CONtract/conTRACT

[Dennis R. Preston]

You were clear. I assumed that fancy-pants Northerners do make this
distinction. Least that what I hear them doing up here in SESM
(Standard English Speaking Michigan).

dInIs



>On Wed, 31 Oct 2001 13:51:11 -0500 "Dennis R. Preston"
>
>>  Many of us Southerners eschew fancy-pants Romance stress rules and
>>  go
>>  for a root (or even misunderstood as root) earlier syllable. I bet
>>  them good ol- CON-tract speakers are also
>>
>>  CE-ment
>>  ICE-cream
>>  UM-brella
>>  and even
>>  TEN-nessee
>
>And GEE-tar. But I guess I didn't make my question clear. Does anyone use
>BOTH pronunciations but differentiate depending on meaning? For example,
>I would CON-tract for lawn care but con-TRACT a disease. Well, I hope I
>wouldn't do either, but you get the point.
>
>D

--
Dennis R. Preston
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