eye dialect was RE: nekkid

Tom Zurinskas truespel at HOTMAIL.COM
Mon Mar 14 16:07:52 UTC 2011


> So: eye-dialect is in the eye of the beholder--the nekkid eye.

That must be it.  The writer wants the readers' eyes and mind to say the word as spelled.  And maybe any kind of foespel (phonetic splling) qualifies, be it IPA, truespel, or some tradspel form.  So the IPA could be an eye dialect form?  Why not if put in that context.  I have a bible with lots of ~forin names with "eye dialect" notation next to them to show how pronounced.
 
Interestingly "naked" and "baked" don't rhyme.  NAY-kid (~naekid) and baykd (~baekd).  I've never heard the term ~nekid much.

Tom Zurinskas, Conn 20 yrs, then Tenn 3, NJ 33, now FL 9.
The FREE English-based phonetic converters, URL and text , are at truespel.com


 
 
> 
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
> Subject: Re: eye dialect was RE: nekkid
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> So: eye-dialect is in the eye of the beholder--the nekkid eye.
> 
> --Charlie
> 
> ________________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM]
> Sent: Monday, March 14, 2011 9:15 AM
> 
> 
> Wikipedia is correct though idiotically expressed.
> 
> "Eye dialect" means nonstandard spelling that's intended to show that a
> character is ignorant and illiterate, regardless of the phonetic accuracy of
> the spelling itself.
> 
> A prime example of eye dialect in the USA would be "uv" for "of." Few
> Americans make that distinction. OTOH, in Irish dialogue written for
> Americans, "uv" is a reasonable, if distracting, approximation; in other
> words, not eye dialect.
> 
> For some, "nekkid" is pointless eye dialect for "naked" - pointless because
> that's how almost everybody across a vast region says it. To me, it isn't
> eye-dialect because it represents a nonstandard pronunciation.
> 
> Now, if somebody suddenly realized just how ignorant and illiterate *I* am,
> and, to prove it, represented me as saying "nekkid" instead of /nEikId/ that
> would be eye dialect, regardless of what it would be for Wilson and Charlie.
> 
> 
> (Actually they'd nail it for eye dialect because they know that, back where
> I come from, /nEikId/ is normal; also, I've already told them I say
> /nEikId/.)
> 
> JL
> 
> On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 8:22 AM, Tom Zurinskas <truespel at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster: Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> > Subject: Re: eye dialect was RE: nekkid
> >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > from wikipedia
> >
> > "Eye dialect is the use of non-standard spelling for speech to draw
> > attention to pronunciation, often in regard to the literary technique of
> > using non-standard spelling to approximate a pronunciation that is actually
> > no different from the standard pronunciation but has the effect of
> > dialectal, foreign, or uneducated speech."
> >
> > This makes no sense. How could using a special spelling "no different from
> > standard pronunciation" make it "dialectal, foreign or uneducated" Unless
> > the standard is that way? But that would make it a nonstandard standard.
> >
> > My take is that "eye dialect" as defined is merely a form of tradspel
> > phonetics. It's a writing system. So this form of phonetics could be
> > called tradnetics, so to speak. The problem here is that not all English
> > sounds have consistent tradspel forms, so they can never be spelled in "eye
> > dialect". Basically truespel phonetics steps in here to standardize eye
> > dialect using a phonetics based on English tradspel.
> >
> >
> > Tom Zurinskas, Conn 20 yrs, then Tenn 3, NJ 33, now FL 9.
> > The FREE English-based phonetic converters, URL and text , are at
> > truespel.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ----------------------------------------
> > > Date: Sun, 13 Mar 2011 17:34:26 -0500
> > > From: GordonMJ at MISSOURI.EDU
> > > Subject: Re: eye dialect was RE: nekkid
> > > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > >
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > > Sender: American Dialect Society
> > > Poster: "Gordon, Matthew J."
> > > Subject: Re: eye dialect was RE: nekkid
> > >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > The author gets to decide. People who pronounce 'naked' as [nEkId] may
> > interpret 'nekkid' as eye dialect, but that doesn't mean the author intended
> > it as such. Many readers today would look at spellings like "wut, w'at, wot'
