# pronunciation: Sail [monophthong?]



## Outsider

This is a continuation of another discussion in the German forum, which seems to have gone off-topic. Please left-click on the quotes, if you're interested in the context.



elroy said:


> That's quite a presumptuous statement, and one I do not appreciate. I certainly know the difference between a diphthong and a monophthong. I did not compare the sound to _any_ long "a," but specifically to the one in "bear" and "sail" - which is different from the one in "name" and "rain."


Well, it's possible that there is some dialectal variation I had never noticed before. I admit that I was too assertive. 

On the other hand, the pronunciations I described certainly do _exist_ in English, contrary to what your initial post in this thread seemed to be implying. I hear them all the time.



elroy said:


> This statement suggests to me that you do not realize that the "ai" in "sail" is different from the one in "rain." There is no "ay" in "sail"; there is only an [e].


I'm quite curious about this, because Conchita disagrees with you. (Are you a native speaker, Conchita?)



elroy said:


> In fact, /seil/ is a wrong pronunciation that is frequent among native speakers of Spanish, who I suppose hyper-correct by pronouncing an [ei] where one does not exist (I don't know if Portuguese speakers do the same thing). "Sail" is pronounced /sel/ (more or less) whereas "rain" is pronounced /rein/.


Do you know the song _Sailing_ by Rod Stewart? There is also another one with the same name by Christopher Cross, I think. To my ears, each of them pronounces the "a" as a clear [ei], not an [e].



elroy said:


> That's right! What _you_ said was that the "ea" in "ear" *(the "ie" in "bieten" and the "ea" in "beat")*


In the dialects of English I'm familiar with, the vowel in the word outside the parenthesis is different from the vowel in the words inside it.



gaer said:


> This is only true, perhaps, for those who speak ONLY English and who have never seriously listened to other languages.


I readily admit that some English speakers are perfectly capable of speaking foreign languages as good as natives. However, for those English speakers who do speak another language with an English accent, using diphthongs instead of monophthongs is one of their typical mistakes.
This is why I always feel that it's important to stress the distinction between the two things.


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## panjandrum

I read your post, but I don't know what you are you asking?
Please clarify.


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## cuchuflete

> *mon·oph·thong*   (mŏn'əf-thông', -thŏng')
> n.
> A single vowel articulated without change in quality throughout the course of a syllable, as the vowel of English _bed._
> Two written vowels representing a single sound, as _oa_ in _boat._


How does one "left-click" with a one button mouse?

In my neck of the woods, sail, nail, pale, whale and kale all share a single vowel sound. It is not a dipththong.  I have heard many native AE speakers elongate the sound into something like 'sayull',  but this is but one of a number of common pronunciations.


Therefore, whatever your squabble is about, you both lose.  (Or, if you are optimistic curmudgeons, neither of you loses...)


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## Outsider

There were several examples in discussion. The most contentious one was perhaps the pronunciation of the word "sail" in English (AE or BE): is this a diphthong (rhyming with "ay") or a monophthong (rhyming with the French vowel "é")?

All this arose from a discussion where we were trying to explain to a native English speaker how to approximate the close-mid front vowel [e] (actually in a long version, but I don't think that's crucial) of German, using English examples.

But, to be perfectly specific, in that thread Elroy wrote three things that frankly left me astonished:

*1) that 'sail' is pronounced as a monophthong [e], not a diphthong [ei];

2) that the vowel in 'ear' is like the German vowel 'ie' (and English 'beat'!), [i:];

3) that the vowel in 'bear' is the same as the one in 'sail'.*

All three descriptions conflict with the way I have always heard Americans and Englishmen speak. Basically, I started this thread to continue discussing these questions with the posters in the other thread. Needless to say, feedback from other posters is also welcome.

Note: I understand that in other dialects (such as Scottish English, Irish English or Australian English) the pronunciation differs, and a monophthongal [e] may indeed be heard, but I am not talking about those.


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## Outsider

> *monophthong
> 
> 1. A single vowel articulated without change in quality throughout the course of a syllable, as the vowel of English bed.*
> 
> 2. Two written vowels representing a single sound, as oa in boat.


We were using the first definition of 'monophthong', as I believe is clear from the context.


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## cuchuflete

1) true statement for some AE speakers; untrue for others
2) Untrue as far as the vowel in ear being like the vowel in beat
3) Depending on the speaker's regional flavor of spoken EN, the vowel in bear or bare may be quite close to that in sail/sale/pale/flail etc.  Again, there are a multitude of regional variations, so this is not a good example of a vowel pronounced in one consistent way.

What about the left-click?  How does one do that with a Mac one button mouse?


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## Outsider

cuchuflete said:


> What about the left-click?  How does one do that with a Mac one button mouse?


Evidently, I used the wrong idiom in my clumsy attempt to be friendly, and explain to less computer-savy posters how they can get to the other thread. I do apologize. Fortunately, that can easily be fixed.


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## mplsray

Outsider said:


> There were several examples in discussion. The most contentious one was perhaps the pronunciation of the word "sail" in English (AE or BE): is this a diphthong (rhyming with "ay") or a monophthong (rhyming with the French vowel "é")?


 
The only instance I've encountered of [e] (like the French vowel _é_) occurring in English is in some pronunciations of the exclamation _eh._

_Sail_ is pronounced with a diphthong, the "long_ a_."


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## panjandrum

Outsider said:


> [...]
> *1) that 'sail' is pronounced as a monophthong [e], not a diphthong [ei];*
> 
> *2) that the vowel in 'ear' is like the German vowel 'ie' (and English 'beat'!), [i:];*
> 
> *3) that the vowel in 'bear' is the same as the one in 'sail'.*
> 
> [...]
> 
> Note: I understand that in other dialects (such as Scottish English, Irish English or Australian English) the pronunciation differs, and a monophthongal [e] may indeed be heard, but I am not talking about those.


I'll ignore, if I may, the bit at the end about ignoring Irish English pronunciation. I do that because my pronunciation of each of these vowel sounds is different.

In my accent:
- *sail* is a diphthong;
- the vowel in *ear* is not the same as the vowel in *beat*;
- the vowel in *bear* is not the same as the vowel in *sail*.

What is the pronunciation indicated in the OED?
I seem unable to contribute the IPA symbols (yet again), but these four words have four distinct sounds for me, and four distinct symbol sets in the OED (where each has only one pronunciation listed).


