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From: rdd@usa1.com (Aaron J. Dinkin)
Subject: Re: Chain Shift (was Tendency of Inflections to Disappear)
Message-ID: <rdd-0908960913490001@dmn1-21.usa1.com>
Date: Fri, 09 Aug 1996 09:13:49 -0500
References: <4tjfe5$3be@news4.digex.net> <4tlflg$7v7@agate.berkeley.edu> <19960802014519.richw@yank.kitchener.on.ca> <rdd-0208961030400001@dmn1-66.usa1.com> <3202162c.85779338@nntp.ix.netcom.com> <3209e64a.17638852@news.tcp.co.uk>
Lines: 38

In article <3209e64a.17638852@news.tcp.co.uk>, laker@tcp.co.uk (Markus
Laker) wrote:

> exw6sxq@ix.netcom.com (Bob Cunningham):
> 
> > rdd@usa1.com (Aaron J. Dinkin) wrote:
> > 
> >      [...]
> > 
> > >He is saying that the word "rosebud" does not have any secondary stress,
> > >and I agree with him.
> > 
> >      I think it does have secondary stress on "bud", and I'm happy to
> > see that three US dictionaries agree with me: AHD3, RHD2U, and MWCD10.
> 
> Er, me too.  I give the second syllable of 'rosebud' considerably more
> stress than the last two syllables of 'rosemary'.

Well, I don't. It's possible that I give "-bud" and "-mar-" both tertiary
stress, but no one really cares about tertiary stress, and I'm sure it's
not phonemic.
 
> OED gives no secondary stress in "'ordinary", "'cataclysm" or, for that
> matter, "cata'clysmic".  Nor, as a Briton, would I.  I believe many
> Americans say "'ordi,nary" but, for most Britons, the "a" is reduced to
> a schwa and the "i" is often elided altogether.  I find it more
> surprising that OED2 treats "ordinarily" in the same way: it places
> primary stress on the first syllable and reduces the poor old "a" to a
> schwa again.  Having four consecutive unstressed syllables is, in my
> view, just asking for an inaudible mumble.

My own dialect prohibits three unstressed syllables in a row. "Ordinarily"
in RP is probably something like ['O~dn-r@,li], but the secondary stress
on "-ly" is overlooked. I'm happy to be corrected by someone who knows
more.

-Aaron J. Dinkin
Dr. Whom

