Canadians sometimes say that a difference between ''Canadian English'' and American English is that Canadians pronounce ''roof'' as [ru:f] and Americans say [ruf]. I'm an American and I say [ru:f] and I think that pronunciation actually more common in America than [ruf]. Those Canadians are just wrong.
I say [ru:f]....this is definitely the most common way in the U.S.
I'm American and I say [ru:f]. Most Americans I know say that.
The dictionary has two manners of saying "roof". Particularly I think that the English is not reformed, yet. So I cannot tell you how to explain without symbols. Probably you'll criticize(-se) the symbols that other dictionaries don't use alike.
There is a difference in the way the English and the Scots pronounce it....in England it's definitely [ru:f] I, like most Scots, make the vowel sound shorter and it's similar to the "u" sound the French make in the word "du". I'm sure most of you are familiar with the Scottish accent.
Isn't that just how the Scots pronounce [u:]? I mean, e.g., I was listening to the accent of some Scottish sports announcer on the BBC the other day and it seemed that all of his [u:]s came out sounding (to my Aussie ears) like [u]s.
Speaking for myself and my own local accent in Edinburgh it's definitely a shorter sound than the u: sound in England..... as I say more like the "u" sound in French, which phonetically I think is "y". So I guess it is more like "ryf" To your Aussie ears I guess all Scots accents sound the same... Hey, I offended a guy from NZ once asking him where in Oz he came from! :-( Sorry..I cannae tell the difference.
So, you're saying that Scots pronounce ''roof'' as [rjf]. That's impossible to say. No one say [rjf]. There are no words that have only consonant sounds.
Joe,
Damian said he pronounces the "u" like in French, so that would be [ryf] not [rjf]. Is that so hard for you to understand?
Joe means Jolanda. He's just a woman. Learn inglés, marica!
Damian,
Thanks for the info. Hey, what about [u] then? Are [u:] and [u] different in your Edinburgh accent? I guess they'd have to be otherwise "full" & "fool", "pull" & pool", "puff" & "poof", etc. would sound the same. If so how? What about other Scottish accents?
I couldn't answer whether or not all Scots sound the same to me. You see, the problem is that I've never been to Scotland (except maybe when I was seven-months or so old) and whenever I've heard a Scottish accent the full details of its socio-geographic origin tend not to accompany it.
Joe,
That's not what Damian was saying at all. He was using [y] as in the IPA which is not the same as Antimoon's [j]. Check it out.
http://www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA/fullchart.html
So, I guess he was saying that in his Scottish accent [u:] is more closer to the IPA's [y].
Let me clarify what you might mean by "more closer". Not trying to be pedantic or anything: it's just that "closer" (you wouldn't say "more closer") indicates some kind of comparison so we have to be clear exactly what comparison was being made.
He was comparing /u:/ in his Scottish accent to the same phoneme in English accents. He was saying that his /u:/ is closer to the IPA's [y] than the English /u:/. The same phoneme but different phones.
Note the different notation: this is to contrast phones and phonemes. I've been too lazy lately and not bothered to make this distinction. Please remind me in future. To see what I'm no about click here.
http://www.sil.org/linguistics/GlossaryOfLinguisticTerms/WhatIsAPhoneme.htm