ah/ awe

[Mark A. Mandel]

Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote, replying to Beverly Flanigan
<flanigan at OHIO.EDU>:

>>>
> (What field are you in, by the way???)

I'm a retired FAA Employee whos written a few books on USA English phonetics
- via truespel.


>As for uniting linguists in any kind of quest to "perfect" the language,
>fuhgetaboudit!  Unlike English teachers and speech therapists, we're not in
>the business of telling people how to speak or write or spell.

OK.  Thanks for clearing that up.  Please telll me who is and I'll not deal
with linguists anymore.  If I were on a quest to standardize USA English
pronunciation, where would I go?

<<<

And:

>>>

>> 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.
>
> As an ideal, dialectical differences are not good.  The purpose of
> speech is to communicate.  Any alterations that lessen this is not a good
> thing.   We don't have dialects when we write, why should we in this day
> and age have them when we talk.

<<<

Thank you for clearing THAT up. Now I will express plainly what I, and I
think the other professionals on this list, have suspected since your first
post here:

1.  You are an amateur with an interest in language -- nothing wrong with
that!

2.  You think that because you're a native speaker of English, and because
of your own studies and thoughts about it, you know everything that needs to
be known about the subject and don't need to pay attention to people who
actually have made a career of studying language in general and/or English
in particular. That is a grave error.
 Example:
 -  >> 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.

3.  While spelling and grammar certainly don't correlate with intelligence,
education, or professionalism, there are traditional standards for them, and
your lack of adherence to those standards does not recommend you--
especially since you claim authority in, and propose to uphold, traditional
standards of language.
 Examples:
 - Any alterations that lessen this is not a good thing.
 - [...] why should we in this day and age have them when we talk.
 - dipthong
 - two-phthongs

4.  For success in your quest to standardize USA English pronunciation, I
suggest that you turn to prayer. No earthly force has ever succeeded in
achieving such a goal in a population so large, diverse, and widespread. I
see no reason whatsoever to believe that you will be successful either, and
no reason to wish that you should.

-- Mark A. Mandel
   Linguistic Data Consortium, University of Pennsylvania
   [This text prepared with Dragon NaturallySpeaking.]

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