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## muselinazi

panjandrum said:


> I'll ignore, if I may, the bit at the end about ignoring Irish English pronunciation. I do that because my pronunciation of each of these vowel sounds is different.
> 
> In my accent:
> - *sail* is a diphthong;
> - the vowel in *ear* is not the same as the vowel in *beat*;
> - the vowel in *bear* is not the same as the vowel in *sail*.
> 
> (where each has only one pronunciation listed).



The same is true of Australian English. 
And I would be hard-pressed to think of a dialect in which the vowel sound in *sail *is _not_ a diphthong. 
The same could also be said of the relationship between *ear *and *beat *and *bear *and *sail* because even when allowing for differing pronunciations across dialects, variation tends to be systematic. I don't know whether I am explaining this very well...but if *ear* and *bear* do not share the same vowel sound in one dialect, it's logical that they won't in another. 
Even though the vowel sounds in each _individual_ word may differ, the relationship between the two words stays the same- whether you're speaking to someone from Auckland or Birmingham.
Hope that helps.
I never was any good at explaining things...

Kate


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## GregLee

For me, "sail" has the diphthong [ei], meaning tense front mid vowel [e] followed by the glided, non-syllabic version of high tense front _.  It can be compared with the lax monophthong [E] in "sell", [sEl] (writing cap E for want of a Greek eta for the lax vowel).  But I certainly don't think you can count on finding a diphthong in "sail" in other dialects, especially since glides tend to be lost before [r] and [l].  Before an [r] in the same word, [ei] and [e] are not possible for me, and I have a lax monophthong in "there", "bear", "Mary", except for words formed by contraction, where [Der] or [DEr] for "they're" are both possible (but never the tense diphthong [Deir]).  And although [ei] remains before [l] in ordinary words like "sail", it becomes a monophthong [e] or [E] in contracted "they'll".

Trying to settle questions like this in a general way "for English" is just not possible, because there is a great deal of dialect variation and because what consonant follows, whether it's in the same syllable, and whether you're dealing with a contraction may all make a difference.  As well there is the matter of whether it is phonemics or phonetics that is in question, which ordinarily confuses discussions like this._


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## gaer

panjandrum said:


> I'll ignore, if I may, the bit at the end about ignoring Irish English pronunciation. I do that because my pronunciation of each of these vowel sounds is different.
> 
> In my accent:
> - *sail* is a diphthong;
> - the vowel in *ear* is not the same as the vowel in *beat*;
> - the vowel in *bear* is not the same as the vowel in *sail*.
> 
> What is the pronunciation indicated in the OED?
> I seem unable to contribute the IPA symbols (yet again), but these four words have four distinct sounds for me, and four distinct symbol sets in the OED (where each has only one pronunciation listed).


This is a mess. I think that saying a vowel, by itself, is not the same as saying the same vowel with a consonant following.

This is already complicated in AE

sea, seam, seen, seep, seed

Adding "m, n" and many other vowels makes very little difference, so this is reasonably OK, so far, but now we have a problem:

seal, seer

Ending with "l" and "r" modifies how the words are ended and caused some sort of "glide".

But the "a" sound as in say, pay, may, day, ray, etc. already "glides". It's a dipthong, in both AE and BE, right?

What does the final consonant do to what proceeds it?

may, main, mare, male/mail

Unless I'm totally crazy, main, male/mail and mare all end differently from may. I think standard phonetic systems are far too crude to even come close to adequately describing what happens in these words.

Gaer


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## modus.irrealis

Outsider said:


> *1) that 'sail' is pronounced as a monophthong [e], not a diphthong [ei];
> 
> 2) that the vowel in 'ear' is like the German vowel 'ie' (and English 'beat'!), [i:];
> 
> 3) that the vowel in 'bear' is the same as the one in 'sail'.*



1) I have a diphthong in "sail" -- it's basically [seil] (with "dark l"), although there does seem to be some kind of very short vowel popping up as my tongue moves from saying the [ei] to the dark l -- but the word starts out exactly like "say" for me, which is [sei].

2) For me "ear" is [i:r] -- but like [l] in "sail," the [r] here causes some kind of vowel to develop between the [i:] and the [r] -- but "ear" starts out the same way as "ee" (the letter name) does, which is [i:].

3) For me, the vowel in "bear" is more open than the [e] in "sail" but that in turn is (or seems to me to be) more open than the French [e] in "ses."


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## john_riemann_soong

Discussed this phenomenon in the French forum once. Phonetics is always tricky: you have to sort out the dialectical variations from the theoretical variations.

For me, it's sort of like a dipthong, but sort of like two syllables. Also, some dialects eliminate the schwa completely. It tends to occur with lateral approximants like /l/ and /r/, because it's easier to stress the laterals (at the end of a syllable) in the schwa position than with other vowels, and you don't see this with words like "seek" for example, while you see it with "real".

I think it's precisely because of this issue that many other sound changes in languages other than English seem to occur.

Spanish "la muerte" with French "la mort" and Latin mor*- in general. Other than the /o/ => /u/ sound change, there is the addition of /e/ between /u/ and /r/. Why? Try saying "moor" or just plain "more" - it's easier to articulate the ending "r" with a mid-vowel, and it sounds like one and a half syllables rather than just one (/mO@r). Often it seems that French "pourquoi" sounds like "porquoi" for this reason, "bonjour" like "bonjor", etc. - even with native speakers. (They keep the /u/, I think, just that it develops into /O/ in order to articulate the ending /r/, and this ends up obscuring the shorter /u/.)


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## john_riemann_soong

gaer said:


> But the "a" sound as in say, pay, may, day, ray, etc. already "glides". It's a dipthong, in both AE and BE, right?



That's because when stressed, the phoneme being articulated is /eI/, not just plain /e/. If you say "cliché", that /I/ (using SAMPA-modified IPA; it represents the "i" in b*i*t; note the case distinction from /i/, which is the vowel in b*ee*t) shouldn't be present. The pure /e/ should be present in words like m*a*te.

The "I" of "hi" for example, is actualliy /aI/, as well ... if you say the "I" part of "I .... want" really long for example, you will actually just stress the /a/ (as in _ahh_) first.


