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Great Vowel Shift

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Re: Great Vowel Shift

#171

Post by glup »

eointierney wrote: post #145
yesenadam wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vowel shift is a term of art in linguistics Aside: I see "term of art" everywhere on HN lately. Why?! What does it add to saying "Vowel shift is a linguistics term" or "a term in linguistics"? Why do people want to sound like patent lawyers? Am I missing something?

Terms of art are pre-scientific jargon that survive mainly due to utility. They are common in crafts such as pottery or the Law. They are references to heuristically derived conveniences. They're linguistically cool. In Math, lemma is a term of the art.

In linguistics, lemma is also a term of art.

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#172

Post by ahazred8ta »

QuesnayJr wrote: post #119
aasasd wrote: post #37

Moreover, there wasn't just one or a few shifts: they happen all the time and there were plenty of them. Apparently a big discovery in etymology (in 19th century iirc, and I forget the guy's name) was that words mostly don't change pronunciation individually, but the same parts in different words change in the same way. Which allows to track those changes over time and thus backtrack how modern words should've sounde…

Is this Grimm's Law, by Jacob Grimm of "Grimm's Fairy Tales" fame?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimm%27s_law#See_also

There were a lot of sound shifts.

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#174

Post by yesenadam »

JackFr wrote: post #131
yesenadam wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vowel shift is a term of art in linguistics Aside: I see "term of art" everywhere on HN lately. Why?! What does it add to saying "Vowel shift is a linguistics term" or "a term in linguistics"? Why do people want to sound like patent lawyers? Am I missing something?

It’s shorthand for “in context, that might not mean what you think it means.” I would use term of art to distinguish something that has a particular meaning for the context. For example “clobber” has a useful meaning, a meaning that many people use, but when programmers use it, it’s a term of art that means something specific and non-obvious.

Yes..it's a term in programming, a programming term.

None of these replies justifying "term of art" seem at all convincing to me. "Term doesn't imply a specialized meaning" – but I think it does here: if "clobber" didn't mean something different in programming, you wouldn't (need to) say "it's a programming term". "It's a programming term" precisely means "the term has a meaning in programming different to what it commonly means". The listener already knows it's a word in everyday English, which is apparently all "term of art" adds.

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#175

Post by tclancy »

adamrezich wrote: post #98

related, but has anyone noticed younger Americans pronouncing a few specific types of words differently as of late? I'm 29 and grew up in the Midwest, so in my accent, when I say "button," the "tt" is nearly silent. however, at my last job doing remote web development, one guy who was a bit younger than me (and also American) would pronounce it "BUH 'in," with noticeable "stop" between the two syllables. I have since…

Lexicon Valley covers these sorts of things regularly. And I think he takes ideas from listeners too!

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#176

Post by mehwoot »

eointierney wrote: post #145
yesenadam wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vowel shift is a term of art in linguistics Aside: I see "term of art" everywhere on HN lately. Why?! What does it add to saying "Vowel shift is a linguistics term" or "a term in linguistics"? Why do people want to sound like patent lawyers? Am I missing something?

Terms of art are pre-scientific jargon that survive mainly due to utility. They are common in crafts such as pottery or the Law. They are references to heuristically derived conveniences. They're linguistically cool. In Math, lemma is a term of the art.

They are references to heuristically derived conveniences

That's every word in existence

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#177

Post by [deleted] »

yesenadam wrote: post #125
eindiran wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vowel shift is a term of art in linguistics, so I'm not sure the pun would be worth it.

> Vowel shift is a term of art in linguistics Aside: I see "term of art" everywhere on HN lately. Why?! What does it add to saying "Vowel shift is a linguistics term" or "a term in linguistics"? Why do people want to sound like patent lawyers? Am I missing something?

[deleted]

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#178

Post by TylerE »

coolreader18 wrote: post #162
gchucky wrote: post #3

The vowel shift is one of the major reasons why Shakespeare's poetry doesn't rhyme when spoken with modern English. There was a rather fascinating video that went around awhile back of a father and son demonstrating the changes.[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPlpphT7n9s

It's funny, for at least the first example, original pronunciation just sounds like Hagrid from the Harry Potter movies, which is especially interesting considering that's intended to be a less formal/"lower class" accent. Reminds me of something I heard once that the modern american accent is actually closer to the british accent at the time of the revolutionary war, and it's the british accent that's changed more s…

I seem to remember that the closest thing to an old school English is a costal Maryland/Virginia accent. Which sorta makes sense historically speaking.

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#179

Post by schoen »

Scarblac wrote: post #143
mason55 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I still have many English words I know (and use correctly in writing) that I'm not sure how to pronounce. Do you mind sharing some examples? As a native English speaker, I'm so curious! Do you think that if you heard them without seeing the word you'd realize what the written form was? Or might there be words where you know the written form and the spoken form and don't realize it's the same word?

I once lost a bet because I couldn't believe "finite" and "infinite" sounded so different. But the best examples are in the poem _The Chaos_ ( http://ncf.idallen.com/english.html ). Through, though, throw, tough... I know a trough exists but I have no idea how it's pronounced.

Dr. Seuss has a lesser-known book called The Tough Coughs as He Ploughs the Dough (based on the observation that none of these -ough words rhyme -- the /tʌf/ /kɔfs/ as he /plaʊz/ the /doʊ/). (And yes, that's not even all of the sounds that are spelled by -ough, like /-u/ in "through".)

Trough is /tɹɔf/ and rhymes with "cough".

Re: Great Vowel Shift

#180

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

Bayart wrote: post #153
adamrezich wrote: post #98

related, but has anyone noticed younger Americans pronouncing a few specific types of words differently as of late? I'm 29 and grew up in the Midwest, so in my accent, when I say "button," the "tt" is nearly silent. however, at my last job doing remote web development, one guy who was a bit younger than me (and also American) would pronounce it "BUH 'in," with noticeable "stop" between the two syllables. I have since…

That sounds like the glottal stop you hear quite a bit in England. Bu'hu for "butter", wa'hu for "water" and so on. I've been in heated discussions with Englishmen arguing my pronouncing the Ts in the middle of words is incorrect. I personally hold to the notion that at the very least if you go to the length of putting the letter T *twice* in the same spot, it really wants to be pronounced.

That is the rule for RP. Lots of English are afraid of sounding posh and avoid it. Estuary English is what the elite kids speak these days so they can blend in with working class.
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