Newsgroup: it.cultura.linguistica.inglese
Titolo: Pronunciation Question

Hello everybody,
I'm a lurker who loves this newsgroup! It really is one of the most
informative and entertaining.
Straight to the point now. I was told by a British friend that when
pronuncing "I saw it" the speaker adds an R sound before "it". Am I to
believe this trustworthy friend? Is there a general rule or perhaps
other examples which may clarify this issue?
Thank you for helping.
OTRboy

 other examples which may clarify this issue?
I'm not a native speaker, though I'm quite certain I've never heard it. If
it is uttered somewhere, it is not standard, I suppose.
Bye, FB

 other examples which may clarify this issue?
Can't think of any offhand. 
-- 
Mary

ONETREEHILLboy:

This is okay. It is very hard to hear the difference in any case (the
British /r/ being what it is). The rule is: if it is easier to say with an
/r/ sound between the two words (one ending in a vowel sound, the other
starting with a vowel sound) then feel free.
This is called a "linking r", and is only used in British English.
Consider words that actually do end in an r or r vowel, where the r is not
sounded, such as: door, care, four, car, etc. The phonetics where shown in a
dictionary will place the r in superscript or brackets, e.g. /ka:(r)/ for
car. So car engine becomes /ka:rendzin/ ... (except the /z/ needs a tail,
which I can't do in the NG!)
It certainly isn't incorrect to do so.
I hope this is clear.
Zz

 This is called a "linking r", and is only used in British English.
I was taught at school that a "linking r" is incorrect if the word
doesn't end in an "r" (like "saw").
This is what the aue faq says:
A further development of "linking r" is "intrusive r".
Intrusive-r speakers, because the vowels in "law" (which they
pronounce the same as "lore") and "idea" (which they pronounce
to rhyme with "fear") are identical for them to vowels spelled
with "r", intrude an r in such phrases as "law [r]and order" and
"The idea [r]of it!"  They do NOT intrude an [r] after vowels that
are never spelled with an "r".  Some people blanch at intrusive r,
but most RP speakers now use it.
I would say practically everyone in the UK uses this "r" in normal
conversation, but you wouldn't use it if you were a Shakespearean actor,
making a formal speech, reciting a poem or something of the sort. I bet
elocution teachers try to stamp it out.
-- 
Mary

 This is called a "linking r", and is only used in British English.
Can you see an "r" in "I saw it"? (witty face) An "r" between "saw" and "it"
would sound very badly to me.
By the way, leaving aside the linking "r", does the pronunciation of "saw"
change if it is followed by a word beginning with a vowel? E.g.:
"I saw John" vs. "I saw it"
Is "saw" pronounced in the same way in both cases?
Bye, FB

 Is "saw" pronounced in the same way in both cases?
Apart from the linking "r", yes.
-- 
Mary

 Apart from the linking "r", yes.
I see. Thank you.
Bye, FB

 I bet elocution teachers try to stamp it out.
Anything to earn a buck! I would show them the door at once. With or without
a linking r.
Do you think the so-called intrusive r, as illustrated above, is damaging to
comprehension? If not, I can't see your point. Is it for the grammar to
reflect the way we speak or dictate it?
Zz

 would sound very badly to me.
Can you see an "f" in tough?
Can you see the audible difference in bow and bow?
FYI
...would sound very *bad* to me.
Zz
:)

 Anyway, I hope it will disappear, as it is worse than "I must of", innit?
No, it is not. Think!
:)
As Mary says: it is absolutely normal in spoken British English.
"Must of" is appalling! FB, I could give you lines as a punishment!

 reflect the way we speak or dictate it?
It's a bit of class thing, don't you think?
A strongly emphasised linking "r" makes you sound ignorant.
Like I said, I use it myself, as practically everyone does, in normal
conversation, but if I was to give a speech, read out a poem, etc., as I
said, I would avoid it and use a faint w sound or a slight glottal stop
instead. 
I can't say it's something I'd really thought about till reading this
thread, though.
-- 
Mary

 ...would sound very *bad* to me.
Uh?
Bye, FB

Uh?
You wrote "would sound very badly to me" instead of "would sound very
bad to me", and he pointed that out.
Sebastiano
-- 
Your brain at this moment is composed of brigades of tiny Bolivian
soldiers. They are tired and muddy from their long march through the
night. There are holes in their boots and they are hungry. They need
to be fed. They need the Bolivian Marching Powder.

