endangered phonemes

[Peter Richardson]

> But there's question I've always wanted to ask: for me, and for all
> other which/witch-ers I've ever asked, the interrogative "why" and the
> interjection "why" are a minimal pair  -- i.e. we have /hway/ in "Why
> did you do it?", but /way/ in "Why, that's impossible!"

woops. Here's an exception. I say /hway/ for both. I suspect others do as
well, but maybe only those born in 1943 or before.

Peter Richardson