At 7:09:11 AM on Sunday, February 23, 2003, Glen Gordon
wrote:
>>*The* major difference? No. Aspiration is noticeably more
>>important; that's why unaspirated voiceless stops are
>>often heard by English speakers as voiced stops.
> I question this statement.
Question away. It's based on a great deal of empirical
evidence, mine and others'.
By the way, Middle High German was apparently similar to
English in this respect, since MHG often substituted <t->
for foreign <d-> in loanwords: MHG <tama> (Latin <dama>),
MHG <tihten> (Lat <dictare>), MHG <tuom> (Lat <domus>), MHG
<trache> (Lat <draco>), etc. This will have been lenis /t/.
> If you're correct, then how does an aspirated voiced stop
> sound like to English speakers? Does it not still sound
> like /d/ because of the voicing?
In my experience it is generally interpreted as a 'funny'
foreign-sounding /d/.
Before you get too excited, though, note that no one is
denying that English /d/ is voiced in comparison with
English /t/ in the sense that even in initial position it
has an early VOT, or that some speakers have a realization
that is voiced by any standard. Initial /d/ and /t/
typically differ in both aspiration and voicing. If a
dental or alveolar stop is voiced throughout, it will be
categorized as /d/ irrespective of aspiration. If it is
unvoiced throughout (i.e., until release or later) and
unaspirated, untrained English ears more often hear it as
/d/ than as /t/ -- a slightly 'funny' /d/, perhaps, but a
/d/ none the less. Ignoring the observation won't make it
go away.
Brian