Re: Why "aren't I"?

On Thu, 29 Jun 2006 14:56:48 -0400, Harlan Messinger
<hmessinger.removethis@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:4gim3hF1nopraU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> in sci.lang:

Brian M. Scott wrote:

<Amnesty> is irrelevant: the /n/ is a syllable onset, not a
nucleus. Even if you really do split <amn't> between the
/m/ and the /n/, which I find hard to believe,

It seems to me that

(a) a claim that we have trouble with adjacent nasals in the same
syllable and,

Which in fact was not precisely my claim.

(b) a claim that given a choice between treating the /m/ in "amn't" as
being in the same syllable as the "n" and *not* being in the same
syllable as the "n", the latter is hard to believe

are mutually inconsistent. If (a) were true, it seems to me that it
would follow that the /m/ in "amn't" would *very likely* be in the first
syllable.

Except that English tends to maximize onsets. Both
divisions, am-n't and a-mn't, are problematic, though for
different reasons; I find the first significantly more
problematic than the second.

If on the other hand the /m/ is *in fact* in the second
syllable, then that seems to make claim (a) unlikely.

Brian
.