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## john_riemann_soong

Outsider said:


> This is a continuation of another discussion in the German forum, which seems to have gone off-topic. Please left-click on the quotes, if you're interested in the context.
> 
> Well, it's possible that there is some dialectal variation I had never noticed before. I admit that I was too assertive.
> 
> On the other hand, the pronunciations I described certainly do _exist_ in English, contrary to what your initial post in this thread seemed to be implying. I hear them all the time.
> 
> I'm quite curious about this, because Conchita disagrees with you. (Are you a native speaker, Conchita?)
> 
> Do you know the song _Sailing_ by Rod Stewart? There is also another one with the same name by Christopher Cross, I think. To my ears, each of them pronounces the "a" as a clear [ei], not an [e].
> 
> In the dialects of English I'm familiar with, the vowel in the word outside the parenthesis is different from the vowel in the words inside it.
> 
> I readily admit that some English speakers are perfectly capable of speaking foreign languages as good as natives. However, for those English speakers who do speak another language with an English accent, using diphthongs instead of monophthongs is one of their typical mistakes.
> This is why I always feel that it's important to stress the distinction between the two things.



Some further comments, I know this is an English-only forum, but I bring it up for comments on phonetics (phonology?) in general, from which the concept can be extended to English:

Sometimes in French (though usually I don't) I may pronounce "il" as /i@l/ (with a very short schwa) because in English, there are nearly no words whose syllables end in a lateral approximant without a mid-vowel. Hence, the intermediary schwa (or the /I/ as in bit in some contexts) is subconsciously seen as necessary to get from /i/ to /l/.

It appears that some northern pronunciations in France, the issue of ending in lateral approximants is somewhat resolved like in Spanish: a word like _regarde _(r@gaRd) ends up being pronounced with /E/, not /a/, (e.g. r@gErd). Again, it's easier to end in a lateral approximant with a mid vowel. The ultimate difficulty for me as a non-native speaker is somethiing like /yr/ (in _sur_), because /y/ (as in *u*ber) is a *rounded* *front* *close* vowel, all three characteristics that go against ending with an /r/

Using SAMPA to represent IPA here because I can't bothered to copy and paste from Wikipedia anymore.

Anyhow, such phonological phenomena are clearly prevalent in languages besides English, so it is not unreasonable for English to have it either.

Also, obligatory vowels and consonants that get articulated as a secondary effect of wanting to articulate two different sounds is something that fascinates me, since it seems that it's something that IPA can't systematically deal with at the moment, or at least there isn't an accessible "grand theory" for it either.

For example, for front vowels, as /i/ glides into its open counterparts, a /j/ sound (e.g. as in *y*ou) tends to be created. Yet (I can't remember the exact examples at the moment) that there are situations in Chinese where this seems to be miraculously avoided and the /j/ can't seem to be noticeably articulated for my life. For the back vowels, /w/ is created /uo/ is basically the same as /wo/, except perhaps in the former the first vowel might be more noticeable). 

But what about something like "yeah"? The SAMPA would seem to be /jia/, but doesn't /ia/ already form a /j/? (Hence /jia/ => /jija/?) Yet it doesn't sound like it.


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## gaer

Outsider said:


> _[quote: Elroy_
> _This statement suggests to me that you do not realize that the "ai" in "sail" is different from the one in "rain." There is no "ay" in "sail"; there is only an [e].]_
> 
> I'm quite curious about this, because Conchita disagrees with you. (Are you a native speaker, Conchita?)


Cambridge is on your side, with the phonetics "seIl". But I disagree. I think this is at best a simplifaction, at worst a gross distortion of what actually takes place.

I hear a huge difference, for instance, between same and sail.

But that's not what bothers me. We lack absolutes. We lack "sound models" that tell us how "sail" sounds, and who makes it sound that way.

Describing sound in writing is incredibly frustrating, inaccurate and misleading. It's like describing colors to someone blind.

I would suggest this instead:

Use the sound file on MW sites and on WR for sale/sail. WR has both a US and UK example.

Are they alike? How much? Are they different? Now different?

I definitely do not hear what Elroy is calling a "monophthong", but I'm also hearing something quite different from the start of: sane, same, shape, shade, etc.

Gaer


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## elroy

I generally agree with Cuchu's statements: 





cuchuflete said:


> 1) true statement for some AE speakers; untrue for others


 I added a disclaimer to my post in the other thread to say that I was referring to my own American-English pronunciation. There is a distinct difference between the way I pronounce the "ai" in "sail" and the way I pronounce the "ai" in "rain." Particularly, the former loses its "glide" *[by "glide" I mean the "y" sound you hear in "rain"]* because of the "l," making it similar to the German "ee" (which is what the other thread was about). 


> 2) Untrue as far as the vowel in ear being like the vowel in beat


 Honestly, I never thought of these vowels as being different, but maybe they are. Maybe this is one difference that I produce but can't hear (and maybe there are some who produce the difference I hear between the "ai" in "sail" and the one in "rain" but can't hear it themselves). Regardless, my point in the other thread was that the "ea" in "ear" (whether or not it's the same as the "ea" in "beat") is not similar to the German "ee" (which I said was more similar to the "ai" in "sail"). 


> 3) Depending on the speaker's regional flavor of spoken EN, the vowel in bear or bare may be quite close to that in sail/sale/pale/flail etc. Again, there are a multitude of regional variations, so this is not a good example of a vowel pronounced in one consistent way.


 I never meant to imply that the "ea" in "bear" was _identical_ to the "ai" in "sail," but that (the way I pronounce them) they could both be used as approximations of the German "ee."


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## john_riemann_soong

gaer said:


> Describing sound in writing is incredibly frustrating, inaccurate and misleading. It's like describing colors to someone blind.



There's phonetics, but first you probably have to learn IPA and all the jargon ... but I think IPA (and basic phonetics) should eventually be a must-learn in school curriculums.

They can drop the useless Elements of Style from college courses and perhaps include something that's actually quite necessary and useful like being able to read IPA (and all of it's special features of retracted tongue root and whatnot).


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## john_riemann_soong

elroy said:


> There is a distinct difference between the way I pronounce the "ai" in "sail" and the way I pronounce the "ai" in "rain." Particularly, the former loses its "glide" *[by "glide" I mean the "y" sound you hear in "rain"]*



The _ (of the [eI] you hear in "rain" is not a glide, it's a dipthong, that is, if the stress warrants pronouncing the  in the first place. It seems that the  is not consciously pronounced, just that the voice chords are still open when the mouth goes through the motions of articulating ; it's generally a product of stress, a subconscious effort to make the /e/ even more closed, and in doing so, making /eI/.

