Help talk:IPA/English/Archive 3

Pronunciation of /i/ needs to be added
Suggestion: add a vowel entry This suggestion seems to agree with Help:IPA.
 * /i/ ee as in meet

I was led here from the Greek letter Pi which has pronunciation /pi/.

There seems to be no reference on this page to the /i/ sound. (I thought the /ɪ/ was it but that has a short i as in pit. As I understand it Pi has an i sound as the ee in meet.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ablonus (talk • contribs) 09:15, 29 April 2008 (UTC)


 * You have stumbled on perhaps the only minimal pair distinguishing /i/ (pi) and /iː/ (pee) in English. The sign /ː/ is generally used to mark a long sound. In almost all cases /i/ is long in English. So the symbol chosen in the table is /iː/. You can derive /i/ from the table as shorter form of /iː/. However, the standard pronunciation of "pi" is /pаɪ/. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 09:54, 29 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I should have checked the pi article first. It explicitly states that the pronunciation in Greek is /pi/. Clicking on the link leads you to help:IPA, the page for language independent (phonetic) application of IPA, that contains a separate entry for /i/. This page "help:pronunciation" is only meant to describe the way IPA is applied to words in English, which generally does not have short /i/. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 10:06, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

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Yes, the same is true for the page Pi (letter). Again it uses /pi/ for the Greek pronunciation as, "In Modern Greek, the name of the letter is pronounced /pi/; in modern English, it is pronounced /paɪ/," and, again, the link on /pi/ takes the reader to the Help:Pronunciation page which does not have /i/ listed. I guess we could edit the two pi pages which point here to point to the Help:IPA page instead but I expect there are other pages which also point here for the pronunciation of /i/.

I believe the modern Greek name of pi is 'pee' as it is in English for the letter P. If that is right can we correct Wikipedia by adding /i/ to this, the Help:Pronunciation page? Ablonus (talk) 10:05, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

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Though of course as you all know standard American English does not have phonemic vowel duration, and /i/ etc are the standard American transcription (as found in for example the Oxford American English Dictionary), and American Wikipedia editors will often never use /i:/ -- which gets into the existential problem of this page, claiming to be how things are and should be done in Wikipedia... a thought continued in a new comment below ("While Chart Is Useful - It Violates All Wikipedia Principals")

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Ablonus (talk) 12:08, 12 May 2008 (UTC) It seems from the footnote on the page that /i/ is now generally used instead of or as well as /iː/ to represent the same sound. To my surprise the Help:IPA page links both symbols to exactly the same ogg file. Per the previous contributor it seems questionable to have two pages to explain certain symbols. This is exacerbated when they disagree or when symbols which are linked to a page are not explained on that page. But there has just been a very recent discussion on whether to keep or remove the Help:Pronunciation page and the decision was Keep so I guess we are stuck with it for now.

My objection would be resolved by adding /i/ to the Help:Pronunciation page. What happens to the page longer term is another issue but for now while articles link /i/ to this page Wikipedia is in error and confusing. I'm not familiar with the talk process. What do we need to do to decide whether to add /i/ to the page or not, i.e. when does the talk on this topic come to an end? The alternatives of either

1. Relinking every /i/ in Wikipedia which points to Help:Pronunciation to point to Help:IPA, or,

2. Changing every page with /i/ to use /iː/

are not practical, IMHO. So can we simply add /i/ to this page while other discussions continue? Ablonus (talk) 12:08, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

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Ablonus (talk) 19:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC) Well I've added and entry for /i/. Notably it was already referred to in the footnote on /I/ and /iː/. I included the same footnote on /i/. It would be good if someone could check that I've made acceptable updates. Ablonus (talk) 19:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation of ɑ
Why do we use "ɑ" for father all over Wikipedia? The "ɑ" I know is an extremely nasal-sounding vowel, for father I would use "ʌ", I'm far from an expert though and am probably wrong in this. +Hexagon1 (t) 10:46, 5 May 2008 (UTC) PS: My comp is screwing up IPA I just found, so I don't actually know what letter the IPA symbols I used are or which I intended to use, but my question stands, why doesn't the upside-down v correspond to 'father'. +Hexagon1 (t) 10:51, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Short answer, because the upside-down v corresponds to the vowels of "mother" and "brother". —Angr 16:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Er, and they're pronounced differently than father? In my speech the letter a in father is just the lengthened (ː) letter a from brother and mother. +Hexagon1 (t) 06:45, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * My dictionary has father with the vowel of car and mother/brother the vowel of cut. — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  07:07, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * To me all those are the same vowel but lengthened for car and father (cʌː & fʌːðʌ versus kʌt & mʌðʌ & bɹʌðʌ), but I'm not an expert on phonetics and I may be confusing two vowels. I don't think I am though. +Hexagon1 (t) 07:18, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * It could be your specific dialect. Generally, the vowel of car is more open and more back while the vowel of cut is more central and higher.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  08:37, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I speak Australian English (general, I think; but definitely not broad), and am from Sydney. Wow, I never knew that those are pronounced differently in other dialects of English. +Hexagon1 (t) 08:43, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Ahh, yes. Our article on Australian English phonology says just that.  You can also look at IPA chart for English which is nice in that it compares the vowels of major dialects.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  08:51, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Cheers, I'll read up on those links. +Hexagon1 (t) 10:34, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

While Chart Is Useful - It Violates All Wikipedia Principles
This is an innovative work, using some controversial approaches, without citations, presented as standard fact -- and as such should be utterly banned from appearing in Wikipedia. But in fact it's locked instead.

It also suggests that all IPA transcriptions in English Wikipedia follow this system -- when in reality people use all sorts of dialect-specific and/or inaccurate approaches and/or alternate (national) conventions. Where's the part about "We [and who is that??] recommend this system for use by WIkipedia editors"?

Additionally -- since I secretly think it's a good, albeit highly illegal approach, and generally makes good choices -- it lacks the syllable-division symbol.

In the long term, Wikipedia needs a "pronunciation widget" at the start of each article -- with various pronunciations (British, American, local for local-specific subjects) and audio. Can set a cookie on your browser to give you your preferred rendering.

At any rate: at the moment, this article needs a clear disclaimer at the start explaining its true identity as a special help page contrived by some Wikipedia editors and not any kind of of official international English transcription norm. It's recommended for use by editors, but you will in reality find all sorts of variation in Wikipedia articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.199.65.53 (talk) 11:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Check this archive which features a very thorough critique of the system we have right now (from a user who has raised the issues you've brought up). Syllable breaks were part of it, perhaps you could take a look and we can all talk some more about it.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  11:22, 11 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh thanks but here's just some more of my thoughts -- I really don't have time to pursue this further:


 * In general its character as a mishmash of British and American sounds and transcription conventions should be noted. This could be really confusing to someone just getting acquainted with IPA, trying to equate these symbols to their own speech.


 * Am very frustrated with IPA. I can't make heads or tails of it.  That means that all the given pronounciations are useless and are counter-productive to people trying to learn to say a word correctly.  Why not augment the IPA with a more standard dictionary notation?  Regular handheld dictionaries have had a long history of proven utility and many readers have been educated to read those notations.  In contrast, IPA is cryptic and disasterously unhelpful (all of my friends and co-workers are college educated but NONE of them are able to interpret IPA without using the table one character at a time).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rdhettinger (talk • contribs) 01:54, 25 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Although unlikely to get anywhere in today's IPA-is-law environment, I'll mention there is an alternate possibility -- to use capitalized abstract symbols for the vowels rather than IPA symbols. For example /O/ for "historical long-O".


 * One last issue: there's no indication of the standard American split of historical short-O between /ɔ/ ("boss") and /ɑ/ ("hot").


 * In conclusion I do think it's a reasonable practical solution, the symbols used (including long signs on /i:/ etc) are pretty much the best choices (might quibble on a few) -- but its all about labelling it clearly for what it is - nonstandard, Wikipedia-invented, potentially controversial, but best practical solution to problem, and only an attempted recommended much variation will be found in articles.... Thanks.


 * you are confused. This page is not an article and as such does not need to conform to the rules for articles. --86.135.120.224 (talk) 17:44, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Rdhettinger (talk) 02:00, 25 December 2008 (UTC) Am very frustrated with IPA. I can't make heads or tails of it. That means that all the given pronunciations are useless and are counter-productive to people trying to learn to say a word correctly. Why not augment the IPA with a more standard dictionary notation? Regular printedd dictionaries have had a long history of proven utility and many readers have been educated to read those notations. In contrast, IPA is cryptic and disasterously unhelpful (all of my friends and co-workers are college educated but NONE of them are able to interpret IPA without using the table one character at a time).


