Moderator:JackFrost
Woods wrote:As I was reading and whispering the words to myself, I got to wonder about the phonology of those two words declined in genitive:
the Prince’s
the princess
Woods wrote:As we are on the topic of English phonology, I’m going to ask one more thing I’ve wondered about – how do you pronounce analysis vs. analyses? My main reference dictionary (Cambridge Advanced Learner’s) only shows the phonology for the singular, so I can’t check if there’s any difference. On the other hand, Oxford English Dictionary 1989 suggests that the singular is (əˈnælɪsɪs), whereas for the plural (-iːz) is indicated. But I’m not entirely sure they’re right and up-to-date, so I would like to have a confirmation – do I have to lengthen the last vowel and finish with [-z] instead of [-s] for the plural?
Woods wrote:Is there any difference? If you hear a story out loud and there are both a prince and a princess involved, and you do not quite know who does a certain thing, can you distinguish from the way the words are pronounced?
linguoboy wrote:Even speakers which don't put primary stress on the final syllable…
linguoboy wrote:They are distinguished by vowel quality
linguoboy wrote: …consonant voicing…
Even speakers which don't put primary stress on the final syllable of princess stress it more than they do the final syllable of prince's/princes.
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:Even speakers which don't put primary stress on the final syllable…
This is indeed the first time I realise that is an option.
Is it common to pronounce it this way in America? The only way I’ve ever heard it or used it is with the stress on the first syllable. But I think I’ll start saying [prin’tsɛs] from now on!
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:They are distinguished by vowel quality
How exactly? I mean if the stress falls on the same syllable, otherwise my question is no longer valid.
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote: …consonant voicing…
So, prince’s is [‘printsəz]?
Woods wrote:How about the prince’s castle? Does the ‘s remain [z]?
Woods wrote:The prince’s absence. – I guess here we’ll have a [z], but not if the next word starts with a consonant. What do you think? I’ve never thought of whether ‘s would be pronounced [s] or [z]. If I try to come up with some other examples:
the house’s roof = [ðə ’hawsɪs ru:f]
the house’s artificial appearance = [ðə ’hawsɪz ’artɪfiʃəl əp’iərənts]
Am I right or just not used to discerning the [z]?
Woods wrote:And, to finish with the houses, we could add:
the houses’ roofs
the houses’ artificial appearance
I guess that would be:
[ðə ’hawzɪs ru:fs]
[ðə ’hawzɪz ’artɪfiʃəl əp’iərənts]
I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten it wrong up until here, so I hope you will fix my phonology a little bit.
Woods wrote:Indeed, I don't think I pronounce the genitive suffix as [z] very often, if ever – I just say [s] almost all the time. So the question is, where should I replace the [s]'s with [z]'s instead. The strange thing is, natives say I speak great English and nobody points these things out to me, and then all of a sudden I'm surprised to find I haven't spoken right. Maybe they can't hear the difference either?
Woods wrote:Even speakers which don't put primary stress on the final syllable of princess stress it more than they do the final syllable of prince's/princes.
Can you really use which in this sentence? I would either use who or that, otherwise it sounds to me like we’re talking about an object. Sorry for deviating into your grammar, which is without a doubt much better than mine, but that also grabbed my attention.
linguoboy wrote:So, prince’s is [‘printsəz]?
I don't think many people have a true [ə] there. Despite what dEhiN says, I think in General American [ɪ̈] is much more common. (This sound is sometimes referred to as "s(c)hwi" by analogy with s(c)hwa.)
linguoboy wrote:And [r] sounds pretty unusual here unless you're Scottish.
linguoboy wrote:There's a subphonemic distinction in English whereby short vowels are slightly longer before voiced consonants than before unvoiced ones.
linguoboy wrote:Very view native speakers are aware they do this and it's not taught explicitly in English courses as far as I know, but it can affect comprehension.
linguoboy wrote:How about the prince’s castle? Does the ‘s remain [z]?
In rapid speech, it might be devoiced to [z̥], but I don't feel this is mandatory.
dEhiN wrote:One thing about rule 3 is that it applies even when you're adding a genitive to a plural (and you're pronouncing the genitive "-s", which not everyone does):
[hɔɹsɪz] -> [hɔɹsɪzɪz]
dEhiN wrote:1) In the linguistics course I took they basically broke down the pronunciation rule for the plural s, which would be the same for the genitive s, which perhaps one extra rule:
a. unvoiced stop + s = /s/
b. voiced stop + s = /z/
c. sibilant + s = /z/ (actually I think it was /ə/)
dEhiN wrote:2) There's a difference between broad and narrow transcription in IPA. Broad, which uses /, is meant to give a rough idea.
dEhiN wrote:Also, [z̥] means a devoiced or voiceless [z], which in my eyes is effectively an [s].
Woods wrote:I guess it’s that you’re just pronouncing the s and the z, and the schwi/schwa is just the very minimum amount of filling necessary to separate them.
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:And [r] sounds pretty unusual here unless you're Scottish.
You know the IPA much better than me. When I write [r] I mean normal English r, I really don’t know which way I should turn it around to match the exact IPA symbol… Indeed, both dictionaries I have on my computer (Cambridge Advanced Learner’s, which is pretty basic, but also Oxford English Dictionary, which is very detailed), use the simple [r] in their transcriptions.
Woods wrote:Indeed, is there such a thing as a standard IPA where every sound in any language and dialect has its own symbol and everybody uses it and knows it?
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:There's a subphonemic distinction in English whereby short vowels are slightly longer before voiced consonants than before unvoiced ones.
Interesting. I can’t really imagine it without hearing it – can you give some good examples so that I can try to check them by pressing the hearing icon on the dictionary?
