the dissappearing "awe" sound

[ronbutters at AOL.COM]

This point is so on the mark that TZ will most likely just ignore it completely. You could also have mentioned the no-doubt tragic loss of initial /k/ before /n/ which resulted in the merger of such words as "night" and "knight", thus creating potential for an unintentionally racist interpretation of such sentences as, "I hate these black nights."

And then there are all those wicked people who refuse to distinguish between "park" and "pock", "through" and "threw," etc. All no doubt the source of many plane crashes.

"Do you promote linguistic change?" is a meaningless question. Asking it indicates the essential lack of understanding of the asker. "Do you promote snowstorms? Changes in hairstyles? Do you promote the public's loss of interest in Tommy Dorsey?"
------Original Message------
From: Nathan Sanders
Sender: ADS-L
To: ADS-L
ReplyTo: ADS-L
Subject: Re: [ADS-L] the dissappearing "awe" sound
Sent: Jun 3, 2009 5:21 AM

On Jun 3, 2009, at 3:18 AM, Tom Zurinskas wrote:
>
> Have you no problem with changing talk to tock, walk to wok, hawk to
> hock, Dawn to Don etc.?  as awe-dropping does.  Do you think it's a
> great idea?  Is it an improvement?  Do you promote it?

Have you no problem with changing maid to made, gait to gate, tail to
tale, plain to plane, etc.?  Do you think it's a great idea?  Is it an
improvement?  Do you promote it?

How about tow to toe, rowed to rode, soul to sole, grown to groan, etc.?

How about sea to see, meat to meet, heal to heel, team to teem, etc.?

Given how vocally desperate you are to prevent the pane and confusion
sure to result from completion of the cot-caught merger, I have know
doubt your ideological twin from about 1650 had quite a problem with
"ai-dropping", "ow-dropping", and "ea-dropping", since these changes
cause(d) the loss of THREE phonemes, not just one.  But you seam not
to care about these three mergers at all, and I find that quite awed.

Nathan

--
Nathan Sanders
Linguistics Program
Williams College
http://wso.williams.edu/~nsanders/

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