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Pronunciation of Guess

Chris   Fri Jun 23, 2006 3:56 am GMT

How do you pronounce the word guess? I pronounce it as [gIs]. Is this the General American pronunciation?

Guest   Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:09 am GMT

[gEs]

Kirk   Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:23 am GMT

Really? I pronounce "guess" as [gEs] (or a somewhat lowered [E] given my California Vowel Shifted vowels).

Travis   Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:24 am GMT

Same here in Milwaukee, WI; [gEs] is the normal pronunciation by far of "guess" here.

Chris   Fri Jun 23, 2006 3:15 pm GMT

Wow! Outnumbered... What is wrong with me? I must sound quite odd... Something funny is going on with my [I]'s and [E]'s. Is it some sort of weird merger or something that I have? guess [gIs] guest [gIst] guesthouse [gIsthaUs] guestroom [gIstrum] when/win [wIn] windy/Wendy [wIndi] Welcome to Wendy's [wIndiz] get [gIt] but inexplicably: pin [pIn] vs. pen [pEn] bin [bIn] vs. bend [bEnd] wind [wInd] vs. wend [wEnd] wed [wEd] said [sEd] Kent [kEnt] felt [fElt] winter [wInt@`] vs. went [wEnt] sell [sEl] vs. sill [sIl] and... milk [mIlk] vs silk [sIlk] Seriously, when I went to the Netherlands, and saw the cartons of "melk", I thought to myself, "They spell it like it's pronounced, why don't we?" I've never noticed any other pronunciations, and no one has ever corrected me. The funny thing is that when/if someone pronounces them differently I've never noticed the difference, either. I remember, back in the day, when they had Windows 3.1... and I couldn't start it. Someone told me "all you have to do is type [wIn]." (at the DOS prompt) And so I did: when and it kept saying: "Bad Command or filename." The other funny thing is I don't ever remember hearing any unusual pronunciations of those above words, so either everyone pronounces them as I do...or somehow I perceived them to be the same, and therefore didn't notice the difference. Before now, I assumed that "when" and "win" were pronounced the same way just like "cot"/"caught", etc.--just another spelling irregularity. But I certainly don't pronounce or even perceive "pin" and "pen" to be the same or even close. I'm trying to learn to speak General American because I want to become an actor. I never knew I had such a strong accent before though.

Kirk   Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:35 pm GMT

<milk [mIlk] vs silk [sIlk] Seriously, when I went to the Netherlands, and saw the cartons of "melk", I thought to myself, "They spell it like it's pronounced, why don't we?" I've never noticed any other pronunciations, and no one has ever corrected me. >> Wait, then don't you mean you have [E] for "milk" and [I] for "silk?" We've talked about this here before but I do that, too. Some of us also talked about it here: http://www.langcafe.net/viewtopic.php?t=817 << The other funny thing is I don't ever remember hearing any unusual pronunciations of those above words, so either everyone pronounces them as I do...or somehow I perceived them to be the same, and therefore didn't notice the difference. Before now, I assumed that "when" and "win" were pronounced the same way just like "cot"/"caught", etc.--just another spelling irregularity. But I certainly don't pronounce or even perceive "pin" and "pen" to be the same or even close. >> Same with me. In normal speech I pronounce "when" and "win" the same, but I'm definitely not "pen-pin" merged. I think it's because at least for me such high-frequency words with unemphatic [En] tend to become [In]. The other one I can think of where I can also have [In] is "went." This lies in contrast to "wend" or "end" or "bent" which are always with [E] for me. I think it's roughly analogous to the difference many people have between "our" [Ar\] and "hour" [aUr\] or "I'll" [A5] and "aisle" [aI5]--the high-frequency function words are often most susceptible to vowel differences or leveling while their near-identical but less-common counterparts don't have a change. Thus it's not indicative of a true vowel change or shift (as would be the case with my own "cot-caught" or "Mary-merry-marry" merging which is 100% of the time in all possible positions). However, I definitely don't have the [gIs] or [gIt] thing you do so who knows where those came from. Where are you from, again? <<I'm trying to learn to speak General American because I want to become an actor. I never knew I had such a strong accent before though.>> The things you mention are probably not that noticeable to most people. