stars and ours

[Dennis R. Preston]

Yes; I suppose the undershoot associated with lighter stress cold
almost give a Canadian raising like impression for the onset,
although the undershot glide target would not be in play. I assumed
people were sitting around pronouncing fully stressed forms of these
words.

dInIs

>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Michael H Covarrubias <mcovarru at PURDUE.EDU>
>Subject:      Re: stars and ours
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>I imagine the pronunciation of 'my' would be different from 'eye' in some
>situations.
>
>In an unstressed position such as 'my best friend' or 'my only
>friend' the vowel
>in 'my' could be similar to 'fight' or 'bike' especially in fast
>speech. Before
>the consonant in 'my best' it could be reduced to a schwa and lose
>the diphthong
>contour, but before a vowel in 'my only' it would always be a diphthong.
>
>In no environment would I would pronounce 'eye' with anything less
>than the full
>[aI] diphthong.
>
>Michael
>
>Quoting "Dennis R. Preston" <preston at MSU.EDU>:
>
>>  Seems very unlikely since Canadian raising is limited to closed
>>  syllables before voiceless consonants.
>>
>>  And poets do not use spectrograms.
>>
>>  >
>>  >I believe I raise "eye." (Though now that I've said them 5 billion
>>  >times . . . .)
>>  >
>>  >(Sorry, perhaps it was poets nitpicking over how they rhymed:
>>  >Atlanta, GA vs Edmonton, AB.)
>>  >
>>  >S.
>>  >
>>  >On May 31, 2007, at 9:43 AM, Dennis R. Preston wrote:
>>  >
>>  >>
>>  >>  Help? What Canadian practice cause "my" and "eye" to not rhyme?
>>  >>  Neither is a candidate for so-called "Canadian raising."
>>  >>
>>  >>  dInIs
>>  >>
>>  >>>
>>  >>>  I can just give a cheers to the W. CND. pronunciation. That is how I
>>  >>>  would say it. (I'm still happy I don't consider "my" and "eye" to
>>  >>>  rhyme though--Brown's MFA poetry program was a very interesting study
>>  >>>  in pronunciation.)
>>  >>>
>>  >>>
>>  >>>  S.
>>  >>>
>>  >>>  On May 31, 2007, at 8:09 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>  >>>>
>>  >>>>   It sounds like Philadelphian to me. It's a feature of Chomsky's
>>  >>>>   speech.
>>  >>>>
>>  >>>>   -Wilson
>>  >>>>
>>  >>>>   On 5/30/07, James Harbeck <jharbeck at sympatico.ca> wrote:
>>  >>>>>
>>  >>>>>   Just read a poem by a high school student from western Canada that
>>  >>>>>   illustrates a standard Canadian pronunciation rather well: it
>>  >>>>>  rhymes
>>  >>>>>   "stars" with "ours" -- quite reasonably, though I'm not used to
>>  >>>>>   seeing those two words matched, perhaps because at least in my
>>  >>>>>   generation and earlier ones, we were taught that "ours" was
>>  >>>>>  properly
>>  >>>>>   pronounced like "hours," even if it almost never really was by us.
>>  >>>>>   Evidently even that awareness of [aUrz] as a citation form is
>>  >>>>>   disappearing. (This is from a well-educated kid, too -- a gifted
>>  >>>>>   student, graduating high school at 16.)
>>  >>>>>
>>  >>>>>   That one's also common in much of the US, no?
>>  >>>>>
>>  >>>>>   James Harbeck.
>>  >>>>>
>
>
>
>
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>    English Language & Linguistics
>    Purdue University
>    mcovarru at purdue.edu
>
>    web.ics.purdue.edu/~mcovarru
>   <http://wishydig.blogspot.com>
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org


--
Dennis R. Preston
University Distinguished Professor
Department of English
15C Morrill Hall
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824
517-353-4736
preston at msu.edu

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org