the stories they told.
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
He'd have thought "well, good thing I published CotG before that happened".
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Live Journal: http://seawasp.livejournal.com
Catherine Jefferson
I imagine he'd probably laugh himself silly. He had a great
appreciation for human foibles, and who could help liking a bunch of
teenage girls who were annoyed at an officious outsider hamhandedly
probing into the most intimate parts of their lives? ;-)
My husband is an archaeologist, which in America means he started as an
anthropology student and specialized. There are stories that *any*
anthropology B.A. who paid any attention at all in his or her cultural
anthropology classes can tell of "informants" playing practical jokes on
the poor, hapless anthropologist trying to study them. Being able to
recognize this when it happens, allowing for it, and learning not to
take everything your told or shown at face value is part of the job.
--
Catherine Jefferson <ar...@devsite.org>
Personal Home Page * <http://www.devsite.org/>
The SpamBouncer * <http://www.spambouncer.org/>
pan
Hardly current. Freeman waited until Mead died and published his screed
in
1983. (Manuscript was done in 1978, but Mead was still alive and might
have
responded.)
Freeman's book was declared by APA to be "poorly written, unscientific,
irresponsible and misleading".
Would seem that the consensus is that Freeman was an ideologue bent
on curtailing any thought that adolescent sex might be different than
the American version of the aupou system.
Besides the obvious dichotomy Freeman ignores between public
declarations of morality and actual practice, (viz. Kinsey, any recent
republican religio-conservative politico caught with appendages in
the nookie jar, etc.) why didn't Freeman consider that the aged girls
of Mead's book wouldn't consider it more of a joke to lie to a
johhny-come-lately male who obviously wanted 'proof' that even
in Samoa his beliefs and ideals held true?
Will in New Haven
> Louann Miller wrote:
> >> Rereading "Citizen of the Galaxy," as I do every few years. The
> >> total- immersion anthropologist is named Margaret Mader.
>
> >> I wonder what Heinlein would have thought of the current theory-
> >> approaching-consensus that most of Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa"
> >> was based on practical joking by local (teenaged girl) informants
> >> and a gross failure to cross-check the stories they told.
>
> Hardly current. Freeman waited until Mead died and published his screed
> in
> 1983. (Manuscript was done in 1978, but Mead was still alive and might
> have
> responded.)
>
> Freeman's book was declared by APA to be "poorly written, unscientific,
> irresponsible and misleading".
>
> Would seem that the consensus is that Freeman was an ideologue bent
> on curtailing any thought that adolescent sex might be different than
> the American version of the aupou system.
Not unless the consensus has changed radically since 2006. At that
time the consensus was mixed. Anthropoligists have an interest in
people believing that their findings, which are often based on
interviews, are valid. So Freeman's work met a lot of resistance.
Also, as you point out, it is awful reading. However, the idea that
Mead was systemically lied to and that her conclusions were wrong has
become widely held in anthroplogical circles, if not consensus, or at
least it was a few years ago.
--
Will in New Haven
pan
If everything is suspect, then nothing is true.
Isn't this just an example of a soft science subject to doubt because
of an irreducible problem of reproducibility?
Maybe the methods used to bring back famous composers in one
sf short, or the myriad of AI avatars, etc. could serve to ressurect
Meade's teeny bopper gossips. Then anyone could redetermine
the validity of whatever conclusions might have been drawn.
Will in New Haven
You said what the consensus is, as if there was one and you knew it. I
said that this is not the consensus. I don't know whether it is "just
an example of etc" I just know it seems very likely that Freeman had a
point. He may have had a point _and_ some axes to grind. You took a
position that was a lot more positive than the one you are taking
now.
--
Will in New Haven
>
pan
It just seems that some disciplines make more sense the less I am
asked to take what seems anecdotal as fundamental to a shared
and enlarged life of the mind.
I mean, any point Freeman can make is the same point anyone who
wanted to could make given that there is little to none observer
independent data.
If Freeman reproduced (virtually?) the situation of Mead's work,
then maybe he would be a more interesting read. As is, how do
you choose between the crowds each with dogs in the fight?
I suppose there is also, now, a Meadeiana industry.
You want bloodthroat exchanges of opinion? Look into the
Shakespeariana arena (ignore those Marlowe dirt
biters).
pan - meandering and thinking of American Romantic Novel
plot development. Meville, yes !
Dan Goodman
> Louann Miller wrote:
> > Rereading "Citizen of the Galaxy," as I do every few years. The
> > total- immersion anthropologist is named Margaret Mader.
> >
> > I wonder what Heinlein would have thought of the current theory-
> > approaching-consensus that most of Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa"
> > was based on practical joking by local (teenaged girl) informants
> > and a gross failure to cross-check the stories they told.
>
> I imagine he'd probably laugh himself silly. He had a great
> appreciation for human foibles, and who could help liking a bunch of
> teenage girls who were annoyed at an officious outsider hamhandedly
> probing into the most intimate parts of their lives? ;-)
>
> My husband is an archaeologist, which in America means he started as
> an anthropology student and specialized. There are stories that any
> anthropology B.A. who paid any attention at all in his or her
> cultural anthropology classes can tell of "informants" playing
> practical jokes on the poor, hapless anthropologist trying to study
> them. Being able to recognize this when it happens, allowing for it,
> and learning not to take everything your told or shown at face value
> is part of the job.
The basic traits of humans, found in any culture: language, use of
fire, and lying to anthropologists.
--
Dan Goodman
Journal at:
dsgood.livejournal.com
dsgood.dreamwidth.org
dsgood.insanejournal.com
Dimensional Traveler
inherent in the basic concept of "human language"? :D
--
7 Years - 2265 Experiments - 10 tons of explosives - 705 Myths
Myths - Will - Fall!
Will in New Haven
I think you _could_ drop the last two words but it would be even more
telling to replace them with "to nosy strangers."
Louann Miller
news:oeednQkDzpX29XXX...@supernews.com:
> My husband is an archaeologist, which in America means he started as an
> anthropology student and specialized.
Where? I was one of the anthropology department secretaries at Southern
Methodist University for four years.
Louann, who (cringe) prononuced the "h" in Neanderthal while talking to
Lewis Binford.
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
The "h"? You mean you pronounced it as "Nee Ann Dirt Hal"?
Or do you mean the "th", as in "Nee Ann Durth Al?"
