ai to ^i

<b>Forum for ideas on how to teach pronunciation </b>

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fluffyhamster
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ai to ^i

Post by fluffyhamster » Thu Nov 13, 2008 5:04 am

What do you make of the substitution of the first dipthong with the second? (That is, imagine a pronunciation guide that gave only the latter and no longer the former).

Sorry for the non-IPA font, but I'm sure it will do.

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Lorikeet
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Post by Lorikeet » Fri Nov 14, 2008 5:19 pm

It didn't do for me ;) Can you give examples for those of us who didn't figure it out?

fluffyhamster
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Post by fluffyhamster » Fri Nov 14, 2008 9:28 pm

The change applies like this: my > m^i ; fire > f^i* (*=schwa symbol, upended e).

I suppose I might as well say (now that I've got a reply - thanks, Lori!) that this is about the only thing that raised my eyebrow in the New Oxford Dictionary of English (now called just the Oxford Dictionary of English in later editions, both as opposed to the more "historical" OED) - it otherwise appears to be an excellent resource. (You might be interested to know that they use it on the Countdown game show nowadays).

Just in case there's still any doubt, the short vowel ^ at least by itself is as in 'run' (i.e. has in the NODE's pronunciation guide its usual value, the same as it is in most other dictionaries).

BTW ai does appear, but only in the section of symbols for and representing foreign pronunciations e.g. ai (German) Gleichschaltung.

I guess Oxford are trying to get away from RP and/or fudge the issue of a correct/standard pronunciation for the "benefit" of the more critical among international users or something (even though the NODE then only indicates pronunciation for "hard" words i.e. those that would give a (British) native speaker pause).
Last edited by fluffyhamster on Fri Apr 10, 2009 7:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Metamorfose
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Post by Metamorfose » Fri Nov 21, 2008 2:07 am

Fluffy I'd tentatively say that it is just a matter of choosing symbols to representing phonemes. The IPA or any other set of symbols for phonetics/phonology are just there to guide us, just think, as a Briton, how many different ways people will pronounce five in England.

And also, This symbol /^/ can stand for many different vowel qualities throughout the English speaking universe. For Brazilian speakers of English it's not a difficult segment as it does mach, for example, the unstressed vowel in Brazilian Portuguese like in casa (house).

About the RP conundrum, Daniel Jones's English Pronuncing Dictionary in its 15th edition proposes that "The time has come to abandon the archaic name Received Pronunciation. The model used for British English (in the dictionary) is what is referred to as BBC English; this is the pronunciation of professional speakers employed by the BBCs newsreaders and announcers..." (page V).

But surely I'd raise an eyebrow if I came across something like my /m^I/ but again, linguists kind of select their symbols on a rather caprichious way, like Sapir using /U/ for schwa.

José

fluffyhamster
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Post by fluffyhamster » Tue Feb 24, 2009 9:06 am

I think I've stumbled across the answer to this puzzle. Take a look at the chart in the final section ('7. Upton's scheme') at the bottom of the following webpage:
http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/ipa-english.htm
Upton's reforms: for and against

.....

Price. The standard notation might seem to imply that the starting point of the price diphthong is the same as that of the mouth diphthong. In practice, speakers vary widely in how the two qualities compare. In mouth people in the southeast of England typically have a rather bat-like starting point, while in price their starting point is more like cart. In traditional RP the starting points are much the same. Upton's notation implicitly identifies the first element of price with the vowel quality of cut -- an identification that accords with the habits neither of RP nor of southeastern speech (Estuary English), and strikes me as bizarre.

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