Submitted by officepolicy t3_zsy4un in boston
officepolicy OP t1_j1av7x3 wrote
Reply to comment by ftmthrow in Does anyone else know someone that pronounces Cambridge with a soft "A" like jam? by officepolicy
I find long and short confusing because you can say a soft vowel slowly or a hard vowel quickly
ftmthrow t1_j1b48w8 wrote
I think the “a” in jam is harsher (“harder”) sounding than the “a” in Cambridge, so I find that confusing.
officepolicy OP t1_j1b4nxg wrote
Yeah I guess it’s all subjective whichever words you use, better to compare to other words
shanghaidry t1_j1c5pbo wrote
Vowel length is a real thing.
officepolicy OP t1_j1d9czz wrote
You can say a short vowel slowly though right?
[deleted] t1_j1dxbiz wrote
[deleted]
officepolicy OP t1_j1dy5d3 wrote
I can say both of those slowly. I honestly don’t see how saying those two vowels slowly shows which is long or short. Also a speech pathologist in the comments told me jam is not a short vowel (like hat, which I can say slowly just fine too.) Jam is a nasalize vowel influenced by an n or m after it
UpsNoDowns t1_j1c17e3 wrote
A bit hypocritical to nitpick at someone's mispronunciation of Cambridge when you won't accept long/short and are defending your usage of hard/soft because you find it confusing.
officepolicy OP t1_j1d8rwn wrote
What? I accept long and short vowels as a concept, I just find them confusing
angelabroc t1_j1dad1a wrote
I’m in the field of speech pathology so I’m just gonna jump in here, the a in “jam” is not 100% a short vowel (like in “hat”) or a long vowel (where the vowel says its name, like in “same”). It’s actually a nasalized vowel (influenced by an n or m after it, like “ran/man” as opposed to “rat/mat”.) So that might be why it’s a little hard to identify the sound in “jam” 🙃
officepolicy OP t1_j1daxyb wrote
That’s really interesting, makes sense that it’s not just a binary between long/short. Do you prefer using long/short or hard/soft? Or do you just compare to other words to disambiguate? Thanks so much for the expert opinion, häts off to you 😉
angelabroc t1_j1dblgp wrote
Haha i have to agree with other posters that its definitely typically long/short for vowels, and then hard/soft for consonants (hard g in gate vs soft g in giraffe, same goes for the letter c in cage vs. cent). There are a ton of technical terms/specifics for each sound that can be made/used in a language, but if you aren’t a speech pathologist or a linguist it really doesn’t matter too much! Rule of thumb for vowels though is if the vowel “says its name” in the word, it’s a long vowel.
officepolicy OP t1_j1dc2rp wrote
Ah gotcha, thanks! When I originally wrote the post I had just quickly googled “hard and soft vowels” and some results came up so I used that, didn’t realize it wasn’t the typical terms
CommonNotCommons t1_j1ccxqq wrote
It’s not that deep
UpsNoDowns t1_j1dt8ub wrote
It's really not but neither is this whole thread
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