phonoloblog | all things phonology | camba.ucsd.edu/phonoloblog

During a discussion in our department meeting about whether to rename our TESL program a TESOL program (snore…), I learned that TESL is pronounced [tɛsəl] while TESOL is pronounced [tisɑl]. I’m curious as to why the pronunciation of the first vowel changes depending on the second vowel. I can think of two possibilities:

1) To emphasize the presence of the O in TESOL, speakers want a full vowel in the second syllable, which requires putting a secondary stress on the second syllable, which requires making the second syllable a foot, which in turn requires that the first syllable be a foot by itself: (t__)(sɑl). Being a single light syllable, (tɛ) would not make such a good foot, so (ti) is chosen instead.

2) Maybe [tɛsəl] and [tɛsɑl] would sound too similar, so an additional sound difference was introduced to disambiguate.

Since reading Kie Zuraw’s work on aggressive reduplication (changes where “already-similar syllables are made more similar”, with no apparent phonotactic rationale), I’ve noticed several other possible cases of this in English. As I will probably never use this list for anything else, I offer it here as data for anyone interested in this topic.

As in Zuraw’s paper, rough popularity is indicated by number of Google hits.

(”Onaconna” is a deliberate misspelling of “on account of”.)

As evidence of how these pronunciations arise, I can attest that my daughter (3;8) spontaneously starting saying “Barbar” although I was careful to use the correct pronunciation in her first exposure to the Babar books.

Another possibly related case is the Biblical pair Priscilla and Aquilla: Kenyon & Knott 1953 note that Aquilla is often incorrectly given second syllable stress, apparently to make it rhyme with Priscilla. But since this involves making two words rhyme, perhaps it better falls under the rubric of “paradigmatically echoic words” than aggressive reduplication.

Ref:

Kenyon, J.S. & T. A. Knott (1953) “A Pronouncing Dictionary of American English”. Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster.

 Anyone interested in syllable contact and metathesis should take note of the current news reports about Britney Spears. Her manager, whose real name is apparently Sam Lutfi, is frequently called Sam Lufti by reporters.

Currently, “Sam  Lutfi” gets 76,700 Google hits, while “Sam Lufti” gets 60,000.

In an earlier post (7/20/2006), I asked for examples of liquid dissimilation in English, such as omitting /r/ in the(r)mometer, Feb(r)uary, su(r)prise, etc.

There also seem to be cases where an /r/ is inserted into words that already contain an /r/. Some examples I’ve heard or had reported to me include:

1. farmiliar
2. contractural
3. ardurous (the OED gives this as a ‘poetic variant’)
4. verneer (would you trust this dentist?)
5. fruneral (African American English)
6. borogroves (this has entered the epigraphic record, conveniently for future philologists)
7. perservere
8. sherbert
9. phertographer
10. catergorize
11. lavartory
12. Kervorkian
13. intergral
14. perjorative

There are also historical examples like cartridge from cartouche, and treasury from thesauria.
This process is interesting because it is the reverse of long-distance dissimilatory loss of /r/. The existence of such a reverse process is predicted by Ohala’s theory that dissimilation results from hypercorrection on the part of the listener. According to this theory, the long-domain acoustic cues of /r/ can cause the listener to be uncertain whether there is one source of rhoticity in the word or two. Errors are possible in either direction.

Has anyone noticed other cases of this?

[This is an expanded version of a query I posted to Linguist List a few days ago.]

I’m interested in what appears to be a sporadic but widespread pattern of liquid dissimilation in English. I’ll post here the data I’ve collected so far, in hopes that readers might think of more examples or just want to share their wisdom on the subject.

(more…)

While Googling for new examples of intrusive vowels, I keep running into a 1976 film called “New Improved Institutional Quality: In the Environment of Liquids and Nasals a Parasitic Vowel Sometimes Develops”. It’s apparently a 10 minute artsy kind of thing. Has anyone seen it?