ah/ awe

Tom Zurinskas truespel at HOTMAIL.COM
Mon Oct 2 21:50:59 UTC 2006


>From: David Bowie <db.list at PMPKN.NET>
>>
>From:    Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> >> From: sagehen <sagehen at WESTELCOM.COM>
>
> >> Tom, would you wipe out all dialectal differences in pursuit of this
> >> pronounce-as-spelled campaign?  How would you deal, e.g., with the
> >> diphthongal i with which most northerners pronounce /light, sight,
>might/,
> >> &c?
>
> > I'm not familiar with that dipthong.  In m-w.com those words above do
>not
> > have vowels that are two-phthongs to me.
>
>The standard pronunciations of the vowels in those words are
>diphthongs--in fact, pronouncing those vowels with monophthongs is
>rather markedly non-standard. I'm starting to become very curious as to
>where your assumptions about the technicalities of English pronunciation
>come from.

My assumptions are my own.  Are your assumptions someone elses?  Hwo's
(Sorry that's "who's", I'm practicing saying "wh" as "hw") are they?.  Words
/light, sight, might/ have one phthong as I hear them in m-w.com.

Tom Z

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