finlay wrote:I did actually go to the Wholly Folk bonfire last night (because I was in York for a funeral and they wanted a bonfire as part of the wake), and another guy had just got what the pun was supposed to be, 2 years after the name was made up. Not sure if it was for the same reason.
We had a quick discussion – I explained my confusion by saying [hoʊɫ.ɫi] very slowly to disambiguate "wholly" from "holy" although I don't think that's the way I normally pronounce it. The others chimed in with stories of family members and such being confused into thinking it was "holy" Folk and therefore some kind of Christian folk club, which it's really really not, apart from like one guy. I do think this is a combination of them being homophones (or at the very least near-homophones) and "wholly" being a rather uncommon word – I think I would normally use "entirely", which covers most if not all of the same meanings.
But yeah, everyone including me just says /hoʊli foʊk/ for the name.
This is one of those cases where I would
get the pronouncing of
wholly as
holy, and would likely in context simply pronounce
wholly as
holy, knowing that it is supposed to be a pun, particularly considering that I am sufficiently familiar with the two being merged in English varieties in the first place. However, without the context given here, I would still pronounce
wholly so that it is distinct from
holy.
finlay wrote:What about other words with -lly? Normally?
For
very many words I have both a version with /l/ (which usually has schwa elision) and a version with /ll/ (which usually lacks schwa elision), such as in:
normally:
/ˈnɔrmli/ > [ˈnɔːʁˤmɰi(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈnɔrməlli/ > [ˈnɔːʁˤmɯ̞ːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
carefully:
/ˈkerfli/ > [ˈkʰɛ̝ʁˤfɰi(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈkerfəlli/ > [ˈkʰɛ̝ʁˤfɯ̞ːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
practically:
/ˈprɛktɪkli/ > [ˈpʰɰˤɛʔk̚tɨʔkɰi(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈprɛktɪkəlli/ > [ˈpʰɰˤɛʔk̚tɨʔkɯ̞ːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
tactically:
/ˈtɛktɪkli/ > [ˈtʰɛʔk̚tɨʔkɰi(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈtɛktɪkəlli/ > [ˈtʰɛʔk̚tɨʔkɯ̞ːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
actually:
/ˈɛkʃəli/ > [ˈɛʔkɕəːɯ̞̯i(ː)]~[ˈɛʔkɕɯ̞ːɯ̞̯i(ː)] and, a bit more stressed/carefully,
/ˈɛkʃuli/ > [ˈɛʔkɕʉ̯uɯ̞̯i(ː)]~[ˈɛʔkɕʉ̯uʊ̯i(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈɛkʃulli/ > [ˈɛʔkɕʉ̯uʟ̞ːi(ː)] and, even more stressed/carefully,
/ˈɛkʃuwəlli/ > [ˈɛʔkɕʉ̯uwʊːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
factually:
/ˈfɛkʃəli/ > [ˈfɛʔkɕəːɯ̞̯i(ː)]~[ˈfɛʔkɕɯ̞ːɯ̞̯i(ː)] and, a bit more stressed/carefully,
/ˈfɛkʃuli/ > [ˈfɛʔkɕʉ̯uɯ̞̯i(ː)]~[ˈfɛʔkɕʉ̯uʊ̯i(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈfɛkʃulli/ > [ˈfɛʔkɕʉ̯uʟ̞ːi(ː)] and, even more stressed/carefully,
/ˈfɛkʃuwəlli/ > [ˈfɛʔkɕʉ̯uwʊːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
I have a similar pattern for
really, but with varying vowel quality rather than schwa elision:
really:
/ˈrɪli/ > [ˈɰˤɪːɯ̞̯i(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈrilli/ > [ˈɰˤiːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
In some cases there is also just alternation between /l/ and /ll/ in less stressed/careful and more stressed/careful versions of a word, aside from any other predicable phonological effects of being less or more stressed/careful:
totally:
/ˈtotəli/ > [ˈtʰôːɯ̞̯i(ː)]~[ˈtʰôːʊ̯i(ː)] and, a bit more stressed/carefully, [ˈtʰoɾ̥ɯ̞ːɯ̞̯i(ː)] and, more stressed/carefully,
/ˈtotəlli/ > [ˈtʰoɾ̥ɯ̞ːʟ̞ːi(ː)]
From what it seems, my dialect has essentially created new versions of or well preserved preexisting versions of these sorts of adverbs by attaching -
ly to the adjective from which they are derived or maintaining the separate identity of the affix -
ly in stressed/careful speech, without reducing the resulting /ll/. Conversely, it seems to have not reanalyzed preexisting versions of them in everyday speech with just /l/ and often with other changes in unstressed everyday speech. In the case of
wholly, that it is not a word that gets used much in everyday speech could very well be a factor here, so that it has ended up with having /ll/ overall rather than having one version with /l/ and another with /ll/.
finlay wrote:And what about folk, while we're at it? Anyone have intrusive L there?
I do not have an intrusive /l/ in:
folk:
/ˈfok/ > [ˈfoʔk]
but I do have it (properly, spelling pronunciations with /l/) in:
palm:
/ˈpɒlm/ > [ˈpʰɒ(ː)o̯m]
calm:
/ˈkɒlm/ > [ˈkʰɒ(ː)o̯m]
Note however that some more conservative speakers of my dialect do still have intrusive /l/-less versions as:
palm:
/ˈpam/ > [ˈpʰa(ː)m]
calm:
/ˈkam/ > [ˈkʰa(ː)m]
finlay wrote:And as for 'cupboard', I don't think there's anyone with /pb/ in the middle – I think the <p> is a historical/morphological thing (it makes it clear that it's from cup+board, even though this is now entirely irrelevant and not intuitive from the pronunciation). Usually I gauge these things these days by whether I'd correct a foreign learner of English, and /pb/ in cupboard is certainly within that camp.
I thought so myself here.
) I mean with the bunch of friends that it was, such a thing is ridiculous). Now whether that means that they pronounce the two words the same and I would have pronounced them differently, making me not get the pun properly, or that I'm just shit at puns, I dunno.
