According to Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage, than6, you're assuming an ellipsis of than I (keep) but you can use than me without that assumed ellipsis. It depends on whether there would be ambiguity in the sentence. The example given in Fowler is You treat her worse than I means something other than You treat here worse than me
As John Lennon once said, "If I give my heart to you I must be sure from the very start that you would love me more than her." He could mean one of two things.
Yes, totally agree with your last sentence. I started to give that sort of example, but could not quickly think of one as neat. Far from sure about the conclusion Fowler reaches - it records much public usage but does that make it correct? Possibly, to some.
If enough people say it wrong in the same way for long enough, it becomes right. Either that or go back to speaking proto-Indo-European, much luck to you.
As John Lennon once said, "If I give my heart to you I must be sure from the very start that you would love me more than her." He could mean one of two things.
I've wondered about that since I first heard it.
(Well, not non-stop, but every once in a while.)
Nissen huts are incredibly versatile and long-lived - much of the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital is still accommodated in some put up by Luftwaffe PoWs and the famous Italian Chapel on Orkney is a nissen hut.
We have some in a neighbouring town which were erected as post-war social housing and are now listed on the local heritage register, and thus subject to planning restrictions.
We have some in a neighbouring town which were erected as post-war social housing and are now listed on the local heritage register, and thus subject to planning restrictions.
Some not all that far from us were built in WW II and used by the RAAF as dormitories etc, and then after the War for newly arrived migrants. I don't know if they are still there, but I must check them out now you've raised the subject. Mr Curly might take a walk there, probably about a half hour each way from where he is, with some good hills in between to get him really fit.
And epergne of course. Never sit down to a meal without one.
Really? To my mind, unless you have a very wide table they fall into the category of "clutter", plus many are hideous and hard to clean. A low bowl is much better for a few flowers.
Yes, but where are you going to put the candied fruits and suchets?
You obviously keep a far more lavish establishment than me.
Nissen huts are incredibly versatile and long-lived - much of the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital is still accommodated in some put up by Luftwaffe PoWs and the famous Italian Chapel on Orkney is a nissen hut.
Not the same as prefabs – which also date from WW2 and were put up all over London and other heavily bombed cities to accommodate people who had lost their homes. They were small, single story flat roofed units that were meant to be strictly temporary, but in fact they turned out to be so well designed, efficient and comfortable (and in many cases better than the slums the occupants had been living in before) that they were still around well into the 1960s. I remember several prefab sites in my area of London when I was walking to school in the 60s. They were much missed!
There were prefab houses, little flat roofed houses, locally until more recently than that - 1990s? I know someone who lived in one and still lives in the now replacement houses, which look like the rabbit hutch housing of early Milton Keynes. I lived in a prefab bungalow for a while, which I loved.
And epergne of course. Never sit down to a meal without one.
Really? To my mind, unless you have a very wide table they fall into the category of "clutter", plus many are hideous and hard to clean. A low bowl is much better for a few flowers.
Yes, but where are you going to put the candied fruits and suchets?
You obviously keep a far more lavish establishment than me.
And epergne of course. Never sit down to a meal without one.
Really? To my mind, unless you have a very wide table they fall into the category of "clutter", plus many are hideous and hard to clean. A low bowl is much better for a few flowers.
Yes, but where are you going to put the candied fruits and suchets?
You obviously keep a far more lavish establishment than me.
The trouble with living in a multicultural household is, more often than not, the different languages that we speak. I told my Dear Wife that I was going to solder something. "You mean sodder, don't you?" "NO! I'm going to solder it, not sod it!"
I agree with @BroJames and @Barnabas_Aus, though some people round here would pronounce 'almond' with a swallowed 'l' as they would Calne, palm, etc. That, though, is a recognised dialectical quirk.
What people on both sides of the pond call a long a is actually a diphthong formed of the sounds e+i. It's all that great vowel shift which broke the link between sounds spelled with the same vowel symbol.
The walk, talk vowel is shifted towards o by the now unpronounced l. Hence UK English has the same sound in talk as torque; rhotic accents would sound the r in the latter but the vowel itself would still be the same sound, and distinct from the sound in tock. The talk/torque vowel is long and somewhat rounded; that in tock is short and unrounded.
