Bruce,
I haven't seen the Vh analysis since, I think, Gleason's text, or something of that vintage. I suppose the closest analog today would be the syllabic analysis in which a short vowel is
V
|
a
and a long vowel is
V V
\ /
a
In r-less dialects, not all final /r/ turn into schwa. Low and central vowels typically don't diphthongize, although I'm sure there are dialects that do. But you're right that the intrusive /r/ results from a loss of final /r/ that results in no longer distinguishing, e.g., tuba and tuber. Since those with original /r/ would have an /r/ between vowels but not finally or before consonants, the environments in which /r/ disappears become the dominant ones, and all central and low vowel-final words pick up the /r/. Dialects do differ as to whether this happens only across word boundaries (Cuber is) or also across morpheme boundaries (She's drawring a picture). I'm sure the cross-dialect distribution of these things has been studied.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of Bruce Despain
Sent: Fri 7/7/2006 1:43 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: schwa
I haven't done a study, nor a search of the literature on this one. I suspect, however, that in the dialect in question the syllable is structured CVC. This has had the effect of making any word that "ends in a vowel" have that vowel diphthongized, so that the syllable ends in a glide or "silent-h." This is the way a number of phonologists have analyzed the English tense/lax opposition. The final 'a' becomes 'ah', i.e., "tense." With that in mind we would be inclined to say that the 'r' on the end of such words is simply an allophone of 'h'. As far as the person speaking the dialect is concerned, the variation in pronunciation is sub-phonemic (as Johanna would say). Hence, the 'r' in "far off" is phonemic, but in "idea of it" it simple separates the words. There is no word "idear" heard or perceived, only "ideah."
Bruce
>>> "Stahlke, Herbert F.W." <[log in to unmask]> 07/07/06 9:24 AM >>>
Good point, Bruce. Has anyone done a comparative description of /r/-insertion across dialects? They don't all do it the same: Southern US non-rhotic dialects don't do it at all while New England dialects do. I don't know the range of variation in British dialects.Herb
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bruce Despain
Sent: Friday, July 07, 2006 9:45 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: schwa
Herb,
What you probably need to say is that the spelling for Pooh's donkey friend, Eeyore, comes from the pronunciation of "eeyaw" when followed by a word that begins with a vowel. Thus in many non-rhotic dialects (as particulary in Australia) there is usually an "r" inserted in such cases, such that "eeyaw, eeyaw" becomes "eeyawreeyaw."
Bruce
>>> "Stahlke, Herbert F.W." <[log in to unmask]> 07/06/06 9:52 AM >>>
Bruce,
You're right about that, and when Andy Capp says, "Er", he's actually pronouncing a mid central vowel with no rhotacization. Another effect of the <r> in British Spelling is in the name of AA Milne's donkey, in Pooh, Eeyore, pronounce eeyaw, naturally. American speakers usually miss the humor on that one.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of Bruce Despain
Sent: Thu 7/6/2006 8:52 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: schwa
Johanna,
It may be relevant to note as well that the schwa is often phonetically spelled
as 'er', I surmise at least by British writers who do not pronounce the 'r'.
Bruce
>>> "Stahlke, Herbert F.W." <[log in to unmask]> 07/05/06 8:24 PM >>>
Here's another helpful posting from Johanna. Her point about the difficult of
pronouncing schwa ! in isolation illustrates that fact that in English schwa
occurs only in unstressed syllables, and phonetically untrained English speakers
can't pronounce unstressed syllables by themselves without stressing them, which
will change the vowel sound.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Johanna Rubba [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wed 7/5/2006 4:42 PM
To: Stahlke, Herbert F.W.
Cc: Johanna Rubba
Subject: Re: schwa
Herb,
I hope you'll post this little addendum to the schwa thread.
