LL-L "Language varieties" 2000.10.29 (03) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 29.OCT.2001 (03) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German) S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic Z=Zeelandic (Zeeuws)
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From: Criostoir O Ciardha <paada_please at yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2000.10.27 (02) [E]

Dear all,

Thanks to Ron and Holger for clarifying the position
of Low Saxon. Much appreciated. My fiance is
Australian so I got her mouthing Australian English
"car" to mimick [k'a:]. I don't have an [r] sound
either... in fact, it seems that the [r] phoneme is
fairly thin on the ground in many Lowland languages.
Why would this be? What's so difficult about it to
encourage its gradual loss?

To digress a little more, and to return to the subject
of pan-North Sea contacts between Lowland and
Scandinavian languages, I pick up on what Ron wrote:

"Finally (surely not), Dutch has changed the  sequence
/old/ to /oud/,
while Low Saxon has not; e.g., ...

Dutch = Low Saxon
oud = old 'old'
koud = kold 'cold'
goud = gold 'gold(en)'"

This is remarkable from the point of view of Northern
English variants including, yes, my own. In my
variant, and I think in most variants along a line
Manchester-Yorkshire, the following occur:

old = oewd ['o:wd] ("old")
cold = koewd ['ko:wd] ("cold")
gold = goewd ['go:wd] ("gold")

And so on. This is a basic rule of the language. Are
we looking at yet more evidence of a closer
relationship between northern English variants and
languages spoken in the Netherlands, Zeeland and
Fryslan [sic]?

What does the list think?

Dank u,

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language varieties

Críostóir,

> My fiance is
> Australian so I got her mouthing Australian English
> "car" to mimick [k'a:]. I don't have an [r] sound
> either... in fact, it seems that the [r] phoneme is
> fairly thin on the ground in many Lowland languages.
> Why would this be? What's so difficult about it to
> encourage its gradual loss?

Technically speaking, it is not a matter of loss in the "non-rhotic"
varieties.  Rather, it is a matter of applying a phonological rule, a
rule of assimilation: syllable-final /r/ assimilates to the preceding
vowel by changing into a similar vowel.  In Low Saxon and Australian
English, it changes into [a] after [a(:)], which results in [a:].  In
some varieties the /r/ changes into a vowel that is not identical but
very similar.

> I pick up on what Ron wrote:
>
> "Finally (surely not), Dutch has changed the  sequence
> /old/ to /oud/,
> while Low Saxon has not; e.g., ...
>
> Dutch = Low Saxon
> oud = old 'old'
> koud = kold 'cold'
> goud = gold 'gold(en)'"
>
> This is remarkable from the point of view of Northern
> English variants including, yes, my own. In my
> variant, and I think in most variants along a line
> Manchester-Yorkshire, the following occur:
>
> old = oewd ['o:wd] ("old")
> cold = koewd ['ko:wd] ("cold")
> gold = goewd ['go:wd] ("gold")

Indeed!  I hear many Americans say [k`oUd] for _cold_.  Also remember
examples such standardized pronunnciations like _almond_ ['?Q:m at nd],
_Holmes_ [hoUmz] and _Lincoln_ ['lINk at n].  This is a "natural" or
"tempting" rule to apply where a non-initial /l/ is "thick" (as in
_ball_ or _bald_, which is also in the inventory of many Low Saxon
dialects).  Such an /l/ is easily changed into a [w] or [U] sound.  You
will also notice this in many Portuguese varieties, bearing in mind that
Portuguese, too, has this "thick" /l/; e.g., _Portugal_ [pUrtU'gaL] ~
[pUrtU'gaw] and _Brasil_ [br@'ziL] ~ [br@'ziw].

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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