My limericks

[Jules Levin]

On 5/30/2012 8:43 PM, Paul B. Gallagher wrote:
> Robert Orr wrote:
>
>> "Let's all join the chorus "
>> "For our fabled Horace"
>> how many people rhyme "chorus" and "Horace"?
>
> Too many, in my book.
>
> Where I come from (N'York, originally), "Horace" has "short o" as in 
> "not," which sounds the same as "a" in "father" (British speakers and 
> New Englanders will disagree). But many Americans, especially south of 
> here, lengthen stressed vowels before intervocalic /r/:
>
> borrow, coronary, Dorothy, florist, Florida, foreign, horrible, 
> horror, majority, minority, moral, Norris, orange, origin, porridge, 
> sorry, torrent, torrid, etc.
>
> I have /a/ as in "father" in all of these.
One man's neutralization is another man's contrast.  Since I have two 
different vowels possible among the set above, I don't see how Orr 
(/ahr/?) claims to be preserving a contrast.  I would distinguish 
between 'sorry' and a nonce 'sorey' as in "my muscles are feeling kinda 
sorey..."
Jules Levin


>
> I do have "long o" in some words (boring, glorious, Taurid), so for me 
> these speakers are neutralizing a contrast. Their pronunciation of 
> "horrible" sounds to me like "whorable." (sorry!)
>
> Many of these speakers also lengthen other "short" vowels before 
> intervocalic /r/ and in some other positions. Thus, "I maried mary 
> Mary and we all had a Mary Christmas." For me, merry/marry/Mary have 
> three distinct vowels. Compare also "mirror" pronounced as "meerer," 
> "error" as "airer" ("to air is human"), etc. Some even say things like 
> "emediately," but that might be under the influence of the following 
> /i/. Here, too, these speakers are neutralizing what I hear as a 
> contrast.
>

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------