Re: [tied] Re: American dialects, correction

At 13:18:19 on Monday, 2 February 2004, wtsdv wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Marco Moretti"
> <marcomoretti69@...> wrote:

>> In most American dialects there are two different
>> rhotics: one, retroflex, is the native, inerited /r/,
>> while a trilled rhotic sound corresponds ot inherited /t/
>> or /d/ in intervocalic position.

> You mean a flap not a trill, but I thought the flap was an
> allophone of /t/ only, not /d/. At least that's how it
> seems in my own dialect. "Matter" and "madder" sound
> distinct to me. It could be there's no other difference in
> the two but the length of the "a", but I thought that in a
> stressed syllable it would be long in any case.

If you're like most people who flap their intervocalic /t/s,
the main difference between <matter> and <madder> is the
length of the /æ/: it's longer in <madder>.

Brian