Return of the minimal pairs

[Larry Trask]

--On Saturday, June 2, 2001 3:00 pm +0000 RAHammitt at aol.com wrote:

>        As for what you said about not tolerating /h/ before schwa, my
>        speech agrees except with the h in word-initial position.  I
> pronounce the word "hull" with a schwa.

OK; thanks, and I guess I'd better clarify a bit.  In Britain, it is the
tradition to identify the 'cut' vowel as a wholly distinct phoneme from
schwa.  In the US, of course, there is something of a tradition of treating
the 'cut' vowel, on grounds of phonetic similarity, as merely the stressed
form of schwa.  If this second analysis is preferred, then I must modify my
account of my own speech as "no /h/ before unstressed schwa".  I too, of
course, have /h/ before the 'cut' vowel in 'hull', 'hut', 'hush', 'hum',
'hung', 'hustle', 'huddle', and many other words.

Larry Trask
COGS
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk

Tel: (01273)-678693 (from UK); +44-1273-678693 (from abroad)
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