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Dear Andy,
I'm glad you tried to feel your tongue for the English retroflex vowel
series and did not accidentally gag yourself to death. English has an
incredibly complex vowel system, one of most complex in the world. I am not
surprised that most of the "dialect" differences and historical changes
occur in English in the vowel system.
William Labov, a sociolinguist, says there are no "dialect differences"
within a geographical area; there are just the signs of a historical change
taking place. He uses statistics to show that "dialect differences" are
present within individual speakers. The "ah" vs "aw" question occurs not
only in different areas, but within individual speakers for certain words.
Midwestern English speakers have three kinds of words where there is a
difference between "ah" and "aw."
1) Words that are always pronounced with the "ah" vowel.
2) Words that are always pronounced with the "aw" vowel.
3) Words that are sometimes pronounced with one vowel and sometimes with
the other vowel. Speakers are unaware of this fluctuation. The
fluctuation is measured by having a person speak onto tape, and
measuring, for example, what percent of the occurences of a variable
word are pronounced with "ah" and what percentage is spoken with
"aw."
In Illinois, US, we drew a line between St. Louis (a predominantly "ah"
location: "forty" and "farty" are pronounced the same with the "ah" vowel)
and Chicago ( a predominantly "aw" location: "forty" has "aw", and "farty"
has "ah"). We found some variable words, especially the negative marker
"not." We recorded the speech of people in towns that occur on or near the
line we had drawn. The closer you are to St. Louis, the more frequently do
people say "naht." The closer you are to Chicago, the more frequently do
people say "nawt." Because of time constraints we were unable to find a
point on the line where people are 50-50 "aw" and "ah."
It appears that the pronunciation of variable words with only "ah" is a
historical innovation in American English, in part because the historical
spelling shows some of these words spelled with an "a" and some with an "o."
Also some St. Louis people have completed the change, and pronounce all the
variable words with "ah." No one pronounces all the variable words, all of
which are spelled with "o," with "aw" in our sample.
The reason for the change is as yet unknown. It is not due to normal
phonetic change, inasmuch as "not" is a variable word but "knot" is
everywhere pronounced with "ah" in our area. The change to everywhere "ah"
in variable words seems to be affected by social class, but this is getting
harder and harder to study because of the social mobility along the line. It
is mostly, outside of immediate urban areas, an area of farms. Many farms
have been consolidated in the last 50 years, and the children of farmers are
now often engineers, teachers, etc.
An intense study of the shift in variable words within a family is
needed. We were able to study only one family with three generations of
farmers present. The younger the family member, the more often the speaker
(near St. Louis) was using "ah" for variable words. But this sample is, of
course, very small. Studies are expensive, so we have not done nearly enough
work on this. In this sense, "dialect" is not only a regional feature, but
an individual one.
Labov is the founder of "statistical dialectology," which we believe to
be a method of watching language change in progress. Statistical
dialectologists look for centers of innovation, places where language change
seems to have originated, and the reasons for the change. Since this means
backwards extrapolation, the few results that we have are highly tentative,
as are all historical-statistical results.
One of the advantages of Shavian with people writing what they say is to
make the collection of material for statistical dialectology
available--having people transcribe the phonetics of their own speech at a
less than fully conscious level.
I tend to see Standardized Spelling, which is most of all the result of
the invention of movable type, as the result of linguistic evolution rather
than as a choice by a group of people. I have created Standard Spelling
Systems for some unwritten languages, giving as it were, a standard. 25
years later the standard spellings (the way people usually opt to spell for
people in other dialect areas of the same language) have changed from what I
chose. The change is most often in frequently used words that mark grammar.
***Well, what do you think of that??!
I say "draw-wing," for the spelling "drawing," Andy. The root definitely has
"aw," but there is a semi-vowel "w" transition from the "aw" of the root to
the "i" vowel of "ing" ending.
The pronunciation "drawring" is known in the US, mostly on the East
Coast. It is considered a historical hyper-correction, which I can explain
later.
Too much for now, Dan
----------
>From: "A.M.Callaway" <acal@...>
>To: shavian@...
>Subject: Re: [shavian] Questions concerning vowels, etc.
>Date: SunThurSepJun 2429, 2000200029,06:43
>
>
> At 11:07 AM 9/23/00 -0700, you wrote:
>
>>
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>>
>> Dear Andy,
>> As hard as this is to do, try to feel/notice the position of your tongue
>> when you say "raw" and "roar." Is your tongue somehow further back when you
>> say "roar" than when you say "raw?" This is out of my interest to see if
>> also you have retroflexed vowels, or if their presence is a dialect feature.
>> Yours always, Daniel
>
> Yaw right, I mean, you're right, it was difficult to do. However, after some
> tongue twisting I think I can safely say that the two words are identical
> phonemically and, as far as I can tell, orally (is that the right word to use
> here?)
>
> While we are in the /or/ /aw/ department, how do others in here pronounce
> drawing? I notice that Autocad uses DWG for its file extension, and when I
> used
> to work in a drawing office I noticed a lot of people used DWG as an
> abbreviation for drawing. These suggest that the /w/ in drawing is pronounced.
> This seemed strange to me, as I say /droring/, with no hint of a /w/ (and the
> /r/ pronounced...)
>
>
> - .+'^'+. -- A.M.Callaway --------------------
> - A N D Y ------------------------------------
> - `+.,.+' -- www.ozemail.com.au/~acal --------
>
>
>
>
>