 * We can add your favorite convention, but then people who aren't used to it (i.e. most of the world) will be just as confused about it as you are about the IPA. We use the IPA for the same reason that we give areas in hectares rather than roods. kwami (talk) 02:10, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Media
hey, is this relevant to be put in the See Also section?> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Pronunciation and does anybody know what is the format to put as an audio .ogg file the native term of Places/Subjects in articles? Thanx -CuteHappyBrute (talk) 00:43, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Distinctions
For the sake of neutrality, I strongly feel this page should have as many practical distinctions as possible among the intelligible polished pronunciations. Distinctions that are conservative (some accents still keep them) and splits that are common and phonologically distinct (like the way short /u/ and /oo/ are treated in Southern England and in Northern England), and only excluding things like...phoneme splits that aren't even heard by their own speakers (like ae-tensing and the bad-lad split). In particular, pre-meet-meat merger as (conditional until it is assuredly extinct worldwide within our language), pre-pane-pain merger as  and pre-toe-tow merger as  (both distinctions are reportedly alive and well in Welsh English), a full recognition of the pre-fern-fir-fur merger as, and the pre-horse-hoarse merger as , and metapronunciations involving cut-put-good-mood as  (North-South difference in England), and distinguishing fore-four , fare-fair , threw-through , you-yew-ewe  and such&mdash;all distinctions that are still alive and (for the most part) well in a few corners of our global intelligible language. I do not believe that this page should be discriminatorily majoritarian, as it will leave large swaths of speakers of our same language phonologically unrepresented. It seems that the most neutral thing to do here is to keep pronunciations conservatively broad, even keeping distinctions that may sound archaic to some, as long as they survive in spoken language that still communicates clearly with the rest of us as English. I used to think this would involve a great deal of research, but not necessarily&mdash;the mergers we know are not globally complete can have pre-merger distinction preserved until and unless they are known to be 100% complete, and the details of phonemic splits (like North-South England /u/) maintained if the split (that would be the South part of England) is especially more common than not (as it exists in England-Wales and in the Americas and the Southern Hemisphere...). Then, with this level of broadness in place, we can finally agree that the pronunciation is internationally neutral and isn't biased towards specific varieties). - Gilgamesh (talk) 13:54, 15 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The problem is that most dictionaries don't indicate such distinctions, so it will be nearly impossible to maintain consistency between the pronunciations listed in the articles and the key that's supposed to explain them. kwami (talk) 18:47, 15 May 2008 (UTC)


 * At the very least we should distinguish horse-hoarse. Even many American dictionaries do that&mdash;that's how I discovered that words like cord-lord-sort have a horse-style vowel and ford-port have a hoarse-style vowel.  As for pane-pain, toe-tow and threw-through, it's actually pretty straightforward, as English has already clearly spelt the majority of these distinctions since the Chancery standard.   is for all normal long /a/, tense /e/ (like in caf&eacute; and break) and so forth.   is for all normal /ai ay ei ey/ in words such as rain-gray-rein-grey.   is for all normal long /o/ and /oa/, as well as the /ol/ in /olm/ words like Holmes, and /au/ in words loaned from modern French such as faux.   is for all normal /ou ow/ that are pronounced like in soul-snow, as well as /o/ in /ol/ words such as roll-poll-cold-colt, and the /ol/ in /olk/ words such as folk-yolk.  In fact, the unique regular pronunciations of sequences like /all alt alk alm oll olt olk olm/ are from a historically regular diphthongization of the vowel before dark L (or the disappearance of the L in /alm olm/ and compensatory lengthening of the vowel), each becoming like /awl ault awk aːm owl oult owk oːm/.  (Of course, the /au/ diphthong subsequently monophthonged to  centuries ago.)  threw-through distinction is simply not dropping the yod where RP or GA typically would.  These are highly regular examples that seem to derive from common reading sense, for certain. - Gilgamesh (talk) 07:11, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Is there any evidence that people are indicating these distinctions when showing how English words are pronounced in Wikipedia entries? Don't forget this page is not about describing every variety of English, it's about explaining pronunciation symbols used in articles for readers who are unfamiliar with them. "Simplify, simplify" needs to be our motto here. —Angr 18:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * You're right, I may be missing some principles. I keep switching between Wikipedia and Wiktionary and I'd forgotten the scopes of focus.  However, what I'm saying is not about describing every variety of English, but describing English conservatively so that we don't have to describe every regional variety.  In many ways, RP and GA are oversimplified for a global scope.  A conservative transcription need not be prescriptively dialectal, but there are conservative features of Modern English phonology that are still maintained in actively spoken English in our world.  Keeping conservative distinctions simply indicates, "This is the conservative distinction of this pronunciation that exists in our world."  I don't think it is too much if toe is  and tow is .  In the varieties where they sound the same, both transcriptions  are regional allophones.  And besides, being autistic, I totally suck at being simple, and need help.  Discussion helps.  I still think I have good and important ideas, but I alone cannot easily convey them in simple layman's terms. - Gilgamesh (talk) 05:47, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Besides, we already indicate the horse-hoarse distinction. kwami (talk) 19:39, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Touch&eacute;. - Gilgamesh (talk) 05:42, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I must voice my strong disagreement about the bad-lad split not being heard by people who speak with it. In the dialect I am familiar with (I grew up in Southern Maryland, U.S.) the "a" in bad, bath, path, staff, draft, raft, and calf is pronounced like the "eah" in yeah. It sounds very different from the "a" in lad, math, sat, rat, pat, mat, etc. For those who speak this dialect, seeing "bad" and "pat" as examples of the same sound registers as pure nonsense. 24.23.110.199 (talk) 03:56, 25 December 2008 (UTC)Rev. Zak Zennii 5:55 25 December 2008 (UTC)
 * What you're talking about is æ-tensing which, indeed, is phonemic in some regions. I suppose we don't indicate it because it's largely predictable by environment.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  04:54, 25 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Zak, do you know of an accessible dictionary that makes this distinction? Webster's, Random House, and the OED do not make the distinction, so it's difficult for us to either. kwami (talk) 07:50, 25 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Merriam-Webster's Collegiate doesn't indicate æ-tensing, but Webster's Third New International unabridged does. It's the only dictionary I know of that does. However, I don't know how reliable it is, since æ-tensing is so hard to pin down. Even in accents where it seems to be phonemic (NYC, Philadelphia) there's variation in which words get it and which words don't (i.e. some words have tense æ in NYC but not Philly, other words have tense æ in Philly but not NYC); and in other accents it doesn't seem to be phonemic at all. —Angr 10:20, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Move
How about moving this page from Help:Pronunciation to Help:IPA for English, which is where all of the other language specific pages are (i.e., Help:IPA for Hebrew, Help:IPA for Italian, Help:IPA for Korean, Help:IPA for Polish, Help:IPA for Russian, Help:IPA for Spanish)? Epson291 (talk) 19:39, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I'll be bold and move it, since it makes a lot of logical sense. Epson291 (talk) 23:54, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Possibility of dividing sounds according to syllable
If possible, I would like to propose a standard for seperating each syllable to aid in pronunciation. For instance, take a look at the word Moai:



It is difficult for someone unfamiliar with the IPA to identify dipthongs while still keeping syllables apart. You could look at this word and think "mow-oo-ai" easily. (given, there is nothing to indicate that ʊ is or is not part of the dipthong oʊ) Respectively, it could be represented like this instead:



Where the • would indicate a syllabic break. 74.242.119.58 (talk) 23:27, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * If we were to do this, a period would be a better syllable break. A syllable break would help distinguish between mistake (error) and mistake (erroneously take).  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  00:00, 25 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I added it. I can see it in disambiguating cases such as these, but they'll just result in arguments if we try applying them universally, since we can't agree on English syllable structure. kwami (talk) 01:09, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for the prompt response! I do like the idea of a period, as well. This definitely makes syllables more clear. 74.242.119.58 (talk) 15:31, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I think using the period to mark syllables is a good idea as long as it's done very sparingly, only where there's real potential for confusion (e.g. Bowie vs. boy). —Angr 16:52, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Silence pronounced letters
When is a letter silence? as in "tsunami"? In the wiki page on "tsunami", the pronunciation is given as "/(t)suːˈnɑːmi/". I assume that the parentheses bracketed letter "(t)" is supposed to indicate the "t" is silence?

