Re: Subtitutes for English /T/ and /D/

On 16 Jul, 09:21, "John Atkinson" <johna...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<phogl...@xxxxxx> wrote...
Ruud Harmsen <realemailons...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I just heard an old sketch on the radio, by the late Wim Kan
(http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wim_Kan) where he talks about a
(hypothetical, I suppose) violinst named Kenneth Johnson. Then he
says>
(in a folksy accent) "dat mot een kennis van Johnson wezen" (= "that
must be an acquaintance of Mr. Johnson"). Dutch kennis (/k'En@s/ =
acquaintance. In other words, he speculates that his Dutch audience
hears Kenneth as kennis and would themselves pronounce Kenneth the
same as kennis.

Now this was a rather old recording (1960s? 1970s?), the joke would
not be very funny any more now, because younger people learn English
in school, including pronunciation, whereas older people learnt to
read and write, but little else. Many people now often use a correct
[T] (but not a correct /D/!). But if they do substitute it bu
anything
alse, it is by [s], not [t].
I guess we use mostly [t] and [d] here in Finland. The good old days
when "the" was rendered as "röh" are regrettably gone.

Why do French speakers from France use [s] and [z], while those from
Quebec use [t] and [d]?


Not just the French but also the Spanish.

I have often wondered why non-natives use [s] and [z] or [t] and [d]
but many natives use [f] and [v]. [s] and [z] or [t] and [d] mark you
as non-native but [f] and [v] might not.

I do know one Frenchman who uses [f] and [v] but he lives in South
East Essex where that is common. He sounds quite unusual, a mix of
French features and Estuary ones. Not a common combination.

--
Seán Ó Leathlóbhair

.

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