nona the brit  +  396359 Wed, 25 Jul 07 07:38 AM Glad to make you smile CJ There's an ad on TV at the moment where a woman says 'hot' (same vowel sound) and the way she says it makes me laugh every time. She spits it out in such a stroppy and sharp way that she sounds like a terribly-posh-indeed 4-year-old in a mood! Just that one word,out of everything she says, comes across in a weird way. nona the brit Joined on Wed, Sep 22 2004 England Veteran Member 11,713 The name says it all. Vowels

	Orpheus  +  396377 Wed, 25 Jul 07 08:26 AM Frog? Clock has also that vowel. We have that vowel in Italian too. Why do you say it's weird? I think there is that vowel in American English, for those who distinguish "cot" and "caught". The vowel in frog (and hot and got, too) is indeed a typical feature of British English. I don't think you can find it in American pronunciation. Words which have this vowel will instead have /a:/ or /o:/ in American English. And I believe the vowel in cot in AmE is pronounced precisely like the vowel in father, while the vowel  in caught is pronounced more like the vowel in dog. These two vowels i.e. /a:/ and /o:/ are not the same with the vowel in frog and clock in British pronunciation. Orpheus Joined on Tue, Jun 17 2003 Jakarta, Indonesia Regular Member 587 'Truth is Subjectivity' - Kierkegaard Vowels, American English, Pronunciation, British English

	CalifJim  +  396379 Wed, 25 Jul 07 08:35 AM I'd venture to say that most Americans use /a:/ in father, cot, and caught -- all three. And I don't believe Italian has the vowel in British frog either! CJ CalifJim Joined on Mon, Aug 2 2004 California Veteran Member 22,389 "There are no facts, only interpretations" - Nietzsche Vowels

	MrPedantic  +  396750 Wed, 25 Jul 07 11:42 PM Would it be the first o in e.g. "occhio"? MrP MrPedantic Joined on Tue, Oct 12 2004 Veteran Member 12,592 ...opella forensis / adducit febris...

	CalifJim  +  396759 Thu, 26 Jul 07 12:12 AM I was taught that that o sound (occhio) was closest to the au in author (for those Americans who speak an AmE in which that sound has not been changed to the a in father) -- a sound nearly identical to the British au in author.  I don't believe that is the same as the British o in frog, no. Of course, I may have been taught wrong, but if so, then it would have been by a native speaker from Rome who had her sense of speech sounds (whether American or Italian) messed up.  CJ CalifJim

	MrPedantic  +  396768 Thu, 26 Jul 07 12:24 AM That's odd. I would do a pot/hot sound. (I always wondered why Italians winked at each other when I said "occhi".) MrPedantic

	Kooyeen  +  396779 Thu, 26 Jul 07 01:07 AM Well, maybe it's a little different, because there are several kinds of "o" in British English, I think, and there are several kinds of "o" in Italian too. It depends on the accent... Some vowels (produced by speakers form a different region) sound funny to some speakers in Italy too. However, the "o" in "clock" on Nona's website sounds exactly like an Italian "o" to me. I thought those who didn't have the cot-caught merger had that sound too... well, on second thought, it is a little different, yeah. But that British "o" in clock is the closest you can get to Italian "o", I believe. By the way, there isn't only an "o" in Italian (my variety, at least), there is another kind, similar to the starting sound of the dipthong in "more". Kooyeen Joined on Thu, Dec 22 2005 Italy Senior Member 4,969 Parental Advisory / Explicit Posts Vowels, Accents, British English

	CalifJim  +  396780 Thu, 26 Jul 07 01:14 AM Frog? Clock has also that vowel. We have that vowel in Italian too. Why do you say it's weird? I think there is that vowel in American English, for those who distinguish "cot" and "caught". You seem to think that the vowel in British frog is the same as the vowel in American caught (where they have it).  Not true.  From what I've heard, the Italian sound you're talking about (open o, I believe you call it) is like in American caught (where they have it) -- not like in British frog. In some parts of the U.S. -- not all -- AmE dog and frog do have the same vowel as AmE caught, but that doesn't make it the vowel in British dog and frog. CJ CalifJim Vowels, American English

	CalifJim  +  396785 Thu, 26 Jul 07 01:30 AM I would do a pot/hot sound. Actually, I just looked this up in a dictionary I have, published in Britain, and it recommends using the o in dog.  On the other hand, I have a book of Italian dialogs, published in the U.S., which recommends using the au in taut.  (Both for the open o of Italian.) Now I'm thoroughly puzzled.  Is British o (dog) the same as American au (taut)?  I've never heard that before.  I've always been told that we do not have the British o (dog) in AmE. CJ CalifJim