Message-ID: <4574C210.4080106@phma.optus.nu>
Date: Mon, 04 Dec 2006 19:49:20 -0500
From: Pierre Abbat <phma@phma.optus.nu>
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To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org
Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: Pronouncing "a"
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Nathaniel Krause wrote:
> Danny,
> 
> Examples like this are stymied by regional variations in the English 
> accent. The "a" sounds in father and in hat are quite distinct in 
> American English, and I would have thought they were in English English, 
> too; but, as for Glaswegian, that is a bit beyond my ken. On the other 
> hand, the "a" in father and the "o" in top are indeed exactly the same 
> in American English, but this a specifically American feature, so the 
> example of "top" is not relevant to other English speakers. Sorry about 
> that. Although many Lojbanists are Americans, "Lojban for Beginners" in 
> particular should be free of Americocentrism, since its two authors are 
> Australian and English.

I'm not sure about "hat", or Glaswegian, but I know an Englishman, and 
he pronounces as "a" in "father" a lot of a's I pronounce as "a" in "ash".

phma