[Lexicog] Heteronyms in English

[Andrew Dunbar]

On 4/6/06, Kenneth C. Hill <kennethchill at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Spanish 'the pope' is el papa (masculine) and Mexican Spanish 'the potato'
> is la papa (feminine). (Peninsular Spanish 'the potato' is la patata and
> I've been told in Spain that the Mexican la papa 'the potato' sounds like
> a silly mistake, as though there were a female pope. The Mexicans in turn
> regard the Spaniards as very hoity-toity.) 'Daddy' is accented on the
> final sylleble: papá.
>
> Of course none of these are "heteronyms" in the sense of Fritz's original
> idea at the beginning of this thread, words pronounced differently though
> graphically identical.

Oops! At least I don't feel alone in confusing heteronyms and homonyms
and homophones and homographs /-:

Andrew Dunbar.


> --Ken
>
> --- Fritz Goerling <Fritz_Goerling at sil.org> wrote:
>
> > Andrew,
> >
> >
> >
> > Just out of interest: How would Spanish speakers distinguish between
> >
> > "Pope" and "Daddy?" Same question for Italian.
> >
> > Isn't "Il Pápa" (the Pope) accented on the first syllable?
> >
> >
> >
> > Fritz Goerling
> >
> >
> >
> > Spanish is full of heteronym even with identical accent. My favourite is
> > "papa":
> >
> > papa 1 m. (Latin papas, from Greek. πάππας): pope
> > papa 2 f. (Quechua papa): potato
> > papa 3 f. (Latin pappa): pap
> >
> > Being a proud new owner of a used current RAE and an active contributor
> > to Wiktionary, I have seen many others which don't spring quickly to
> > mind.
> >
> > Andrew Dunbar.
> >
> >
> > On 4/5/06, Kenneth C. Hill <kennethchill at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > Spanish would abound in "heteronyms" except for the fact that written
> > > accents serve to disambiguate them. A few examples are:
> > >
> > > canto 'I sing/singing/edge'  :  cantó '3rd person singular sang'
> > > continuo 'continuous'        :  continúo 'I continue'
> > > cortes 'cuts/courts'         :  cortés 'polite'
> > >
> > > Spanish even writes accents to distinguish some homophones, e.g., mas
> > > 'but', más 'more'; si 'if', sí 'yes/selves'; se 'self', sé 'I
> > know'; te
> > > 'yourself', té 'tea'; tu 'your', tú 'you'.
> > >
> > > It is the failure to mark stress in English that provides many of
> > Fritz's
> > > "heteronyms". I bet there are lots of "heteronyms" to be found in
> > > languages which have orthographically unmarked phonemic stress.
> > >
> > > --Ken Hill
> > >
> > > --- Fritz Goerling <Fritz_Goerling at sil.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > > We discussed homonyms in English on this list a while ago.
> > > > English has quite a number of heteronyms, too.
> > > > Here are the first two stanzas from a "Hymn to
> > > > Heteronyms:"
> > > >
> > > > Please go through the entrance of this little poem.
> > > > I guarantee it will entrance you.
> > > > The content will certainly make you content,
> > > > and the knowledge gained sure will enhance you.
> > > >
> > > > A boy moped around when his parents refused
> > > > For him a new moped to buy.
> > > > The incense he burned did incense him to go
> > > > On a tear with a tear in his eye.
> > > >
> > > > To what extent does this phenomenon exist in other languages?
> > > >
> > > > Fritz Goerling
> > > >
> > >
> > >
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