/j/ as a byproduct of articulating two vowels seems to only occur when the first vowel is more closed than the second, unless consciously articulated. In fact, /j/ seems very difficult to articulate from an open vowel to a close one. In a made-up word like mayee (theoretically, represented /meji/ in IPA), for example, you have to try extra hard to make the /j/ sound, and I suspect it's only because you're trying to find a form of /i/ that's even more closed and more fronted than /i/ usually is, and I find I have to use the breathy voice in order to have an effect distinct from just plain /mei/. However /j/ is much easier (and seems to be obligatory in some cases) when going from a front vowel to a back one, as long as the second vowel is of the same height (or lower) than the first (hence, words like mayo exist). 

In "sail" for example, it is pronounced /se@l/ (@ is the schwa in SAMPA) - with the close e developing into the schwa. A /j/ glide results, because /e/ is more closed than /@/.

In contrast, "rain" has the sequence /eI/ (hence, /reIn/). /e/ is *less *closed than /I/ is. No /j/ glide occurs._


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## gaer

john_riemann_soong said:


> There's phonetics, but first you probably have to learn IPA and all the jargon ... but I think IPA (and basic phonetics) should eventually be a must-learn in school curriculums.


Fine, but please not without teaching these phonetics as an aid to analyzing what the sounds really are. Let's not put the cart before the horse and lead people to believe that phonetics, alone, are more accurate than the actual sound of words. This is insane.


> They can drop the useless Elements of Style from college courses and perhaps include something that's actually quite necessary and useful like being able to read IPA (and all of it's special features of retracted tongue root and whatnot).


I don't entirely disagree, but I think it is absolutely essential to learn example words using sounds represented by phonetics. Then other words that rhyme with these words, in the same language, may be explained much more efficiently.

If, for instance, I already know that in English a, bay, day, gay, hay, etc. all rhyme, then having a phonetic system to describe exactly what I hear when these words are spoken by someone would be incredibly useful to learn other words, new ones, that don't look at all alike: such as sleigh, ai (as in aid), and other words that I may be forgetting. This would not only be useful for non-natives, it would help explain nuances that exist in different regions or countries.

But I insist that the sound must come FIRST, the phonetic representation SECOND. Anything else is illogical.


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## elroy

john_riemann_soong said:


> The _ (of the [eI] you hear in "rain" is not a glide, it's a dipthong,_


_ I was using "glide" the way I thought Outsider meant it earlier.  I am aware that the combination of the two vowel sounds makes a diphthong._


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## gaer

john_riemann_soong said:


> In "sail" for example, it is pronounced /se@l/ (@ is the schwa in SAMPA) - with the close e developing into the schwa. A /j/ glide results, because /e/ is more closed than /@/.


NOW you are describing something that seems both logical phonetically and also describes exactly what I believe I feel as I say the word.

In layman's terms, I would simply say that the end "opens up". My jaw drops a bit (or tends to when I say it slowly, my tongue drops and my throat opens). That's what I hear.

It matches. But I'm starting with my pronunciation and the sound files that sound very close to what I say.


> In contrast, "rain" has the sequence /eI/ (hence, /reIn/). /e/ is *less *closed than /I/ is. No /j/ glide occurs.


Another way to describe what happens is that the throat closes in some way at the end of "sane". Or that the "glide" is doing the opposite thing in "sane" and "sail".

But again, can't people learn all this from simply listening? Wouldn't it be good to get very good at mastering pronunciation FIRST and then analyzing, through phonetics, and approximation of what happens?


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## john_riemann_soong

gaer said:


> Fine, but please not without teaching these phonetics as an aid to analyzing what the sounds really are. Let's not put the cart before the horse and lead people to believe that phonetics, alone, are more accurate than the actual sound of words. This is insane.
> I don't entirely disagree, but I think it is absolutely essential to learn example words using sounds represented by phonetics. Then other words that rhyme with these words, in the same language, may be explained much more efficiently.
> 
> If, for instance, I already know that in English a, bay, day, gay, hay, etc. all rhyme, then having a phonetic system to describe exactly what I hear when these words are spoken by someone would be incredibly useful to learn other words, new ones, that don't look at all alike: such as sleigh, ai (as in aid), and other words that I may be forgetting. This would not only be useful for non-natives, it would help explain nuances that exist in different regions or countries.
> 
> But I insist that the sound must come FIRST, the phonetic representation SECOND. Anything else is illogical.



Hmm? The point of phonetics is to describe every nuance of sound as accurately as possible. One day, we may phonetically represent the difference between Stephen Hawking's voice synthesiser versus the way I would normally speak in IPA, for example.

We already can represent things like tongue-root, degree of aspiration and labialisation, co-articulation, clicks, all the exotic phonemes the !Kung language makes, r-coloured vowels, and so forth.

Phonetic representation is supposed to describe sound, down to pitch and frequency change. Phonetics to actual sound is kind of like the midi to the mp3. When you're teaching music students for example, you might tell them which notes to play, pitch, rhythm - the little slight nuances like pushing on the pedal half-lightly and so forth - these all get included. Things mp3's don't cover is the actual real real sound of the instrument; but then again, that's like representing the difference between my voice and your voice through IPA, with the general imperfections and variations in the shape of our mouths and our vocal chords that make each of our voices unique. IPA doesn't need to distinguish between that!

The sound system of a language is *phonology*, including which phonemes it assigns to which graphemes, (hence how the grapheme -ough can represent highly contrastive phonemes, e.g. _rough_ versus _through_).

How to produce a sound is the realm of *phonetics*. Phonetics as an aid to what the sounds really are? But phonetics does describe the sounds really _are_! Well, we're close. Phonetics is still a field with plenty of research to be done.

Well, you never know. Perhaps one day we'll find a phonetic model that can replicate Celine Dion's voice and contrast them against Jacques Chirac's.


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## john_riemann_soong

gaer said:


> NOW you are describing something that seems both logical phonetically and also describes exactly what I believe I feel as I say the word.
> 
> In layman's terms, I would simply say that the end "opens up". My jaw drops a bit (or tends to when I say it slowly, my tongue drops and my throat opens). That's what I hear.
> 
> It matches. But I'm starting with my pronunciation and the sound files that sound very close to what I say.
> 
> Another way to describe what happens is that the throat closes in some way at the end of "sane". Or that the "glide" is doing the opposite thing in "sane" and "sail".
> 
> But again, can't people learn all this from simply listening? Wouldn't it be good to get very good at mastering pronunciation FIRST and then analyzing, through phonetics, and approximation of what happens?