> > as eye dialect for "what," but they were used in the 19th-cen. to indicate
> > marked pronunciations.
> > >
> > > -Matt
> > > ________________________________________
> > > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of
> > Charles C Doyle [cdoyle at UGA.EDU]
> > > Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2011 5:14 PM
> > > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > > Subject: Re: eye dialect was RE: nekkid
> > >
> > > But who gets to decide what pronunciations a "marked" and what
> > "unmarked"? That's the question that Wilson and I were raising.
> > >
> > > For some of us, the pronunciation [nEkId] is, so to speak, unmarked; so
> > the spelling "nekkid" is, for us, eye dialect.
> > >
> > > And some of us don't pronunce "was" as if spelled "wuz."
> > >
> > > --Charlie
> > >
> > > ________________________________________
> > > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> > Gordon, Matthew J. [GordonMJ at MISSOURI.EDU]
> > > Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2011 6:02 PM
> > >
> > >
> > > By way of clarification:
> > > "eye dialect" refers to respelling of words to reflect their unmarked
> > pronunciation (e.g. wuz, iz, uv for was, is, of). The label comes from the
> > fact that such forms appear to represent distinctive regional or social
> > dialects but in fact represent the "standard" pronunciation. Thus, they are
> > dialect for the eye not for the ear.
> > >
> > > Pronouncing words according to their spelling is usually called "spelling
> > pronunciation."
> > >
> > > I think it's hard to argue that 'nekkid' is intended as eye dialect since
> > it respells the word to represent a marked pronunciation (with /E/ instead
> > of the unmarked /e/).
> > >
> > >
> > > -Matt Gordon
> > > ________________________________________
> > > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Tom
> > Zurinskas [truespel at HOTMAIL.COM]
> > > Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2011 4:01 PM
> > > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > > Subject: Re: nekkid
> > >
> > > Isn't "eye dialect" more like "mouth dialect". It ain't one's eyes doing
> > the talking. Folks are just spelling how they talk, what their mouths are
> > doing. Their mouths do the talking, not their eyes.
> > >
> > > Shouldn't "eye dialect" refer to mispronouncing a word because of it's
> > spelling, like saying for "Arkansas" are-CAN-zis (~Aarkkanzis) instead of
> > ARE-kin-saw (~Aarkinsau). That way the "eye" is creating the dialect from
> > what it sees.
> > >
> > > I would assume "nekked" or "nekid" or "neckid" would work as well. It's
> > not a real word, so why not? It's dialectspel, spelling how your talking in
> > a tradspel (traditional spelling) kind of way.
> > >
> > >
> > > Tom Zurinskas, Conn 20 yrs, then Tenn 3, NJ 33, now FL 9.
> > > The FREE English-based phonetic converters, URL and text , are at
> > truespel.com
> > >
> > >
> > > >
> > > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > > > Sender: American Dialect Society
> > > > Poster: Charles C Doyle
> > > > Subject: Re: nekkid
> > > >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > >
> > > > And the synecdoche "butt naked" parallels the Middle English idiom
> > "belly naked"--obsolete, as far as I am aware.
> > > >
> > > > --Charlie
> > > >
> > > > ________________________________________
> > > > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> > Charles C Doyle [cdoyle at UGA.EDU]
> > > > Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2011 10:58 AM
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > I've always sort of liked "butt naked"! It's so vivid, picturesque . .
> > . .
> > > >
> > > > --Charlie
> > > >
> > > > ________________________________________
> > > > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> > Wilson Gray [hwgray at GMAIL.COM]
> > > > Sent: Saturday, March 12, 2011 6:17 PM
> > > > Well, that's all right, I reckon. Now, if there were only a way to
> > > > delete from the AmE-speaking language-organ the abominable reanalysis,
> > > > _butt-_nekkid!;-)
> > > > --
> > > > -Wilson
> > > >
> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------
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> > > >
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> > > ------------------------------------------------------------
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> 
> 
> 
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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