Surprise

[Arnold Zwicky]

On Feb 17, 2009, at 7:57 AM, Ron Butters wrote:

>
> This is variable in my speech, though the /r/ tends to be realized
> only in nonallegro speech. I expect this is true of most rhotic
> dialects. I don't THINK that I have deletion in "surmise"--but I am
> wary of self-reports (maybe it gets weakened variably in allegro
> speech).

the cases where r is dropped (in rhotic dialects, in unaccented
syllables) are almost entirely words with an r later in them.  so
"surprise" is a good candidate, but "surmise" is not.

arnold

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