Naming conventions for vowel mergers (Was Re: Eggcorn? "warn" > "worn")

[Neal Whitman]

This is a good point. If I didn't already know (or bother to read up on it),
I wouldn't know which vowel the cot/caught merger resulted in. Or, if the
term "low back merger" was used, which earlier-stage vowel ended up as a low
back vowel. Indeed, I didn't remember whether the card/cord merger resulted
in "card" or "cord" prevailing. The suggestion of the "(word 1)-to-(word 2)"
naming convention sounds good to me.

But "phoneme dropping" is no more informative than "cot/caught merger",
since it gives no indication at all of what becomes of the dropped phoneme.
I would wonder: Do the sounds on either side of the dropped phoneme end up
adjacent, or does the phoneme turn into another phoneme?

Neal

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Zurinskas" <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2009 8:10 PM
Subject: Re: Eggcorn? "warn" > "worn"


> ---------------------- Information from the mail
> header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Eggcorn? "warn" > "worn"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> The word "merger" doesn't get it for me.  To say there is a "card/cord"
> merger is not clear.  Are both words said as "card" or as "cord" or as a
> phoneme inbetween the two or a combination of all the above?
>
> The cot/caught merger to me means both words are said as cot.  In rare
> cases I have heard "on" said as ~aun which is the reverse.
>
> Better said, the caught-to-cot merger.  Then one knows what is going on.
> Basically folks are dropping out the "awe" phoneme altogether.  This
> deserves a name.  Phoneme dropping sounds about right.
>
>
>
> Tom Zurinskas, USA - CT20, TN3, NJ33, FL5+
> see truespel.com
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ----------------------------------------
>> Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2009 09:45:09 -0500
>> From: db.list at PMPKN.NET
>> Subject: Re: Eggcorn? "warn"> "worn"
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>> header -----------------------
>> Sender: American Dialect Society
>> Poster: David Bowie
>> Subject: Re: Eggcorn? "warn"> "worn"
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> From: Laurence Horn
>>
>>> I think I've mentioned here a while back that
>>> John Lawler informed me 40 years ago that in Utah
>>> one lays a fort in the fart. I found it hard to
>>> believe, but evidently it's true for at least
>>> some Utahns.
>>
>> Most of what i've looked at (my own work and others', published and
>> unpublished) on the Utahn card-cord merger that relies on acoustic
>> analysis finds that it's a variable merger of {cord} into {card}, not a
>> reversal.
>>
>> Complicating this is that the {cored} class seems to not participate in
>> the merger. Looking more intensely into that is next on my agenda,
>> starting this summer.
>>
>> --
>> David Bowie University of Central Florida
>> Jeanne's Two Laws of Chocolate: If there is no chocolate in the
>> house, there is too little; some must be purchased. If there is
>> chocolate in the house, there is too much; it must be consumed.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> _________________________________________________________________
> Windows LiveT: E-mail. Chat. Share. Get more ways to connect.
> http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_HM_AE_Faster_022009
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org