LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 13.AUG.2000 (05) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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From: john feather [johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk]
Subject: Standardization

Ron

I wrote:
>There's obviously a danger in trying to represent fine distinctions in one

language by reference to other languages.<

This was (I thought) a prefatory remark, not a stand-alone piece of
philosophy. You wrote, and Henry replied:

>>Your 15 is superfluous.  It's actually 08.  All the words in my dialect
>>indicated by "08" have this [Q:] sound that you write as "åå".
>
>Well, if they're pronounced differently in your dialect as well, then I
agree. However, if where I use 08 and 15, your dialect doesn't make a
distinction, then I'm not sure.

So Henry seems to be making distinctions that you don't. Doesn't that
suggest that some of the distinctions are "fine"?

I wrote and you replied:

>> I hear American "go" as distinctively different from English English<

>Which American?<

Standard Media American, ie the dominant variety.

Looking at the list again in the light of your comments it strikes me that
perhaps "Dutch _baas_ or Australian _part_" are not to be construed as
alternatives but as representing points of a continuum, ie the difference
between them is part of the description. Is that right? The same may be
true
of "`posh' British/South African _part_". But what strikes me about this
example is that in SA English the vowels are very often shorter - more
"clipped" - than in BE, and that one attribute of _some_ "posh BE" speakers

is that they drawl. (How posh is posh?) Since it is length which
distinguishes 08 from 06 these examples may not be the optimum choice for
illustrating the distinction.

John Feather johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk

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From: Kent Randau [kentr at tripnet.se]
Subject: LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 12.AUG.2000 (05) [E]

>Regarding Kent's comment on the Swedish letters ä, ö, å, the E. word
>"vowel"
>can mean either a sound or a letter. I can't see any logical reason for
not
>
>using the term "accented vowel" to mean a letter with an accent.

Of course you can call it what you want. But I'm just pointing out
that a Swedish person does not think of the letter "ö" as an "o" with
an accent.

>  That
>apart,
>German would have the option of writing "ae" for "ä", and Danes could
>presumably revert to "aa" in order not to simply abandon "their" letter
for
>
>an international one. I guess Swedes don't have such options.

It is not common practise and would not appear an logical option to a
Swedish person. As for "å" in Danish, they used to write "aa" in
Denmark until recently.

Kent Randau
(in Moelndal, Wow! I could do it!)

----------

From: Henry Pijffers [hpijffers at home.nl]
Subject: LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 12.AUG.2000 (05) [E]

John hef schreven:
>
>Henry wrote:
>
>>[In Dutch] -a is also used for the plural of stadion (-> stadia).<
>
>Van Dale, 10th edition, has "stadia" (or "stadiums") as the plural of
>"stadium". It says that "stadion" [E. "stadium", pl. "stadia" or
"stadiums]
>has only the pl. "stadions". Do I need to buy a later edition? I don't
want
>to if I can avoid it because I believe that the next one was in 3 volumes
>and my rotating lectern will only hold 2!
>
Hmmmm. Maybe my Dutch is a little faulth there then?
I'm aware of "stadia" being the plural of "stadium", but I thought it was
also the plural of stadion. Maybe this is one of those little glitches that

sneak in.

And Ron: yes, our /g/ is fricative.

regards,
Henry

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