A few words I can think of straightaway that can be spelt with either 'ah' or 'ash':
Asked, past, grass, path, mask, task, pass, laugh, master, fast, glass... it goes on like this. There are MANY words that have two (interchangeable) pronunciations in this country.
Basically I can be pretty sure of myself when I say that anyone from either northern or southern England could use either phoneme *despite* their own pronunciation, if they were to think about it. I live in an area in what should be the southern half of England; but most people around me these days use 'ash'. Some would say that only the more 'educated' people would use 'ah', and people often remark on the fact that I say 'gr-AH-ss' rather than 'gr-A-ss'
Personally, because I can see how much trouble this 'ah' thing might cause, I will try to use 'ash'. This is perfectly acceptable to me, and I'm sure most of the UK as well. It should mean that American-English writing differences will be slashed even further. Comments on this idea?
Hugh
----- Original Message -----
From: Paul Gershon Vandenbrink <mailto:pvandenbrink@...>
To: shavian@... <mailto:shavian@...>
Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 2002 5:18 AM
Subject: [shavian] Rhotic "ARE" American versus British Pronunciation
Hi Hugh
I imagine "Ah" would still be very common in South East England. It would
be interesting to see a list of words, where Ah is used but "ash" would be
an acceptable alternate pronunciation. And of course a list of words where
"ash" would not be an acceptable alternate pronunciation would be even more
interesting.
I am not aware of any situations where in general American pronunciation
(Rhotic) where are would not be pronounced.
Word ending in "ar" are generally pronounced as Shaw "Are" and words ending
in "are" (i.e. fare, stare, mare, care, fair) are usually pronounced as
"air" or the Shaw "Air".
I don't know of any words spelled as "are" that would be pronounced as "ah".
Perhaps someone else would be aware of some confusion in this area. There
doesn't seem to be much overlap between Rhotic and Non-Rhotic dialects.
Regards, Paul V.
______________attached_____________________
At 05:14 PM 7/29/02 +0100, you wrote:
>Paul
>
>I understand completely what Craig said - he's completely correct. I am
>aware that most Americans don't use the 'ah' phoneme. This is why I
>included (in brackets) the possibility of *minimalising* its use by using
>'ash' instead of 'ah' in the majority of words where British readers would
>be able to use either. That way, 'ah' would be a much more rare occurrence.
>
>I would be keen on undertaking a study to see if we can cut down the
>occurrence of 'ah' to the bare minimum (i.e. keep it to the occasional
>word such as 'father').
>
>I will try to use 'ash' from now on so that I can monitor how much I
>*really* use 'ah'... I suspect it won't be very often.
>
>Hugh
>
>P.S. Another important point - am I correct that Americans don't have any
>problems knowing when to use the rhotic 'are' letter?
>----- Original Message -----
>From: <mailto:pvandenbrink@...>Paul Gershon Vandenbrink
>To: <mailto:shavian@...>shavian@...
>Sent: Monday, July 29, 2002 3:29 AM
>Subject: [shavian] Revised response: American versus British Pronunciation
>
>Hi Craig
> Excuse my earlier rushed response, (see below) to your note.
>Because I had been focusing on Hugh's suggestion,
>I neglected to respond properly to your points.
>Primarily, we are trying to work out some minimum sub-set of Shaw
>characters, that would be usable to all American learners of Shaw, for the
>purposes of getting across a basic understanding of the sounds of the Shaw
>letters.
>But secondarily, we do want to preserve sound distinctions that exist in
>pronunciation, even tho the speaker doesn't notice them or as you put it,
>considers them allophones for the same phoneme in American English. That is
>the situation we have with the ON and AWE sounds.
>This is a much different situation than the AH sound which I suspect, just
>isn't used anymore in General American.
>It appears from what Hugh is saying, to not be used in most British
>Accents, although it is preserved in British Educated Received
>Pronunciation.
>As you pointed out correctly, Shaw is not entirely a phonetic a language.
>Although it was built on phonetic principles, it has concentrated on
>providing phonemes for all the common sound in the various British accents.
>I believe those phonemes are sufficient to include all the commonly used
>General American Phonemes of English.
>In fact I keep harping on the fact that the Shaw Alphabet represents a
>superset of phonemes needed to represent General American English. I
>believe that there are more phonemes than needed for the American
>pronunciation. That needs to be checked, of course.
>
>There may be a need for other phonemes in General American such as the \hw\
>sound Star Raven keeps bringing up.
>But can we agree that a recognizable set of shared phonemes between General
>American and British R.P. are a necessary starting point. Different accents
>will have their own idiosyncratic phonemes, but they can be marked as
>pertaining to specific groups of English Speakers. I would like to put the
>Ah sound in that category.
>
>Regards, Paul V.
>
>P.S. My apologies again for my previous rushed response.
>
>P.P.S. You are correct that even in non-rhotic accents the r-sound can pop
>up before a following vowel. This is does not alway occur tho. Once you
>start dropping a sound in English, there is tendency over time for it to
>disappear in conversational speech. This can be seen in multiplicity of the
>silent letters in Roman Alphabetic spelling. (i.e. gh)
>__________________attached_________________________
>
>
>
> >Date: Sun, 28 Jul 2002 02:19:58 -0300
> >To: shavian@...