Louann Miller
$629$1...@news.eternal-september.org:
>> Louann, who (cringe) prononuced the "h" in Neanderthal while talking to
>> Lewis Binford.
>>
>
> The "h"? You mean you pronounced it as "Nee Ann Dirt Hal"?
>
> Or do you mean the "th", as in "Nee Ann Durth Al?"
The second. Nee AN Der Tal is correct pronunciation.
Binford is not quite up there with anyone named Leakey where
paleoarchaeology is concerned, but he's pretty high-powered.
Mike Schilling
And he's kind of a tool.
Wayne Throop
: Louann Miller <loua...@yahoo.com>
: The second. Nee AN Der Tal is correct pronunciation.
I have a tendency to say the thorn sound. Which is in some ways ironic.
Thames, Thompson, Thallheimer's... or for that matter aiui, "thing"
(as in the viking meeting, depending ...).
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Anthony Nance
'cause he wants More Power?
Robert Carnegie
Uh-uh. In Frederik Pohl's Heechee-world there's an Albert Einstein AI
reconstructed from all public and private records of him, but in
Charles Stross's _Accelerando_ the hyper-economic post-human culture
of the inner Solar System is suspected of transmitting not only real
reconstructed human minds to the physical-human enclave, but fictional
people too, as well as plain forgeries.
So you only get back the people that we think they were, and not the
actual person.
As for the anthropology, I suppose you can imagine similar inquiries
put to modern people, in different parts of the world, and checked
against reality. My own prejudice about the sexes points to females,
young especially, being much less likely to boast about fictional
sexual experiences than males, if it's a question of that - and to an
older woman, too. But maybe I'm mistaken.
Mike Schilling
That's the buzz.
Greg Goss
>I think you _could_ drop the last two words but it would be even more
>telling to replace them with "to nosy strangers."
You think that "lying to her dad" isn't universal?
--
apart from one noisy guy up in Canada, no-one wants
a three-cylinder tissue box on bicycle tires.
Peter Knutsen
[...]
> My husband is an archaeologist, which in America means he started as an
> anthropology student and specialized. There are stories that *any*
Was that also the case in Indiana Jones' time?
> anthropology B.A. who paid any attention at all in his or her cultural
> anthropology classes can tell of "informants" playing practical jokes on
> the poor, hapless anthropologist trying to study them. Being able to
> recognize this when it happens, allowing for it, and learning not to
> take everything your told or shown at face value is part of the job.
--
Peter Knutsen
sagatafl.org
Peter Knutsen
> I have a tendency to say the thorn sound. Which is in some ways ironic.
> Thames, Thompson, Thallheimer's... or for that matter aiui, "thing"
> (as in the viking meeting, depending ...).
I have no idea how "thing" is supposed to be pronounced in English. In
Danish it's "ting".
--
Peter Knutsen
sagatafl.org
Peter Knutsen
[...]
> As for the anthropology, I suppose you can imagine similar inquiries
> put to modern people, in different parts of the world, and checked
> against reality. My own prejudice about the sexes points to females,
> young especially, being much less likely to boast about fictional
> sexual experiences than males, if it's a question of that - and to an
> older woman, too. But maybe I'm mistaken.
There is that.
But there is also, in many people. a tendency to try guess what the
other person wants to hear, and then saying that to her (or him). (And
there may om some anthropoligists, as well as in other people, be a
tendency to subtly clue the interview subject in, on what kinds of
answers one is most interested in hearing.)
Also I sometimes have a sneaking suspicion that not all cultures have
the strong sense of objective truthfulness that exists in ours. Or
possibly a more generous assumption is that other cultures may have
different traditions regarding in which contexts it is all right to lie
(i.e. make up stuff).
--
Peter Knutsen
sagatafl.org
Dorothy J Heydt
English "thing", meaning object, is pronounced with a voiceless
"soft" theta, that is, a spirant produced by letting the air
escape between the tongue-tip and the upper lip.
Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by
those English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be
pronounced "ting."
--
Dorothy J. Heydt
Vallejo, California
djheydt at hotmail dot com
Should you wish to email me, you'd better use the hotmail edress.
Kithrup is getting too damn much spam, even with the sysop's filters.
William December Starr
djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) said:
> English "thing", meaning object, is pronounced with a voiceless
> "soft" theta, that is, a spirant produced by letting the air
> escape between the tongue-tip and the upper lip.
>
> Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by
> those English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be
> pronounced "ting."
So who put that 'h' in it? And why?
-- wds
Butch Malahide
> :: You mean you pronounced it as "Nee Ann Dirt Hal"?
> :: Or do you mean the "th", as in "Nee Ann Durth Al?"
>
> : The second. Nee AN Der Tal is correct pronunciation.
>
> I have a tendency to say the thorn sound. Which is in some ways ironic.
> Thames, Thompson, Thallheimer's... or for that matter aiui, "thing"
> (as in the viking meeting, depending ...).
In Icelandic the word "thing" (meaning a kind of assembly) is spelled
with a thorn, which I guess means that it's pronounced the same as in
English, with a theta sound at the beginning. And I guess that's how
the old Vikings pronounced it too. But I don't know anything about it,
and I'd love to be corrected if I've got it wrong.
Wayne Throop
:: English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be
:: pronounced "ting."
: So who put that 'h' in it? And why?
Probably the same guys who put it in Thomas and Neanderthal.
Such a widepsread conspiracy, it's probably the Bavarian Illuminati.
Mike Schilling
Logically, "th" would mean an aspirated "t" (that is, a "t" sound
followed by or including an "h" sound.) There's no reason for other
languages to care that English uses it to indicate a different sound
entirely.
Butch Malahide
> In article <4aee1d05$0$282$14726...@news.sunsite.dk>,
> Peter Knutsen <pe...@sagatafl.invalid> wrote:
>
> >Wayne Throop wrote:
> >> I have a tendency to say the thorn sound. Which is in some ways ironic.
> >> Thames, Thompson, Thallheimer's... or for that matter aiui, "thing"
> >> (as in the viking meeting, depending ...).
>
> >I have no idea how "thing" is supposed to be pronounced in English. In
> >Danish it's "ting".
>
> English "thing", meaning object, is pronounced with a voiceless
> "soft" theta, that is, a spirant produced by letting the air
> escape between the tongue-tip and the upper lip.
>
> Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by
> those English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be
> pronounced "ting."