South is said sowth like a pig with a th on the end by a good proportion of people here.
I was interested to hear accents which said "a duck on a dock" where both words sounded the same. Somewhere Minnesota I think. Also Anne and Iain said the same. Anne with 2 syllables.
Both sides of the pond, it depends if it's lay talk or linguistics talk. Lay talk calls the diphthong 'ay' (as in pay) a long 'a' - and in general defines long vowels, and their corresponding short vowels, by what happens if you add what used to be called in primary schools 'the magic e.' Short a in hat. Long a in hate. Short i in sit. Long i in site. Short e in pet. Long e in Pete. The 'magic e' lengthens it.
When you analyse those sounds phonetically, though, you realise the reality is a different matter. Those sound changes are more a spelling thing, not representing what actually happens if you lengthen those short vowel sounds. If you lengthen a short i, you in fact get an ee sound. This is shown in other European languages whose spelling is more phonetic than ours. And in international phonetic alphabet, this lengthening is represented by the use of a colon. /i:/ is pronounced ee, and is a long i. Lengthen the short a, and you get the sound like the vowel in a West Country accent pronunication of bath. Lengthen the short e, and you get a sound like the vowel in a Yorkshire accent pronunciation of 'fate'. Or kind of like the RP pronunication of air, for those who pronounce it as a monophthong, which many do these days.
As for the words with sometimes silent l in them, I also have heard some Brits pronounce the l in almond, but never in salmon. I don't pronounce the l in either.
I discovered recently (from observing a huge heated discussion on FB about it, and then doing a bit of googling) that Scottish people often pronounce 'palm' and 'calm' to rhyme with ham. It seems that in most English accents, both north and south, the l in those words is an indication to do a long ah sound, rather than a short a. Not like bath, where there is a north/south difference. The long ah in palm and calm seems universal in England (not sure about Wales), and only shortened in Scotland.
Both sides of the pond, it depends if it's lay talk or linguistics talk. Lay talk calls the diphthong 'ay' (as in pay) a long 'a' - and in general defines long vowels, and their corresponding short vowels, by what happens if you add what used to be called in primary schools 'the magic e.' Short a in hat. Long a in hate. Short i in sit. Long i in site. Short e in pet. Long e in Pete. The 'magic e' lengthens it.
When you analyse those sounds phonetically, though, you realise the reality is a different matter. Those sound changes are more a spelling thing, not representing what actually happens if you lengthen those short vowel sounds. If you lengthen a short i, you in fact get an ee sound. This is shown in other European languages whose spelling is more phonetic than ours. And in international phonetic alphabet, this lengthening is represented by the use of a colon. /i:/ is pronounced ee, and is a long i. Lengthen the short a, and you get the sound like the vowel in a West Country accent pronunication of bath. Lengthen the short e, and you get a sound like the vowel in a Yorkshire accent pronunciation of 'fate'. Or kind of like the RP pronunication of air, for those who pronounce it as a monophthong, which many do these days.
As for the words with sometimes silent l in them, I also have heard some Brits pronounce the l in almond, but never in salmon. I don't pronounce the l in either.
I discovered recently (from observing a huge heated discussion on FB about it, and then doing a bit of googling) that Scottish people often pronounce 'palm' and 'calm' to rhyme with ham. It seems that in most English accents, both north and south, the l in those words is an indication to do a long ah sound, rather than a short a. Not like bath, where there is a north/south difference. The long ah in palm and calm seems universal in England (not sure about Wales), and only shortened in Scotland.
Is the "a" in "ham" not an ash where you are, or in Scotland?
KarlLB, I* don’t pronounce ‘torque’ and ‘talk’ the same, not quite, although I can’t quite identify how they are different. I think I say ‘torque’ further back in my mouth than ‘talk’ and I slightly pronounce the ‘l’ in talk.
Another one who says torque and talk slightly differently, slight emphasis on the r and l in the respective words. Chock is a different word, completely different to chalk, the chocks that stop wheels rolling down hill.
