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From: rickw@eskimo.com (Richard Wojcik)
Subject: Re: Phonemic nasal vowel in English
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References: <3l34jv$qbo@mother.usf.edu> <D621zr.2pF@eskimo.com> <3lbhuv$c36@riscsm.scripps.edu>
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 1995 01:20:42 GMT
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In article <3lbhuv$c36@riscsm.scripps.edu>,
Mark Israel <misrael@scripps.edu> wrote:
>In article <D621zr.2pF@eskimo.com>, rickw@eskimo.com (Richard Wojcik) writes:
>> In article <3l34jv$qbo@mother.usf.edu>, millert@grad.csee.usf.edu
>>(Timothy Miller) writes: 
     [discussing the pronunciation of uh-huh and uh-uh]
>>> Are there anyother such instances, aside from borrowings, of this kind of 
>>> thing in Engligh?
>
>   Well, there's "huh"/"hunh" (expression of contemptuous acknowledgement).
>"Aw" (expression of disappointment) is pronounced not as nasally as French
>_on_, but more nasally than the English word "awe".  "Waah" (simulation of
>crying) is pretty nasal.  "Nah" (meaning "no") doesn't sound right if it's
>is as un-nasal as "nap" /n&p/ would be in British RP; but then, American 
>vowels are more nasal than British vowels to begin with, so it's kind of 
>hard to tell.

I don't think that any of the above examples violate English phonology in
quite the way that "uh-huh" and "uh-uh" do.  The nasality in "Aw" strikes
me more as an affectation that emphasizes the mocking nature of the sound.
Nasality has the interesting property (like hyper-palatal articulation) of
connoting contempt or mocking.  Another good example of phonology-violating
paralinguistic expression would be "tsk-tsk", the sound for disapproval.
This sound is actually an alveolar click, although it has a spelling
pronunciation of "tisk".
-- 
Rick Wojcik  rickw@eskimo.com     Seattle (for locals: Bellevue), WA
             http://www.eskimo.com/~rickw/