By "Norse" do you mean just Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, or do you
include Icelandic and Old Norse?
More precisely: How is the Icelandic word, whose English
transliteration is "thing", pronounced in Icelandic, either by itself
or in compounds such as althing? Is it pronounced "thing" as in the
title of the movie based on Campbell's "Who Goes There?", or is it
pronounced "ting" as in "The bells of hell go timg-a-ling-a-
ling . . ."?
Sorry to be bothering you with this, but I tried unsuccessfully to
google the answer, and I know you have some expertise in linguistics.
Butch Malahide
wrote:
>
> Logically, "th" would mean an aspirated "t" (that is, a "t" sound
> followed by or including an "h" sound.) There's no reason for other
> languages to care that English uses it to indicate a different sound
> entirely.
Do you know of a language where h after t is used to indicate
aspiration, i.e., "t" means unaspirated t and "th" means aspirated t?
I can only think of examples where "t" and "th" are pronounced the
same, either both aspirated (English Tom * Thom) or both unaspirated.
Lawrence Watt-Evans
That used to be the distinction in German, but it dropped out of use,
which is why the latest round of spelling reform dropped a lot of H's
-- they don't have a phonetic purpose anymore.
They apparently did indicate aspiration until maybe two hundred years
ago.
I believe there's a distinction in some North Indian languages -- I
don't know whether it's in all of them -- that's reflected in some
transliterations. (The North Indian family is Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi,
Rajasthani, Marathi, Bengali, and Romany, if I remember correctly.)
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
I'm selling my comic collection -- see http://www.watt-evans.com/comics.html
I'm serializing a novel at http://www.watt-evans.com/realmsoflight0.html
John F. Eldredge
> :: Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by those
> :: English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be ::
> pronounced "ting."
>
> : So who put that 'h' in it? And why?
>
> Probably the same guys who put it in Thomas and Neanderthal. Such a
> widepsread conspiracy, it's probably the Bavarian Illuminati.
>
>
And, of course, it is no coincidence that "Bavarian Illuminati" contains
no h's. They were careful to look uninvolved...
--
John F. Eldredge -- jo...@jfeldredge.com
"Reserve your right to think, for even to think wrongly is better
than not to think at all." -- Hypatia of Alexandria
Jacey Bedford
<jo...@jfeldredge.com> writes
>On Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:20:37 +0000, Wayne Throop wrote:
>
>> :: Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by those
>> :: English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be ::
>> pronounced "ting."
>>
>> : So who put that 'h' in it? And why?
>>
>> Probably the same guys who put it in Thomas and Neanderthal. Such a
>> widepsread conspiracy, it's probably the Bavarian Illuminati.
>>
>>
>
>And, of course, it is no coincidence that "Bavarian Illuminati" contains
>no h's. They were careful to look uninvolved...
Ha, but at sekrit meetings the sign on the door says 'Bavarian
Illuminathi'
Jacey
>
--
Jacey Bedford
Don Aitken
wrote:
>On Sun, 1 Nov 2009 23:47:19 -0800 (PST), Butch Malahide
><fred....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On Nov 1, 11:59 pm, "Mike Schilling" <mscottschill...@hotmail.com>
>>wrote:
>>>
>>> Logically, "th" would mean an aspirated "t" (that is, a "t" sound
>>> followed by or including an "h" sound.) There's no reason for other
>>> languages to care that English uses it to indicate a different sound
>>> entirely.
>>
>>Do you know of a language where h after t is used to indicate
>>aspiration, i.e., "t" means unaspirated t and "th" means aspirated t?
>>I can only think of examples where "t" and "th" are pronounced the
>>same, either both aspirated (English Tom * Thom) or both unaspirated.
>
>That used to be the distinction in German, but it dropped out of use,
>which is why the latest round of spelling reform dropped a lot of H's
>-- they don't have a phonetic purpose anymore.
>
Including the one in "thal" (valley). Which is why the place is now
Neandertal, although the hominid is often still Neanderthal.
>They apparently did indicate aspiration until maybe two hundred years
>ago.
>
--
Don Aitken
Mail to the From: address is not read.
To email me, substitute "clara.co.uk" for "freeuk.com"
cryptoguy
ObSF Yasid: I remember a story in Analog from about the time of the
Viking landers, in which the various (intelligent) Martian lifeforms
engage in an elaborate charade to provide the lander's instruments
with exactly the results they thought the Earth scientists wanted, on
the basis of eavesdropping on our TV and radio.
pt
Joseph Nebus
>Also I sometimes have a sneaking suspicion that not all cultures have
>the strong sense of objective truthfulness that exists in ours. Or
>possibly a more generous assumption is that other cultures may have
>different traditions regarding in which contexts it is all right to lie
>(i.e. make up stuff).
Plus, you just *know* the first aliens from the planet Chad
Oliver XII are going to try sampling from the joker who can't let a
straight line go to waste. And if Robert Sheckley didn't write that
story he should have.
--
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
sigvaldi
> On Nov 1, 6:18 pm, djhe...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > In article <4aee1d05$0$282$14726...@news.sunsite.dk>,
> > Peter Knutsen <pe...@sagatafl.invalid> wrote:
>
> > >Wayne Throop wrote:
> > >> I have a tendency to say the thorn sound. Which is in some ways ironic.
> > >> Thames, Thompson, Thallheimer's... or for that matter aiui, "thing"
> > >> (as in the viking meeting, depending ...).
>
> > >I have no idea how "thing" is supposed to be pronounced in English. In
> > >Danish it's "ting".
>
> > English "thing", meaning object, is pronounced with a voiceless
> > "soft" theta, that is, a spirant produced by letting the air
> > escape between the tongue-tip and the upper lip.
>
> > Norse "thing" meaning a council is pronounced the same way by
> > those English-speakers who don't realize that it's supposed to be
> > pronounced "ting."
>
> By "Norse" do you mean just Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, or do you
> includeIcelandicand Old Norse?
Norse is Icelandic and Old Norse, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish have
developed away from the Old Norse.
> More precisely: How is theIcelandicword, whose English
> transliteration is "thing", pronounced inIcelandic, either by itself
> or in compounds such as althing? Is it pronounced "thing" as in the
> title of the movie based on Campbell's "Who Goes There?", or is it
> pronounced "ting" as in "The bells of hell go timg-a-ling-a-
> ling . . ."?
The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
"thing" or "their" etc.
