hoarse-horse

[Dale Coye]

You're  recollection is correct--RP has never had this distinction between hw
and w--the distinction is preserved in many or all Scottish dialects however.

Dale Coye
The College of NJ

In a message dated 7/23/2004 12:54:25 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
GordonMJ at MISSOURI.EDU writes:
AFAIK, the distinction has been lost for quite a while in southern England,
and presumably in RP as well. I don't have my copy of Wells (1982) handy to
check.

-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society on behalf of Arnold M. Zwicky
Sent: Fri 7/23/2004 11:15 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject:      Re: hoarse-horse

last night i heard a BBC news report about whaling ships, with
"whaling" pronounced with a [w]; i kept hearing it as "wailing ships"
(the Flying Dutchman, maybe).  i should know by now that the
distinction is rapidly fading in the u.k., but i keep expecting to hear
it in people who are otherwise RP speakers (as this newsreader was).

here in the u.s., i'm pleased when a [hw] goes by, but i don't really
expect it.

arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)