Return of the minimal pairs

[Tristan Alexander McLeay]

>> In Britain, it is the tradition to identify the 'cut' vowel as a wholly
>> distinct phoneme from schwa.

> I've been following this debate with interest.
> I just want to remind linguists, in case anyone's interested - in
> NZ, there
> is no schwa.  The vowel in "bit" is used instead.  So there is no problem
> whatever with h before schwa - it just doesn't occur.

You've got it back-to-front. The vowel in 'bit' is a schwa over there. I'm
an Aussie, but have heard enough NZeders to know it.
Fush and Chups, 5+1=sex... (and, on the other hand, sex=/sIks/ (or something
close to it)
(both different renditions of the same sound, a stressed /'@/)

And so they have hs before @s, in words like hit and hill.

Tristan