Hoarse, four, mourning etc.

[Mark Mandel]

I use "4" for "for" in text-messaging, and AFAIK I don't pronounce them
differently, apart from stress-related difference.

Sideslipping:  Interesting that you use "messengers" here. I would use
"messagers", from the (recent?) verb "to message" 'to send a message',
reserving "messenger" for 'one who carries a message'.

m a m

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 6:14 AM, Margaret Lee <mlee303 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Do you think that text messengers, advertisers and others who use the
> number 4 in place of 'for' make a distinction in the pronunciation of four
> and for?
>
> --Margaret Lee
>
> --- On Fri, 7/2/10, Paul Johnston <paul.johnston at WMICH.EDU> wrote:
>
> That just indicates that the rule might be more general than I
> figured.=A0 Historically, both had Middle English /Or/ ( > NORTH), not
> ME /O:r/ (like bore, store, score, more), /OUr/ (like four), or /
> uurC/ (like court, course) or any other originally long or
> diphthongal vowel giving you modern FORCE.=A0 Actually, thinking about
> it, force itself belongs to this same subclass--it's from OF force,
> with /OrC/ and a labial preceding.=A0 The French origin has nothing to
> do with the development--board, which is native, also joins FORCE,
> though there are dialects which lengthen /Ord/ to /O:rd/ (and even /
> o:rd/) in ME, and labials don't condition this lengthening or any
> raising.
>
> Paul Johnston
>
>
> On Jul 1, 2010, at 6:25 PM, David Wake wrote:
> >
> > I may be misunderstanding your email, but Wells lists both "port" and
> > "pork" among the FORCE set, not the NORTH set.
> >
> > David
> >
> > On Thu, Jul 1, 2010 at 1:15 AM, Paul Johnston
> > <paul.johnston at wmich.edu> wrote:>
> >>
> >> Does any dialect of American English have a rule which shifts
> >> historical NORTH words to FORCE when a labial precedes?=A0 This would
> >> affect morning/mourning (and, possibly for/four), but also words like
> >> pork and port.=A0 This is a really old rule (late ME/Older Scots) in
> >> Scots and Northern English dialects, where you get [o:] or [U@]
> >> instead of [O:], in both rhotic and non-rhotic dialects.
> >> I've heard Southern and AAVE [poUk~poU?] for pork anyway, but do you
> >> get other cases of this?=A0 And does it occur among New England white
> >> speakers?
> >>
>
> >> On Jun 29, 2010, at 10:30 AM, Gordon, Matthew J. wrote:
> >>
> >>>
> >>> I don't think boar/bore and board/bored are part of this historical
> >>> contrast. Boar, bore and board are listed by Wells (1982) as
> >>> members of the FORCE group, deriving from long open o in Middle
> >>> English. Bored isn't listed there.
> >>>
> >>> St. Louis traditionally maintains the contrast including between
> >>> 'for' & 'four,' 'morning' & 'mourning,' 'or' & 'ore,' etc. The
> >>> Atlas of North American English has acoustic evidence to illustrate
> >>> the contrast.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On 6/29/10 8:36 AM, "Geoff Nathan" <geoffnathan at WAYNE.EDU> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> As others have noted, the 'horse:hoarse' contrast has been
> >>> extensively discussed on this list, and in the dialectological
> >>> literature. It is one of a small number of similar examples
> >>> ('boar:bore, board:bored' for example) that continue to contrast in
> >>> parts of the midwest and southern US. A competent discussion can be
> >>> found here
> >>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-
> >>> language_vowel_changes_before_historic_r#Horse-hoarse_merger
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> unfortunately there are no sound samples for the contrast. The OED
> >>> says that RP still distinguishes them as a contrast between long
> >>> open-o and open-o schwa. I believe this has disappeared, however.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> The other two (for:four, morning:mourning) are identical in all
> >>> contemporary dialects I'm aware of, and their etymologies suggest
> >>> that they fell together long ago (the former), or were never
> >>> different (the latter, at least from Middle English times). There
> >>> is some dispute about this, however.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Geoff
> >>>
> >>> Geoffrey S. Nathan
> >>> Faculty Liaison, C&IT
> >>> and Associate Professor, Linguistics Program
> >>> +1 (313) 577-1259 (C&IT)
> >>> +1 (313) 577-8621 (English/Linguistics)
>

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