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Linking in English/ Liason
I have noticed that some speakers seem to ignore "Linking/ Liason" (e.g. "She works in an old office" --> "She work si na nol doffice"), they do not connect the sounds at the end of the words.
Is there a general rule for this?
What you are describing is not liaison. Liaison is the pronunciation of a final and normally silent consonant in a word when that word precedes certain other words. Liaison is a prominent feature of French but is not otherwise very common among languages.
The only example in English that I can think of is the liaison of final 'r' in non-rhotic English pronunciations (such as RP) with the initial vowel of a following word (this 'r' would normally be silent in non-rhotic pronunciation). In American English, however, even this liaison does not exist: the 'r' is always pronounced if it is written, and it is never pronounced if it's not, no matter what word follows. Some non-rhotic accents go one step further and insert a non-existent 'r' sound between two words if one ends in a vowel and the other begins in a vowel, or at the end of an isolated word ending in a vowel. This is why some British speakers say "idear" instead of "idea." It sometimes sounds substandard to American ears (because it makes the speaker sound illiterate).
Mxsmanic said
>>the 'r' is always pronounced if it is written, and it is never pronounced if it's not<< this is not exactly true... how about the word "colonel"? I pronounce it /k_h3`:nl/ with a rhotic vowel though the r is never written.
<<Mxsmanic said
>>the 'r' is always pronounced if it is written, and it is never pronounced if it's not<< this is not exactly true... how about the word "colonel"? I pronounce it /k_h3`:nl/ with a rhotic vowel though the r is never written.>> Also, there is a very small class of words in rhotic American English which may often have no 'r' at the phonetic level in normal speech, even tho 99.99% of all other written 'r's are indeed spoken. One example of this is the word "surprise," which is often pronounced [s@"praIz] instead of [s@`"praIz] even by otherwise completely rhotic Americans.
Differences in cadence exist among the different varieties of English, especially between American and British English forms. The tendency in colloquial speech to drop the -d- in 'old' occurs in both America and England e.g. Brit. "Got any ol' Pixies' clobber gathering dust under the dresser?"; Am. "Yow! A big ol' bee came right through the window!"
<<Also, there is a very small class of words in rhotic American English which may often have no 'r' at the phonetic level in normal speech, even tho 99.99% of all other written 'r's are indeed spoken. One example of this is the word "surprise," which is often pronounced [s@"praIz] instead of [s@`"praIz] even by otherwise completely rhotic Americans.>>
Yeah - I'm completely rhotic, but I omit an orthographic 'r' in the following words: surprise - [s@pr\aIz] particular - [p@tIkj@l@`] governor - [gVv@n@`] |