Tung Quoc  +  302379 Sun, 10 Dec 06 05:24 AM Please tell me the difference in pronunciation of /^/ between: Ago, bird, love Thanks Quoc Tung Quoc Joined on Sun, Sep 17 2006 Regular Member 870 Pronunciation

	CalifJim  +  302394 Sun, 10 Dec 06 06:45 AM In ago, compared to love, the sound is the same, but unstressed and briefer in ago. This sound, called the schwa sound, is also found in stressed form in words like but and cup, month and son.  Stressed, it is also called "short u". In bird, the ir together gives a new sound unlike the sound in ago or love. So /^/ in /^r/ is entirely different from /^/ in other contexts. Usually "er", "ir", and "ur" all have this same "R-colored schwa" sound (her, term, shirt, bird, dirt, hurt, fur), as does "ear" followed by a consonant (pearl, earth, learn, heard), and "or" preceded by "w" (work, worm, worth). These comments apply to American English. CJ CalifJim Joined on Mon, Aug 2 2004 California Veteran Member 22,128 "There are no facts, only interpretations" - Nietzsche Consonants, American English

	Tung Quoc  +  302417 Sun, 10 Dec 06 08:33 AM Please tell me the difference in pronunciation of /^/ between:   love and young   Thanks Quoc Tung Quoc Pronunciation

	Tung Quoc  +  302418 Sun, 10 Dec 06 08:39 AM Hi, 1/  Stressed, it is also called "short u". It = the sound in "ago". Right? 2/ In bird, the ir together gives a new sound unlike the sound in ago or love. So /^/ in /^r/ is entirely different from /^/ in other contexts. Usually "er", "ir", and "ur" all have this same "R-colored schwa" sound (her, term, shirt, bird, dirt, hurt, fur), as does "ear" followed by a consonant (pearl, earth, learn, heard), and "or" preceded by "w" (work, worm, worth). How can I pronounce this sound? (/^/ in "bird", "her", "worm", "learn"...)? How to distinguish this sound with  /^/ in "love" ? Quoc Tung Quoc Consonants

	Kooyeen  +  302482 Sun, 10 Dec 06 02:51 PM  Tung Quoc wrote: How can I pronounce this sound? (/^/ in "bird", "her", "worm", "learn"...)? You need to hear that sound and try to imitate it. Listen to the pronunciation in some dictionaries (Merriam Webster pronunciations are available online at http://www.m-w.com/ ) As for young and love, I pronounce them using the same uh sound ( yuh-ng, luh-v), and my dictionaries don't distinguish those sounds as well. I'm not a native speaker though Kooyeen Joined on Thu, Dec 22 2005 Italy Senior Member 4,933 Parental Advisory / Explicit Posts Pronunciation

	Marvin A.  +  302524 Sun, 10 Dec 06 04:15 PM I also pronounce "young" and "love" with the same vowel. The reason that "love" has an "o" in Modern and Middle English is because: "The pronunciation of written o in son, love, come, etc. is due to Norman spelling conventions prohibiting writing of u before v, m, n due to the graphical confusion that would result. (v, u, n were identically written with two minims in Norman handwriting; w was written as two u letters; m was written with three minims, hence mm looked like vun, nvu, uvu, etc.)" http://www.bibliodata.com/article/orthography.htm Marvin A. Joined on Fri, Dec 8 2006 Regular Member 638 Vowels, Pronunciation, Articles, Spelling

	CalifJim  +  303318 Wed, 13 Dec 06 04:31 AM Stressed, it is also called "short u".  It = the sound in "ago". Right? Yes! How can I pronounce this sound? (/^/ in "bird", "her", "worm", "learn"...)?  How to distinguish this sound with  /^/ in "love" ? Only by imitating what you hear.  Listen as suggested in previous posts. love and young both have the same sound /^/. (Words where "ou" is /^/: young, touch, country, cousin, double, trouble, couple, southern, southerly, rough, tough, enough Words where "ove" is /^v/: above, dove, glove, love, shove, cover, govern, government, hover, lover, plover, shovel, hovel, oven, coven, sloven(ly), Coventry, covet) CJ CalifJim