I also say the l in almond slightly swallowed, but not in salmon. (Maybe southeastern England, but I have bits of accent from the south west, midlands and north east.)
In RP English there are, I think, three 'a' sounds. What's confusing is talking about a short one and a long one.
The short 'a' is as in 'cat. It's a single sound.
The long 'a' is as in 'calm' if you don't pronounce the 'l'. An RP speaker doesn't. It's a single sound. I think pronouncing the 'l' is largely restricted to the South West.
In RP this is the 'a' in 'bath'. In Northern English the 'a' in 'bath' is as in 'cat'.
As @fineline has said, the inhabitants of Bath, unless RP speakers, pronounce the 'a' in Bath as a longer version of the short 'a' in 'cat'. It's not the same sound as in 'cat'. The same people will probably pronounce an 'l' in 'palm'. That 'l' is a swallowed sound and slightly different from how an 'l' is when it starts a word.
The long 'a' in 'hate' is a quite different sound, and is a diphthong. It's also present in 'bathe' and 'Kate'.
Again, as @fineline has said, in some dialects that vowel is pronounced as a single sound, a long version of a short 'e'.
@NOprophet_NØprofit I think virtually everybody in the UK pronounces 'sowth' like a pig with a 'th'. How else can one pronounce it?
In RP, the vowels in 'wok' and 'walk' are different. 'Wok' has a short one and 'walk' has a long one. Both though are 'o's not some variety of any other vowel. There would be some dialects over here where the vowel in 'walk' might sound more like a long 'a', but I can't offhand think of anywhere the vowel in 'wok' would sound like 'wack'.
Likewise, the vowels in 'duck' and 'dock' are different. 'Duck' is a short 'u'. 'Dock' is the same one as in 'wok'. I think that probably applies to most, if not all, dialects here and not just RP. However, it's very difficult to generalise as pronunciations can vary widely within a few miles of each other.
Duck is a short /u/ in some dialects, but I think in RP is a central vowel, almost like /a/. I'm a bit rusty, but fineline will know. Same as butter. London, almost dack.
@mousethief, RP has the one below the ash: [a]. Though some pronounce it more like the ash. Scottish has [ä], so a bit different. It's further back, so in between a and ah, and is used for ham, bath and palm.
@Enoch, yes, that's true, people in the South West (or in the part where I live) do pronounce the l in calm if they have a regional accent. And the vowel sounds (to me) more like o, as in hot, so it sounds kind of like colm. A kind of mix between o in hot and u in duck.
@quetzalcoatl, u in duck in RP is like an upside down v in IPA. Open-mid back unrounded vowel. But I know what you mean, because in older fashioned RP, I think it was more open and forward, sounding more like an [a] - at least I notice that when I listen to Julie Andrews. And I imagine even now it probably sounds more an [a] to people in the North. But yes, more so with a Cockney or Estuary accent - if someone is putting on a Cockney accent, that is one of the things they do in an exaggerated way, making the u sounds into a sounds.
What somebody (or somebodies) upthread is trying to tell you all is that the term "long a" (long i, long o, whatever) is NOT universally the same across all English-speaking places. I was taught in Southern California to call the sound in "bate" a "long a", as contrasted with the sound in "cat" which was a short a. A bunch of you (but not all) have made it abundantly clear that you mean something totally different by "long a."
I'm bringing it up because every single one of you who continues to post about the "long a" as if we all agreed on what that meant, is adding to our confusion.
What to do, then? Well, we could do IPA. Or we could give examples each time. Or we could just carry on ignoring one another and driving each other nuts, which is most probable.
What to do, then? Well, we could do IPA. Or we could give examples each time. Or we could just carry on ignoring one another and driving each other nuts, which is most probable.
Carry on.
Or we could just drink IPA and forget the whole thing.
The long vowel thing is as Fineline explained dependent on whether you're coming at it as a layman, in which case the terminology is aimed at matching the orthography, or as a linguist, or indeed a phoneticist, in which case you're interested in the sounds. To the latter, a long vowel is the same sound (or, in any given language) nearly the same sound, but, well, longer.
