From: rh@rudhar.com   
      
   Sat, 22 Mar 2025 20:30:24 +1300: Ross Clark    
   scribeva:   
      
   >On 22/03/2025 7:59 p.m., Ruud Harmsen wrote:   
   >> Sat, 22 Mar 2025 09:46:53 +1300: Ross Clark    
   >> scribeva:   
   >>> Here's how the phonemic analysis of AmEng that I was taught many years   
   >>> ago treats this:   
   >>> The vowel of the -ton syllable is [?]; it occurs only unstressed.   
   >>   
   >> Shwa. (My crappy old Agent program can see nor post IPA (although it   
   >> can post in UTF8). But I easily guessed what you posted, and confirmed   
   >> it by looking under the hood, in the data file. Linux IS fully Unicode   
   >> enabled.)   
   >>   
   >>> It's in complementary distribution with the phonetically similar [?] in   
   >>   
   >> Upside down v.   
   >>   
   >>> "gun" and "one", which occurs only stressed.   
   >>> So the two are allophones of one phoneme.   
   >>> (In the current pronunciation regime of OED, all three of these vowels   
   >>> are written as .*)   
   >>   
   >> Yes, I understand that’s the explanation. But I still think it’s a   
   >> weird rhyme, because of the stress difference,   
   >   
   >I would say it's a weird pronunciation of "Galveston", with an extra   
   >stress that shouldn't be there. But given that pronunciation, there's   
   >nothing wrong with the rhyme.   
      
   Yes, I can agree with that. For AmEng, that is. Even with that stress,   
   still largely unthinkable in South-Brit, I would think. But I cannot   
   speak for them, being a non-native speaker.   
      
   >and because in my view   
   >> (which is not mainstream and is not scientifically based, I know),   
   >> they are not the same phoneme. Being in complementary distribution   
   >> isn’t enough of a criterion for that.  and  are also in   
   >> complementary distribution, but clearly not the same phoneme, and they   
   >> couldn’t ever rhyme.   
   >   
   >But we know the answer to that one is that they are not phonetically   
   >similar. Whereas [?] and [?] certainly are.   
   >Personally, as a speaker of NAmEng, I consider the theory intuitively   
   >plausible. It also accounts for why, for many speakers, the stressed   
   >forms of words like "of" and "from" have [?].   
      
   Perhaps, yes.   
      
   >> I also consider the history of the language and the phonemes. I know   
   >> very well that according to any phonemic theory, and PTD, I shouldn’t,   
   >> but I do it anyway. The BUG vowel has an unrounded [o] realisation in   
   >> Northern England, which shwa could never have.  (when stressed)   
   >> and  and ,  and  have the same vowel there. The   
   >> origin and sound of shwa in English, as in Galveston, is totally   
   >> different and unconnected.   
   >   
   >A phonological version of the Etymological Fallacy?   
      
   (Had to look that up, didn't know the term, do recognise the   
   phenomenon.) Probably, yes, except that here of course I don’t   
   consider it a fallacy.   
      
   >> This also reminds me of a discussion we had years ago, about Memphis   
   >> sounding like Memphus, in a song sung by Cher. Unthinkable in   
   >> South-Brit. The THIS and THUS vowels are always distinct there.   
   >   
   >They're quite distinct for me, too. What you mean is that in S-B (RP?)   
      
   SB = anything not Canadian or US, inclusing Australian and   
   New-Zealandish, perhaps also South-African. What about Irish English?   
      
   >the (various) unstressed vowels have sorted themselves into just two   
   >groups, where as for me (and I guess most NAmEng speakers, and others)   
   >there's only one.   
      
   --   
   Ruud Harmsen, https://rudhar.com   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)