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From: James Eason <jeason@ucpopmail.uchicago.edu>
Subject: Re: *** English pronunciation ***
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Date: Fri, 26 Apr 1996 19:27:06 GMT
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Markus Laker wrote:
> 
> Fredy Labbaci <s183914@studenti.ing.unipi.it> wrote:
> 
> >    Are there any differences between the English spoken in the South of
> > England and RP speech?
> 
> Good gracious, yes!  Let's take as an example the word 'tomorrow'.  RP
> pronounces it /t@'mA.r@u/.  I'd expect the Queen in everyday conversation,
> or an educated person giving a speech, to change the first syllable:
> /tu'mA.r@u/.  In South London, where I grew up, the final vowel becomes a
> schwa:  /t@'mA.r@/.  And seventy miles away, in Hampshire, where I am now,
> the lady who serves my lunch at work unaccountably^ says /t@'m&r@/. If I
> drove fifty miles along the coast in either direction it would be different
> again.
> 
> Forgive me for not referring to your 'pity' example: I think other words
> offer far more dramatic variations in pronunciation.
> 
> ^No jokes, please: she serves me lunch because that's her job and, no, It
> doesn't (directly) cost me anything.
> 
> --
> Markus Laker.

This reminds me of "scone". When I finally got up the courage to ask 
how to pronounce it (we Americans pronounce it resolutely to rhyme 
with (the way we pronounce) "moan" or "bone"), the waitress looked at 
me and said "scone" in the "American" way. Politeness, perhaps. Then 
she said "or scun, or scoon, or scon" and several other variants. I 
suspect she was having me on a bit, but I heard most of the variants 
in subsequent days, so maybe not.

I have heard "pity" pronounced by British speakers (never an American, 
but we probably do it too) as though it were pitty, with a very hard 
and almost doubled "t" and a good deal of force in the final syllable.