Hmm, but I think, phonetics is a description of what happens with pronunciation. Of course, it is incomplete, as much as for example, physics is. But I think phonetics *is* pronunciation, or rather the science of pronunciation. You would of course tell a child not to touch the hot stove rather than giving him or her a lecture on thermodynamics, and similarly most children pick up pronunciation without learning phonetics, but I think for example, children are phonetics machines.  

When you hear babies suddenly start talking out of the blue (previously idle), with no grievance or real wants for example, perfectly content, they are generally playing around with phonetics. Due to mirror neurons I think, they in fact sort of know (if ever so subconsciously), what is going on with the adults' tongues when they speak to them, only they can't replicate it with the same skill. (i.e. the Fis phenomenon). I can still remember sort of, the thoughts I associated with the distinctions of things in Chinese that English doesn't make, e.g. aspirated versus non-aspirated. When I moved to the US at the age of five, I also picked up the American "retroflex d", e.g. in AE pronunciations of bu*tt*er and u*dd*er. No one ever told me how to pronounce it. I can't recall struggling with it. I might have mispronounced it the first few times as I linguistically assimilated. 

If you know what's going on with the tongue, the lips, or whatever, then you in fact, know phonetics. In order to pick up pronunciation you probably used your instinctive knowledge of phonetics that biology gave you. The problem I think comes when we take our knowledge of how to talk and make sounds for granted and we lose our learning modules (our instinctive knowledge of language goes away) and we forget how exactly we made the sounds in the first place: we just make them. Children have an instinctive sense of phonetics that they lose as they grow up. So when people past the critical age try to learn a new phoneme, they struggle. 

But if we teach children phonetics while they still have their natural ability of instinctive phonetics, then they won't lose their natural ability to discern and identify the mechanics of each phone - the ability gets transferred, becoming "natively-fluent" in identifying phonemes.


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## winklepicker

Outsider said:


> Do you know the song _Sailing_ by Rod Stewart? There is also another one with the same name by Christopher Cross, I think. To my ears, each of them pronounces the "a" as a clear [ei], not an [e].


 
Problem is, sail and sailing have different vowel sounds:

Sail = seɪəl (for the non-consumers of IPA _say-uhll_)

Sailing = seɪliŋ (_say-ling_)

Why is this? I don't know. I also don't know why the stress falls in different places in these words:

ph*o*tograph
phot*o*grapher
photogr*a*phic

There are many other things about English I don't know, if you'd like to hear them...


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## john_riemann_soong

Really? I can say "photographer" in a variety of ways and the stress for a word isn't necessarily fixed.



> Sail = seɪəl (for the non-consumers of IPA _say-uhll_)
> 
> Sailing = seɪliŋ (_say-ling_)



I suspect this is one dialectical realisation. I can envision myself saying "sailing" with both the schwa and without the schwa, depending on register or  emphasis ...


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## winklepicker

john_riemann_soong said:


> Really? I can say "photographer" in a variety of ways


 
You can say what you like, mate. I'd like to say *&^%$£$ - but the moderators won't let me. Fact is, the stresses I have given are those used in BE RP. 



john_riemann_soong said:


> the stress for a word isn't necessarily fixed....


 
Actually it is. That's why when you look in the dictionary you'll find it tells you where the stress falls.



john_riemann_soong said:


> I suspect this is one dialectical realisation. I can envision myself saying "sailing" with both the schwa and without the schwa, depending on register or emphasis ...


 
Again - you can say what you like. And you can _envision_ what you like (does that mean _imagine_?) But if you want to be understood it helps to speak the same way as some other people.

SWALK.


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## GregLee

john_riemann_soong said:


> Really? I can say "photographer" in a variety of ways and the stress for a word isn't necessarily fixed.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sail = seɪəl (for the non-consumers of IPA _say-uhll_)
> 
> Sailing = seɪliŋ (_say-ling_)
> 
> 
> 
> I suspect this is one dialectical realisation. I can envision myself saying "sailing" with both the schwa and without the schwa, depending on register or  emphasis ...
Click to expand...

The -ing suffix can potentially work in two ways, either leaving the pronunciation of the form to which it is attached   exactly the same ("sail-ing") or causing a resyllabification ("sai-ling").  Phonetically, for me, this turns out to be a slightly darker "l" for the first, probably corresponding to a schwa glide before the "l" in other dialects.  For this particular word, for me, the "l" always goes in the first syllable, but I distinguish between the participle of the verb "rail" (in "He was rail-ing against the Dems") and the noun for a sort of metal fence ("He leaned against the rai-ling").

Similarly, -er can sometimes fail to change the stress of the word it's attached to, though for me not in the particular case of "photographer".


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## john_riemann_soong

winklepicker said:


> You can say what you like, mate. I'd like to say *&^%$£$ - but the moderators won't let me. Fact is, the stresses I have given are those used in BE RP.



And RP is a dialect.



> Again - you can say what you like. And you can _envision_ what you like (does that mean _imagine_?) But if you want to be understood it helps to speak the same way as some other people.
> 
> SWALK.



Wow, thanks for the oh-so-masked comment there. I'm both an American and British (and Singaporean) English speaker. I code-switch frequently between English dialects, depending on where I am. The anglophonia is a very wide community and you may pride yourself on that ivory tower of a dialect RP and define it as the standard, but where did you infer prithee, that I don't speak the same way as other people?

"Say what you like" is not helpful. If a newbie comes on to a forum and asks "can I say such and such in French/English [or whatever]" and you say "of course you can say whatever you like, but if you want to be understood", I take that as a sign of rudeness on your part.

GregLee: yes, it may depend on semantics too, since that sometimes affects stress.


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## Conchita57

john_riemann_soong said:


> And RP is a dialect.


 
I am totally mystified by that statement of yours, considering that you first came across as a relatively educated person. RP (or Received Pronunciation) is an accent, not a dialect.

Ah well, we all make mistakes.


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## john_riemann_soong

It's a register, an accent, a dialect -- there is no clear distinction. When does a register become an accent or an accent become a dialect? When does a dialect become a language?

