Ryusenshi wrote:It seems that in Polish, there is some voicing assimilation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assimilation_(phonology)) that turns /f/ into /v/ before a voiced consonant such as /g/. This is actually very common, and lots of languages would similarly turn an /f/ into a /v/ in this context. But English isn't one of them: English speakers can, at least potentially, keep a contrast between /f/ and /v/ in this situation. This has nothing to do with the previous vowel.
I think English sometimes has regressive voicing assimilation, but it is unpredictable/irregular. Progressive voicing assimilation is more common, although it often doesn't cause neutralization. E.g. a synchronic explanation of the /v/ in plural forms like "leaves" and "wolves" might be that the /f/ assimilates to the following /z/. There are also some prefixes like "dis-" that sometimes seem to show voicing of /s/ to /z/ for some speakers, although for me it's voiceless /s/ in all the words I can think of.
In "Afghanistan," I feel like the voiceless [f] might cause the following /g/ to be devoiced, e.g. realized as [g̊] or as "lenis" [k]. The preceding vowel, /æ/, would be "short" in the sense that any vowel preceding a phonemically voiceless (or "fortis") coda consonant is allophonically short. I guess /æ/ would be realized with more length before a phonemically voiced consonant. I agree with Ryusenshi that I wouldn'y expect voicing assimilation to be affected by the phonemic identity of the preceding vowel.
ˈd̪ʲɛ.gɔ kɾuˑl̪ wrote:Afghanistan - in Polish I have something like /avganistan/ [ävɡ̠ä̃ˈɲ̟is̪t̪ä̃n̪] or [äʋʀ̝ä̃ˈis̪t̪ä̃n̪] and therefore I was surprised Wiktionary told me this /æfˈɡænɪˌstɑːn/. Does /f/ surface only in something like short /æ/?
It's /f/, yes, but I'm not sure what your last question there means. /f/ is a common phoneme, and yes, it can precede voiced stops.
English does have a tendency to assimilate voicing over time, I think. But in the short-term, we have no problem with voiceless+voiced clusters (though I think that in native words this tends to be across morpheme boundaries? There are probably exceptions...). The preceding vowel makes no difference. I definitely would have /fb/ in a word like "knifebox", for instance, and I have /sd/ in "raceday". It also works the other way around: there's an American sportsteam called the "Redsox", which at least for me (I don't know about actual Redsox fans local dialects) has /ds/. Similarly, "abseil" has /bs/.
But the river tripped on her by and by, lapping
as though her heart was brook: Why, why, why! Weh, O weh
I'se so silly to be flowing but I no canna stay!
What I am used to in the English here is that no cluster of obstruents may disagree in voicing, and not only do they normally become voiceless if any member is phonemically fortis, but they tend to become voiceless even if all members are phonemically lenis. The big but to this is this is only with regard to the phonetic voicing of the obstruents themselves - this does not change preceding vowel length, aspiration, or whether there is preglottalization or not.
So in the case of "Afghanistan" I would transcribe it as [ˌɛfˈkɛ̃ːnɘˌsʲtʲɛ̃(ː)n] (n-elision aside) - but this does not change the fact that this underlyingly has /g/ not /k/, as if it had /k/ it would be *[ˌɛfˈkʰɛ̃ːnɘˌsʲtʲɛ̃(ː)n].
Well, I admit I didn't explain what I meant exactly; yeah, I wanted to imply Polish has this assimilation but English doesn't and ask how you "deal" with clusters having obstruents of different voicing. It like seems impossible to me to preserve them in any other way than lengthening or shortening of preceding vowel as my Polish has strong voicing assimilation.
@Travis I've originally excluded you in my mind from these who could have any assimilation, I suppose many people already know you're pronunciation is unique.
Here in Vancouver, the noun is always pronounced cómplex, but I hear the adjective pronounced both cómplex and compléx. Curiously, when people say compléx, they usually say it in a slower, more careful way, which makes me think it must feel a bit artificial to speakers or something. Do you guys agree?
Serafín wrote:Here in Vancouver, the noun is always pronounced cómplex, but I hear the adjective pronounced both cómplex and compléx. Curiously, when people say compléx, they usually say it in a slower, more careful way, which makes me think it must feel a bit artificial to speakers or something. Do you guys agree?
Naw, I often hear it with reduction of the initial syllable. I will grant you that it does occasionally have a more deliberate variant pronunciation with an unreduced vowel which other similar words (e.g. compact) seem to lack.
Are there any vowels in your dialects of English which don't have long and short versions depending on the voicing of the following consonant? I'm especially interested in Australian, but I really appreciate getting any bit of information about any variety of English.
ˈd̪ʲɛ.gɔ kɾuˑl̪ wrote:Are there any vowels in your dialects of English which don't have long and short versions depending on the voicing of the following consonant? I'm especially interested in Australian, but I really appreciate getting any bit of information about any variety of English.
Depends on what you mean. For AuE, vowels are allophonically long before voiced consonants, but aren't phonemically distinct as opposed to the AuE long vowels: /a:/, /e:/, /i:, /o:/, /ʉ:/, /ɜ:/. Though there are a few AuE words that have generically long /æ:/, but this isn't easily dependant on the following consonant.
Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
The conlanger formerly known as “the conlanger formerly known as Pole, the”.
If we don't study the mistakes of the future we're doomed to repeat them for the first time.
ˈd̪ʲɛ.gɔ kɾuˑl̪ wrote:Afghanistan - in Polish I have something like /avganistan/ [ävɡ̠ä̃ˈɲ̟is̪t̪ä̃n̪] or [äʋʀ̝ä̃ˈis̪t̪ä̃n̪] and therefore I was surprised Wiktionary told me this /æfˈɡænɪˌstɑːn/.
That's just the usual American pronunciation of it. It's not the only valid one in English by any means.
I have /æ/ for every <a> in the word, for example.
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
Pretty sure it's always /sɛz/ for me. /seɪz/ sounds like somebody sounding out out from reading it, tbh.
I generally forget to say, so if it's relevant and I don't mention it--I'm from Southern Michigan and speak Inland North American English. Yes, I have the Northern Cities Vowel Shift; no, I don't have the cot-caught merger; and it is called pop.
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
/sɛz/; /seɪz/ sounds like someone trying to be ironic to me.
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
/seɪz/ sounds wrong to me, like pronouncing "undoes" as /ʌnˈduz/ rather than /ʌnˈdʌz/. I'd expect it about as much (e.g. I don't hear it normally and I don't consider it a usual variant, but it wouldn't surprise me too much to hear it from some native speaker at some point, particularly as a production error, since the analogical basis for it is pretty clear).
This question made me realize that I don't actually even know what the non-restressed strong pronunciation of "were" used to be. I was going to guess /wɪər/, but the OED seems to indicate that it was actually /wɛər/, which sounds marginally less unnatural (but still unnatural; then again, /wɑz/ and /biːn/ also sound unnatural to me).
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
/seɪz/, or more accurately, [sæɪz], is a feature that is quite prominent in New Zealand English.
Sumelic wrote:
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
/seɪz/ sounds wrong to me, like pronouncing "undoes" as /ʌnˈduz/ rather than /ʌnˈdʌz/. I'd expect it about as much (e.g. I don't hear it normally and I don't consider it a usual variant, but it wouldn't surprise me too much to hear it from some native speaker at some point, particularly as a production error, since the analogical basis for it is pretty clear).
This question made me realize that I don't actually even know what the non-restressed strong pronunciation of "were" used to be. I was going to guess /wɪər/, but the OED seems to indicate that it was actually /wɛər/, which sounds marginally less unnatural (but still unnatural; then again, /wɑz/ and /biːn/ also sound unnatural to me).
ˈd̪ʲɛ.gɔ kɾuˑl̪ wrote:Are there any vowels in your dialects of English which don't have long and short versions depending on the voicing of the following consonant? I'm especially interested in Australian, but I really appreciate getting any bit of information about any variety of English.
Depends on what you mean. For AuE, vowels are allophonically long before voiced consonants, but aren't phonemically distinct as opposed to the AuE long vowels: /a:/, /e:/, /i:, /o:/, /ʉ:/, /ɜ:/. Though there are a few AuE words that have generically long /æ:/, but this isn't easily dependant on the following consonant.
bad /bæ:d/ [bæ:ˑd̚] bat /bæt/ [bæt̚] lad /læd/ [læˑd̚] am /æ:m/ [æ̃:ˑm~ẽ:ˑm] jam /dʒæ:m/ [dʒ̯æ̃:ˑm~dʒ̯ẽ:ˑm]
I meant do you have all the vowels lengthened or maybe it is blocked for some vowels like /e/, /eː/ or /ɪ/, /ɪː/? I consider their occurences before flapped consonants or anything able to make these allophones phonemes.
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
It can be either. But "says" is more often found in emphatic circumstances. In "Simon says:" or "so then the guy says...", it's /sEz/. But for me, in "well, he says he'll be back on Tuesday, but...", it's /seIz/. I think I'd also use the unreduced option when telling a child "and a lion says...", where "say" is really a different verb, meaning "makes the noise..." (saying 'sez' for that makes it sound like you're saying the lion (cow, etc) is actually talking...)
But the river tripped on her by and by, lapping
as though her heart was brook: Why, why, why! Weh, O weh
I'se so silly to be flowing but I no canna stay!
Pole, the wrote:Is “says” /sɛz/ or /seɪz/? I've been thinking it's exclusively /sɛz/, but now I'm hearing some people, with otherwise not abnormal accents, pronounce it /seɪz/.
It can be either. But "says" is more often found in emphatic circumstances. In "Simon says:" or "so then the guy says...", it's /sEz/. But for me, in "well, he says he'll be back on Tuesday, but...", it's /seIz/. I think I'd also use the unreduced option when telling a child "and a lion says...", where "say" is really a different verb, meaning "makes the noise..." (saying 'sez' for that makes it sound like you're saying the lion (cow, etc) is actually talking...)
But what does the fox say?
...I'll show myself out.
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”
