Re: ring & rink

--- In phoNet@yahoogroups.com, "Jean-Paul G. POTET" <potetjp@w...>
wrote:

> "that depends on the dialect... in my dialect it would be [r\iNg_}]
> and [r\iNk] ... from my experience, /N/ is usually [N] or [Ng_}]
> and /Nk/ is usually [Nk] or [Nk_}], with [N] and [Nk] being most
> common." Robert B. WILSON
>
> If you do not recall where you hail from, it is difficult for your
> reader to see what your dialect is. :-)

I don't remember where Robert "hails from", but I'm from South
Florida and have always lived in the southeastern U.S. I've heard
only [N] for morpheme-final /N/ (as in [r\iN]) with the single
exception of "Long Island" (as pronounced by people from that area,
and only those people). Also, I usually say [Nk_h] for /Nk/.

> To me [N] is not a phoneme in English, but a phone that is the
> realisation of the phoneme /n/ before a velar stop. When /g/ is
> dropped, the realisation is [n], e.g. shipping > shippin'.
>
> Jean-Paul G. POTET, FRANCE

I don't think one can meaningfully speak of "phonemes in English". It
seems clear that the set of phonemes is accent-dependent. Also, it's
my understanding that {shippin'} is really {shippen} -- that is, a
remnant of a dialect that generalized a different form, so there is
no {g} to be dropped.

IKP