Yes, there are regional variations in American English. Do you know which accent is chosen by MW as the reference in the pronunciation keys. Is it General American? My problem is that, as I have mentioned before, they are indeed denoted

Sorry, this will probably be a really long post. My mission? To dispell false notions about American English First, we do NOT say "drug" as the past tense of "drag." It's dragged! There are only three kinds of Americans who would say this:

Spelling Book (Noah Webster 1800) and "Zed" vs "Zee" Richard Maurer quoted from Wikipedia: The American English form zee derives from an English late 17th-century dialectal form, now obsolete in England. Lye's New Spelling

How many Americans are aware that the "long 'o'"of Received Pronunciation is different from the American "long 'o'"? Some American accents have a "long 'o'" that is similar to the "long

I stopped reading Katherine Kerr when the same mistake was perpetuated in her 3rd or 4th book: she gave 'thin' as an example of voiced 'th'. This is from a book by Molly Gloss of Portland, Oregon regarding the Esperanto used in her

This I don't understand. What rule do you have in mind which might, when misapplied, lead to "erster" from "oyster"? You have a dialect where, say, "bird" is (bV"Id) and it starts to get ridiculed

Dylan Nicholson infrared: "Crèche", always in RobertE's UK sense, often retains its French grave accent and the vowel is closer to that of "air" rather than "mesh". In Aus. I've only ever heard it pronounced

the of helps, Dear Jonathan, I mean 'ay' as in 'may'. I prefer the representation 'eh' for this vowel. I have not learnt linguistics but I have learnt Pitman Shorthand, and this is the representation of short - long vowels

What I really wanted to hear was the "er" sound ... has always been "berled in earl" for "boiled in oil". He says "appointment" three times in the sound file Ben gave: http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5075/

Is there any reason why "posh" people tend to change the way they No idea why OE does this. I've experimented with the wrap settings, at 72, 76 and 80, and I can't get it to stop wrapping like this. Never mind. Many people (and