--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Andy Howey <andyandmae_howey@...>
wrote:
> João:
>
> I don't know if that's such a good example. The only reason the
French have trouble pronouncing "th" is because they don't have that
sound in their native language. They can learn to pronounce it, IF
they want to learn. Likewise with Germans and "w". The same applies
to Filipinos trying to pronounce "f" or "v". Those sounds aren't
part of their native inventory, so most Filipinos TEND to
pronounce "f" as "p" and "v" as "b". With more exposure, they
eventually are able to use the correct pronunciation, and, among
Filipino immigrant families to the U.S., that pronunciation
difficulty typically doesn't occur with the children.
>
I think there's another reason.
Our Danish textbooks on English tell us Danes to beware of the
important distinction between 'u' and 'o' in eg. 'hut' and 'hot'. The
problem is (but the texbooks aren't aware of this) that those two
sound are sociolect-dependent allophones, or, should I say,
shibboleths, the first one being Gammel Holte (Gammel Halte) and the
other one Vesterbro (and this makes absolutely no sense to y'all's
limbic system and a lot to mine). My limbic system absolutely refuses
to believe that English-speakers all over the world, who seem to be
reasonable people (some of them) would pronounce some vowels with a
Gammel Halte accent and some with a Vesterbro accent. Nonono!
Therefore I will continue to ignore what the stupid and unnatural
textbooks say and pronunce the socalled two vowels the same; and I
know all reasonable English speakers everywhere will agree with me.
Nuts? Well, the Anglophonians feel the same way about their glides:
why should I speak French and Spanish and German with an Irish
accent??? No, I'll keep my glide and everyone will appreciate it.
Torsten