> Sorry to be bothering you with this, but I tried unsuccessfully to
> google the answer, and I know you have some expertise in linguistics.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Butch Malahide
> On Nov 2, 7:39 am, Butch Malahide <fred.gal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > By "Norse" do you mean just Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, or do you
> > includeIcelandicand Old Norse?
>
> Norse is Icelandic and Old Norse, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish have
> developed away from the Old Norse.
>
> > More precisely: How is theIcelandicword, whose English
> > transliteration is "thing", pronounced inIcelandic, either by itself
> > or in compounds such as althing? Is it pronounced "thing" as in the
> > title of the movie based on Campbell's "Who Goes There?", or is it
> > pronounced "ting" as in "The bells of hell go timg-a-ling-a-
> > ling . . ."?
>
> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
> "thing" or "their" etc.
Actually those two are not quite the same, as the former "th" is
unvoiced and the latter voiced; but I understand that you mean the
unvoiced "th" as in the English "thing" or . . . "thanks" for
answering my question! Takk!
Jacey Bedford
<1acdb398-49a8-4fed...@g27g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>,
sigvaldi <sig...@binet.is> writes
>The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
>"thing" or "their" etc.
Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
Jacey
--
Jacey Bedford
Butch Malahide
> In message
> <1acdb398-49a8-4fed-89ca-88710dc5d...@g27g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>,
> sigvaldi <sigv...@binet.is> writes
>
> >The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
> >"thing" or "their" etc.
>
> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
They are different sounds (I'm not sure about *very*), but the
difference is best described as unvoiced/voiced rather than soft/hard.
I'm not sure but I think that, as fricatives, both would be classified
as "soft" consonants. Note that English "hard G" (Gecko) and "soft
G" (Giraffe) are both voiced.
Robert Bannister
>
> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
> "thing" or "their" etc.
A slight problem here: English "thing" and "their" do not have the same
th sound. The former is voiceless thorn; the latter is voiced eth. The
Icelandic Althing is spelt with thorn, so I am guessing it is the
voiceless sound.
--
Rob Bannister
Wayne Throop
: The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
: "thing" or "their" etc.
Nnnnot sure what you mean. One of those is voiced and one isn't.
So... do you mean some words of Icelandic are done voiced and some not,
or something else?
William December Starr
Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> said:
> I believe there's a distinction in some North Indian languages --
> I don't know whether it's in all of them -- that's reflected in
> some transliterations. (The North Indian family is Hindi, Urdu,
> Punjabi, Rajasthani, Marathi, Bengali, and Romany, if I remember
> correctly.)
You mean Romany isn't a Romance language? That's just wrong, man.
-- wds
William December Starr
Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> said:
> sigvaldi <sig...@binet.is> writes
>
>> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
>> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>
> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
tongue and teeth.
-- wds
David Goldfarb
Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
"voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
(among others).
Now try it while saying "They" and then "Thing". Say them slowly,
so that the initial sound lasts a while. (Thus avoiding confusion
from the vowel sounds, which are voiced.) Notice that the "th"
in "They" is voiced, and that of "Thing" is not.
The alphabet of Old English included letters for the initial sounds
of "thing" and "they": two different ones, called "thorn" and "edh".
--
David Goldfarb |"Given enough time and the right audience,
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | the darkest of secrets scum over into
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | mere curiosities."
| -- Neil Gaiman, _Sandman_ #53
Jack Bohn
So "they" aren't Danish?
--
-Jack
sigvaldi
> In article <hcotje$3k...@panix2.panix.com>,
> William December Starr <wdst...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> >In article <7$$i2rX7g27KF...@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
> >Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> said:
> >> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>
> >I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
> >loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
> >words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
> >tongue and teeth.
>
> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
> letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
> (among others).
>
> Now try it while saying "They" and then "Thing". Say them slowly,
> so that the initial sound lasts a while. (Thus avoiding confusion
> from the vowel sounds, which are voiced.) Notice that the "th"
> in "They" is voiced, and that of "Thing" is not.
>
> The alphabet of Old English included letters for the initial sounds
> of "thing" and "they": two different ones, called "thorn" and "edh".
>
The Icelandic alphabet does too, Þ og Ð
sigvaldi
Well, I´ve probably made a mistake here but Icelandic has got the word
"Þeir" that starts with the "th" letter and is pronounced very similar
to the English "their"
The "Ð" (edh) letter is never the first letter of a word in Icelandic.
sigvaldi
>
Actually, in Icelandic a word can begin with a "Þ" (th) (but not end
with one) and it can be used in compound words but the "Ð" (edh) is
never used as the first letter of a word.
Robert Carnegie
> In article <hcotje$3k...@panix2.panix.com>,
> William December Starr <wdst...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> >In article <7$$i2rX7g27KF...@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
> >> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>
> >I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
> >loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
> >words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
> >tongue and teeth.
>
> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
> letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
> (among others).
>
> Now try it while saying "They" and then "Thing". Say them slowly,
> so that the initial sound lasts a while. (Thus avoiding confusion
> from the vowel sounds, which are voiced.) Notice that the "th"
> in "They" is voiced, and that of "Thing" is not.
>
> The alphabet of Old English included letters for the initial sounds
> of "thing" and "they": two different ones, called "thorn" and "edh".
Also The Sopranos pronounce the words with a clear distinction as
"ting" and "dey". :-)
Jacey Bedford
<1b629713-5f0b-400f...@d5g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
Butch Malahide <fred....@gmail.com> writes
You can describe it however you like. I'm not a linguistics specialist
so I described it with words that are in my vocabulary. I wouldn't know
a fricative if it bit me on the bum. Neither do I know the difference
between voiced and unvoiced, and probably don't need to since I have
managed for half a century without knowing. The only time I am unvoiced
is when I have laryngitis.
I think linguistics students often forget that us lowly mortals don't
speak their specialist language. (It's one of the things that gets me
steaming in rasfc when folks start using tech-speak.)
I just speak the lingo and to me 'thing' and 'their' are very different
- to the extent that neither would be sensible if you swapped the
pronunciation round.
Anyhow, you knew what I meant so the communication of the idea worked
regardless of my non-specialist use of terminology.
Jacey
(Hey, thanks to rasfc I know what a schwa is now.)
--
Jacey Bedford
Jacey Bedford
<wds...@panix.com> writes
Are you English? I'm puzzled as to how folks can think these two sounds
are anywhere close to interchangeable.