I tried looking this up and there's no mention of when a letter in a word is supposed to be silence. Can something be added to cover this?

Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.16.28.198 (talk) 16:48, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd say the parenthesis around the "t" means it's optional: You can pronounce that word either /su:na:mi/ or /tsu:na:mi/. A letter that is always silent (like the "b" in "lamb" or the "k" in "knife") shouldn't be indicated in phonetic transcription at all. —Angr 17:00, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to revise representation of rhoticised vowels
While arranging the rhoticised vowels in parallel columns, it occurred to me that it might be an improvement to replace the contentious schwa by another way of representing the rhotics.

I know this proposal comes rather late in the game, but what do you think? &minus;Woodstone (talk) 14:48, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi, I'm adding the phonemic parallels. I'm also reverting the changes you made to transcription. They require changes to hundreds of articles, so I think we'd better have consensus first. kwami (talk) 17:50, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * As far as I know there were no changes to the transcriptions, only to the layout. So there is no effect on any existing references. and I reverted back to the new layout. Of course if you don't like it, we can discuss if it's considered an improvement. It is part of my effort to make all help:IPA-xx pages similar in style and to make them fit as much as possible on one screen each. Whenever a list is very long, I try to find some logical way to chop it into parallel columns. For Italian and Russian this was the obvious thing to do, with few exceptions. For English, it least it would seem to help in making it easier to rememeber. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 18:03, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Sorry, my bad. Some of the rhotic vowels were changed from a 'lax' to a 'tense' notation before you started editing. What we concluded when rolling this out, if I remember correctly, was that a tense notation (if made consistent, as at right above) would be diachronically phonemic, more or less, but that a lax notation (as at left above) was more intuitive to RP speakers. I suggest that either way, we restrict diphthongs to /au, ai, oi/ in order to keep the correspondence between rhotic and non-rhotic vowels regular.


 * Oh, and I agree that making the rhotic-nonrhotic correspondences explicit is a good idea. My problem with the details of your proposal is that ɔː goes with ɔr but oʊ goes with ɔːr. That's confusing, but could be resolved by first changing ɔː to ɔ. — kwami(talk) 18:17, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * We also have a possible problem with a /ʌ, ɜr/-/ʊ, ʌr/ correspondence. Someone more knowledgeable than I would need to address that. kwami (talk) 18:31, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I have reinstated the new layout, but reverted the recent transcription changes. I did it by manual comparison, so I may have overlooked some. Any improvements in parallelism that need changes to the transcription choices need more time to discuss. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 18:51, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Would you like I move the "ou" and "ei" (too lazy for IPA here) from diphthongs to mono now? So the system shows better? &minus;Woodstone (talk) 18:57, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * While I wouldn't mind seeing the schwas removed to make a more phonemic (broad) transcription, I don't know if transcribing the vowel of bear as would be better.  The table makes the table at right the best option.  It might make it less intuitive for RP speakers but the system is unintuitive for everybody in one way or another. — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  19:30, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * AFAIR, the table at right was preferred by GA speakers, and the table at left by RP speakers. Since the RP speakers were making a concession by us writing r when it is not pronounced in RP, I thought it prudent to at least write the vowels the way they like. kwami (talk) 19:55, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
 * It seems odd to consider that an equal concession. A pan-dialectal representation would have to have the rs.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  22:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I was just happy to get agreement without hard feelings. I'd be happy to revisit the issue. kwami (talk) 00:16, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I have condensed the three tables into one for easier comparison. I sorted back going around the standard IPA table (better for discussion here, not for final presentation). &minus;Woodstone (talk) 15:22, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't think this proposed change has much going for it. AFAIK, and  don't closely reflect any major accent's pronunciation of the NEAR and CURE vowels, nor does  vs.  adequately reflect the difference between NORTH and FORCE in any accent that distinguishes them. The "phonemic" representation isn't very satisfying either; the only major accent of English where the SQUARE and FORCE vowels are unambiguously FACE and GOAT followed by /r/ is Scottish English, and FACE and GOAT are monophthongs there. I think the existing system, for all its flaws, is the best option presented so far. —Angr 15:42, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * You're right with the latter point; if we were to go that route, I'd recommend modifying it to and . Course, that takes us even further from RP, but at least the non-rhotic vowels are conventional and the schwas in the rhotic vowels would correspond 1-to-1 with length marks. Basically,  would be a diphthong symbol in a lot of dialects.  kwami (talk) 16:07, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm right in all the points! :þ But what I was getting at is I don't think there's any added value in interpreting SQUARE and FORCE as being phonemically FACE and GOAT followed by /r/, except in Scottish English, as opposed to treating them as phonemes in their own right. —Angr 16:15, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree, or at least don't disagree. (And yes, I know you're right in all points; I was only addressing the last. :þ) This would have value in the English phonology & history of English articles, but I don't know that it would be helpful here. kwami (talk) 19:44, 4 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Since the data of the original tables at the top of this discussion are now contained in the merged table, I replaced them by it. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 21:13, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

rrr. Please someone with privilege edit and then delete this...
In paragraph 5, the article says "The IPA the stress mark" and should probably have the first "The" replaced with "In" or "With". Thanks! CBMalloch (talk) 14:07, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Fixed. —KCinDC (talk) 14:13, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

/r/? Seriously?
Does anybody know of any place in the English speaking world where r is pronounced /r/? Every native speaker I've ever heard in my entire life has pronounced it /ɹ/. I don't see how the note justifies it; it just states the many transcriptions erroneously use /r/. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.7.9.32 (talk) 00:53, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The nice thing about a phonemic transcription is that one can deviate from a language's phonetics when making a phonemic representation of its sounds. The most common usage of this is the tendency to represent the rhotic consonants of various European languages as  when the actual realization is not actually an alveolar trill.  I've also seen  used when there is -lectal variation between the trill and tap (such as with Arabic).  It makes a certain degree of sense as the body of sounds labeled rhotic are perceptually alike even when they are articulatorily distinct.  I believe  is used here rather than  for two reasons.  The first is that it's easier on editors.  The second reason is that  is only true for a certain number of dialects.  American English has a more postalveolar or retroflex pronunciation and Scottish English has a tap.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  02:22, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Ah, ok. It's sort of like generically using // for unstressed sounds that aren't considered different within the language. Thank you for the response. 152.7.9.32 (talk) 06:07, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
 * In addition to your saying that no dialect uses the trilled r: I'm pretty sure Indian English uses a pure [r]. Although of course most (all?) speakers of Indian English are not native speakers. --86.135.123.181 (talk) 19:55, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Petition to develop a more user-friendly pronunciation standard for articles
I clicked on the article Donna Shalala and saw pronunciation /ʃəˈleɪlə/. Having no idea what that said, I clicked and came to IPA_for_English. It look me a long time to find each symbol in the chart. If it had said (Shuh-lah-lah) it would have been much faster. Or, if there was an automated way to give the chart entries specifically for the word I clicked. How many people are going to just give up on understanding "/ʃəˈleɪlə/" because of the hassle? I just think something better would be nice. Habanero-tan (talk) 09:45, 18 September 2008 (UTC)


 * The best option is to have sound files in addition to IPA. Using ad-hoc pronunciation guides like "shuh-lah-lah" actually does not solve the problem, as they are imprecise and overly subject to personal interpretation. Occasional attempts to come up with more "intuitive" pronunciation guides than the IPA always fail because they invariably turn out to be no easier to learn than the IPA is. Also, they can only be used for English, while the IPA can be used for any language. —Angr 10:12, 18 September 2008 (UTC)


 * That would sound more like shə•LAY•lə.


 * No need for a petition. There are already two methods in use: English Phonemic Representation and Help:Pronunciation respelling key.  You are welcome to add helpful pronunciations transcribed by these systems.


 * IPA can also be used to compare the details of different English accents, which is difficult or impossible with the other methods. —Michael Z. 2008-09-18 14:40 z 


 * No, apparently it doesn't matter if only those who live on Wikipedia can use IPA. The rest who casually surf in because it was the top Google result are just SOL. RoyBatty42 (talk) 17:47, 24 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Right. Heaven forbid you should actually learn something from an encyclopedia. —Angr 18:30, 24 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Roy, print dictionaries throughout the world use IPA, including in much of the English-speaking world. It is more common than any one of the dozen or more other systems in use.  People who “live on Wikipedia” probably also live in these places.


