[Ads-l] Pronunciation of "faith" and "also" in certain parts of Alabama

Charlie Law chaslaw at GMAIL.COM
Tue Mar 1 19:38:04 UTC 2016


[There were some very weird character-encoding problems in my previous
post. Sorry! Here's another try.]


I’ve recently been going to a Presbyterian church in Georgia where several
of the pastors are native Alabamans. I’ve noticed that all three of them
pronounce “faith” as if there were a “t” prior to the “th”, something like
this: [feɪtθ] “feytth". It’s as if they’re saying “fate” but with a “th”
added at the end.



Also, when they say the word “also”, it sounds as if a “t” is inserted
prior to the “s”, producing something like this: [ˈɔlt·soʊ] “awltso”.



(I can’t really remember my IPA, but I hope you get the idea.)



What’s going on with this? What’s the geographical range for these
pronunciations? I don’t know where in Alabama these folks are from, but
I've heard someone else use both of these pronunciations. I asked where she
was from and, sure enough: Alabama. She said she had grown in several
different parts of the state (child of a Methodist minister; they often
move every four years).



Thanks.



-chaslaw

-- 
*Tired? There's a nap for that.*

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



More information about the Ads-l mailing list