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From: Peter Hullah <Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr>
Subject: Re: endings: "theirselves" vs. "themselves" etc.
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Date: Mon, 19 Feb 1996 10:50:55 GMT
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John Lawler wrote:
> 
> That is, the voicing assimilation that makes these morphemes voiceless
> /s/ after voiceless consonants, and voiced /z/ after voiced consonants
> and vowels (including the epenthetic schwa that follows sibilants
> /kIs/ - /kIs@z/) is not so much a matter of "ease" as it is of rule.

Speaking as a non-linguist but as someone who finds language fascinating,
I find it hard to believe that any of the English we speak exists because
of rule - I would have thought that it is _all_ a matter of ease and
usage. The linguists came along latter, to my mind, and tried to decide -
and are still trying to decide, in some cases - what rules are followed.
[When they _do_ try to give us rules, they often manage to screw it up 
completely, by trying to tell us not to end sentences with prepositions 
or to split infinitives etc. Some of the earlier ones even managed to get 
us, on both sides of the Atlantic, to spell "ache" with a 'ch' rather than 
a 'k'. :)]

> >In fact, /vz/ is also a lot easier than /fs/ which is probably why
> >-self becomes -selves in the plural.
> 
> Alas, not so.  Different rule.  And there's no evidence that /vz/
> is "a lot easier" than /fs/.  If anything, the reverse is true,
> since (a) /vz/ is voiced, and thus requires participation of the
> larynx, which would otherwise be uninvolved -- i.e, there's more
> physical effort and control required, and (b) at the end of the
> word, the environment is more likely to condition voicelessness
> than voicing.

Now I think of it, it could have something to do with the 'l'. I notice
that, for example, my Dutch colleagues cannot pronounce "self" as one
syllable - it becomes "seluf" like "film" becomes "filum" - whereas they 
can pronounce "themselves". Just a guess.

> >> (listen carefully to the way English speakers say the fraction
> >>  "five-sixths"; you'll find the /0/ (theta) between the two
> >>  /s/'s disappears almost totally, because /sIks0s/ is practically
> >>  impossible to articulate at speed.)
> 
> >So slow down :-) I've never noticed myself omitting the 'th'.
> 
> That's why usenet is the wrong venue to discuss phonetics.
> The data is (or are) the important thing(s).  When you learn
> phonetics you will see what I mean.  In the meantime, while
> you may be correct -- I can't tell -- I urge you to pay
> closer attention.  If you don't omit the /0/ in unmonitored
> natural speech (anybody can say it slowly with care, but that
> doesn't count), you're speaking a very unusual brand of English.

Whilst I might, occasionally, drop the 'k' in "asked" so that it sounds
like "arsed" - this only happens when I'm speaking very slovenly - I can't
imaging myself dropping the 'th' in "sixths". And I don't consider my
brand of English to be unusual.

Pete

["thierselves" changed to "theirselves" in subject line!]

-- 

Peter H.C. Hullah                     Technical Services
e-mail: Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr   EUROCONTROL Experimental Centre
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