Wedge and schwa

[Matthew Gordon]

Well, according to Trudgill's famous study of British pop bands, including
the Beatles, the BUT vowel was one of those commonly Americanized to schwa
in place of either the RP norm or the northerm [U].


On 3/9/09 11:12 AM, "Benjamin Zimmer" <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU> wrote:

> On Mon, Mar 9, 2009 at 11:40 AM, Tom Zurinskas <truespel at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Meanwhile, I went to hear a Beatle tribute band.  They spoke with British
>> accents.  The words "just" and "us" were  said ~joost and ~oos, with short oo
>> as in "good" ~good.
>
> I should hope so! And I should also hope that they used [g] after [N] in the
> Liverpudlian fashion. Thus, if they were covering "Old Brown Shoe," the rhyme
> would be maintained in the lines, "If I grow up I'll be a singer / Wearing
> rings on every finger." (Perhaps your patronage of Beatles tribute bands helps
> explain the peculiar treatment of [N] in truespel?)
>
> More here, if you care:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancashire_dialect_and_accent
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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