 * But as I already pointed out above, there are three systems in use on Wikipedia—what exactly are you asking for? If you see something lacking in an article, you are welcome to improve it.  If you aren't able to, then you could add an article to Category:Requests for audio pronunciation, post a request for another type of pronunciation transcription at Requested IPA transcriptions, or even start a new requests page for pronunciations in whichever system it is that you prefer. —Michael Z. 2008-09-24 21:20 z 

I'm also a longtime opponent of any standardization of IPA on Wikipedia, because, statistically speaking, nobody understands IPA, and nobody uses it. Articles should use sound-alike pronunciation, because this is an encyclopedia, and encyclopedias have laymen as the audience, and sound-alike pronunciation guides would be useful to readers, instead of unintelligible and useless, as IPA was to the original poster. The snarky "Heaven forbid you should learn something from an encyclopedia" is unacceptable. People just want to know how to pronounce something and they do not want to learn specialist linguist notation. The quibble that sound-alike pronunciation is "imprecise" is easily dismissed when you compare its disadvantage to the real disadvantage of using the more precise IPA: statistically speaking, nobody understands IPA, and nobody uses it. Tempshill (talk) 18:46, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Non-IPA pronunciation guides would NOT be useful to readers, because they're ambiguous and meaningless in addition to being every bit as "unintelligible and useless" as you seem to think the IPA is. People who just want to know how to pronounce something but can't read IPA are not going to find out from "pro-nun-see-AY-shun" guides either. And nobody understands them and nobody uses them either. —Angr 18:52, 3 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Here's a couple of more (speculative) statistics for you, Tempshill:


 * Dictionaries are for laypeople
 * More dictionaries worldwide use IPA than any other single system
 * More English dictionaries use IPA than any other single system


 * Now, I'm curious about the statistics you referred to. —Michael Z. 2008-11-03 23:18 z 


 * More people in his school use the system in the dictionary purchased by his school district than any other system. All we have to do is correlate the IP addresses of our readers to the dictionaries purchased by their local school district, with an option to switch locals for readers who live outside the school district they were educated in, or whose school district has decided to change dictionaries since they went to school. Come on people, quit trying to push a non-provincial POV on our readers. kwami (talk) 23:58, 3 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh, you're such a scamp! —Michael Z. 2008-11-04 00:01 z 


 * I agree with Roy above. The IPA system now used on wikipedia is worthless for most people. I actually took a linguistics class in college and learned some of these symbols, but I still find them completely unhelpful as used here. On the other hand, the system I learned when I was in grade school for pronunciation is quite useful. I don't know the name of it, but you see it in m-w.com and most dictionaries that I have encountered.


 * The jumble of unintelligble IPA symbols also is simply ugly. If you all must keep it, at least please move it to the end of articles. 68.101.152.153 (talk) 02:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * That anything other than IPA is used in “most dictionaries” is a misapprehension. What you found so useful is one of at least fourteen different systems (can you tell me which of these you learned in grade school?).  And none of these can be used for any other language, so we still need the international IPA anyway. Quite frankly, this is the definition of “worthless for most people.


 * But we do have the English Phonemic Representation, which is our own adaptation of one of these. I don't understand what the complaint here is.  How many transcriptions using this system have you folks added to articles?  Or are you complaining that we're not doing it for you? —Michael Z. 2008-11-04 14:33 z 

ç is missing
Most speakers say [ç] in letter combinations like hu or hy: like in huge, human, hyundai [çu...]

The article lacks the [ç] sound. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.73.82.119 (talk) 13:27, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * This only lists phonemes. [ç] is just a possible surface representation of the cluster /hj/. —Angr 13:37, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Old chart
Is now considered outdated and useless? RobertM525 (talk) 21:42, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Stress
"It is arguable that English does not distinguish primary from secondary stress,..." (note 15). What does this mean? If it's some arcane technical debate among linguists, perhaps it doesn't belong on this page?--Kotniski (talk) 10:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The slashes suggest that what lies between them is a phonemic representation, but it isn't, it's a conventionalized dictionary transcription. This is just one example of the difference. kwami (talk) 12:01, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * So you think the note is intended to mean that the distinction between primary and secondary stress is not phonemic?--Kotniski (talk) 13:06, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes. According to Ladefoged, the traditional distinction in English stress is a combination of prosody and reduced vowels: Prosodic stress is 'primary', lexical stress is 'secondary', lack of stress is 'tertiary', and reduced vowels are 'quarternary'. Many dictionaries (I think Random House?) count tertiary as secondary when it comes after the primary, but not when it comes before before. In the OED, which generally doesn't do that, the pattern is always secondary-primary; the only thing 'primary' means is 'the last secondary'. That's not a phonemic distinction. kwami (talk) 20:13, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * In that case I've altered the note slightly to clarify that it's phonemic distinctions we're talking about.--Kotniski (talk) 10:14, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, that wording's good, as long as we stick to OED conventions rather than Random House conventions, which mix up stressed & unstressed syllables. kwami (talk) 10:26, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Barred i
(continued from User talk:Kwamikagami) The barred i as defined here is just a conventional symbol (for a sound that varies between and schwa depending on dialect), that has no relation to the IPA symbol. It is misleading to readers to use the IPA symbol for this purpose; since our use of this convention is based on OED practice, we should use the OED symbol instead.--Kotniski (talk) 10:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Previous discussion was that we should stick to the IPA. Personally I support Kotniski, though using isn't inherently any more confusing than using  for a non-trill. kwami (talk) 11:57, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I suspect it is though - /r/ is a well-known representation for that phoneme, while (as far as we seem to know) isn't used in the way we use it by anyone other than us.--Kotniski (talk) 13:03, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * That's a legitimate objection. kwami (talk) 20:08, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I've seen it used that way in American linguistics textbooks. —Angr 08:34, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
 * The current edition of the Oxford English Dictionary does not use the barred i in its phonetic transcriptions:, so this symbol should be eliminated from Wikipedia.  I teach linguistics and have read most "American linguistics textbooks".  I've never seen barred i used to represent a reduced / in any of them that I recall.  It is certainly virtually never taught in American linguistics phonetics classes.  (Taivo (talk) 14:23, 12 December 2008 (UTC))
 * I'm looking at OED3 right now: there's a barred and a barred . kwami (talk) 21:00, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * No objections from me; I've never believed there was a difference between barred i and unstressed . But are you willing to go through all the pages that currently use barred-i and change it to ? Because by simply removing it, you've introduced a situation in which many pages use the barred-i symbol while linking to this page, and users will be baffled by a lack of explanation of the symbol they see. —Angr 15:07, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
 * We can add a note here, but it needs to be removed from the chart so that future editors don't reinsert or add it to new transcriptions. Someone who likes to play with bots can go through and change it. (Taivo (talk) 15:24, 12 December 2008 (UTC))
 * I've been changing the barred to  whenever I encounter it, but changing it to  works fine too (especially per the objections above).  I suspect that if anyone wants to systematically go through and change this that looking through Kwami's edit history from about a year or so ago might help since (if I remember correctly) he included it in quite a few pages shortly before we agreed on .  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  19:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * By eliminating it, we're back to specific dialects: Unstressed in RP that is also  in GA, vs. unstressed  in RP that is  in GA. The two i's in chauvinism are not the same, and so IMO should be transcribed differently for the same reasons that cot and caught should be transcribed differently, even though I pronounce them the same. kwami (talk) 21:00, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Webster's Third New International uses (a dotted shwa) for the sound that's  in some dialects and [ə] in others. —Angr 21:10, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I'd forgotten about that. Either would work for me, though you might get an argument from the same people who object to OED usage. kwami (talk) 21:17, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

For the convenience of readers, why not put into the table for now, indicating that the first is preferred, but the second might be seen on Wikipedia? —Michael Z. 2008-12-12 22:09 z 


 * Because in many, perhaps most, dialects, it is not . kwami (talk) 23:41, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * You cannot use because that is a specific IPA symbol that has a different meaning (and therefore sound) from what is being discussed here.  The  that is under discussion is a non-IPA symbol that covers something that is  for some speakers and  for other speakers.  We cannot transcribe anything in English without caveats (such as "postvocalic  is gone in non-rhotic dialects with compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel"), but using a phonetic symbol that exists in no dialect is unacceptable to me.  Using  as a convenient cover for a sound that is highly variable in all the world's languages where it occurs is a minor issue compared to using a vowel symbol that, in IPA, represents a sound that occurs in none of the English dialects.  Since the majority of English dialects use, then there really shouldn't be a problem.  In fact, if you listen carefully, you can hear, at least in American English, the same speaker using , , and  in the same word in different registers (for example, in "republic").  I suspect that the same is true for British English and possibly other dialects as well.  The truth is that the reduced vowels are highly variable and that overspecifying them is probably somewhat misleading.  The OED does a good job of smoothing out these dialectal, idiolectal, and situational differences by using  in these forms. It's sort of halfway between  and  so it works very well as a compromise for American pronunciations.  (Taivo (talk) 23:07, 12 December 2008 (UTC))


 * [edit conflict] We "cannot"? Of course we can. It would be incorrect between brackets, but between slashes we could use a baseball if we liked. (There's one Micronesian grammar than transcribes the four vowels with dingbats, something like /♠/, /♣/, /♥/, /♦/ (I forget exactly).) All phonemic symbols are cover symbols, and our transcription isn't even phonemic, but just a pronunciation key.