In many languages these two usages pretty much align anyway, because it's a fairly logical way to organise your orthography. But English has a peculiarity; over a period roughly from Chaucer to Cromwell the long vowels all shifted, while the short vowels were largely unchanged. Google Great Vowel Shift if you're interested. The spelling of the vowel sounds didn't change, preserving a dislocation between the short and long vowels in English. Indeed, of the commonly called 'long vowels', only the sound represented by 'ee' is a pure vowel; the rest are all diphthongs. Meanwhile, the sound in food and boot (and the sound in foot and book) *are* pure vowels but get two letters to represent them. But not always; it's be rude to put down, erm, rude and put...
It's one - albeit only one - of the reasons English spelling is a mess. Essentially, written modern English is a slight modification of a particular dialect of Middle English as spelled by Norman French monks.
I can normally tell by context which one people mean, as they tend to give examples where you can work it out. Plus most people use the layman's one in this sort of discussion. Normally only in an academic setting, or a group of linguists chatting, or if you're teaching English as an additional language, is the more literal, phonetic meaning used. I am calling it the academic meaning, but I suspect for other languages it is the only meaning of the concept of a long version of a short vowel - I think the inconsistencies of the English spelling system make a lot of native-English speakers less aware of the phonology of language.
Anyway, I wouldn't use that term here in explaining a sound - only to explain the different meanings when the subject arises. It's similar to using vocabulary that has different meanings in different countries - I will find a universal term, or explain what I mean in several words, or use my term and define it, or put the other meaning in brackets.
Comments
As John Lennon once said, "If I give my heart to you I must be sure from the very start that you would love me more than her." He could mean one of two things.
If enough people say it wrong in the same way for long enough, it becomes right. Either that or go back to speaking proto-Indo-European, much luck to you.
(Well, not non-stop, but every once in a while.)
Well, at least I know some people do read my posts. SOUP (damn spell check).
Carry on, my wayward friends.
We have some in a neighbouring town which were erected as post-war social housing and are now listed on the local heritage register, and thus subject to planning restrictions.
Some not all that far from us were built in WW II and used by the RAAF as dormitories etc, and then after the War for newly arrived migrants. I don't know if they are still there, but I must check them out now you've raised the subject. Mr Curly might take a walk there, probably about a half hour each way from where he is, with some good hills in between to get him really fit.
You'll have heard of Florencecourt?
Not the same as prefabs – which also date from WW2 and were put up all over London and other heavily bombed cities to accommodate people who had lost their homes. They were small, single story flat roofed units that were meant to be strictly temporary, but in fact they turned out to be so well designed, efficient and comfortable (and in many cases better than the slums the occupants had been living in before) that they were still around well into the 1960s. I remember several prefab sites in my area of London when I was walking to school in the 60s. They were much missed!
Yes.
The model for Villa Firenze. Give or take a few hundred acres of Fermanagh (and a few other minor deviations).
Almond--I pronounce the l
Salmon--the l is silent.
Likewise in Australia
Ah, thank you. I was fixin' to post something really nasty about the others.
Agreed.
Salmon the l is barely there.
Solder has no L.
L weak but often present in almond, never pronounced in salmon.
Same here.
It doesn't apply to salmon.
Here they sound the same, and what we call a long A is the diphthong in eight.
The walk, talk vowel is shifted towards o by the now unpronounced l. Hence UK English has the same sound in talk as torque; rhotic accents would sound the r in the latter but the vowel itself would still be the same sound, and distinct from the sound in tock. The talk/torque vowel is long and somewhat rounded; that in tock is short and unrounded.
I was interested to hear accents which said "a duck on a dock" where both words sounded the same. Somewhere Minnesota I think. Also Anne and Iain said the same. Anne with 2 syllables.
When you analyse those sounds phonetically, though, you realise the reality is a different matter. Those sound changes are more a spelling thing, not representing what actually happens if you lengthen those short vowel sounds. If you lengthen a short i, you in fact get an ee sound. This is shown in other European languages whose spelling is more phonetic than ours. And in international phonetic alphabet, this lengthening is represented by the use of a colon. /i:/ is pronounced ee, and is a long i. Lengthen the short a, and you get the sound like the vowel in a West Country accent pronunication of bath. Lengthen the short e, and you get a sound like the vowel in a Yorkshire accent pronunciation of 'fate'. Or kind of like the RP pronunication of air, for those who pronounce it as a monophthong, which many do these days.