Jacey
--
Jacey Bedford
Jacey Bedford
<gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu> writes
> Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers on your throat,
>right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the letter T a few times.
>Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice that your tongue is in
>exactly the same place for both -- but when you say the D, there is a
>vibration in your throat. This is called "voicing", and is the
>distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z (among others).
Thanks for that, David, I'll add it to my very scanty knowledge of
linguistics. Beyond knowing they were different I hadn't a clue why.
Jacey
--
Jacey Bedford
Butch Malahide
> In article <7$$i2rX7g27KF...@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
> Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> said:
>
>
> >> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
> >> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>
> > Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>
> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
> tongue and teeth.
Try "bath" and "bathe". Stretch out the final consonant.
Butch Malahide
>
> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
> letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
> (among others).
But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it? If
it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
conversation, would we?
Lawrence Watt-Evans
<fred....@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Nov 3, 3:54�am, goldf...@ocf.berkeley.edu (David Goldfarb) wrote:
>>
>> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
>> linguistics. �Here's an exercise: �put your hand or a few fingers
>> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. �Say the sound of the
>> letter T a few times. �Now say the sound of the letter D. �Notice
>> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
>> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. �This is called
>> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
>> (among others).
>
>But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it?
Yes, it is.
> If
>it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
>conversation, would we?
Try it sometime.
Mike Schilling
> On Tue, 3 Nov 2009 08:04:40 -0800 (PST), Butch Malahide
> <fred....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Nov 3, 3:54 am, goldf...@ocf.berkeley.edu (David Goldfarb)
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
>>> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
>>> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
>>> letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
>>> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
>>> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
>>> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and
>>> Z
>>> (among others).
>>
>> But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it?
>
> Yes, it is.
At the start of a syllable, the "t:" is aspirated; the "d" is not.
(In my dialect, anyway.)
Butch Malahide
> On Tue, 3 Nov 2009 08:04:40 -0800 (PST), Butch Malahide
>
> >On Nov 3, 3:54 am, goldf...@ocf.berkeley.edu (David Goldfarb) wrote:
>
> >> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
> >> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
> >> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
> >> letter T a few times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice
> >> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
> >> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
> >> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
> >> (among others).
>
> >But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it?
>
> Yes, it is.
Sometimes, maybe. What about "tie dye"? The T is aspirated but not the
D.
> > If
> >it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
> >conversation, would we?
>
> Try it sometime.
I will have to try that experiment with someone else. Meanwhile,
"ladder" and "latter" seem hard enough to distinguish, even speaking
aloud; whispered "ride" and "rite" seem clearly distinguishable, but
the difference seems to be in the vowels (one is longer) than the
consonants.
Richard R. Hershberger
> On Sun, 1 Nov 2009 23:47:19 -0800 (PST), Butch Malahide
>
> <fred.gal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >On Nov 1, 11:59 pm, "Mike Schilling" <mscottschill...@hotmail.com>
> >wrote:
>
> >> Logically, "th" would mean an aspirated "t" (that is, a "t" sound
> >> followed by or including an "h" sound.) There's no reason for other
> >> languages to care that English uses it to indicate a different sound
> >> entirely.
>
> >Do you know of a language where h after t is used to indicate
> >aspiration, i.e., "t" means unaspirated t and "th" means aspirated t?
> >I can only think of examples where "t" and "th" are pronounced the
> >same, either both aspirated (English Tom * Thom) or both unaspirated.
>
> That used to be the distinction in German, but it dropped out of use,
> which is why the latest round of spelling reform dropped a lot of H's
> -- they don't have a phonetic purpose anymore.
>
> ago.
>
> don't know whether it's in all of them -- that's reflected in some
> transliterations. (The North Indian family is Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi,
> Rajasthani, Marathi, Bengali, and Romany, if I remember correctly.)
It is also worth noting that the [th] sound as used in English is
somewhat rare in world languages. I don't know the history of this
bit of orthography, but given that Old and Middle English used the
thorn and/or the edh for this sound, I wonder if Early Modern English
printers wanted some purely Latin alphabet way of showing this sound
and picked [th] because it wasn't being used for anything else.
Richard R. Hershberger
Lawrence Watt-Evans
Hmmm.
I don't think I'm consistent about that.
Kurt Busiek
It does to mine.
Maybe not the way you say it, of course, but then, I couldn't hear you.
kdb
--
Visit http://www.busiek.com -- for all your Busiek needs!
Butch Malahide
> In message
> Butch Malahide <fred.gal...@gmail.com> writes
>
> >On Nov 2, 5:16 pm, Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> >> In message
> >> <1acdb398-49a8-4fed-89ca-88710dc5d...@g27g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>,
> >> sigvaldi <sigv...@binet.is> writes
>
> >> >The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
> >> >"thing" or "their" etc.
>
> >> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>
> >They are different sounds (I'm not sure about *very*), but the
> >difference is best described as unvoiced/voiced rather than soft/hard.
> >I'm not sure but I think that, as fricatives, both would be classified
> >as "soft" consonants. Note that English "hard G" (Gecko) and "soft
> >G" (Giraffe) are both voiced.
>
> You can describe it however you like. I'm not a linguistics specialist
> so I described it with words that are in my vocabulary. I wouldn't know
> a fricative if it bit me on the bum. Neither do I know the difference
> between voiced and unvoiced, and probably don't need to since I have
> managed for half a century without knowing. The only time I am unvoiced
> is when I have laryngitis.
>
> I think linguistics students often forget that us lowly mortals don't
> speak their specialist language. (It's one of the things that gets me
> steaming in rasfc when folks start using tech-speak.)
I know what you mean: the discussions here are very often over my
head, everybody seems very highly educated, so I tend to assume that
anything *I* know must be common knowledge. No, I never had a course
in linguistics. I knew about voiced and unvoiced consonants (Z vs. S),
but I didn't understand what you were saying about hard and soft TH;
the only hard or soft letters I'd heard of were C and G. So I Googled
"hard and soft consonants" and that's where I got that stuff about
"fricatives", whatever those might be. Sorry about that!
To further confuse the issue of hard/soft TH, here's a quotation from
the OED entry for "edh":
1846 E. J. VERNON Guide Anglo-Saxon Tongue i. 4 (eth) our soft th, as
in other.
Quadibloc
> In message
> <1acdb398-49a8-4fed-89ca-88710dc5d...@g27g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>,
>
> >The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English pronounce
> >"thing" or "their" etc.
