ah/ awe

[Paul Johnston]

Are you REALLY saying that the vowel in light, sight etc. is a single
sound, and you don't mean the Southern /a:/?  I think you may need a
course in "phthongs"--or at least a good phonetics course.

PAJ
On Oct 2, 2006, at 5:50 PM, Tom Zurinskas wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: ah/ awe
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> ---------
>
>> 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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