wheel barrel
Wilson Gray
hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Wed Feb 27 16:25:05 UTC 2008
It's been years since I've heard my name spoken in the real local
dialect - as opposed to that used by the "Talented Tenth," to coin a
phrase - but I'm fairly sure that there's an [l]. Of course, [-V at -] is
very hard to distinguish from [-V at l-] and I could very well be
mistaken. I remember when I was taking a course in Ukrainian and
someone asked the professor, a native speaker of Ukrainian, how the
pronunciation of /l/ in Ukrainian differed from its pronunciation in
Russian. The prof answered, "[Eu]? Tozhe samoe kak i po-russki
(Exactly the same as in Russian): [Eu]." Of course, in Russian, /l/ is
pronounced almost exactly the same as in *English*: [E at l].
I agree that the final syllable is [sn]. I was attempting to represent
the syllabic /n/ by "@n."
I've mentioned that there were, back in the day, two distinct dialects
of BE spoken Saint Louis's two separate 'hoods, "Downtown" and "West
End." I can distinguish only as "more Southern" (Downtown) and "less
Southern" (West End), because of a lack of terminological knowledge on
my part, not because there was some dialectological peculiarity
present. In college in Saint Louis, in the first desegregated, hence
pan-neighborhood, public school in the state of Missouri, I once
flirted with a girl from Downtown (her name was Barbara, but she was
known as "'Hind" [hV:n] (I don't know a phonetic symbol for Southern
long i) because of her Hottentot-like arse; you can never tell how the
genes are going to lean, since 'Hind was otherwise a typical octoroon,
for all practical purposes indistinguishable from any random white
girl), asking her for her picture. The next day, she handed me the
picture, saying something like::
"Here's your picture, Wilson." [hi at z yo pItC@, wi at s@]
A West-Ender would have said "[hirz ... wI at lsn]."
-Wilson
On 2/25/08, Dennis Preston <preston at msu.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>
> Poster: Dennis Preston <preston at MSU.EDU>
> Subject: Re: wheel barrel
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> [wIwsn],
>
> Hypercorrect [hw] is cool; thanks for that.
> BUT
> I'm very suspicious of the postvocalic [l] you indicate in the
> transcription of what locals called you, perhaps even also of the
> schwa before your final [n]. I could go for a nasalized schwa (no
> [n]) or a syllabic [n] (no schwa).
>
>
> dInIs
>
> >---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >-----------------------
> >Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >Poster: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> >Subject: Re: wheel barrel
> >-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >FWIW, in East-Texas middle-class BE, "wheel barrel" is the standard
> >"correction" of local [hwi at l bae@]. Also, "Wilson" being a very rare
> >name locally, the locals always call me by the hypercorrected
> >[hwi at ls@n] instead of *[wi at ls@n]. I've never liked my name, so I kinda
> >dug being "Wheelson."
> >
> >-Wilson
> >
> >On Sat, Feb 23, 2008 at 2:26 PM, Dennis R. Preston <preston at msu.edu> wrote:
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >>-----------------------
> >> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster: "Dennis R. Preston" <preston at MSU.EDU>
> >> Subject: Re: wheel barrel
> >>
> >>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> As is the explanation complicated. Your wife is not a post-vocalic
> >> /l/ vocalizer (or deleter), and her rendition is a "real" folk
> >> etymology (there is no "barrow" for her but there is a "barrel"). For
> >> us standard-speaking post-vocalic /l/ vocalizers (and deleters), the
> >> temptation is greater since added to the folk etymological urge is
> >> the phonetic evidence itself.
> >>
> >> But I think you are right than we done did this.
> >>
> >> dInIs
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> >---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >> >-----------------------
> >> >Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> >Poster: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> >> >Subject: Re: wheel barrel
> >>
> >>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >> >
> >> >At 12:56 PM -0600 2/23/08, Darla Wells wrote:
> >> >>Seen on the Acadiana Freecycle list:Looking for a small wheel
> >>barrel to do
> >> >>yard work.
> >> >>
> >> >>------------------------------------------------------------
> >> >>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >> >
> >> >There should be an archived thread on this from a discussion awhile
> >> >back. As I mentioned at the time, my wife (from Fairfield County,
> >> >CT) refers to "wheelbarrels", while I (from
> >> >NYC/Rochester/California/New Haven) had never been aware of
> >> >encountering the form, so if it's regional, the isogloss is very
> >> >complicated.
> >> >
> >> >LH
> >> >
> >> >------------------------------------------------------------
> >> >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Dennis R. Preston
> >> University Distinguished Professor
> >> Department of English
> >> 15C Morrill Hall
> >> Michigan State University
> >> East Lansing, MI 48824
> >> 517-353-4736
> >> preston at msu.edu
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> >--
> >All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> >come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> >-----
> > -Sam'l Clemens
> >
> >------------------------------------------------------------
> >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>
> --
> Dennis R. Preston
> University Distinguished Professor
> Department of English
>
> Morrill Hall 15-C
> Michigan State University
> East Lansing, MI 48864 USA
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Sam'l Clemens
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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