Talk:International Phonetic Alphabet chart for English dialects/Archive 2

message: "i or ɪ" etc. unnecessarily confuses the structure of the table.  The structure is: single IPA element on the left, multiple usage examples on the right.  The point is to find usage examples for each IPA letter, not to specify all possible variant pronunciations of each word.
RP and GA are, to some extent, fictions, in that they're well defined accents where each question has a right answer.  But they're still useful models.  If one person is pronouncing "city" or "goat" differently from another person, then the two people are not speaking with the same accent.  At least one of them is deviating, perhaps only slightly, from the standard, whatever it is.
More examples of words could surely be found where the IPA elements could not be conclusively determined.  They would be bad examples and have thus been left off the chart, but "city" does not seem to be such an example, given my memory of OED pronunciations and corroborating testimony above, i.e. "happy" = RP /ˈhæpɪ/.  And /e/ and /o/ by themselves as "diphthongs" in America is in fact an unusual and distinctive Northern pronunciation, not universal even in Wisconsin or Minnesota.  Rent Fargo for a crash course on that accent.
So, "i or ɪ," "eɪ or e," and "oʊ or o" are structurally bad for the tables, argumentative toward the concept of standard accents, and not warranted by the facts.  Three strikes.
That's the reasoning, anyway.  Angr asked for some discussion.  If there is a General American accent, then I think I'm a native speaker, or pretty close. 67.168.216.176 23:37, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: They're slightly different situations. The "happy" vowel was discussed above; this is a genuine change within RP. Older sources gave it as , while newer sources give it as ; this seems to reflect a change in pronunciation within RP, although both varieties are still accurately called RP. The  and  issue in General American is not really a difference in pronunciation but a difference in style. Some sources prefer to transcribe these vowels as diphthongs at the phonemic level, while others prefer to transcribe them as monophthongs at the phonemic level, while conceding that they have a diphthongal surface pronunciation, especially in open syllables. Since the main function of this article is to provide a quick reference guide for Wikipedia users who encounter IPA transcriptions in other articles, both transcriptions should be listed here, because both transcriptions are likely to be found in other Wikipedia articles. —Angr 00:25, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Traditional IPA transcription for RP happy is indeed , but the current OED pronunciation guide can be found here, and happy is shown as .  See also Wells's article, as mentioned in the "Length marks" section.  I think the evidence is that this /i/ is standard for transcriptions of present-day RP, even if its phonemic status is dubious.--JHJ 10:40, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  ditch "i or ɪ," "eɪ or e," "oʊ or o" 

message: I've been working on developing a standardized transcription for English, and a hover guide that would pop up over IPA text to make reading it easier for people not familiar with the system. This scheme would complement or replace the use of this page as a reference guide for people wishing to decode simple English IPA, or to write it themselves. A justification of the principles underlying the transcription, a long with some discussion of it, can be found at Wikipedia:Pronunciation, and the transcription itself at User:Gheuf/Sandbox2. The hover guide is being worked on independently at Template:IPA hover. Let me know your thoughts.--Gheuf 06:44, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I like the idea. The large majority of readers can't understand IPA and it's a nuisance to have to come to a page every time to check it. What confuses me more is that there are a variety of different symbols used for the same vowel sounds, and some articles even mix and mingle between them. The word I was looking for just now seems to use symbols that aren't even on here. Richard001 05:18, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What word was that? —Angr 05:30, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Standardized Transcription for English, a hover guide 

message: Hi all
I don't know if this has ever been tried or whatever, but I had the idea to suggest the inclusion of a pronunciation box, or some other link, to Wikipedia articles. I've seen a lot of articles with an IPA key in the first line after the subject, and it just looks ugly in an encyclopaedic article, we're not Wiktionary. There are also instances of alternative codes being given, e.g. both GenAm and RP (such as in the Mars article), which could be more neatly addressed in a separate box somewhere. I've mulled it over and it does seem like a bit of a complicated "mission" to undertake. Does anyone know if this has already been tried? Or perhaps more to the point, where a more appropriate place to make the suggestion is on Wikipedia? Kris 23:45, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronunciation box 

message: If I look at the pronunciation in an article, I assume I should be able to read it and figure out how to pronounce the word (kind of like in a dictionary).  But in most cases, it is just a jumble of funny characters.  Do I need some sort of plugin for it to work?  -- Mufka (user) (talk) (contribs) 02:01, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If it's a jumble of boxes, then your browser doesn't support the IPA characters, so yes. But if it isn't, then that's how it's supposed to be; IPA is a jumble of funny characters. -Amarkov moo! 02:06, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Amendment to the above: "If it's a jumbled of boxes or question marks, then..." —Angr 05:32, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  I'm not getting how this is supposed to work. 

message: From this chart it appears that tin and ring would be represented with the same final consanant in IPA, when they don't rhyme to me. I know nothing about this but I'd be very interested if someone would explain?137.138.46.155 17:48, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, tin ends with  and ring ends with . Those are different characters; if they look the same to you, there's something wrong with how your browser is displaying them. —Angr 20:51, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok thanks, yeah it must be a browser thing, I thought something must be up cos they're obviously different sounds. 137.138.46.155 08:32, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Tin-Ring?

message: What do you all think about including an entry for ɪ/ɨ, right below the one for ə? --Atemperman 03:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Scwhi as well as schwa?

message: Should // vs [] be added on this page? Also doesn't using [] usually mean that what type of accent is used should be described as well? -Ravedave 02:55, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  // vs [] 

message: As I see it, this article is a tool or guide for laypeople.  But it doesn't work very well because on many screens there are rectangles instead of symbols.  DON'T say that it is the reader's responsibility to down-load the appropriate software to make it readable.  That is 1)often not possible on public machines and 2) something we cannot assume the average reader is both willing and able to do.  It is the editors' responsibility to make articles that can be read almost as easily as a book is read. Basta.  (I'm talking about the main article, notthis discussion page, where things can be laxer.) Kdammers 17:57, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There is virtually no article on Wikipedia that is 100% usable for all users on all computers and all browsers. Should we delete all images because they can't be seen by blind users using screen readers? Should we delete the Chinese Wikipedia, just because not everyone can correctly view the Chinese characters (after all, downloading the appropriate fonts is often not possible on public machines)? —Angr 19:39, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Should we TRY and make everything accessible? yes. The symbols can be replaced by images on this page since this is the page used to decipher hundreds of other pages. The IPA page itself can remain the way it is. I will try and do so soon. -Ravedave 20:36, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, images would make them much more accessible, but mysteriously, they've (the characters) found themselves a place in my computer.  Only my browser, though.  It's the same with all of the languages listed as the largest other-language Wikipedias on our Main page.  No downloading of language packs, no availability of, say Japanese, or most of the IPA-specific characters in my word processor or IMs.  This hasn't happened on other computers I've used (perhaps because I'm a regular viewer(?), on my own machine), so the problem still stands. The Chairman 15:17, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

text: There was some talk at the Korean Wikipedia about using images instead of text for IPA; if you're going to use images, please add them instead of replacing text. --Kjoonlee 17:58, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: On another note, you can find a lot of IPA images at X-SAMPA, but almost all of them use an opaque white background instead of using a transparent one. Almost all are in the Gentium typeface, with approx. 3-pixel margins. The letters are about the same size as "22" in Inkscape. --Kjoonlee 18:05, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have posted an image of the chart (which is also handy for other reasons as well) -Ravedave 00:54, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Not user-friendly enough