Can some native USA English speakers say "awe" or not

[Wilson Gray]

I may be out of step with the rest of mankind, but my own experience
is that a merger can not be automatically undone just because you feel
like it.

For one thing, I've found it extremely difficult even to find mergers
in my own speech. Someone has to point them out to me.

As a child, I went to a Catholic elementary school in Saint Louis in
which all of the faculty were white, but all the students were black.
>From the very first grade, I can recall teachers saying stuff like,
"10 is pronounced 'TIN,' *not* 'tin'! See? [Writing on the blackboard]
It's 'T-E-N,' not 'T-I-N'!" and wondering what in the world the
teacher could possibly be going on about. Why does she think that we
don't how to spell "10"? "T-I-N" spells "tin." not "10." We know that!

Some forty or so years later, I read somewhere or other that this kind
of general-rule-governed, i.e. E -> I / __ [+nasal], merger can be
undone in a given person's speech only if the speaker tackles
individually each word that fits the rule. I've tried that and, sure
enough, it works! But it simply isn't worth the effort: Let's see,
now. Is this "mint" as in "sprig of mint," to which the rule has
applied vacuously, in which case, I'm cool? Or is this "mint" as in,
"I meant to say," in which case I have to apply the ad-hoc rule, I ->
E / __ [+nasal] in words standardly pronounced with E [+nasal],
specific to cases like these, to reverse the effect of the general
rule?

-Wilson

On 10/27/06, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Can some native USA English speakers say "awe" or not
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Sometimes I have similar thoughts, though opposite.
>
> One day I was in a room of sociolinguistics student and a SL professor
> and made a reference to the "bawdy" language of Shakespeare. Every
> single person thought I meant "body" despite the fact that "body
> language" and 'bawdy language" have different stress patterns. And they
> were in MY native dialect territory of Seattle; transplants, every one.
>
> Another way I have similar thoughts is my amazement when TV newscasters
> can't pronounce the "t" in tsunami. But then I realize that just like I
> can't pronounce that "awe" sound, they can't say syllable initial "ts".
> I imagine they would have similar trouble pronouncing the "tl" in Tlingit.
>
> Benjamin Barrett
> a cyberbreath for language life
> livinglanguages.wordpress.com
>
> Tom Zurinskas wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> > Poster:       Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > I believe awe-droppers as native born American English speakers can hear the
> > sound "awe" and they can say the sound "awe".  They just don't like the
> > sound "awe" nor forming it in their mouths when they talk.  They may llive
> > in an area were "awe" is dropped and they don't use it much.
> >
> > I cannot believe that any native born American English speaker exposed to as
> > much TV and radio as they are simply cannot form their mouths to say one of
> > the main phonemes of USA English.
> >
>
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>


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complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is knows how deep
a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our
race. He brought death into the world.

--Sam Clemens

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