LL-L "Phonology" 2002.08.01 (01) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 01.AUG.2002 (01) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German) S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic Z=Zeelandic (Zeeuws)
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From: Gary Taylor <gary_taylor_98 at yahoo.com>
Subject: phonology

Dear All

I wrote:
>(This could
>however be the same as an Englishman denying that
they
>ever drop their 'h's, when in fact probably about 99%
>of the population do sometimes).

And Fiete asked:
>I didn't understand this; are You able and willing to
>explain it with
>some
>examples?

The phoneme 'h' in English mainly occurs word
initially (as in 'hello') or (quite rarely) within a
word (behind). In the vast majority of English accents
in England this 'h' is sporadically dropped in both
positions to produce 'ello' and 'be'ind'. If people
are speaking carefully then they tend to be aware of
their 'h's and so will include them. However, in
normal to rapid speech 'h' is quite often one of the
first things to go (or be dropped).

The majority of people will claim that they do not
drop their 'h's as it is heavily stigmatised, but even
listening to the 'best' ie. most standard English
carefully you can hear that the 'h' is often dropped
in words such as 'he' when this is in a non phrase
initial position.

There are very few areas of the country where the 'h'
is practically always retained, the biggest being in
East Anglia and Essex. (The latter being a surprise to
most English speakers as Essex is often associated
with London speech where h-dropping is common.)

Regards

Gary

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From: Luc Hellinckx <luc.hellinckx at pandora.be>
Subject: Celtic influence on Germanic dialects.

Beste leeglanners,

Reading some information about Shetland and Orkney dialect, I
involuntarily
came to think of the following phenomenon.
Quite some time ago I heard this athlete from Iceland (I forgot his
name)
talk in English and it immediately struck me that he pronounced English
just
the same way that (some) people from Northern Holland often do.
Afterwards I
also sometimes heard Norwegian people display this accent.
Please don't misinterpret my words, I'm not trying to bash anybody, it's
only something that I noticed with people that have a very basic
understanding of English (and thus imposing their former "sound system"
on
English).

The effect I'm trying to describe could be called "devoicing" (becoming
"voiceless"):

1) "b" becomes "p" : "big" pronounced "pig"
2) "v" becomes "f" : "very" becomes "ferry"
3) "d" becomes "t" : "do" becomes "to"
4) "z" becomes "s" : "zero" becomes "sero"

English doesn't really have a "g" sound like it is pronounced in Flemish
or
Brabantish but if it would have had it, I'm pretty sure that it would
have
sounded like a dutch "ch".
High German (together with other south-eastern languages) on the other
hand
seems to "overstress" these consonants (make them somewhat "explosive"
*s*).

Could this linguistic landscape be the result of "Celts" pronouncing
Germanic sounds versus a more authentic voiceless pronounciation ???

Greetings,

Luc Hellinckx

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