Three pairs of pronunciation

[Dan Goncharoff]

In each case, if asked to pronounce the pair, I would say them the same.

OTOH, I doubt I would ever use "mourning" in a sentence and make it
sound the same as "morning" when I am greeting someone while in a good
mood on a glorious day. Likewise, I would never stress the word "for"
the way I clearly enunciate a digit while communicating a telephone number.

So, while I confidently claim to pronounce them the same, I doubt they
ever sound the same in context, except for "horse" and "hoarse", unless
I am the one who is hoarse, and explaining my affliction.

DanG

On 6/28/2010 10:02 AM, Laurence Horn wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society<ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn<laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Three pairs of pronunciation
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 9:46 AM -0400 6/28/10, Joel S. Berson wrote:
>
>> A book a friend is reading (sorry, I didn't record the title) claims
>> that the following three pairs of words are pronounced differently:
>>       for             four
>>       morning     mourning
>>       horse         hoarse
>>
>> Initially I said of myself that I pronounce these pairs identically
>> (perhaps with a "deeper" OU than O in "mo[u]rning?).  But now having
>> rolled them around in my mouth (moth?) too much, I no longer trust
>> what I hear.
>>
>> The OED does make distinctions (although for mo[u]rning only between
>> British and American), but I cannot quite convince myself that they
>> are present.  Or expressed correctly:  the key tells me "fur" is
>> pronounced like "burn"?  Especially for rhotic moi, who *perhaps*
>> pronounces "horse" with an R.
>>
>> What do others hear and say, esp. from/about rhotic speakers?  (And
>> excluding the pronunciation of "for" with the @.)
>>
>>
> The locus classicus is that last pair, horse/hoarse.  Our local
> advocate for this distinction was Dennis (a.k.a. dInIs) Preston, but
> I can't remember what the qualities in question were.  Although I'm a
> staunch differentiator of Mary/merry/marry/Murray, my horse sounds
> just like my hoarse.
>
> LH
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>

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