 * The problem is that there is a reduced, which is variable in pronunciation, and a full , which is not. What you're suggesting would be like replacing all schwas with , with for "pencil". Yes, the distinction between full and reduced vowels may be subtle, but it's there. If we're going to conflate them, better to conflate all reduced vowels to <> than to start mixing full and reduced vowels. If you don't like <>, as I don't, then we can always use barred  or dotted . kwami (talk) 23:41, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Having spent a few minutes digging up the pronunciation key in the on-line OED, I see that they still list and  as cover terms, but I have yet to find a single word that they actually transcribe that way.  I'm willing to leave this here with that pseudo-IPA symbol, but I don't accept the use of the "easy"  since that IPA symbol means something entirely different and not what we are discussing here.  (Taivo (talk) 23:27, 12 December 2008 (UTC))
 * Representing the vowel in question as is by no means a stretch, even for a phonemic transcription and especially for a pan-dialectal one.  All of the vowels have some pretty considerable variation amongst dialects, so it's safe to say that each symbol doesn't mean e.g. cardinal  and cardinal  but the vowel of bet and the vowel of bit respectively.  — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  23:34, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * They are still in the process of converting over. It will be years before it's finished.


 * As for using a phonemic symbol for something besides its exact phonetic value, it happens all the time, even in official IPA publications: etc. etc. etc. I prefer the OED convention, but was outvoted in a previous discussion. Whichever we choose, we should come to agreement first, because hundreds or thousands of articles will be affected, and it's very time consuming to convert, even using AWB. kwami (talk) 23:41, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The new, online version of the OED transcribes many words using ɪ . The word republic is not transcribed using ɪ since, as you can verify by looking at the upper right-hand corner of the page, the entry  for this word has not been revised since the second edition of the OED, which did not use this symbol.  It's easy however to find entries which do use this symbol by using the pronunciation search feature of the OED.  Two examples are peer review  and semesterly.
 * Re the use of // versus // or //, I have no personal preference, but // is what we are using now. Changing the symbol here will mean that we should go through all pronunciations using it and change it there as well, something it seems better to avoid.  Other editors have already pointed out that the transcription is phonemic and not phonetic so I won't belabor this point any further. Spacepotato (talk) 23:58, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I really don't mind if I am outvoted and everyone wants to the use the totally misleading for this cover symbol (it's not really a phoneme in this usage).  But what I object to is using the symbol  and claiming that the transcription is either (1) phonetic, or (2) uses IPA.  Since Wikipedia stresses the use of IPA, then another symbol besides  must be used since the IPA symbol does not support any of the phonetic realizations of underlying unstressed .  Changing  to  may be difficult, but it should be done if we are to maintain any level of respect for the phonetic transcriptions of English words that contain underlying reduced .  It is a falsehood to claim that we use "IPA" for English if we let this stand. (Taivo (talk) 00:22, 13 December 2008 (UTC))


 * 1) No-one claims the transcription is phonetic. 2) We are using the IPA. You're the one proposing that we partially abandon it; the falsehood would only occur if we adopt your proposal.


 * There is no need to make phonemic symbols phonetically accurate, though generally people try for a reasonable approximation. However, sometimes this is not possible: What do you do with a phoneme that is sometimes [g] and sometimes [n], for example? Or Japanese /u/ or /r/, neither of which can be transcribed phonetically in the IPA? The IPA Handbook itself uses  for, which is wrong both in manner and place of articulation. What we're doing is no more radical than that, or than using  for . The only good argument I've seen against <> is that it's unfamiliar, not that it's wrong.


 * On the other hand, it is extremely common for linguists to use the IPA with a few non-IPA symbols thrown in, as we see in the OED. So neither <> nor <> are inherently wrong; the difference is a philosophical one. kwami (talk) 00:43, 13 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The philosophical problem is that (I'm not lumping  in with this) has a specific meaning in IPA that is not found phonetically in any English dialect.  There are no other languages that use this IPA symbol to represent a vowel that is not (at least allophonically) ever [].  Phonemic representations should always involve at least one of the allophones as an optimum solution.  The OED solution  seems acceptable to me (1) since it is not an IPA symbol, (2) the use of  as the base for the symbol implies a lower vowel than, (3) and it is at least conceivable that some speakers might have [] (as a lower ) as an allophonic variant.  The difference between using  as a cover symbol here and using  for  or  for  is that there are historical precedents in both written and phonetic transcription systems for the latter, but no historical precedents for the former.  It smacks of the dreaded "original research" that Wikipedia shuns so much.  Use the OED's  or the Merriam-Webster variant and I will not object.  But there is a fundamental problem with making a Wikipedia-specific usage for . (Taivo (talk) 04:55, 13 December 2008 (UTC))


 * As Angr noted, there is precedence. Meanwhile, quit screwing up the key. If you want to go through and change all 20,000 articles that link to this page to one of these other conventions, then as far as I'm concerned you may change the key. (I can't speak for anyone else.) Until then, you're screwing with the readers who come here to find out what the <> in those articles means.


 * BTW, this isn't an article, and the normal OR rules do not apply. Which symbols we use is a matter of formatting. We can of course choose to follow a specific edition of a particular dictionary, but that's no more required for individual symbols than for the key as a whole. kwami (talk) 05:18, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually Angr noted no such precendence. He merely stated "American linguistic textbooks", of which I have seen none (and I'm an American linguistics professor).  He also didn't state whether he had seen  or, so your assertion that there is precedence for using  is unreferenced at this point.  Using  is referenced, but not the other symbol.  From now on, only  (or, IMHO, better ) should be used and not the unprecedented , which is misleading and unprecedented. (Taivo (talk) 05:49, 13 December 2008 (UTC))


 * The context of the exchange was <>, but it doesn't really matter. You can dictate anything you like, but as long as we use in articles linked to this key, we need to explain what it means. Once you've changed all the articles so that we no longer use, then there will no longer be any need for the symbol here. (Unless, of course, someone else objects and starts reverting them back. Personally, I don't care which symbol is used.) kwami (talk) 06:04, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * So you should have no objection then if I convert to  whenever I see it in an English transcription.  Perhaps someone who likes bots can do this automatically. (Taivo (talk) 06:18, 13 December 2008 (UTC))


 * Knock yourself out! I've been converting the other way only because people have screamed that we need to stick to the IPA. These are also professionals, who seem to be just as passionately against as you are against, and I imagine that while they're not following this debate, they'll come out when you start mass conversion. (An advantage of , besides IMO it being more intuitive than , is that we could also use .)


 * A side note: some people have converted, formatted with strike out, to , with a cross-bar diacritic. The latter does not display properly on my browser, and I assume also on a lot of other people's, so I suggest we avoid it even though it's easier on the eyes while editing.