As for the words with sometimes silent l in them, I also have heard some Brits pronounce the l in almond, but never in salmon. I don't pronounce the l in either.
I discovered recently (from observing a huge heated discussion on FB about it, and then doing a bit of googling) that Scottish people often pronounce 'palm' and 'calm' to rhyme with ham. It seems that in most English accents, both north and south, the l in those words is an indication to do a long ah sound, rather than a short a. Not like bath, where there is a north/south difference. The long ah in palm and calm seems universal in England (not sure about Wales), and only shortened in Scotland.
And here. Universally.
Is the "a" in "ham" not an ash where you are, or in Scotland?
MMM
*South east England
I also say the l in almond slightly swallowed, but not in salmon. (Maybe southeastern England, but I have bits of accent from the south west, midlands and north east.)
@NOprophet_NØprofit I think virtually everybody in the UK pronounces 'sowth' like a pig with a 'th'. How else can one pronounce it?
In RP, the vowels in 'wok' and 'walk' are different. 'Wok' has a short one and 'walk' has a long one. Both though are 'o's not some variety of any other vowel. There would be some dialects over here where the vowel in 'walk' might sound more like a long 'a', but I can't offhand think of anywhere the vowel in 'wok' would sound like 'wack'.
Likewise, the vowels in 'duck' and 'dock' are different. 'Duck' is a short 'u'. 'Dock' is the same one as in 'wok'. I think that probably applies to most, if not all, dialects here and not just RP. However, it's very difficult to generalise as pronunciations can vary widely within a few miles of each other.
Sarf? As in Sarf Lunnon?
In Ireland, the further south, the more it's 'sou'dt' (the opposite of 'nor'dth').
@Enoch, yes, that's true, people in the South West (or in the part where I live) do pronounce the l in calm if they have a regional accent. And the vowel sounds (to me) more like o, as in hot, so it sounds kind of like colm. A kind of mix between o in hot and u in duck.
@quetzalcoatl, u in duck in RP is like an upside down v in IPA. Open-mid back unrounded vowel. But I know what you mean, because in older fashioned RP, I think it was more open and forward, sounding more like an [a] - at least I notice that when I listen to Julie Andrews. And I imagine even now it probably sounds more an [a] to people in the North. But yes, more so with a Cockney or Estuary accent - if someone is putting on a Cockney accent, that is one of the things they do in an exaggerated way, making the u sounds into a sounds.
I'm bringing it up because every single one of you who continues to post about the "long a" as if we all agreed on what that meant, is adding to our confusion.
What to do, then? Well, we could do IPA. Or we could give examples each time. Or we could just carry on ignoring one another and driving each other nuts, which is most probable.
Carry on.
Or we could just drink IPA and forget the whole thing.
In many languages these two usages pretty much align anyway, because it's a fairly logical way to organise your orthography. But English has a peculiarity; over a period roughly from Chaucer to Cromwell the long vowels all shifted, while the short vowels were largely unchanged. Google Great Vowel Shift if you're interested. The spelling of the vowel sounds didn't change, preserving a dislocation between the short and long vowels in English. Indeed, of the commonly called 'long vowels', only the sound represented by 'ee' is a pure vowel; the rest are all diphthongs. Meanwhile, the sound in food and boot (and the sound in foot and book) *are* pure vowels but get two letters to represent them. But not always; it's be rude to put down, erm, rude and put...
It's one - albeit only one - of the reasons English spelling is a mess. Essentially, written modern English is a slight modification of a particular dialect of Middle English as spelled by Norman French monks.
Anyway, I wouldn't use that term here in explaining a sound - only to explain the different meanings when the subject arises. It's similar to using vocabulary that has different meanings in different countries - I will find a universal term, or explain what I mean in several words, or use my term and define it, or put the other meaning in brackets.
The problem, of course, is that this depends on us all pronouncing the examples the same way. Ha. Haha. Hahaha.
Harumph.