Dr. Emerson and the " Guide to Pronunciation."Author(s): Samuel PorterSource: Modern Language Notes, Vol. 8, No. 3 (Mar., 1893), pp. 73-75Published by: The Johns Hopkins University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2918640 .

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I45 i''/a1-CI, I893. MODERN LAVNGUA GE NO TES. VoI. viii, NO. 3. 146

DR. EM1ERSON Ai\D THE "GUIDE TO PRONUNrCIA TION."

THE remarks here offered have reference to the criticism, by Dr. 0. F. Emerson, of the " Guide to Pronuniciation " prefixed to the 'Webster's Interniational Dictionary,' with my review of the same anld his rejoinder, in IoD. LANG. NOTES for Jan., Apr., and Nov., 1892.

In treatinlg of the vowels of a language in a thorough manniier, the first thinlg to be done is to describe them as what they are in them- selves, each in its own kind, independently of the graphic symbols used to represent them, and apart firom their sitLuation- in particular words or syllabic coinbinations, and apart from variations they may uncdergo in quan-tity. As thus viewed, they ai-e distinlguished one from ainotlher by characteristic qualities perceived by the ear, anid also by clifferences in the mode of formation by the organs.

Now we halve, in Modern Eniglish, certain sounids which are custonmarily called " long vowels "; and certain others whiclh are called

short vowels." And yet the so-called long, occuIrring as they son-metimiies do in uinaccelnted syllables, become thenl acttually short; as, the e in legality and the o in oration. Trhe sound of the e is still specifically the saime as in leal;- and of the o, as in oral; thouglh the shorteniing miiay cause a slight cl-halnge of quali- ty. The one is still called the long e; the otlher, the lonlg o. It is also the case that the so-called '"shor-t voxeo,les " are som etinmes actual- ly prolonged. Fhle reason for the established use of the termls is that the so-called lonig are coniceived as havin- a special congruity witlh long quantity; and thle so-called short, with short quLanitity. In fact, the so-called lonig are ca,pable of indefiniite prolotngationi with ease and withouLt change, wlhile shorteninig beyond a certain degree brings with it a clhange of quality. On the othler hanid, any great pro- longationi of the so-called short tends stroingly to wvhat Dir. Rutsh calls a deformiied pronutnci- ation. TIhe tenclenicy of the onie kinid to acttual leni(gtlh and of thie otlher to actual shortness will, of cour-se, take effect in the absence of contrary idflu(-nces. It xvas perfectly proper to describe the one class of vowel souinds as

naturally loaig," aind the other as " inattirally short; ' acin it xas quiite in orcder to prepare

the way, by such careful definition, for a clear understanding of the sense of the terms as employed in the sequel. If Dr. Emerson would have authority for this use of terms, he may find " inaturally long " employed, if I mistake not, in the sense as above explained on page 73 of the first edition of Sweet's 'History of English Sotunds; ' also on page 78 of 'Franz6sische Phonetik,' by Franz Beyer, aln able and scholarly work, highly commenided by Paul Passy anid others. The same phrase is used by Smart, and probably by other orthoepical authorities, and, indeed, may be found in ILatin alnd Greek Grammars.*

The naturally "long" conmprelhend all the ''narrow" (or " prima-y '") vowels togetlher with the diplhtlhongs; the " niaturally short" are idelntical with the "wide." The wide form wlhiclh Mr. Sweet finlds as the initial elemnenit in xvhat he calls the English lon- i is lnot, eitlher naturally or actually, a long sounld. Franz Beyer, on page I2 of the work above-cited, says it is the case in many languages, anid specially in the Eniglish alnd the Nor-tlh and tlhe Middle German, but not in the Frenclh, that length anid shortness rlln parallel wvith narrow- ness alnd width, so that lonig vowels are niar-roxv anid short are wide; giving, as exatmplies from the German, Bieyne, bin, S,c/u/e, Schzuld, iiber, iipbig; anid of the Englislh, feel, fill, pool, pdll. Alnd AIr. Sweet says, oln page 9 of the work cited above, and oni page 30 of the larger work by the samiie title, thcat iong vowels tenid to narrowniess alnd slhort vowels to xvide- niess. The plhysiological grotundl of thiis corr-e- sponidenice is niot far to seek. Inl proCdciLng the niarrow, there is a firm pr-essure of the sides of the tonigue a-ainst the opposite parts of the orgalns; and release of this pressurie- for the wVTide. This makes proloulatioii easy and natural for th( one, alnd lnot so for the other.