> >From: Paul Gershon Vandenbrink <pvandenbrink@...>
> >Subject: American versus British Pronunciation
> >
> >Hi Craig
> >I was hoping that we would iron out as many differences as possible,
> >rather than get tangled up in the details.
> >Obviously, as the English accents of the TV Media (CNN + BBC)
> >are understand around the world, so there is a common ground, outside of
> >current Roman Alphabet spelling.
> >It should be possible to examine the vast majority of phonemes we have in
> >common, before dwelling on the relatively few phonemes that have different
> >allophones.
> >
> >Regards, Paul V.
> >P.S. We are working on a strategy for teaching not rebuilding the English
> >pronunciation.
> >P.P.S. Regarding the addition of a Schwa(ado) to differentiate the sound
> >of 'urge' from 'array'. It was just suggestion to mark the longer "urge"
> >sound. Most Americans do not consistently differentiate those 2 sounds.
> >
> >_______________attached_______________________
> >
> >
> >At 06:23 PM 7/26/02 +0000, you wrote:
> >> > The mutual concession could be:
> >> > -- Brits/Australians learn to use rhotic vowels 'are', 'or' and
> >>'ear' (and possibly use 'ash' instead of 'ah' in words such as 'past',
> >>'fast', etc.*)
> >> > -- Americans/Canadians (any who don't already differentiate) learn
> >>to use 'ah', 'awe' and 'on'
> >> >
> >> > Sounds sensible, doesn't it? Mutual compromise. And not a very
> >> >difficult one to come to. This is all that has to be done to make
> >> >writing more or less phonetically unified. It will take some time
> >> >initially, but the long-term result is a more unified alphabet. As
> >> >has been pointed out, both parties can find out when to use the
> >> >appropriate letters from the current alphabet as it is.
> >>
> >>But that's exactly the thing--you can't. Nothing in TO indicates to
> >>north americans when to use AH, AWE, or ON. This analogy to
> >>non-rhotic spreakers is not appropriate. As I understand it, the
> >>"missing" R in Britain isn't really missing. It's just a null
> >>allophone of the R phoneme which the brain is still processing as an
> >>R. In non-rhotic Boston they say, "pahk the cah." But in the right
> >>sound environment, the R appears: "pahk the cah rover theah."
> >>
> >>
> >>Do those of you who profess to be R-less pronounce "moreover" the same
> >>as you pronounce "mow over"?
> >>
> >>Where ON an AWE have merged, they are allophones of the same phoneme.
> >> (And for many people they aren't even produced as different
> >>allophones.) Differentiating them in writing would be equivalent to
> >>NOT writing the R in a non-rhotic accent, because one would be
> >>recording what particular version of a sound is being used, not just
> >>what sound. But we don't have different letters for the two versions
> >>of ASH in "fan" and "fat" (totally different in the US) or a special T
> >>to show that the T's in "what I want" are really glottal stops.
> >>
> >>Perhaps it's not a matter if teaching additional letters "later", but
> >>just saying up front, AWE and AH exist, but Americans should use ON
> >>for these merged sounds in their writing. If we don't say that, then
> >>there won't be any consistency within American English, much less
> >>across the seas, because people will be randomly stabbing at what
> >>vowel to write. It seems like a British reader would prefer to have
> >>ON consistently replacing AWE and ASH always replacing AH, than ON
> >>sometimes meaning AWE, and AWE sometimes meaning ON, and AH sometimes
> >>meaning AWE, and AWE sometimes meaning ON...
> >>
> >>Shavian is not a phonectic alphabet--it doesn't record every nuance of
> >>pronunciaiton--so it can withstand quite a bit of regional variation
> >>without showing it. However, it is meant to be phonemic. What we are
> >>seeing here is that two varieties of English have different phoneme
> >>sets. The number of phonemes has changed and their boundaries have
> >>shifted. If, for the sake of internationality, it fails to represent
> >>that, it quits being a phonemic writing system. Above all other
> >>conflicting concerns, Shaw wanted a phonemic system.
> >>
> >>There is no such thing as a perfect writing system because so many of
> >>the ideals are incompatible. I think it makes sense to pick a
> >>philosophy and stick to it. Compromise is the reason TO is such a
> >>mess, but also one reason it is so successful. Without any unbending
> >>rules it is incredibly adaptable, but that benifit comes with a high
> >>cost in the time it takes to learn. We can abandon the phonemic
> >>system for Shavian and adapt it to be invariable across dialects, but
> >>that will make it less intuitive and harder to learn as well.
> >>
> >>Craig
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
> <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
>
>
>
>Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the
><http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>Yahoo! Terms of Service.
>
>
>Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
>ADVERTISEMENT
><http://rd.yahoo.com/M=228862.2128520.3581629.1829184/D=egroupweb/S=1705213030:HM/A=1155067/R=0/*http://adfarm.mediaplex.com/ad/ck/990-1736-1039-302>127d50a.jpg
>
>Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the
><http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
ADVERTISEMENT
<http://rd.yahoo.com/M=228862.2128520.3581629.1829184/D=egroupweb/S=1705213030:HM/A=1155070/R=0/*http://adfarm.mediaplex.com/ad/ck/990-1736-1039-302>
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> .