 * It might be wise to let a poll run on this page for a good 5 days to see if you can get consensus, or at least no strenuous objections, before you invest any significant amount of time into the conversion. That way you can at least justify your edits with the poll, and people would want objectors to get similar consensus before reverting you. kwami (talk) 07:46, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

I find it really ironic that people want to use "IPA" (where "P" stands for phonetic) for a symbol that represents no sound in any English dialect instead of one of the actual allophones of the phoneme in question :p (Taivo (talk) 11:18, 13 December 2008 (UTC))
 * Who's "people"? Correct me if I'm missing something, but I don't see anyone actually supporting use of the IPA barred i in this discussion. The only point is that it is currently used, so we can't remove mention of it from the documentation until someone with time or a clever bot on their hands goes round changing all instances of it.--Kotniski (talk) 11:34, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Didn't mean to offend. "People" referred to those mentioned in kwami's comment "I've been converting the other way only because people have screamed that we need to stick to the IPA", not to anyone actually engaged in the current conversation.  I have relented on the issue of including  in the chart for now, since we have clarified the nature of . (Taivo (talk) 11:42, 13 December 2008 (UTC))
 * Just because the vowel in question is not cardinal doesn't mean it doesn't occur in English (and arguing that it isn't present in any dialect contradicts Close central unrounded vowel, which lists English with an example).  The problem that I have with, in addition to it not being IPA, is that it requires awkward formatting to do.  It's just as bad as using  for barred i.  To be clear (since we're polling), I'm in favor of changing  to  rather than vice versa. — Æµ§œš¹  [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]  22:30, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * If we decide to use a separate symbol for this feature, I would prefer to use . Since we are talking about IPA, we should use an IPA symbol and it is not located too far from possible realisations in the chart. I would not mind just going for, since the distinction is more phonetic than phonemic anyway. &minus;woodstone (talk) 13:09, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
 * If we go with, the reader has no way (other than orthography) to know whether it's a full or reduced vowel, or whether it would be pronounced in their dialect if they do not distinguish schwi from schwa. kwami (talk) 13:21, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
 * The argument that "the reader has no way...to know" is specious. Readers from the Southern U.S. have no way to determine whether  refers to "pure"  or "broken"  in the Wikipedia system.  The truth is that every single dialect of English has differences from "standard" transcriptions that makes them "unrealistic" in their dialect.  Since Wikipedia is based in America, then the transcription of Merriam Webster should be used throughout.  That argument is just as valid as using the transcriptions of the OED and RP.  Every single speaker must make subconscious adjustments to our pronunciation guides without the help of "cover symbols" for every single variant.  Indeed, the usage of  as a cover symbol based on OED ignores the other cover symbol that OED uses for a similar pair of free variants--.  Do we want consistency? (Taivo (talk) 14:10, 14 December 2008 (UTC))


 * Good luck telling the Brits that RP isn't acceptable in English Wikipedia!


 * Webster's also uses a cover symbol for this. What difference does it make which one we use?


 * I made the point about above. Not many times we'd use it, but IMO it'd be nice to have. kwami (talk) 20:25, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
 * All these transcriptions suffer from a single presumption (and not just here in Wikipedia), that "Received" in RP means "universally acceptable". The fundamental problem is that if you could predict all (or at least most) other dialectal pronunciations from RP (that is, if it was close to "phonemic"), then it would be fine.  But you cannot predict all other dialectal pronunciations from RP.  RP represents a developed dialect just like American, Australian, etc. all do.  What we need is a reconstruction of Early Early Modern English that is closer to the "founding" dialect for the set of International Englishes.  This is a pipe dream, of course, but I resent (as an American) the assumption that RP is somehow primary or more prestigious than other English dialects such as GA or Australian. (Taivo (talk) 20:47, 14 December 2008 (UTC))
 * Of course this is a philosophical discussion best pursued elsewhere. (Taivo (talk) 20:48, 14 December 2008 (UTC))


 * I think we've reached a nice compromise between RP and GA. We even give London place names full rhotic transcriptions, without any silly edit wars, but in exchange the vowel qualities are those of RP (lax & lax diphthongs rather than lax & tense). Usonians don't like the schwa diphthongs, and some of the Brits don't like the ars, but we can each read the result without much problem. The only real problem I've had implementing this is in transcribing "New" as /nju:/ in US place names, which does result in edit wars. It would seem most Usonians are less able to adapt a transcription to their dialect than the Brits.


 * BTW, the motivation was not to promote RP, but to indicate as many distinctions as possible. The reason we don't make all the distinctions of Australian or Scottish (or Southern US, for that matter) is not linguistic imperialism, but simply the practical problem of figuring out what all our transcriptions would be in those dialects, since the main dictionaries only cover GA and RP. So the best we can practically do for *EME is RP distinctions for vowels and unstressed /t/ vs /d/, and GA rhoticism. I think if you can think of a practical way to make our transcriptions (and not just the key) more inclusive, everyone would support you. kwami (talk) 21:36, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't object to trying to represent multiple pronunciations with a single transcrption, up to a (necessarily very limited) point. But we shouldn't do it in a way that is simply going to mislead people. Because our notation is based on IPA, it is better to use a non-IPA symbol for a non-IPA meaning, because using some IPA symbol (if it isn't commonly known from standard dictionaries, like /r/) is conveying false information to people who don't know our peculiar conventions. Using a non-IPA symbol at least forces people to look at the key to find out what it means when we use it (and if the OED uses it as well, and no major dictionary uses the alternative, that's surely a deciding point in its favour).--Kotniski (talk) 11:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Bosnia and Herzegovina
Does anyone really pronounce it like it's written at the moment? I'm not talking about the schwa/barred i dispute, but the full vowel for "and"; the e (rather than open schwa) in the first syllable of H.; the diphthong in H.? At least for the British pronunciation this seems totally wrong.--Kotniski (talk) 11:38, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Hmm, just checked in Collins and it confirms the diphthong but puts the stress on the fourth syllable. --Kotniski (talk) 11:43, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * This seems very close to American pronunciation, but the stress in Hercegovina is usually on the penultimate syllable and the vowel in that stressed syllable is, not . (Taivo (talk) 11:46, 13 December 2008 (UTC))


 * I've usually heard the stress on the vi in English, but a couple online dictionaries I just checked have the first alt with the stress on the go, as in Croatian, and the second stressed on the vi. kwami (talk) 13:05, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
 * And what vowels do they have for the first and third syllables? (BTW, a whole load of the insertable symbols under the edit box - including most of the IPA ones - have just turned into squares here at IE6; I'm sure they were showing up properly before - anyone else noticed anything?)--Kotniski (talk) 13:51, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Transcribing Placenames
Kwami's comment above about transcribing "new" in placenames brings up another point that was discussed previously on the Los Angeles page, I believe. Placenames should always be transcribed in the local variant (unless the "local" variant is in a language other than English). I would never want to see Tooele [], Mantua (Utah) [], or Hooper (Utah) [] transcribed in RP because that would not be the name of the town. It is perfectly acceptable for Moscow, Russia to be [], but Moscow, Idaho to be []. For most localities that is not a real problem when the differences are non-dialectal. Towns like Sulphur Springs, Texas, however, may present some issues since the differences between GA [] and local [] are due more to dialectal variation. In general, however, "local" can be defined as "American" or "British". Thus, "new" in America should never be transcribed as []. (Taivo (talk) 13:03, 15 December 2008 (UTC))
 * I disagree. The system outlined on this page is intended to be transdialectal, and should apply to placenames as much any other words. Brits and Australians and others who have a /j/ sound in "new" do talk about New York, New Jersey, and New Mexico, so the transcription should reflect their pronunciations as well. The instruction to ignore aspects of the guide not relevant to your accent applies to placenames too. The pronunciation is just as valid as the pronunciation  and is used by the same people. The same applies mutatis mutandis to coda R in placenames in non-rhotic areas. While locals pronounce Burford, rhotic speakers can talk about the place too, and when they do, it's , and our pronunciation guide should reflect that. Where we can give precedence to local pronunciation is cases where the local pronunciation differs from nonlocal pronunciations in a way that's more significant than the automatic phonological correspondences between accents - things like Oregon being  and not  or Illinois being  and not . —Angr 13:42, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I think maybe we're trying to be a bit ambitious trying to show so much variation in a single transcription - not all readers are going to come and read the key in detail, most are going to make deductions from what they see. Particularly with place names, there's a case for giving just the local pronunciation and, at least for better known places, the pronunciation(s) in standard varieties of English as well. I don't think we'll ever get a perfect solution, but the best compromise between clarity and conciseness might not be the same in every case. (Sorry this is too vague to be much help.)--Kotniski (talk) 14:04, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I think it's far more ambitious to try to (1) figure out what the local accent is in every case and (2) transcribe that local accent accurately. Should we transcribe placenames in non-rhotic parts of the US like Massachusetts, New York City/Long Island, and Louisiana in a non-rhotic way - even though probably less than half of the people in those areas still "drop their Rs"? Should we indicate the fronted vowel of the Northern Cities Shift when transcribing Wisconsin and write  instead of GenAm  or transdialectal ? Can I assume (without the aid of published, reliable sources telling me so) that the fronting of the  and  vowels that's characteristic of much of the Western US is also found in Alaska and so transcribe Juneau as  instead of ? I think attempting to reflect the local accent of a place rather than sticking to this guide the way it was intended will just create a confusing mess. —Angr 15:29, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Unless there's something notable or unusual about its local pronunciation, Sulphur Springs and New Mexico shouldn't even have transcriptions. These are regular English words, which can be looked up in one's favourite dictionary. The encyclopedia articles are about the places, not about the local accents or dialects, and this is not an English learner's tutorial guide. Systematic examinations of the names' phonologies belong in Wiktionary entries, like New Mexico (or Mexico and new), springs, and sulphur. —Michael Z. 2008-12-15 14:55 z 
 * That's a good point, that Sulphur Springs should not have a transcription because it is composed of non-eponymic elements. But there is nothing "transdialectal" about a local placename.  Yes, people in Australia must be able to talk about Tooele, but are we going to insist on some amalgamated RP/GA concoction that is unrecognizable to a person who lives there?  No.  Just as we would be wrong to insist that Worcester be pronounced [].  Who owns a placename?  The people who live there.  Thus, we must respect the local pronunciations and not insist on some type of "spelling pronunciation" imposed by outsiders. (Taivo (talk) 15:16, 15 December 2008 (UTC))