*The terms "natural," etc., as applied to the quantity of vowels, have bee"i, indeed, tised with various significations: in some cases, inappropriately or supelflUously, as it appears to me; in others, and this may be true of some of the in- stances above-cited, "original," or "originally" wottid ex- press the meaning more fitly thani "' iatural"' or "nattirally." By M. J3eauz6e, a leading French grammarian of the last century, the terrn; in question were defined as having refer- ence to the physiral laws that cointrol the movemelnts of the vocal organs, and tend to miake cer-tain sounlids brief and certain others prolonged; which view is in full accordance with the explanation given in the ' Gulide to ProsuLlnciation."

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147 MIarc/, 1893. MODERN LANGGUA GE NOTES. Vol. viii, No. 3. 148

In proceeding to consider the sounds as as- sociated witlh tlheir symbols, it became neces- sary to distinguish from the several other sounds of each letter those which are properly called their "irregular long" and their "irregu- lar short" sounds, and to clirect attention to the established, plhonetically abnormal, relation- ships between them, whiclh stand forth as a singular and a prominent feature of the language. It is important to remember that the relations, just as we now have them, wvere involved in the old, the so-called English, rules for the pronnunciation of Latin and Greek. Transmutation from the regular long to the regular short (or correlation between the two) may be observed in the Latin or Greek origi- nals of English words; as, in icIztcs comipared with cigens; ,-ed.iclio, with r-edz2co; conci,issio, with conc-Iiiio; cessio, with ce-do-or it may appDear in the formation of a new Englislh from one or inore Latin or Greek words; as, in regicide formn v-ex, regis; or againi, it may take place withini the English itself; as, in ,/io1og-aoNzy form blioIOgraiph. In all tl-he earlier wvords of the language that have come down to us, the vowel sounds as we nlow hlave them are, to a greater or less extent, a cle- velopment from a different earlier pronuinci- ation; anid it is in this way we are to accouint for the existence of the abnormal relations here in question. We know that the Englislh vowel letters had originally the old Roman sotunds; though a careful examination of the course of subsequent chanige makes it evident that the long and tlle short must even theni hiave assumecl the different qtlalities which we nowv distinguish by the terms narrowv anid wide. The long and the short a have both morved forward; the long a to the mid-front-narrowv position ; the shiort a not so far, and( only to low-front-wide. The long e has moved from mid-front to higih-fronit; while the slhort e, as mid-front-wide, remains nearly if not exactly what it was. Thle long i has been changed by diphtlhonigation, or guize, while the shiort i, as high-fronit-wide, remains nearly if not exactly wlhat it was. The long o remainis mid-back- narrowv, uisually with the " vanislh " in a hiigh-ter position; while the slhort o has dropped a stel) lower. Tfle long it las undergonie diphthong- ation ; at a quite early periocl it miay lhave

been, and probably was, colored by French inifluence; while t he short i has tLurned to a sound which I regard as of the mixed ordler, and which anyway has no direct relation to the long i. It has thus come about that the re'gu- lar long and the regular slhort of the same letter are at present, in every instance, of a quite different quality. The diffe-ence is not a mere variationl of narrow and wide: the two of each pair have come togetlher from quiite different position:s of the organs. Yet they have become so associated by use anid habit that to the commori nmind they seem to be thie natural counterpart, each of tbe other. WVe have here a featur e of the languag-e that surely would demand attention in a Guide to Pro- nunciation.

TI-e attempt of Dr. Emzer-soni to defend thle singular position which lhe lhad taken in regar-d to open and closed syllables is certainfly lamne, so far as the imieaniing can he understood. In such exan-mples as cai-e, bar-e, wve find, applying the historical imetlhod, that thle final e silent itn this general class; of words w-as originally sounded, thus mlakllat ing two syllables where we now have but one, ancd with the first of tlie two aln open syllable. It was as having place in an open syllable that the soundcl of the xowel W(as determinied; and the vowel has, in suclh words, remainled long, not because bUt in spite of the fact that it now stanids in a closed syllable. As for such ex,an-mples as /zair, ieaz-, etc., the vowels in these wer-e originally diph- thoongs, and therefore long-, thougih in a closed syllable.

Dr. Eml-ersoni brinigs againist the Dictionary, for discriminating- between the vowel in fer-, bi,rd, etc., and thlat in urn, wor-d, etc., the clharge of settinlg uip for a standard the opinlioIn of ortho'pists in olpposition to prevalent tusage; though the paragraphl whiclh he quotes in part goes on to say, referring to the waant of agree- in ,nt in the pronuniiiciationi : Thie unsettled usag-e makes stuclh diversity allowNable.'" Ihe pl in of the eclitors vas niot to dictate, or, ex- cept in clear cases, to lay do\wTn rutles; btut to statte all the facts, or so far as b)y takilg much p-ains they could ascertaini thlenm, both as re- g!;rds present usage anld the opinions of or thohpists, and to leaxve every on-e, in xviexw of these facts, to the guidlance of hiis oxvn jMdg,-

