Izulde
01-31-2007, 12:43 PM
So I'm in my English Language class and we're going through how to spell words phonetically using the International Phoenetic Alphabet. It's pretty easy work all in all, until we get to one section.
My classmates give the answers to keg and egg as with the e sound like in bet. (so eh if you're saying it out loud)
I raise my hand and ask if it wouldn't be keg and egg with a long a sound like in ate, because that's how I always say it and hear it.
Prof spends about two minutes thinking it over and says, "That's an excellent question and I'd give you credit for it because it is based on the pronounciation that you say or that you hear."
Then he asks as a point of interest if anyone else in the class pronounces keg or egg with the long a sound.
I'm the only one.
Prof goes off on a tangent after that talking about how the writer of our textbook phoenetically spells things with a Bostonian accent and starts talking about how when he taught the course down in Georgia he used a textbook written by a couple Southerners and the way the class spelled Georgia phoenetically and the way he did it was different, so he looked in the book and the book agreed with the class. That made me think of FOFC. :D
Then we're in the next set of exercises where we're reading sentences and indicating which places have the a sound like in bat. (called an ashe or something like that but that's neither here nor there)
My turn comes up and I indicate catch as one of the words. Prof laughs and says, "No, the standardized way not the way you say it in this case." Rest of class laughs and I'm like "Um, can you skip me?" because the ashe sound is the most difficult for me to distinguish and I've been lost this whole set of exercises on what is and isn't an ashe sound.
So then the whole class goes through it and I discover that the standard form of catch is with the eh sound.
...Yeah, so far this class is what I thought it was, a bear to get through, but I'm hoping I'll be able to turn it around when we get to Old and Middle English, where I've at least got the background of doing translation work.
So does anyone else pronounce keg and egg and catch the way I do or am I on crack?
My classmates give the answers to keg and egg as with the e sound like in bet. (so eh if you're saying it out loud)
I raise my hand and ask if it wouldn't be keg and egg with a long a sound like in ate, because that's how I always say it and hear it.
Prof spends about two minutes thinking it over and says, "That's an excellent question and I'd give you credit for it because it is based on the pronounciation that you say or that you hear."
Then he asks as a point of interest if anyone else in the class pronounces keg or egg with the long a sound.
I'm the only one.
Prof goes off on a tangent after that talking about how the writer of our textbook phoenetically spells things with a Bostonian accent and starts talking about how when he taught the course down in Georgia he used a textbook written by a couple Southerners and the way the class spelled Georgia phoenetically and the way he did it was different, so he looked in the book and the book agreed with the class. That made me think of FOFC. :D
Then we're in the next set of exercises where we're reading sentences and indicating which places have the a sound like in bat. (called an ashe or something like that but that's neither here nor there)
My turn comes up and I indicate catch as one of the words. Prof laughs and says, "No, the standardized way not the way you say it in this case." Rest of class laughs and I'm like "Um, can you skip me?" because the ashe sound is the most difficult for me to distinguish and I've been lost this whole set of exercises on what is and isn't an ashe sound.
So then the whole class goes through it and I discover that the standard form of catch is with the eh sound.
...Yeah, so far this class is what I thought it was, a bear to get through, but I'm hoping I'll be able to turn it around when we get to Old and Middle English, where I've at least got the background of doing translation work.
So does anyone else pronounce keg and egg and catch the way I do or am I on crack?