rawk (1987)

[David Bowie]

From:    Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
: At 10:55 AM -0600 2/24/05, Jim Parish wrote:

:: This spelling is also popular (AFAICT, more popular) for the verb
:: "rock", as in "You RAWK!", a rather vague but forceful expression of
:: praise.

: Wonder if there's an influence from the "hawg" spelling (201,000
: google hits, mostly for Harleys and such).  Then there's "dawg" which
: I've always found curious, since that would be how I'd pronounce
: "dog" without any help.  (Sort of like "luv" or "wuz", or "wimmin".)
: At least in the "rawk" and "hawg" case the distinct spelling does
: index a distinct pronunciation.

Provo (Utah) High School's mascot is the Bulldogs, and along the side of the
school is emblazoned "Go Dawgs!" However, this area has the cot-caught
merger.

My suspicion is that in this case (and likely others) it's imitation of the
Georgia Bulldogs, not an index of any particular pronunciation.

In a FWIW aside, i have the cot-caught distinction, and 'hog' and 'hawg' are
both pronounced the same for me. The <og> words are notoriously variable;
for me there's dog, hog, slog, fog, frog, and log (open-o) versus blog, pog,
cog, jog, toggle, and noggin (ah).

David Bowie                                         http://pmpkn.net/lx
    Jeanne's Two Laws of Chocolate: If there is no chocolate in the
    house, there is too little; some must be purchased. If there is
    chocolate in the house, there is too much; it must be consumed.