Marco Cimarosti scripsit:

> One wonders if such a phoneme exists in *any* variety of English...

It definitely does in my idiolect and in that of the many North Americans
who pronounce "garage" as [g@'rAZ], rather than [g@'rAdZ] or ['g&ridZ].
I can't think of a full minimal pair between /dZ/ and /Z/ offhand, but
"garage"-"Rodge"/"Raj" ("Rodge" is a hypocoristic form of "Roger") comes
close.

> if [??] is a phoneme, why aren't the [??] and [??] which I think I am hearing
> at the beginning of words such as "Nuke" or "Luke".

Well, the latter alternate with [nuk], [luk], which is typical North
American pronunciation. If you want to get all radical on my ass,
you should argue that English [ju] is still underlyingly [y]!

--
John Cowan jcowan@... www.reutershealth.com www.ccil.org/~cowan
The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand
on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability.
Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land,
to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions.
--Thomas Henry Huxley