Re: Portuguese lingual r

Ruud Harmsen wrote:
Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:25:02 +0200: "Ekkehard Dengler"
<ED-RS@xxxxxxxxxxx>: in sci.lang:

Unless the samples happen to come from the same speaker, they don't
really prove anything, do they? I mean the two words could perfectly
well form a minimal pair in your accent and be homophones in his.
Which may be precisely your point.

Yes. But I expect that if the isn't consciously recording, but
speaking spontaneously, he'll make the difference tooo, but without
knowing it and still denying it.

Ah. I have no idea how likely that is; I know next to nothing about Dutch.
But I'm reminded of a very long and probably fruitless discussion I once had
with a native speaker of German who insisted that the spelling reform
shouldn't have introduced the alternative spelling "aufwändig", because if
"aufwändig" existed, it wouldn't be pronounced like "aufwendig". There's
nothing to prevent anyone from actually pronouncing these differently, of
course, and if a speaker is consistent enough about their spelling
pronunciations, they've effectively created their very own phonemic
opposition.

Regards,
Ekkehard


.

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