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I49 Marc/h, I893. MODERN LANG UA GE NO TES. Vol. viii, No. 3. I50

ment. On the special point in question, they believed that there was a portion of the people for whose use the Dictionary was made who would desire to lhave the distinction noted; and that the iuumber of tlhese, together with their grade of culture and social position, was suf- ficient to warrant the accommodationi to their prefereinces. On the questioni whetlher or not this method is " uniscienitific,'' we h-ave, on the one hand, thie clictumal of Dr. Emersoni, and, oni the other the deliberate adloption of the metlhod, not only bv the editors of the ' Inter- national,' bhLt by such acknowledged masters of lexicography as Dr. MIurray and Ihis coad- jutors of the ' Newv English Dictionary.' It is not necessary to exaggerate the defects of the pronouncing dictionaries, or to re-echo the too common misrepresenitation of their methods and aims, in order to lead people to welcome any properly conducted efforts, on the part of Dr. Emerson or Prof. Grandgent or others, to extend the knowledge of the actual facts. The discrimination, above referred to, of the two sounds is fuilly accounted for by the " his- torical developmenit." The two have graclu- ally approximated,-having had indeed origini- ally four distinct starting-points,-and only within a comparatively recent period have the two become at all confounded. But the study of the historical development will help little in determiniing the present usage.

I would not deniy that it may have become the fashioin in soimie localities to sLubstitute an a/i sound for the short o. But, on putting the inquiry to several "competent observers," I found no onie who regarded it as the generally prevalent custom. It is a deviatioin akin to that which Dickeens lhas puLt into the moulth of one of his characters in the forms, Gad, Lard, Jarge, for God, Lord, George. T hat, in somie of the replies to MIr. Graindgeint's circular-, the o was reported as uinrounded is no way de- cisive oin this point: an unrounded short o is not by everybody regarded as an n/h sounld.

As for AlIa/oioel and llo/zhamined, I can see no good reason why, after I had said that not any inotion of one of these forms, in Englislh, as growinig out of the other, had been either entertainied or ex)ressed,the imputation slhould still again be thrust forward, by inueniclo with the help of imiis(luotation. Thlat the precise

form Mazhonel owed its adoption, in both French and English, to the work of Mandeville, which was published simultaneously in both languages, I do not yet see any reason to douibt. The existence of earlier fornms begin- ning witli Alaih, but otherwise different, makes rather for than against the su-ipposition.

SAMUREL PORTER. ANational Deaf-MAulte College.

SO UI'A'NEL A

MJi?sie R?eg e eIli/oussu Laour?z.i

MlESTE Rge-' era d'Ai-anioi-ta, qtLe se trova proche de la Mar qu'apteloun la Mfar M\e'diter- rana, & Moussu Laouren era de Sen Laouren qu' es 'a un'aoureta d'ATgamorta.

troun dous ami intime que se visitavoun souvbn. lavie lonten que s'eroun pa vis &

Moussu Rege se digue, " Vai-t-en a Sen Laou- ren per veire toun ami, Mloussu Laouren." WT&n nartis. Lou Ion de la routa savi6 una i The words of the story are written as they are pro-

nounced to-day in the patois of the Canton of SommiLres, D6partement du Gard, France. I have used t! to in-dicate a sound between French mute e and the ~, something approach- ing the Spanish sound of e in que, in el. The quality of the d in the patois differs slightly from the French a; e n (ac- cented) should be pronounced pretty nearly like in in the French word inzention; en (unaccented) like en in the English word enclosed, only with a stronger sound of n.

To facilitate the reading of the story I will give a r6sum= of it in English: Two good friends are in the habit of visit- ing one another. Mr. R-ge on his w ay to St. Lauren finding an eagle's nest, nmakes up his mind to get, if possible, an eaglet for his friend. Unfortuinately the mother-bird sees him, and fasteiling her talons on him carries him out over the Mediterranean. The eagle drops him into the water, but although bruised he manages to keep afloat and calls for help. A boat comes to his rescue. The sailors, a suiper- stitious set, think him a devil, and in order to appease Providence, der-ide to throw him overboard. Mr. R ge pleads for his life, and seeing that he has to be thrown overboard begs to be put into a cask. His player is granted, and the cask in course of time is washed ashore. TShrough the bung- hole Mr. RWg6 secures the tail of an ox that has come to rub his back against the cask. Terrified, the ox runs with all his might, dragging the cask towards his master's home. In entering the gate, he dashes the cask to pieces against the curb-stone, thuis liberating Mr. R6g6, who finds himself at his own door. His wife and children, and Mir. Lauren, who had come to console them, receive him with joy, and he relates to them his adventures. Thanks are retuirnied to God for his marvellouis escape, and as the cock crows the story ends. I-oral: Let the world alone, and especially all bad people, because if you quiarrel with them youi never know what may happein to you

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