 * Yes, but we also respect the reader by illustrating the place name, not the local dialect. To concoct a hypothetical example, if the locals in a remote town have a very distinctive or obscure accent, then we may show a more general pronunciation—say, the way the name would be pronounced in the provincial land office, instead of, or in addition to a strict transcription incorporating the local nuance. —Michael Z. 2008-12-15 15:51 z 


 * Locals do not "own" their placenames any more than they own any other words, but you're mixing up two different cases: for Worcester is a mistake, as no amount of applying the rules of one's local accent is going to get  out of it. But  for Newark, California isn't a mistake at all; it's just a regular example of /nju/ → /nu/ in American English. There's no difference in pronunciation between Newark-on-Trent in England and Newark, California for any individual speaker: anyone who calls the first one  will call the second one  as well, and anyone who calls the second one  will call the first one  as well. It would be misleading, confusing, and frankly incorrect to transcribe the two differently just because the local accents of English in the two places are different. —Angr 15:41, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * All true. And just as we prefer regional English for regionally-based articles, we should prefer the regional accent in transcriptions, while keeping the IPA fairly broad and avoiding obscure symbols.


 * But exactly what concrete text in the table or guideline are we discussing? Is the transcription in any of these articles under dispute? —Michael Z. 2008-12-15 15:51 z 


 * Local pronunciation should be in addition to the generic pronunciation, and it should be clearly marked as such and placed in square brackets, not slashes. Interpretation of a phonemic representation requires that the reader know the phonology of the dialect in question, so unless we provide a link to it, that's inappropriate. kwami (talk) 21:19, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually locals do own the name of their town. And your assertion that people will pronounce the same placename the same universally is false.  People in the West are very specific that the town in Russia is [] but the town in Idaho is [].  They are not pronounced the same even though they are spelled the same in English, just as Mantua, Utah [] and Mantua, Italy [] are pronounced differently.  We can haggle about this, but the assertion that Newark, California should in any universe be pronounced in the British fashion [] is disrespectful, just as applying the American pronunciation to Newark-on-Trent is disrespectful (assuming one has been made aware of the difference).  Within the Wikipedia universe, the local pronunciation should always prevail in transcriptions.  We don't need to cite pronunciations of towns where the name is composed of known elements and the pronunciation is dialectally predictable, but in places where the name is not composed of known elements, then the local pronunciation should always take precedence in transcriptions.  No one owns the English lexicon, but locals own placenames.  (Taivo (talk) 01:17, 16 December 2008 (UTC))


 * Your Moscow and Mantua examples are straw men. Idahoans and Utahns pronounce their local Moscow and Mantua differently than their namesakes, so of course they will be transcribed differently, as Angr pointed out above. You're simply ignoring him in order to make a point, one which is reasonable but does not follow from your argument. The relevant issue here is that we don't need to transcribe the Idaho town as rather than, because the difference is a predictable and automatic adjustment to the local dialect. I wouldn't be opposed to making an exception for Newark, because Usonians might be confused by the <j>, but there is no possibility of confusion with transcribing Moscow  rather than , and your transcription of Mantua is exactly how we would already transcribe it: . It's a non-issue. kwami (talk) 01:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually, if you read Angr's comment you will see that he does not allow for a Utahn to pronounce Mantua, Utah differently from Mantua, Italy. He says that a Brit will pronounce Newark, California and Newark, U.K. identically with a [j] and an American would pronounce them identically without a [j].  He doesn't allow for an American who pronounces Moscow, Idaho and Moscow, Russia differently.  The difference between Moscow, Idaho and Moscow, Russia is not predictable because Idahoans pronounce them differently, just as Utahns pronounce Mantua, Utah and Mantua, Italy differently.  They are not predictable variants.  Layton, Utah [] is predictable because we also have "mountain" [], but "cow" is not pronounced *[] so there's no way to predict the pronunciation of Moscow, Idaho.  They are unpredictable variants where the local pronunciation takes precedence over anyone else's ideas of how a placename should be pronounced. (Taivo (talk) 04:22, 16 December 2008 (UTC))


 * You might want to read him again yourself: he said that we need to transcribe the name so the local pronunciation is clear. kwami (talk) 07:55, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Going back to Angr's example of Newark, I disagree with him on a fundamental issue. If we transcribe this name, it should be transcribed in the local variant.  Newark, California should be transcribed without the [j] and Newark, U.K. should be transcribed with the [j].  "New Mexico", if transcribed, should be j-less.  Locals do own their placenames.  (Taivo (talk) 04:30, 16 December 2008 (UTC))


 * You're dealing with a specific example, so we can't apply your comments to the key in general. Which guiding principles are you proposing? Are you only objecting to alveolars followed by, or should we also transcribe the long O sound based on the local pronunciation? Should we also distinguish between , Ontario, and , England? (Or maybe it's the other way round.) kwami (talk) 07:55, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

←Of course I allow Mantua, Utah, to be transcribed differently from Mantua, Italy, because the difference between them is not just a matter of automatic phonological adjustment due to accent differences. And note, incidentally, that is not the local pronunciation of Mantua, Italy ( is). The same goes for Moscow, Idaho, and Moscow, Russia: the difference is not just a matter of accent differences, the way the different pronunciations of Newark are. (And once again, isn't the local pronunciation of Moscow, Russia anyway.) My point is that Utahns aren't the only people who pronounce Mantua, Utah : everyone (who's been informed) pronounces it that way, but using their own accent's realization of /æ/ before a nasal consonant, using their own accent's realization of the  vowel, etc. So a Scotsman visiting Mantua, Utah, will probably pronounce it. My point is that when we transcribe these names, we stick to the transdialectal transcription outlined on this page; we do not try to imitate a southern California accent for Newark, California, or an Idaho accent for Moscow, Idaho, or a Utah accent for Mantua, Utah, or a Nottinghamshire accent for Newark-on-Trent, or (for that matter) an Italian accent of English for Mantua, Italy, or a Russian accent of English for Moscow, Russia. And sticking to the transdialectal transcription means distinguishing between and  and between  and, but using  consistently. —Angr 09:09, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * (Oops, the first vowel in Moscow is of course, but that doesn't affect the argument.)


