Amphitheater -> Ampitheater

[A. Vine]

What I want to know is, if it were written "amfitheater", would folks pronounce
it with the initial "amp"?

--
Andrea Vine
Sun Internet Mail Server i18n architect
avine at eng.sun.com
Romanes eunt domus.

Dennis R. Preston wrote:
>
> Paul,
>
> Over my entire life I've noticed that people pronounce "amphitheater" this way.
>
> The rule is simple; it's "progressive assimilation" - which means that an
> "earlier" sound influences a "later" one.
>
> In this case, /m/ is an bilabial nasal stop. /f/, if it were to occur, is a
> labiodental oral fricative (i.e., continuant). In short, three features
> "mismatch" in two sounds which come very close together. Your phonetic
> apparatus gets to work and says "Hey" I can't go from bilabial to
> labiodental, nasal to oral, and stop to fricative so damn quick. How about
> letting me keep the stop and bilabial part (and I'll give you the oral)."
> The phonemic apparatus says, "I guess I'll still understand. Deal." The
> phonetic apparatus gets back to work and takes /f/ and applies "stop" (in
> place of "fricative") and "bilabial" (instead of "labiodental"). Voila! a
> /p/.
>
> Of course, we seldom notice assimilation when it happens in our own speech
> (particularly with "ordinary words), but when it happens in items which
> have a "prescriptive" or learned historical ring (especially among groups
> like "younger speakers"), we often latch on to it as part of our pervasive
> language-is-going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket ideology.
>
> dInIs (whose assimilationist positions are severly restricted to linguistics)
>
> PS: I complained to the Michigan State Theatre Department that they spelled
> their department name "theatre." They told me (coldly) that that was the
> "correct" spelling for "serious" drama. I asked them if they changed the
> name when they did comedies. They hung up.
>
> PPS: Please don't write in and tell me that nasals aren't stops. I classify
> "stops" as a feature based on closure of the oral passageway (as do most
> these days).
>
> >We have a local venue called the "Molson Amphitheater." (It's actually
> >spelled "Amphitheatre," but I'll ignore that Britishism for the purposes
> >of this post.) It plays host to many concerts, so the word
> >"amphitheater" is heard quite often on the radio and in conversations.
> >Over the past few years, I've noticed that many people, particularly
> >young people, pronounce this word as "ampitheater." That is, they ignore
> >the first "h" so the initial syllable is pronounced as "amp" instead of
> >"amf." Is this a widespread trend and is there any general linguistic
> >rule that covers such a shift?
> >
> >Paul
> >Books: http://www.mcfedries.com/books/
> >Word Spy: http://www.logophilia.com/WordSpy/
>
> Dennis R. Preston
> Professor of Linguistics
> Department of Linguistics and Languages
> Michigan State University
> East Lansing MI 48824-1027 USA
> preston at pilot.msu.edu
> Office: (517)353-0740
> Fax: (517)432-2736