All 40 USA English phonemes (Was Re: Eggcorn? "warn" > "worn")

[M Covarrubias]

On Feb 13, 2009, at 5:36 AM, Tom Zurinskas wrote:

> "Son/sun" have the same vowel as "sung" ~sun/~sung as I hear in m-
> w.com
>

it follows that the difference is not in the vowel but in the final
consonant.

the first vowel in "hanger" is the same as the vowel in "anger" but
the first has a voiced velar stop after the velar nasal and the second
does not. you're system cannot capture this difference. if you're ok
with that then good luck with it.

you're not looking for accuracy, you seem to be looking for ease and
convenience. your system is certainly easy because it tolerates a very
sloppy analysis of what sounds actually occur in english. all the
problematic examples that have been posted are evidence of this.

it's fine that you're happy with a notation system that gets "close
enough" to an accurate representation. your standards are your own to
live with. but it does no good for those transcriptions that require
linguists to make consequential distinctions in pronunciation. the
convenience of a qwerty keyboard isn't all that tempting when
precision is more highly valued.

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