 * One problem I have, Taivo, is that you define "local" as Usonian vs. British. (Do Scottish and Southern US not qualify as local pronunciations?) You contradict yourself in saying "Towns like Sulphur Springs, Texas, however, may present some issues since the differences between GA  and local  are due more to dialectal variation," but how is that any different than  vs. ? Just because the UK and US are different countries, British and American are not to be considered "dialectal variation"? kwami (talk) 09:28, 16 December 2008 (UTC)
 * (I reject the term "Usonian", I'm an American, just as a resident of the United Federation of Malaysia is a Malaysian instead of a "Ufonian" and a resident of the (former) United States of Brazil was still a Brazilian instead of a "Usonian" and a resident of the United States of Mexico is still a Mexican instead of a "Usonian".)
 * Let me clarify my position a bit. I see several different layers here.
 * 1) Eponyms whose local pronunciations are predictable from the spelling and whose dialectal variants are predictable from regular rule. These need no transcription (and should have no transcription).  Examples would be Sulphur Springs, Newark (in most of its instantiations), New Mexico, New York, etc.
 * 2) Eponyms whose local pronunciation is not predictable from the spelling or regular dialectal rules. These should be transcribed with the local pronunciation taking precedence.  Examples would be Mantua (Utah), Tooele (Utah), Oquirrh (Utah), Newark (Delaware), Moscow (Idaho), Worcester, etc.
 * 3) Eponyms of locations where English is not the native language. These need a transcription in the "generic" transcription system discussed here if the English pronunciation is not predictable from the spelling.  Examples of the predictable variety are Singapore, Moscow, Copenhagen, etc.  Examples of the unpredictable variety are Wroclaw [], Lodz [], Pago Pago [], etc.  Most of the placenames in the former category have been used in English for a long time and have traditional English spellings and usual English pronunciations that may vary radically from the local spelling and pronunciation in the native language, such as Copenhagen, Moscow, etc.  Most of the latter are placenames that are not often talked about by English speakers.
 * I've noted that many articles I've consulted follow these principles, but not all. What I'm suggesting is that we are careful not to impose some pseudo-RP pronunciation on an American name and that local pronunciation takes priority. (Taivo (talk) 12:26, 16 December 2008 (UTC))


 * You still have not defined what you mean by "local pronunciation" (you seem to have no consistent position above), nor have you clarified which phonemic schemes you think should be used in place of this key. Or do you think this key should be used, but with the local pronunciation forced to fit?


 * I assume you mean for Pago Pago?


 * You're free to reject "Usonian", but Canadians, Cubans, and Colombians are of course still Americans. kwami (talk) 14:04, 16 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Not usually in English, they aren't. Most Canadians I know will correct you at best, and get mad at worst, if you call them Americans. —Angr 14:38, 16 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I've noticed that "Usonian" is more of a term of political correctness and less a term of actual usage (except by Americans). Ask any man on the street outside the U.S., "Would you rather become an American or become a Usonian?" and they will universally say "An American".
 * Actually, my position on Angr's question has been consistent, but badly worded until my last one. (I often use these pages to think out and clarify my own understanding and positions.)  Local pronunciation is exactly what it sounds like--the way the inhabitants of a place pronounce their placename.  Notice the entries for Newark (Delaware), Hooper (Utah), Tooele (Utah) and you will see the local pronunciation presented.  They are not orthographically or dialectally predictable ("Hooper" might be more so since "root" is [] here).  As far as this pronunciation key goes, it is fine for non-eponyms, but for placenames, straight IPA should be used without the use of the non-phonetic cover symbols.  Thus "Los Angeles" should not have  in it, but the local [].  What I'm really trying to point out here is that placenames should not be homogenized by a strict adherence to some scheme that we use for non-eponyms.  (Thanks for the correction on Pago Pago, I was working from memory and some of the Austronesian languages use <g> for a prenasalized voiced velar stop and some of them use <g> for a voiced velar stop and some of them, like Samoan, use <g> for a voiced velar nasal.)  (Taivo (talk) 18:16, 16 December 2008 (UTC))


 * I agree it's nice to have a narrow phonetic transcription of placenames. However, that's more than what most people are looking for. Most readers just want to know that Moscow is pronounced with an oh rather than an ow sound; they could care less whether that oh is pronounced or . And they want to know how they should pronounce it, not just how others do. Some of the Oz cities have an Australian transcription, and since I don't speak Stryne, I have to compare them with the Australian English phonology article before I can pronounce them in my own accent. That can be a real pain, and I can only do it because these articles link to AuE phonology. Are we going to create a phonology article for every location we give the pronunciation for? IMO if we give a narrow local pronunciation, we should give the generic pronunciation as well, so that people wanting to know how to pronounce the name are able to do so.


 * I still am clueless as to what you mean by "local pronunciation". Tooele, Utah, Newark, Delaware, and Hooper, Utah are not given in their local pronunciations, but according to this generic convention that both Angr and I support. You seem to agree with us on everything except /ju:/ after /n/. It sounds to me, except for that one point, that we agree and our argument is without any substance. kwami (talk) 18:45, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * And I still disagree. Placenames are no different from any other words. Los Angeles has a pronunciation in RP and in Australian English; Manchester has a pronunciation in GenAm and AusEn; and Perth and Darwin have pronunciations in RP and GenAm; and it brings no benefit at all to use localized pronunciations for them instead of the familiar transdialectal transcription used in other articles. —Angr 18:50, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh wait, I think I see what you're arguing, Taivo: We should not make phonemic distinctions if they are not made locally; we should not, for example, distinguish in the western US, all presumably becoming short . In order to do this, we need to link the IPA for Los Angeles to an article on Californian English phonology. If we don't, a naive reader will not be able to interpret our transcription conventions. That's thoroughly impractical. kwami (talk) 19:02, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, we don't need multiple transcription pages. If a dialect does not make phonemic distinctions between the three back low vowels, then our transcriptions of placenames in that dialect should not make them either.  If a placename in the Western U.S. is [], then there should be no attempt whatsoever made to impose a false distinction on it.  This page is fine since it makes maximal distinctions, I'm just talking about transcribing the placenames in the articles themselves if their local pronunciation is not predictable from the spelling and known dialectal shifts.  No attempt should be made to "harmonize" those local transcriptions or to shoehorn them into a pseudo-RP slipper.  Let the unpredictable local pronunciations take precedence over any imposition of "foreign phonetic influences". (Taivo (talk) 05:31, 17 December 2008 (UTC))


 * You still appear to be contradicting yourself. You say that we don't need a local pronunciation if, as in Newark, the local pronunciation can be predicted, but Newark is one of your prime examples of where we do need the local pronunciation.


 * Let's take LA. Local pronunciation in the Los is . However, it hardly follows that Londoners pronounce the town with that vowel. I have no problem with giving the local pronunciation alongside the general one, but we need to tell Londoners how their peers pronounce the name as well. 90+ percent of the time we can give a pronunciation following all the distinctions of this key, and the local pronunciation is predictable. Occasionally we need to add a second, local pronunciation. However, if you link to this key but do not utilize the distinctions it makes—say you transcribe LA with an instead of an —then you are misrepresenting the phonology and misleading our readers. Local transcriptions need to either be absolute (phonetic), with no predictability as to how outsiders should pronounce it, or link to the appropriate phonology so they can tell what it means to them. kwami (talk) 09:56, 17 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually, I don't use Newark, but Newark (Delaware) only, because the local pronunciation is not predictable. The first vowel of Los Angeles is [].  That is a vowel of RP, so why should Londoners be told that there is any other "correct" pronunciation?  But there is, indeed, an inherent contradiction in my position.  It's inescapable and underlies your position as well.  What is "correct"?  It is my contention that the only correct pronunciation of a placename is the local pronunciation.  But the logical conclusion of that position is that the Queen would have to say [] for "New Orleans".  The opposite position is that there is some magical "common" correct pronunciation that may be totally incomprehensible (or even offensive) to a local.  Both of our positions are compromises to the logical extensions of either point-of-view.  You can't take every local pronunciation and somehow "homogenize" them to make them acceptable to all dialects of English just as you cannot change the way that every speaker pronounces a placename to exactly match the phonetics of the local pronunciation.  In the end, it comes down to compromises.  I am simply arguing that slavishly homogenizing local pronunciations is disrespectful to the people who actually "own" the place.  (Taivo (talk) 13:58, 17 December 2008 (UTC))


 * I'm from LA, and I see nothing at all offensive about transcribing it . The is the vowel in "pot" (which for me is ), and the  is the second vowel in "business" (which for me is . Therefore, when I see "", I automatically pronounce it . Saw a documentary on Niue the other night, and the Brits were pronouncing it, while the Yanks were pronouncing it . I doubt they even noticed the difference. If we transcribe it , then the GA pronunciation is predictable, but not vice versa, so IMO  is the way to go even though I might say . I do not understand how anyone could take offense at such practicality. As for the Newarks, of course we will transcribe them ending in either  or , as Angr and I have maintained all along. No-one disagrees here, but we keep going over and over it regardless. kwami (talk) 14:24, 17 December 2008 (UTC)