"Dialect" is the simplest way to say it, because it just merely means "variation of a language". After all, RP does have different word choices - these factor into dialectisation. Accents (sound shifts) often accompany dialects, Vulgar Latin and so forth. The Mandarin dialect (really the Mandarin language) has its own dialects, some the diversification being based on just sound change alone, or word choice, or idiosyncrasies, and so forth. How do dialect continuums occur? They are a collection of a bunch of isoglosses, with little changes like a sound change or a vocabulary change or a slight syntax change, from place to place.

RP is surely just beyond an accent.


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## Conchita57

I'm sorry, but I can't agree with you at all. According to your theory, everybody speaks a dialect of some sort, as different groups of people have different 'variations of a language'.

Now if, after all, you do distinguish dialects from languages, I'd be curious to know who, in your opinion, speaks the English _language_.


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## gaer

winklepicker said:


> You can say what you like, mate. I'd like to say *&^%$£$ - but the moderators won't let me. Fact is, the stresses I have given are those used in BE RP.


This is the first mention of "RP" in this thread. And you did not mention RP when you gave your examples.

I don't remember anyone having stated that this discussion is even limited to either BE or AE.

Please listen to the sound recordings on MW and WR. The first "o" in "photograph" is not pronounced the same as the first "o" in "photographer", and that's only one of many small differences.


> Actually it is. That's why when you look in the dictionary you'll find it tells you where the stress falls.


Which dictionary?


> Again - you can say what you like. And you can _envision_ what you like (does that mean _imagine_?) But if you want to be understood it helps to speak the same way as some other people.
> 
> SWALK.


That's not only a cheap shot aimed at someone you've never heard speak, it's also totally off-topic.

Let's get back to the topic. Sail. 

Gaer


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## john_riemann_soong

Conchita57 said:


> I'm sorry, but I can't agree with you at all. According to your theory, everybody speaks a dialect of some sort, as different groups of people have different 'variations of a language'.



Ah yes, that is unsettling, isn't it? No one person ever picks up a language the same way, even if their parents were native speakers. That's why language changes. It's not so much as the "telephone" game as people have different conceptions of the same grammar they learn. As you stress different aspects (like tone, or word order, or inflection) one starts dominating over the other and eventually creates variations.



> Now if, after all, you do distinguish dialects from languages, I'd be curious to know who, in your opinion, speaks the English _language_.


The Anglophonia ... now when the dialects are fairly mutually intelligible, when you speak the dialect of a certain language, you can say you speak the entire parent language that encompasses the dialects. Thus, New Zealanders, Singaporeans and Scottish people all speak the English language.

Also, it depends on the grasp of a language family. I can say my mother speaks the Chinese language for example, because she knows Mandarin and several other dialects, even though she doesn't know every single one. Even though the dialects are not mutually intelligible, she knows how the larger language system works such that deciphering a new Chinese dialect isn't that difficult.

There comes a point where the dialect breaks so far off from the parent langauge, learning one doesn't mean being able to communicate in the other. Thus, being able to speak French doesn't mean that one is a Latin speaker and so forth. 

In the context of RP, technically yes it is not a dialect. But look for example: the speakers of RP tend to belong to a particular demographic group, as well as various others (including second language learners) who assimilated into that group.

It's precisely when people say "oh, but that's the RP pronunciation, and how you should pronounce it", that you know it has the effects of a dialect. Diglossia has occurred, because RP is judged to be an acrolect of the English language.


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## Outsider

Thank you all for your replies. 



panjandrum said:


> What is the pronunciation indicated in the OED?


I looked up the pronunciation of some of these words in online English dictionaries, but unfortunately none of them uses IPA. As problematic as IPA itself can be, I get lost in other systems.



muselinazi said:


> The same could also be said of the relationship between *ear *and *beat *and *bear *and *sail* because even when allowing for differing pronunciations across dialects, variation tends to be systematic. I don't know whether I am explaining this very well...but if *ear* and *bear* do not share the same vowel sound in one dialect, it's logical that they won't in another.
> Even though the vowel sounds in each _individual_ word may differ, the relationship between the two words stays the same- whether you're speaking to someone from Auckland or Birmingham.


Not necessarily. There may be sound mergers which occur in one dialect but do not occur in others. (For instance, to my ears some Australians seem to pronounce "bear" just like "beer", or at least very close to it.)



gaer said:


> seal, seer
> 
> Ending with "l" and "r" modifies how the words are ended and caused some sort of "glide".
> 
> But the "a" sound as in say, pay, may, day, ray, etc. already "glides". It's a dipthong, in both AE and BE, right?
> 
> What does the final consonant do to what proceeds it?
> 
> may, main, mare, male/mail
> 
> Unless I'm totally crazy, main, male/mail and mare all end differently from may. I think standard phonetic systems are far too crude to even come close to adequately describing what happens in these words.





modus.irrealis said:


> 1) I have a diphthong in "sail" -- it's basically [seil] (with "dark l"), although there does seem to be some kind of very short vowel popping up as my tongue moves from saying the [ei] to the dark l -- but the word starts out exactly like "say" for me, which is [sei].
> 
> 2) For me "ear" is [i:r] -- but like [l] in "sail," the [r] here causes some kind of vowel to develop between the [i:] and the [r] -- but "ear" starts out the same way as "ee" (the letter name) does, which is [i:].





gaer said:


> I hear a huge difference, for instance, between same and sail.


I think what happens in those examples is that, in addition to the diphthong [ei], there is also a schwa before the final L/R. So there is a difference, but the diphthong remains a diphthong.



modus.irrealis said:


> 3) For me, the vowel in "bear" is more open than the [e] in "sail" but that in turn is (or seems to me to be) more open than the French [e] in "ses."


That French word is normally transcribed as [se]. I'm not saying the [e] in it is exactly the same as the vowel in the English diphthong, but the difference between them seems negligible. Certainly negligible enough to be overlooked without problem by anybody who is still beginning to learn a foreign language.



elroy said:


> Regardless, my point in the other thread was that the "ea" in "ear" (whether or not it's the same as the "ea" in "beat") is not similar to the German "ee" (which I said was more similar to the "ai" in "sail").


