User talk:AmazingJus/Australian English

Suggestions

@Awesomemeeos: Hi, thanks for inviting me. Most of your transcriptions look good, but there's some room for improvement:

• An 'unreleased' word-final /t/ that occurs immediately before a vowel is actually not unreleased but pronounced with glottal masking (it's an alveolar plosive at the beginning and a glottal stop at the end, but that's an oversimplification). Therefore, your pronunciation of put another should be transcribed [pʰʊt͡ʔ əˈnɐðɐ] (or [pʊt͡ʔ əˈnɐðə], I'll explain why). A truly unreleased /t/ is impossible in this context, you'd simply die from lack of oxygen (I'm paraphrasing Wells here). You must release the /t/ (in your case as a glottal stop, but that's still a release) to be able to move on to the word-initial vowel of another.
• I wouldn't transcribe syllable breaks, as they're superfluous and in some cases controversial. Nobody really knows whether words like either are phonemically /ˈiːð.ə ~ ˈɑeð.ə/ or /ˈiː.ðə ~ ˈɑe.ðə/. The alveolar flap that occurs in words such as data, variety, including, bloody, etc. is best analyzed as syllable-final because word-initial alveolar stops can almost never be flapped, but they can in the word-final position. Plus, checked vowels (in AuE those are /ɪ, ʊ, e, ɔ, æ, ɐ/ but not /ə/) require a consonant to follow them to close that syllable. Words like another or bloody have only one correct syllabification, which is /əˈnɐð.ə/ and /ˈblɐd.iː/.
• It's clear that stressed, syllable-initial /p, t, k/ are aspirated, i.e. devoice the following sonorant (vowel or approximant). This is true for all major standard varieties of English around the world. But prawn is not [pʰɹoːn] and including is not [ɪŋˈkʰlʉːɾɪŋ]. If you want to transcribe aspiration, you should write [pɹ̥oːn] and [ɪŋˈkl̥ʉːɾɪŋ], because the way stops in clusters such as /pɹ/ and /kl/ are 'aspirated' is that it's the approximants that are (partially) devoiced, just as in words like car or pork it's the first portion of the vowel that is devoiced (so [kɐ̥ɐ, po̥ok]). But hardly anyone transcribes English vowels like that, for a number of reasons.
• I also wouldn't transcribe aspiration because you don't transcribe devoicing of the lenis stops /b, d, dʒ, ɡ/, which is just as striking to non-native ears (and mandatory in many positions).
• Because of that, I'd also use the simple symbols ⟨v, ð, z, ʒ⟩ to transcribe the 'voiced' fricatives. Plus, the /z/ in has a variety and the /z/ in the sentence-final emus are definitely not the same. The first one is fully voiced, just as in kangaroos and..., the second one is strongly devoiced and the only way of distinguishing it from the /s/ phoneme is the length of the preceding vowel.
• Because you transcribe the PRICE vowel as [ɒɪ], I'd keep [oɪ] for the CHOICE vowel. It's easier to write, and its onset is very likely to be closer than the cardinal [ɔ] in your speech (but it may be as low as your Australian /ɔ/, some speakers have [ɔ̝], a vowel between cardinal [ɔ] and [o] for /ɔ/. But I think that it's variable). I think that you could also accurately transcribe the PRICE vowel with a more familiar [ɑɪ], as (very) back varieties of [ɑ] may have variable rounding in world's languages (see Geordie, Broad South African English, Afrikaans, Swedish and certain dialects of Norwegian and Dutch). But that's your choice.
• Another variability is the word-final schwa, which does tend to be as low as [ɐ] in Australia, New Zealand and Cockney. But I must admit that I've never heard a speaker that would consistently lower all of his word-final schwas. Some of them stay mid [ə], and this pronunciation seems to be mandatory before the linking/intrusive /ɹ/. You wouldn't say [ˈpʊt ðə ˈkɔmɐɹ ən ðə ˌɹɒɪt ˈplæɪs], would you? ;) Therefore, I'd write it [ə] in all positions, unless you're transcribing a particular utterance.
• Because AuE features phonemic vowel length, I'd rather not transcribe allophonic vowel length in words such as lid or pork.
• You got the stress in Melbourne wrong. It's initial in both cases. Also, I think that the second vowel in animals is a schwa in AuE, but I'm not sure.

Here's a book you might find interesting: [1]. Mr KEBAB (talk) 15:09, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Mr KEBAB: Thanks for all of that (I've corrected according to what you said). By the way, is there a dictionary similar to this one but not with the merry-Mary-marry merger or horse-hoarse merger? That'll be good. By the way, I'm actually quite proud that we have the bad-bat split - we have vowel length for the sound [æ], which I reckon is quite cool ;-) — AWESOME meeos ！ * ([ˈjæb.ə ət məɪ])) 20:20, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Awesomemeeos: Thanks. I've just fixed some of what you missed.

Maybe, I'm not sure.

The split is called bad-lad. The distinction between vowels in bad and bat is allophonic and depends on the final consonant as far as phonemes are concerned.

I'd remove Canberra from the list, because there's hardly any difference between AuE and AmE besides the possible /ɛ/ instead of schwa (but it's variable - see Forvo). The alveolar -> labial assimilation is optional (again, see Forvo) and I wouldn't transcribe it. It's a phonetic detail that may or may not be applied and I wouldn't expect to hear it in formal speech with any consistency.

The linking symbol ⟨‿⟩ is superfluous. It's understood that Australia has a variety of animals is normally pronounced without a pause. If you wish to indicate a pause, it's better to use | and leave connected syllables of separate words unmarked.

Also, do you really have a lax vowel in bloody? That's a very posh pronunciation that most Australians wouldn't use. Mr KEBAB (talk) 22:20, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Mr KEBAB: Ha, thanks for picking that one up. Yeah, that was kinda Pommy. Do you find it annoying that the spelling of English is very unpredictable? For example, ⟨through⟩, ⟨thought⟩, ⟨tough⟩, ⟨though⟩ and ⟨cough⟩? — AWESOME meeos ！ * ([ˈjæb.ə ət məɪ])) 01:25, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

@Awesomemeeos: Yes, but I'm not sure how that's related to what we're discussing. Mr KEBAB (talk) 09:13, 29 October 2017 (UTC)