Long and VERY busy day at work today (it's still Wednesday here for a while). Got home, had a nice dinner with my better half, discovered my home office phone had been fixed (the line was on the blink for a couple of days) and there was a message from a big city prosecutor who wants to talk with me about a certain case because of a paper I published years and years ago on the drug in question. (I wonder how he found the paper.) I also received the copy of Edith Skinner's "Speak With Distinction" and the associated practice CD that I ordered from alibris.com; DIY voice and elocution lessons should be fun and an edifying use of driving time. I think I will keep my R's, but will work on my vowels. Final post-cancer follow-up CT scan tomorrow, zero reason to be apprehensive.
Thinking of pronunciation, does anyone here pronounce Mary, merry and marry differently? I understand that Skinner's speech lessons emphasize the distinction between cot and caught (I pronounce them differently), and also the distinction between pin and pen. [To tell the truth I hadn't paid any attention to it, but it seems the latter case (pronouncing short "e" as short "i") is typical of the local (San Joaquin Valley) accent--evidently brought by settlers from the south in the 19th century. ] As a boy I pronounced "poor" as "pore" but was educated out of that.
The summer I graduated from high school I spent differentiating between picture and pitcher. (Before that, "pick-ture" didn't exist in my sound scene.) Then had to spend the next three months backpedaling to put "pit-chure" back, as it had mysteriously disappeared, lol!
Even though I lived in NY for 25 years I stubbornly kept my midwestern accent. People were always asking me where I was from. My daughter, who was born in the midwest but lives in NY, has a purely NY accent. I just rebelliously refused to assimilate.
I pronounce Mary and merry the same (vowel sounds like "eh") but marry differently (don't know how to represent that sound). I pronounce cot and caught differently but pen and pin the same. However, it's my Massachusetts-born wife who still speaks of the pitcher on the wall.
I pronounce the three M's differently from one another, same with pitcher and picture. I suspect that my poor and pore would sound quite close. Most likely my cot and caught are the same in sound. However, while living mostly around Boston as a child, I learned to actually pronounce my R's while living in Rhode Island, and never reverted. :-)
I really wonder how to pronounce the three M's differently. I will have to train my ear, I suppose. Or.....check YouTube! That's an idea, and I will act on it right now (while using my good Grado Labs headphones). And then to bed.
Howard Dean is FIRST!!!
ReplyDeleteLong and VERY busy day at work today (it's still Wednesday here for a while). Got home, had a nice dinner with my better half, discovered my home office phone had been fixed (the line was on the blink for a couple of days) and there was a message from a big city prosecutor who wants to talk with me about a certain case because of a paper I published years and years ago on the drug in question. (I wonder how he found the paper.) I also received the copy of Edith Skinner's "Speak With Distinction" and the associated practice CD that I ordered from alibris.com; DIY voice and elocution lessons should be fun and an edifying use of driving time. I think I will keep my R's, but will work on my vowels. Final post-cancer follow-up CT scan tomorrow, zero reason to be apprehensive.
ReplyDeleteThinking of pronunciation, does anyone here pronounce Mary, merry and marry differently? I understand that Skinner's speech lessons emphasize the distinction between cot and caught (I pronounce them differently), and also the distinction between pin and pen. [To tell the truth I hadn't paid any attention to it, but it seems the latter case (pronouncing short "e" as short "i") is typical of the local (San Joaquin Valley) accent--evidently brought by settlers from the south in the 19th century. ] As a boy I pronounced "poor" as "pore" but was educated out of that.
TTFN
--Alan
The summer I graduated from high school I spent differentiating between picture and pitcher. (Before that, "pick-ture" didn't exist in my sound scene.) Then had to spend the next three months backpedaling to put "pit-chure" back, as it had mysteriously disappeared, lol!
DeleteEven though I lived in NY for 25 years I stubbornly kept my midwestern accent. People were always asking me where I was from. My daughter, who was born in the midwest but lives in NY, has a purely NY accent. I just rebelliously refused to assimilate.
DeleteI pronounce Mary and merry the same (vowel sounds like "eh") but marry differently (don't know how to represent that sound). I pronounce cot and caught differently but pen and pin the same. However, it's my Massachusetts-born wife who still speaks of the pitcher on the wall.
DeleteGo Susan!
DeleteI pronounce the three M's differently from one another, same with pitcher and picture. I suspect that my poor and pore would sound quite close. Most likely my cot and caught are the same in sound. However, while living mostly around Boston as a child, I learned to actually pronounce my R's while living in Rhode Island, and never reverted. :-)
ReplyDeleteI really wonder how to pronounce the three M's differently. I will have to train my ear, I suppose. Or.....check YouTube! That's an idea, and I will act on it right now (while using my good Grado Labs headphones). And then to bed.
Delete--Alan