 A strongly emphasised linking "r" makes you sound ignorant.
In any case? So, provided that a linking "r" is compulsory when "r" is
followed by a vowel sound (e.g. "far afield"), should I pronounce it less
dintinctly than the "r", for example, in "run"?
Bye, FB

 bad to me", and he pointed that out.
Ah, apprezzo la correzione di Zz. Quando imparerò a usare gli avverbi? Bah.
Ciao, FB

 dintinctly than the "r", for example, in "run"?
In British English, when there is a silent r as the final or penultimate
letter in a word ending in a vowel sound, then you can sound the r to link
it to the next word in a sentence starting with a vowel sound. In other
cases, you can link with "y" for many vowel-vowel, "w" with a silent w, as
in cow, etc. It is just a matter of keeping the sentence flowing... You do
not have to think too much about this.
Zz
 :>)

 Quando imparerò a usare gli avverbi? Bah.
You will need to work at them! It doesn't help that in American English many
adjectives are frequently used as adverbs of manner. Also, a fair few
adjectives end in -ly and many adverbs don't. No rule here, just exceptions!
:)
Zz

 ha scritto nel messaggio
news:cec68562.04012...@posting.google.com...

It's quite common in the british spoken english.
Would you like to hear an example? Well, try to listen to a beatles' song "A
day in the life" (that's very nice). When Lennon says "I saw a film today,
oh boy" you can easly hear the linking R put between saw and a.
Bye

 and films are one of my main sources of the English pronunciation.
Or it might be 'cos movies are mainly produced in US... unless you carefully
pick only British movies.
-- 
Giovanni Bajo

 rule here, just exceptions! :)
No kidding. I had a hard time dropping "fastly" from my dictionary.
-- 
Giovanni Bajo

 You do not have to think too much about this.
Nevertheless, I do... Just one more, little, query about what Mary has said
("A strongly emphasised linking "r" makes you sound ignorant"): is, then,
the linking "r" pronounced less clearly than a normal "r" ("row", "rear",
"barrister"), or was she referring to the intrusive "r"?
Bye, FB

 pick only British movies.
No, but I possibly haven't taken so much heed of that.
Bye, FB

 :)
"Friendly", "cowardly"... Thanks for the explanation.
Bye, FB

 "barrister"), or was she referring to the intrusive "r"?
Hmm. I guess it could sound dialectual or out of place. It is very common in
Scouse, for example.
Without thinking about it (at all), I imagine the linking r works best
before a weak vowel sound /@/, as there is less place for it when the
following word is well stressed on the first syllable. Also, with regards to
Mary's comment, if the following word shouldn't have a vowel sound but does
due to dialect or slang, such as 'im instead of him, it would draw attention
to it:
For him
/fO: hIm/
For 'im
-->
/fO: rIm/
Yuck!
Like some people say /'fO:rEd/ or /fo'rId/ (/o/ as in hot) in various
dialects for forhead /'fO:hEd/...
Zz

 "Friendly", "cowardly"... Thanks for the explanation.
To continue this happy thread happily:
Some adverbs have two forms: one the same as the adjective and one with -ly.
The meaning changes in these cases.
pretty / prettily
dead / deadly
just / justly
fine / finely
hard / hardly
...
Zz
http://groups.msn.com/tefl

 (obviously) can't use them here! 
In realtà, anche qui si possono usare i simboli IPA, ma per vederli
serve un reader compatibile Unicode e un font Unicode, come per
esempio il Lucida Sans Unicode oppure il MS Unicode Arial (compreso in
Office 2000, download da
http://www.comelec.enst.fr/osmo4/mp4/tro/Arialuni.ttf
 , 23 Mbytes) 
Se leggi tutti i caratteri della riga che segue...
ɒ æ ɔ  ð ʤ ə ɘ ɛ ɜ ʌ	
BTW, con l'Unicode si può anche giocare a scacchi ;)
	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H
8	♜	♞	♝	♛	♚	♝	♞	♜
7	♟	♟	♟	♟	♟	♟	♟	♟
6								
5								
4								
3								
2	♙	♙	♙	♙	♙	♙	♙	♙
1	♖	♘	♗	♕	♔	♗	♘	♖
-- 
Enrico C
"The early bird gets the worm...
but it's the second mouse that gets the cheese."

Grazie Enrico.

disappointment at the end.
FAQs? Not at all. Some of them are chock full of good stuff. If you
are trying to learn a new programming language, the FAQ for it is
often a gold mine. I have the Perl and Expect FAQs on paper at work
because they're so useful. And the FAQs for games like Nethack and
Angband are jolly useful too. Also, in some newsgroups asking things
which are on the FAQ goes down extremely badly: it smacks of "I'm too
lazy to check the FAQ, so I'd like to waste your time". icli is
relatively forgiving with people who don't read the FAQ, but some of
the regulars on comp.lang.perl will shun newbies who ask things on the
FAQ.
-- 
Adam Atkinson (
gh...@mistral.co.uk
)
British Go Association: 
http://www.britgo.org/