Yes, and I disagree with you. Neither sound is the same as the German one ("ee"), but I argue that the first one ("ea") is the best approximation, because it at least does not contain a diphthong, as "sail" does (at least to many speakers).



elroy said:


> I never meant to imply that the "ea" in "bear" was _identical_ to the "ai" in "sail," but that (the way I pronounce them) they could both be used as approximations of the German "ee."


The "ea" in "bear" is a poorer approximation to the German "ee", in the English I am used to hearing, because its main vowel is open-mid (German "ä"), while the German vowel you want is close-mid (German "e").


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## john_riemann_soong

Note that in some dialects, /ɪ/ is used instead of the schwa, on top of the phoneme /eɪ/. The result is that the dipthong is kept, and the /eɪ/ becomes longer to become /eɪ:/ ... vowel length isn't that distinctive in English, but it's probably noticeable if the syllable is stressed.  

Also, /ɪ/ is more closed than /e/, hence an involuntary /j/ glide doesn't form. 

You can probably notice it better with a word that doesn't use /eɪ/, try something like "real" or "veal"; I use the schwa before the /l/ but if my sense of phonetics is correct, I have heard some speakers use /ɪ/, e.g. /riɪl/.


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## Conchita57

john_riemann_soong said:


> You can probably notice it better with a word that doesn't use /eɪ/, try something like "real" or "veal"; I use the schwa before the /l/ but if my sense of phonetics is correct, I have heard some speakers use /ɪ/, e.g. /riɪl/.


 
In standard British English, at least, 'real' and 'veal' are pronounced differently:

real = [ri9l]
veal = [vi:l]

(9 = schwa)


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## gaer

Conchita57 said:


> In standard British English, at least, 'real' and 'veal' are pronounced differently:
> 
> real = [ri9l]
> veal = [vi:l]
> 
> (9 = schwa)


Cambridge shows:

veal, vi:l
real, rIel  US ri: &l (using "&" for the schwa)

But this time the beginning consonant has an additional effect. I also can't pronounce "rail" and "sail" quite the same. There are always so many factors.

For instance, the beginning of "rigor" and "vigor" make a difference to me. This whole discussion continues to confuse me. There are too many factors! 

Gaer


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## paulochine

是不是全世界的人中只有中国人才有音标啊？you guys haven't the standard pronunciation in your dictionary?


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## cuchuflete

As the two posts immediately before yours show, Paulochine, "standard" pronunciation is variable.


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## quecumber

I haven't been able to read through all of the comments on this forum but I know that in my Australian English pronunciation sail, rain, shale, etc. all have the same diphthong pronunciation. Don't know if that helps, might just be confusing matters. It is certainly possible to pronounce them both in the same way, as a diphthong.


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## Imants

Outsider said:


> There were several examples in discussion. The most contentious one was perhaps the pronunciation of the word "sail" in English (AE or BE): is this a diphthong (rhyming with "ay") or a monophthong (rhyming with the French vowel "é")?
> 
> All this arose from a discussion where we were trying to explain to a native English speaker how to approximate the close-mid front vowel [e] (actually in a long version, but I don't think that's crucial) of German, using English examples.
> 
> But, to be perfectly specific, in that thread Elroy wrote three things that frankly left me astonished:
> 
> *1) that 'sail' is pronounced as a monophthong [e], not a diphthong [ei];*
> 
> *2) that the vowel in 'ear' is like the German vowel 'ie' (and English 'beat'!), [i:];*
> 
> *3) that the vowel in 'bear' is the same as the one in 'sail'.*
> 
> All three descriptions conflict with the way I have always heard Americans and Englishmen speak. Basically, I started this thread to continue discussing these questions with the posters in the other thread. Needless to say, feedback from other posters is also welcome.
> 
> Note: I understand that in other dialects (such as Scottish English, Irish English or Australian English) the pronunciation differs, and a monophthongal [e] may indeed be heard, but I am not talking about those.


Hi!
What accent exactly are you referring to?
All I know is that many Englishmen show the features *1)* and *3)*.
As for *2)*, I thought many English speakers had the sound of German '*ie*' in '*ear*'?


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## Scalloper

"Sail" and similar words would have a monopthong [e] or [e:] in Scotland and the far north of England as well as Indian English. So for these (1) is true.

In the less far north of England (Yorkshire, Lancs?) the vowel would be [E:] as it would in "bear". For these people, (3) would be true.

For everywhere else I can see, it would be a dipthong.


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## Imants

Scalloper said:


> "Sail" and similar words would have a monopthong [e] or [e:] in Scotland and the far north of England as well as Indian English. So for these (1) is true.
> 
> In the less far north of England (Yorkshire, Lancs?) the vowel would be [E:] as it would in "bear". For these people, (3) would be true.
> 
> For everywhere else I can see, it would be a dipthong.


Many Aussies and Kiwis have a monophthong in "ear".


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## Forero

I distinguish "sail" and "sale" (both with long "a") from "sell" (short "e"), and "prayer" has a long "a" when it means one who prays but a short "e" sound when it means keeping in touch with the Deity.

I pronounce "seer" with a long "e" sound, and two syllables (as "see-er"), but "ear", "sear", and "beer" with a short "i" sound because of the "r" in the same syllable.  "Peel" and "eel" have long "e"; "pill" and "ill" have short "i".

I don't mind people saying "ear" or "sear" with a long "e" sound (in one syllable), but I struggle to accept "sell-boat" for "sailboat" or "deli" for "daily".  I thought my friend who spoke that way had a speech impediment, until I heard others from his parents' hometown (NYC) speak the same way.

I don't remember the particulars, but before I picked up on the "speech problem", some of the things my friend said had really confused me because I believed he had said what he seemed to have said.


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## Scalloper

Imants said:


> Many Aussies and Kiwis have a monophthong in "ear".


 
It was "sail" that I was talking about in that context. "Ear" will often have a monophthong, particularly in rhotic accents. Whether any are the same as the German word mentioned, I can't really say.


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## Imants

Scalloper said:


> "Ear" will often have a monophthong, particularly in rhotic accents. Whether any are the same as the German word mentioned, I can't really say.


I was actually thinking of the non-rhotic Aussie (and perhaps also Kiwi) accent, where "ear" is sometimes pronounced just like German *ie* (i.e. long *i*).


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## john_riemann_soong

Considering that ending /r/ can be thought of as an r-coloured vowel, you could say anything ending in /r/ (with a vowel preceding) is a diphthong -- at least for the English /r/ after the schwa.