>
> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced and
unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language, even
though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
John Savard
Quadibloc
What a coincidence! They're even the _same_ two letters!
John Savard
Quadibloc
> But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it? If
> it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
> conversation, would we?
Yes, that's true. T also has a plosive component. Chinese has both the
T sound used in English (transcribed as t in Pinyin, but as t' in Wade-
Giles) and an unvoiced version of D (transcribed as d in Pinyin, but
as t in Wade-Giles) but no voiced D like ours.
Since both sounds are unvoiced, and it is the plosive that is retained
as the distinction, the Chinese can also distinguish between their two
consonants in this area when whispering.
John Savard
Mike Schilling
>
> Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced and
> unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language, even
> though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
Why do you insist on talking about stuff you don't understand at all?
Wayne Throop
:: I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out loud
:: a few times. =A0The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two words
:: neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my tongue
:: and teeth.
So, you'd say "d" and "t" also make the same sound, since you can find
cases where they sound indistinguishable, especially in a words or
sentences where pronunciation of is affected by context? Maybe "dad"
and "tad" have the same initial sound? As in "The Doon Book of Gifts
for Dad'n Tad"? Because "bottle" and "boddle" sound the same unless
you slow down and emphasize the difference?
Say "thing" and "their" in isolation, so the initial sound is less
influenced by context. If the initial phoneme of those two doesn't feel
and sound different... well... that'd be unusual. Even more, if you say
just the *sound* in isolation, the difference is obvious; one is voiced,
the other unvoiced, just as the distinction between "d" and "t". Hm.
Occurs to me that for "this thing", some accents say "dis ting".
Preserving the voiced/unvoiced distinction, even while blurring the
"t"/"th" distinction. Or, "dat ting dere", showing it isn't just for
the initial word. I can easily imagine an accent where one might say
"'e's a tin man", but a bit harder one where "'e's a din man".
( Refreshing my memory, "hard" vs "soft" most often refers to whether
there's a pause in the flow of air. But neither "th"-in-this nor
"th"-in-thing, has a pause in the flow of air. Hard vs soft is the
difference between "t" and "th" or "b" and "v". While "voiced" and
"unvoiced" is whether you are using the larynx to supply... what
to call it... "buzz" to the sound, the difference between "b" and
"p". The difference between "say ahhhh", and simply exhaling, ie,
"say hhhhh". Voicing is one of the things that can change in language
drift... but maybe a bit less likely than the slight shift in tongue
position/movement that goes from "th" to "t". Or so I expect, without
consulting a linguist. Because it seems harder to start and stop
voicing than to start and stop... fricating. )
Wayne Throop
: But [voicing is] not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is
: it? If it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in
: whispered conversation, would we?
There's a very slight difference in tongue position between "d" and "t";
the "t" being a teeny bit closer to the teeth. I suspect that's mostly
because the tension in voicing pulls the tongue a bit back, but whatever.
Nevertheless, it can be exceedingly difficult to tell the difference
between "dell" and "tell" when you whisper; eg "the farmer in the dell"
vs "the farmer in the tell". I mean, you largely know because you don't
expect there to be a "tell" following "a farmer in the". So, hard to
distinguish by sound alone unless you slip up and add a bit of voicing
to "dell", or try a bit harder fling the "t" off the teeth in "tell".
You can still tell by context easily enough.
Similar things are tro of other voiced/unvoiced pairs, like "b" and "p",
or "g" and "k". Insofar as you position your tongue a *teeny* bit
differently between the two, it's mainly because switching to voicing
vs unvoicing is a big shift. IM unexpert O.
Wayne Throop
: What about "tie dye"? The T is aspirated but not the D.
Eh. Try whispering "tie dye" vs "dye tie" to somebody, and take care to
speak in a monotone and whisper them evenly, see if they can reliably
tell which you meant. It's possible they could. As I said, there's a
very slight difference in tongue position between "d" and "t" the way
I pronouce them, which *can* be heard if you're listening very *very*
closely.
I note that wikipedia states that
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspiration_(phonetics)
Voiceless aspiration occurs when the vocal cords remain open after a
consonant is released. An easy way to measure this is by noting the
consonant's voice onset time, as the voicing of a following vowel
cannot begin until the vocal cords close.
so aspriation is very closely related to voicing. So closely that
imo it's fairly reasonable (or reasonably fair) to say that the "only"
difference between "t" and "d" is voicing. And note that "t" has an
un-aspirated form, which is affected by voicing of the sounds before
and after the "t"; that form is very *very* difficult to tell from a
"d" when whispering.
Wayne Throop
:: speak their specialist language. (It's one of the things that gets
:: me steaming in rasfc when folks start using tech-speak.)
Eh. So describe it in terms of what your tongue and throat are doing;
everybody's got words for those, right? Or by analogy with other
sounds. That is, "the flow of air pauses momentarily" vs "your larynx
is vibrating", the former being "hard", the latter being "voiced".
Or "b vs p" for voicing, and "b vs v" for hardness. Or maybe between
"t" and "th" for hardness. That way, it's moderately unambiguous,
and no technical terms to decode.
sigvaldi
David DeLaney
>>> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
>>> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>>
>
>I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
>words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
>tongue and teeth.
To put it a clearer way: "thing"'s th is not voiced. "they've" and "their"'s
is voiced. Try saying "thing" with a voiced th or "they've" or 'their' with
an unvoiced one, and it should sound VERY strange to you. If you're pronouncing
the ths in "that thing" the same, something's wrong.
And neither of those is the unvoiced 't' that the Icelandic pronunciation uses,
as I understand things; that's more like how we say 'ting'.
Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting from d...@vic.com "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.
Kurt Busiek
<mscotts...@hotmail.com> said:
What else does he have to talk about?
David DeLaney
>Butch Malahide <fred....@gmail.com> wrote:
>>But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it?
>
>Yes, it is.
>
>> If
>>it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
>>conversation, would we?
>
>Try it sometime.
You'll find you have to put it in by context. Which, to be sure, isn't that
difficult in English. "to do" vs "tattoo", for example.
David DeLaney
>Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>> You can describe it however you like. I'm not a linguistics specialist
>> so I described it with words that are in my vocabulary. I wouldn't know
>> a fricative if it bit me on the bum.
