gripe from a lurker (a/an)

[Pafra & Scott Catledge]

If I pronounced "the apple" with a schwa in "the," who knows, I might say "a
apple."  In my ideolect, however, "the" boy has a schwa, "the" apple has a
barred i.   I say "an apple."
----- Original Message -----
From: Dennis R. Preston <preston at PILOT.MSU.EDU>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Saturday, October 02, 1999 7:27 AM
Subject: Re: gripe from a lurker (a/an)


> Sooner or later you-all will catch on to the easy rule (mine, which
yields,
> for example, "a apple," not to mention "the apple" with schwa in the
> article).
>
> dInIs
>
>
>
> >That's odd. I find the use of (a) in the quoted American Heritage
> >Dictionary passage quite jarring to both eye and ear. I'm not a linguist
> >and don't know the terminology for it, but I find my pronunciation of the
> >(h) in the unstressed first syllable of "historic/al" to be vocalic
enough
> >to require (an); whereas the stress it receives in "history" pushes the
(h)
> >far enough into the consonantal realm that (a) seems more natural.
> >
> >Scott Swanson
> >==a Montanan de-lurking briefly.
>
> 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