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## Forero

Native English speakers do not distinguish words according to whether a vowel is a diphthong or not but according to which phoneme is used.  The real issue with the words you are asking about is that speakers of some dialects of English may use different phonemes in them that make them sound like different words to speakers of other dialects.

The phoneme "long a" can sound like a French é (a monophthong) or like a French è followed by an offglide like French i (a diphthong).  Either way it is the same phoneme.

The phoneme "short e" can sound like a French è (a monophthong) or like a long "a" followed by a schwa (a diphthong or triphthong).

Non-natives often miss the fact that these two phonemes are distinguished by their endings, not their beginnings, though their beginnings are usually longer and their endings are never stressed.


Outsider said:


> *1) that 'sail' is pronounced as a monophthong [e], not a diphthong [ei];*


Though most pronounce this "ai" as a long "a", some pronounce it as short "e" so that "sail" sounds just like "sell".


> *2) that the vowel in 'ear' is like the German vowel 'ie' (and English 'beat'!), [i:];*


The two phonemes that apply here are:

Short "i": either a monophthong more open than French i or like French i but clipped short, or a long "e" sound followed by a schwa (making a diphthong or triphthong).

Long "e": either a monophthong like French i but perhaps longer or like the monophthong short "i" followed by a closer i offglide.

Some pronounce "ear" with a short "i" (as in "bit"), some with a long "e" (as in "beat").  A following "r" in the same syllable is more likely to cause a preceding offglide to be deleted than a following "l".


> *3) that the vowel in 'bear' is the same as the one in 'sail'.*


The vowel in "sail" I have already explained.  The vowel in "bear" is the short "e", never like the vowel in "ear".  Those who pronounce "sail" like "sell" use the same vowel as in "bear".

The vowel in "beer" is just like the one in "ear", with the same issues of dialect.


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## sound shift

In my speech it is a triphthong: s + e + i + schwa + l.


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## Outsider

Forero said:


> The phoneme "long a" can sound like a French é (a monophthong) or like a French è followed by an offglide like French i (a diphthong).


In IPA, the diphthongal version of the "long a" of English* is normally represented as the equivalent of "éy" ([ei] or [eI]), not "èy" ([Ei] or [EI])...

* I still find this terminology confusing, though. The so-called "long a" of English is either not a long vowel, or not an "a".



Forero said:


> Some pronounce "ear" with a short "i" (as in "bit"), some with a long "e" (as in "beat").


I don't think I had ever noticed that pronunciation until this thread. 

I've since had a very enlightening conversation with Elroy through private message, who I thank for his patience, where I realised that there is greater variation in the pronunciation of English than I previously thought. (I am speaking here of standard English, either British or American; I already knew that the long "a" could be a monophthong in other dialects, for example.)


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## LV4-26

When I listen to the sound file for the UK pronunciation here, I hear something halfway between /seəl/ and /seɪl/.


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## Whosthatrandom

Just to add extra weight to one side of the argument, as a UK English speaker  with an accent that is based on the South East England accent (but possibly corrupted by Welsh and perhaps even Belgian influences):

1) I pronounce "sail"  the same way as "say" but with an L tagged on the end.
2) I pronounce "ear" as "ee-yah" merged into one syllable. A native welsh person will elongate this to make it almost sound like two syllables.
3) I pronounce bear in the exact same way as "bare", as in _the cupboard was bare_, so that it rhymes with dare, hair, hare, care, lair, and so on.


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## Forero

Outsider said:


> In IPA, the diphthongal version of the "long a" of English* is normally represented as the equivalent of "éy" ([ei] or [eI]), not "èy" ([Ei] or [EI])...
> 
> * I still find this terminology confusing, though. The so-called "long a" of English is either not a long vowel, or not an "a".


It is called "long a" because it is spelled with "a" and comes from the Anglosaxon long a.  It is really no longer an "a" sound and can be quite short when followed by two unstressed syllables.

You can represent the first element of the "long a" (the diphthong) with the symbol for any sound near French è that is far enough from /a/ or /I/ to prevent the diphthong from becoming a "long i" or "long e" to an English speaker.  The symbol "e" is convenient.

In Cockney, the first element of long a is very open (similar to the "a" in "cat"), but in my dialect the first element of long a is similar to the "ir" of "bird" in British English.  It's the /I/ or /j/ (y) offglide that that tells us it is a "long a" (along with the fact that the first element is not close to /a/ or /I/).

Still, a simple /e/ is heard as a "long a" by most native English speakers, even those who can't reproduce it without training.


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## Imants

Outsider said:


> In IPA, the diphthongal version of the "long a" of English* is normally represented as the equivalent of "éy" ([ei] or [eI]), not "èy" ([Ei] or [EI])...
> 
> * I still find this terminology confusing, though. The so-called "long a" of English is either not a long vowel, or not an "a".
> 
> I don't think I had ever noticed that pronunciation until this thread.
> 
> I've since had a very enlightening conversation with Elroy through private message, who I thank for his patience, where I realised that there is greater variation in the pronunciation of English than I previously thought. (I am speaking here of standard English, either British or American; I already knew that the long "a" could be a monophthong in other dialects, for example.)


You're right.
English has so many variations in pronounciation.
For example there are many people who say "èy" instead of "éy". Many have even a pronunciation close to "ay".
The way some people say "sail" may sound like "sile" to others.
Others have a monophthong. Something like "séél", which is what you asked in your question.

What Forero said about some using short i, while others long i in "ear", is also true.


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## LV4-26

Imants said:


> .[...]
> The way some people say "sail" may sound like "sile" to others.[...]


You mean like "_the Rhine in Spine sties minely in the pline_"? 
(...which, to my ear, sounds more like /ae/ or /aei/ then just /ai/)


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## john_riemann_soong

Guess how "ai" came to represent /ei/ -- yes, it initially represented /ai/, which got heightened to /eI/!

So actually that dialect could represent a historical intermediate.


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## Imants

LV4-26 said:


> You mean like "_the Rhine in Spine sties minely in the pline_"?
> (...which, to my ear, sounds more like /ae/ or /aei/ then just /ai/)



Yes.
I've heard enough people (from Australia) who actually have an /ai/ there.

I guess basically the pronunciation of the "long A" in English varies from monophthongal "éé" to the diphthong "ay" (like in Australian) with everything inbetween.


----------