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:Very view native speakers are aware they do this and it's not taught explicitly in English courses as far as I know, but it can affect comprehension.
You have no idea how little of pronunciation is taught in language courses.
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:How about the prince’s castle? Does the ‘s remain [z]?
In rapid speech, it might be devoiced to [z̥], but I don't feel this is mandatory.
I have no idea what the difference between [z] and [z̥] is.
Woods wrote:I think I’ll have to search for a good book or website that explains English phonology in detail. Does anyone know such a one?
Woods wrote:Even though I think it’ll be pretty different from place to place – so I guess if your English is good overall and do something like pronouncing [s] instead of [z] for the genitive, natives may just think it’s another sort of dialect?
Woods wrote:I found two such things on my favourite torrent site: English Phonetics and Phonology by Peter Roach, edited by Cambridge (so this one should deal with British English) and an Atlas of North American English by Labov, Ash and Boberg (edited by Mouton de Gruyter, whatever that is – this one is without audio). I’ll download them and check them when I have time for this.
linguoboy wrote:As dEhiN explained, that's what the IPA is. When used for phonetic transcriptions, each symbol has a single accepted value. However, most people aren't phoneticians, and even the best phoneticians make mistakes, so the usage of IPA will never be 100% consistent and accurate.
linguoboy wrote:To interpret them properly, you have to understand the phonological analysis that's being used, which may require referring to an entire independent work.
linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:There's a subphonemic distinction in English whereby short vowels are slightly longer before voiced consonants than before unvoiced ones.
Interesting. I can’t really imagine it without hearing it – can you give some good examples so that I can try to check them by pressing the hearing icon on the dictionary?
bad vs bat is a good one. Try also bid vs bit and bed vs bet.
linguoboy wrote: There's a difference between phonetic transcription and phonemic. The convention is to put phonemic transcriptions between /forward slashes/ and phonetic transcriptions between [square brackets].
linguoboy wrote: There's also a different between broad and narrow phonetic transcriptions. So, for instance, in your examples you did not notate the subphonemic length distinction between [pʰɪg] and [sl̪æp̚]. (Or perhaps your idiolect lacks this?)
linguoboy wrote:dEhiN wrote:Also, [z̥] means a devoiced or voiceless [z], which in my eyes is effectively an [s].
I wouldn't expect most English-speakers to hear the difference. But I've studied two languages (Osage and Alemannic) with [z̥] (and voiceless lenis consonants in general), so I do notice it.
linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:How about the prince’s castle? Does the ‘s remain [z]?
In rapid speech, it might be devoiced to [z̥], but I don't feel this is mandatory.
I have no idea what the difference between [z] and [z̥] is.
A ring below indicates lack of voicing.
linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:You have no idea how little of pronunciation is taught in language courses.
Oh, I do. I'm just appalled by how little effort most USAmerican students make to sound remotely like a native
linguoboy wrote:I haven't used the Roach, but Cambridge does good work. Labov is terrific. There's a website containing some of the same information as the Atlas here: http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/home.html.
Woods wrote:Man (or girl, you’re a girl indeed, aren’t you?)
Woods wrote:Can you recommend a place to study the different phonetic symbols and the sounds they represent (a website, a book or something?)
Woods wrote:I’m not a phonetician, but I'm gradually learning about the different symbols essentially by asking questions about phonology on this forum
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:To interpret them properly, you have to understand the phonological analysis that's being used, which may require referring to an entire independent work.
What?
Woods wrote:Another conclusion (if I can make one based on these few examples) – American short vowels seem to be much longer than British ones?
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote: There's also a different between broad and narrow phonetic transcriptions. So, for instance, in your examples you did not notate the subphonemic length distinction between [pʰɪg] and [sl̪æp̚]. (Or perhaps your idiolect lacks this?)
I got the difference between phonetic and phonemic, but what is subphonemic?
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:dEhiN wrote:Also, [z̥] means a devoiced or voiceless [z], which in my eyes is effectively an [s].
I wouldn't expect most English-speakers to hear the difference. But I've studied two languages (Osage and Alemannic) with [z̥] (and voiceless lenis consonants in general), so I do notice it.
So, [z̥] is a half-voiced, half-unvoiced sound between [z] and [s], like in Dutch v is supposed to be something between w (pronounced [v]) and f (pronounced [f])?
Woods wrote:But lack of voicing is not the same as no voicing (like in a voiceless consonant) in this case?
linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:Man (or girl, you’re a girl indeed, aren’t you?)
You sussed me out. I just put "boy" in my username to throw everyone off.
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:Man (or girl, you’re a girl indeed, aren’t you?)
You sussed me out. I just put "boy" in my username to throw everyone off.
I don't think it's fun to joke with these things though.
Woods wrote:In a world of new genders and custom identities, it is good to know who someone is!
Woods wrote:So basically last four years I was thinking that you were a woman!
linguoboy wrote:I talk about dating/sleeping with/marrying/etc. men and a lot of people still think of that as something primarily women do.)
linguoboy wrote:I could be wrong, but in terms of knowing who I am, I don't think my gender tells you a whole lot.
linguoboy wrote:Woods wrote:So basically last four years I was thinking that you were a woman!
Interestingly, I didn't really notice any difference in your behaviour as a result.
azhong wrote:Woods, you seriously choose not to trust linguoboy (...) ?
Or have I misunderstood you? It's possible for the language and culture gap between us
Woods wrote:linguoboy wrote:I talk about dating/sleeping with/marrying/etc. men and a lot of people still think of that as something primarily women do.)
Well, isn't it something primarily women do?
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