-----
Herb's concentric-circle image is nice. It's important to note one
other thing: though schwa is often phonetically spelled as 'uh', it is
not the same vowel sound heard in 'but', 'fun', or 'son'. The vowel in
these words is very close to schwa, but it is lower (therefore the
mouth is just a trifle more open). When people break a word up into
syllables and pronounce each separately, they will stress the normally
unstressed vowels, which will often come out as 'uh'. This happens to
my students all the time when they are transcribing words into phonetic
symbols, and they always ask me about the difference between the two.
They will pronounce 'about', for instance, as two separate syllables --
'uh' and 'bout'. As soon as that first syllable is pronounced alone, it
receives stress and the vowel changes away from schwa.
Many linguistics book use the same phonetic symbol -- an 'e' rotated
180 degrees -- for both of these vowels. Properly, the rotated 'e' is
for schwa, and the other vowel is represented by a symbol called caret
-- an upside-down lower-case v.
Some readers may also be a little confused about the relevance of
tense/lax to schwa. Both tense and lax vowels are subject to
replacement by schwa in unstressed syllabes: the tense 'ee' sound of
the 'e' in 'reduce' is normally pron! ounced as schwa, as is the first
tense /o/ of 'photography'; the tense /u/ of 'tonight', etc.
I might also note that the differences among schwas that Herb describes
below can also happen to stressed vowels: nearby sounds affect the
pronunciation of a vowel, because of the need for rapid muscle movement
noted in my first message. Phonics teaches about 'r-colored' vowels,
because the /r/ sound affects the vowel pronunciation in more
noticeable ways than other consonants. /l/ can also have a profound
effect on a preceding vowel. If a vowel precedes a nasal consonant such
as /m/, /n/, or the sound we spell '-ng', it will also be nasal -- that
is, the passage to the nasal cavity will open early and produce a nasal
vowel. This passage is closed when a nasal sound is not in a word. If
you're good at stretching out words without distorting them, try saying
'back' and 'bank' with very elongated vowels. You might be able to hear
the di! fference. French has nasal vowel phonemes, hence the difference
in pronunciation between 'seau' ('bucket') and 'son' ('sound'). The -n-
of 'son' is not pronounced.
On Jul 5, 2006, at 9:11 AM, Stahlke, Herbert F.W. wrote:
Thanks to Johanna for that excellent review of schwa, and to DD for
forwarding it. I would add only that schwa in English is functionally
different, in ways that Johanna explains, from schwa in other languages
where it may well be a separate phoneme. This results in part from the
major tense/lax contrast in English vowels. The vowel sounds in pea,
pay, pod (US), pawed, Po, and pool are tense vowels. The vowel sounds
in pit, pet, pat, putt, and put are lax (Midwestern pronunciation, both
Lower and Upper North, but not Northern Cities Vowel Shift areas).
What tense and lax mean physically is that tense vowels are articulated
with the tongue in more extreme positions, farther from the c! entral,
rest position, essentially the position for schwa. It takes more
muscular effort, tension, and time to pronounce these vowels, which is
why they are longer temporally. Lax vowels aren't as far out from
schwa physically, so they don't require as much muscular effor. Schwa,
for English, represents essentially the resting space in the middle of
the vowel space, and so we can think of the three kinds of vowel
roughly as three concentric circles, a bit of radical normalization but
a good image. Tense vowels are the outer circle, lax the inner, and
schwa the innermost. This implies that schwa is not a single vowel
sound but a range of sounds varying from the vowel of "just" as in "I
just left" to the initial vowel of "above", to the slightly rounded
vowel of "equal". As Johanna notes, this is a function of the dynamics
of tongue movement as it's going from one vowel or consonant position
to another.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of DD Farms
Sent: Wed 7/5/2006 9:25 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: schwa
DD: An extremely interesting note from Dr. Rubba, which I was asked
to forward. I really didn't have any idea that simple schwa could be
so complex. But from whence comes that schwa that so many southern
words seem to end in? No vowel there as spelled, but as pronounced.
Or is it just that I talk funny?
At 07:55 PM 7/4/2006, Johanna Rubba wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am still having trouble posting messages. If this doesn't go to
> the list, could you post it for me?
