Ahra-lessnes in white-Southern speech (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:10 PM -0400 6/16/09, Mark Mandel wrote:
>On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 10:42 AM, Jonathan Lighter
><wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>  My friend from rural Middle Tennessee - a distinguished attorney - always
>>  says "fum."
>>
>>  Other than that and maybe one or two other items, he's got all his r's.
>
>And even that isn't r-lessness (arrhoticity), which AFAIK refers to
>loss of *postvocalic* /r/.
>
>m a m
>
Why isn't the /r/ in "farm" an instance of postvocalic /r/?

LH

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