>So I Googled
>"hard and soft consonants" and that's where I got that stuff about
>"fricatives", whatever those might be. Sorry about that!
The classic raspberry, Pbpbpbpbpbpb, is a "bilabial fricative" - one made
with two lips. (This is assuming you're not also using the tongue.) This may
make it slightly clearer what a fricative might be.
Wayne Throop
:: right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the letter T a few
:: times. Now say the sound of the letter D.
: Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid>
: Thanks for that, David, I'll add it to my very scanty knowledge of
: linguistics. Beyond knowing they were different I hadn't a clue why.
I think the key is finding the pairs of analogous sounds that differ
in only the one thing of interest, like "d" and "t" above, then
pronounce the sounds a few times while instrospecting.
You can fairly easly tell what muscles are being stressed differently,
and you get a good idea what's going on. Well... better than if you
hadn't introspected at all.
Mike Schilling
> On 2009-11-03 11:10:37 -0800, "Mike Schilling"
> <mscotts...@hotmail.com> said:
>
>> Quadibloc wrote:
>>>
>>> Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced
>>> and unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language,
>>> even though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
>>
>> Why do you insist on talking about stuff you don't understand at all?
>
> What else does he have to talk about?
Nothing, most likely. Would it be so bad if he said that?
Wayne Throop
: Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced and
: unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language, even
: though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
The teachers when/where I want to elementary and high school
were not aware of this, and taught whole classesfull of students
that there are two distinct sounds that are spelled "th".
Well... three if you count my name.
All these students are out there running around spreading this
misinformation. Why, these people go around supposing that the
"th" sounds in "the thumb" "those three" are distinct.
Enough to make one weep, it is.
Rotten educational system.
Bill Snyder
Seems to work for Terry.
--
Bill Snyder [This space unintentionally left blank]
Joe Pfeiffer
> : Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca>
> : Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced and
> : unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language, even
> : though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
>
> The teachers when/where I want to elementary and high school
> were not aware of this, and taught whole classesfull of students
> that there are two distinct sounds that are spelled "th".
> Well... three if you count my name.
>
> All these students are out there running around spreading this
> misinformation. Why, these people go around supposing that the
> "th" sounds in "the thumb" "those three" are distinct.
> Enough to make one weep, it is.
Turns out they are different phones as they sound different, but the
same phoneme since if you substitute them they sound funny but have the
same meaning.
But now you've got me curious: how is your name pronunced? I've always
assumed you had the same "th" sound as in K
"three".
--
As we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should
be glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours;
and this we should do freely and generously. (Benjamin Franklin)
Kurt Busiek
It'd get my vote, at least. Maybe he could spend all that time he saved
learning stuff, observing the real world or gaining practical experience
in interacting with the opposite sex.
kdb
--
Mike Schilling
> thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>
>>> Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca>
>>> Most English speakers do not notice the distinction between voiced
>>> and unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language,
>>> even though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
>
>>
>> The teachers when/where I want to elementary and high school
>> were not aware of this, and taught whole classesfull of students
>> that there are two distinct sounds that are spelled "th".
>> Well... three if you count my name.
>>
>> All these students are out there running around spreading this
>> misinformation. Why, these people go around supposing that the
>> "th" sounds in "the thumb" "those three" are distinct.
>> Enough to make one weep, it is.
>
> Turns out they are different phones as they sound different, but the
> same phoneme since if you substitute them they sound funny but have
> the same meaning.
There are acutally minimal pairs for the two:
Taki Kogoma
allegedly proclaimed to rec.arts.sf.written:
Is this the bit where I object on the grounds of no such abilities in
evidence?
Gym "Sad to say, I've not done an authentic Quirk Objection in quite a
while, so my timing may be off..." Quirk
--
Capt. Gym Z. Quirk (Known to some as Taki Kogoma) quirk @ swcp.com
Just an article detector on the Information Supercollider.
Mike Schilling
That might lead to objections from the opposite sex.
Mike Schilling
> Joe Pfeiffer wrote:
>> thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>>
>>>> Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca>
>>>> and unvoiced "th", so both are a single phoneme in that language,
>>>> even though the distinction is significant in some other languages.
>>
>>>
>>> were not aware of this, and taught whole classesfull of students
>>> that there are two distinct sounds that are spelled "th".
>>> Well... three if you count my name.
>>>
>>> All these students are out there running around spreading this
>>> misinformation. Why, these people go around supposing that the
>>> "th" sounds in "the thumb" "those three" are distinct.
>>> Enough to make one weep, it is.
>>
>> Turns out they are different phones as they sound different, but the
>> same phoneme since if you substitute them they sound funny but have
>> the same meaning.
>
> There are acutally minimal pairs for the two:
(Hit "send" too soon)
Example "thigh" and "thy".
Robert Bannister
> In article <7$$i2rX7g...@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
> Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> said:
>
>> sigvaldi <sig...@binet.is> writes
>>
>>> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
>>> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>
> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
> tongue and teeth.
You should make a sound recording of yourself. Your brand of English may
be unique.
--
Rob Bannister
Robert Bannister
> On Nov 3, 10:27 am, Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
>> On Tue, 3 Nov 2009 08:04:40 -0800 (PST), Butch Malahide
>>
>> <fred.gal...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Nov 3, 3:54 am, goldf...@ocf.berkeley.edu (David Goldfarb) wrote:
>>>> Then you are being blinded by orthography, and have never studied
>>>> linguistics. Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers
>>>> on your throat, right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the
>>>> that your tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when
>>>> you say the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
>>>> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z
>>>> (among others).
>>> But it's not the *only* distinction between T and D (etc.), is it?
>> Yes, it is.
>
> D.
>
>>> it were, we wouldn't be able to hear the difference in whispered
>>> conversation, would we?
>> Try it sometime.
>
> "ladder" and "latter" seem hard enough to distinguish, even speaking
> aloud; whispered "ride" and "rite" seem clearly distinguishable, but
> the difference seems to be in the vowels (one is longer) than the
> consonants.
The longer vowel length before voiced consonants is a known feature of
most American dialects. Other English dialects do not do this.
--
Rob Bannister
Robert Bannister
It's true that there are almost no distinctive pairs. The only one I can
think of doesn't use a real word: thou (you) and thou (measurement).
--
Rob Bannister
Kurt Busiek
True. But the ones objecting would be far from me and not on Usenet...