>
> Here is the dope on schwa, from a Ph.D. linguist who has studied a
> great deal of phonetics and phonology:
>
> Schwa is a mid-central vowel. This means the tongue position for the
> vowel is pretty much dead cente! r in what we call the 'vowel space'
> -- the area in the mouth in which vowels are made by placing the
> tongue high or low and pulling it forward or retracting it.
>
> Schwa isn't a phoneme of English; it is what we call an allophone.
> An allophone is a particular way of pronouncing a phoneme (phonemes
> are the sounds that we use to build words). We speak very rapidly --
> at the rate of several phonemes per second. At the same time, the
> movements we have to make with our tongues, vocal cords, and other
> vocal-tract parts have to be precise enough to differentiate the
> sounds we speak. In every language, a tradeoff is made between speed
> and precise articulation of a phoneme, resulting in changes in how
> the phoneme is pronounced. Sometimes a small change is made in the
> phoneme; sometimes we get a whole different sound; sometimes the
> phoneme is left out altogether.
>
> The app! earance of schwa depends on which syllables in the word are
> accented -- emphasized more than the others (linguists call this
> feature STRESS). English is a rhythmic language; the preferred
> arrangement of syllables is in stressed-unstresssed pairs, as in
> (stressed syllables are in CAPS) PHO-to-GRA-phic ('photographic').
>
> Schwa appears in syllables which have no stress at all. Any vowel
> (except the diphthongs, the vowels in 'bite', 'bout', and 'Boyd')
> will be pronounced as schwa if it appears in an unstressed syllable.
> Hence the difference in the pair
>
> 1 - PHO-to-GRAPH 'photograph'
>
> 2 - pho-TO-gra-PHY 'photography'
>
> (English has two degrees of stress; the main stress -- on PHO- and
> TO- in these examples -- and secondary stress, on GRAPH and PHY).
>
> Notice how PHO is pronounced with an /o/ in #1, but with a schwa
> (somewhat like 'pu! h') in #2. Similarly, -TO- is pronounced something
> like 'tuh' in #1, but as TAH in #2. Notice that the stress is
> reversed in the pair: in #1, 'pho-' has the main stress and '-to-'
> has no stress. In #2, the exact opposite holds: 'pho-' has no
> stress, and '-to-' has the main stress.
>
> This holds for normal-speed speech. When we slow down or have to
> speak unusually carefully (as in a noisy environment), we will
> pronounce the full vowel.
>
> These rapid-speech changes happen to every sound we say. A
> noticeable one is the various ways /t/ is pronounced: with a strong
> puff of air in 'toe'; as a d-like sound (but it is not /d/) in
> 'water'; as a break in the breath stream (a glottal stop) in
> 'button' or 'kitten'; without the puff of air, as in 'store'. This
> last causes /t/ and /d/ to sound the same, resulting in spelling
> errors such as 'distain' for 'disdain' and ! 'next store' for 'next
> door'. /t/ may also be omitted altogether when it is between an /n/
> and a vowel or '-er': 'twenty' may be pronounced 'twenny' and
> 'hunter' as 'hunner'.
>
> NOTE: These changes are not sloppy or incorrect speech, whatever you
> may have been told by your singing teacher or anyone else. They are
> necessary compromises between speed and precision articulation.
> Every language has a large number of such changes; learning them is
> necessary to acquiring a native accent in a language one is learning
> (a common component of a foreign accent in learners of English is
> the failure to change vowels to schwa).
>
> Dr. Johanna Rubba, Associate Professor, Linguistics
> Linguistics Minor Advisor
> English Department
> California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
> E-mail: [log in to unmask]
> Tel.: 805.756.2184
> Dept. Ofc. Tel.: 805.756.2596
> Dept. Fax: 805.756.6374
> URL: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
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Dr. Johanna Rubba, Associate Professor, Linguistics
Linguistics Minor Advisor
English Department
California Polytechnic State Univers! ity, San Luis Obispo
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
Tel.: 805.756.2184
Dept. Ofc. Tel.: 805.756.2596
Dept. Fax: 805.756.6374
URL: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
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