Schwa hits the Big Time!

[Laurence Horn]

Something else occurs to me on schwas watching the Scripps Spelling
Bee on prime time network TV, making the subject line especially
appropriate tonight:  If there were *really* no such thing as schwas
(i.e. if the unstressed vowels were all distinct in their
pronunciation, as has been recently claimed here), these amazing kids
would sure have an easier time of it than they do.  They mostly get
them right, but only through knowing the "language of origin", not
from the way they're pronounced.

LH

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