Joe Pfeiffer
Something went wrong with either your newsreader or mine: I don't see
anything on the lines after the line ending with "two:"
Joe Pfeiffer
Wayne Throop
: But now you've got me curious: how is your name pronunced? I've always
: assumed you had the same "th" sound as in "three".
"Th" as in "Thompson", "Thames", "Thalhimers" or "Neanderthal".
(Hm, *are* there still Thalimerses (as in the store, not the family name)
out there, or did they go entirely out of business or get subsumed?
And do other people pronounce it as I learned various places on the
east coast? I did find some place in West Virginia that pronounced the
town name of "Pulaski" (which I knew of from a town in Pennsylvania
as "puh-*la*-ski"), as "*pyoo*-la-ski". So you never can tell.)
(And of course, wikipedia (and other places) lists as an acceptable
pronunciation of Neanderthal with "th"-as-in-three. So you can't tell
about that one either. And there are branches of the USian Throop
family that pronounce it "th"-as-in-three also. So... yeah.
"Thompson" is still pretty reliable, though. Don't know anybody
who does Thompson with "th"-as-in-three.)
"Ground control to major Thom..."
David Goldfarb
Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>In message <KsJ26...@kithrup.com>, David Goldfarb
><gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu> writes
>> Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers on your throat,
>>right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the letter T a few times.
>>Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice that your tongue is in
>>exactly the same place for both -- but when you say the D, there is a
>>vibration in your throat. This is called "voicing", and is the
>>distinction between T and D, K and G, S and Z (among others).
>
>linguistics. Beyond knowing they were different I hadn't a clue why.
Many years ago I took an introductory linguistics course at the same
time as introductory Japanese. The linguistics course covered voiced
vs. unvoiced, at the same time as the Japanese told me "This character
from the syllabary is read 'ka' but if you draw two extra small lines
at the upper right it becomes 'ga'." That rather drove it home.
--
David Goldfarb | "You do it. I'm bitter."
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu |
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- MST3K
Quadibloc
> Not on my screen :)
I did not mean they were only one letter. I meant that they were the
same two letters as are used in Old English.
John Savard
Joe Pfeiffer
> : Joe Pfeiffer <pfei...@cs.nmsu.edu>
> : But now you've got me curious: how is your name pronunced? I've always
> : assumed you had the same "th" sound as in "three".
>
> "Th" as in "Thompson", "Thames", "Thalhimers" or "Neanderthal".
Ah, got it.
Rebecca Rice
> In message <hcotje$3kc$1...@panix2.panix.com>, William December Starr
> <wds...@panix.com> writes>>> sigvaldi <sig...@binet.is> writes
>>>
>>>> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
>>>> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>>>
>>> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>>
>> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
>> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
>> tongue and teeth.
>
> are anywhere close to interchangeable.
>
I have to admit that they sounded the same to me too, until
I tried the "hold your fingers on your Adam's apple" trick,
and I am a native English speaker. However, I also am
apparently really really good at hearing harmonies (it's a
struggle for me to lead a tune with other people, because I
will instinctively harmonize instead of singing the lyric
line), so maybe I just fill in the missing sounds with thing
versus their.
Rebecca
Rebecca Rice
> William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>> Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> said:
>>> sigvaldi <sig...@binet.is> writes
>>>> The Icelandic pronounciation is similar to how the English
>>>> pronounce "thing" or "their" etc.
>>> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is hard.
>> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
>> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
>> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to my
>> tongue and teeth.
>
> To put it a clearer way: "thing"'s th is not voiced. "they've" and "their"'s
> is voiced. Try saying "thing" with a voiced th or "they've" or 'their' with
> an unvoiced one, and it should sound VERY strange to you.
This may be where the problem lies... I can't really grasp
the difference between how a voiced and unvoiced th sound.
So when you say "try saying "thing" with a voiced th", I
can't even comprehend what it should sound like, much less
that it should sound strange. And you can't just say "like
you would say "their"", because that gets back to the entire
"I don't consciously hear a difference" problem. The Adam's
apple trick has shown me that they _feel_ different, but
that doesn't translate to sounding different. (And is
probably being made more difficult because the ng in thing
makes the same sort of buzzy feel as the th in they, so the
words as a whole have the same sort of feel to them.)
Rebecca
William December Starr
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu (David Goldfarb) said:
> William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>> Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> said:
>>
>>> Two very different sounds. 'Thing' is a soft th. 'Their' is
>>> hard.
>>
>> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
>> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
>> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to
>> my tongue and teeth.
>
> Then you are being blinded by orthography,
Damn, I hate it when that happens.
> and have never studied linguistics.
Does one need to have studied linguistics to determine whether parts
of two words sound the same?
> Here's an exercise: put your hand or a few fingers on your throat,
> right on your Adam's apple. Say the sound of the letter T a few
> times. Now say the sound of the letter D. Notice that your
> tongue is in exactly the same place for both -- but when you say
> the D, there is a vibration in your throat. This is called
> "voicing", and is the distinction between T and D, K and G, S and
> Z (among others).
>
> Now try it while saying "They" and then "Thing". Say them slowly,
> so that the initial sound lasts a while. (Thus avoiding confusion
> from the vowel sounds, which are voiced.)
I was addressing the way the sounds are spoken in normal speech, not
the way they're pronounced when artificially drawn out or spoken
unnaturally slowly.
-- wds
William December Starr
Jacey Bedford <look...@nospam.invalid> said:
> William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> writes
>
>> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
>> loud a few times. The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
>> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to
>> my tongue and teeth.
>
> Are you English? I'm puzzled as to how folks can think these two
> sounds are anywhere close to interchangeable.
Raised from age 1.5 or so in downstate New York, then moved to the
Cambridge/Boston MA area at age 17, have lived here ever since (34+
years).
-- wds
William December Starr
Butch Malahide <fred....@gmail.com> said:
> wdst...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>
>> I just said "You've got your thing, they've got their thing" out
>> loud a few times. �The pronunciation of the 'th' in the last two
>> words neither sounds different to my ears nor feels different to
>> my tongue and teeth.
>
> Try "bath" and "bathe". Stretch out the final consonant.
Yes, the "th" sounds in those two words are different to me. I
never meant to claim that 'th' can't have different pronunciations
in different words in English, just that I don't/can't perceive a
difference in the their/thing example that Jacey gave. Or at least,
that when both 'th's are pronounced the same, it sounds perfectly
normal to me.
-- wds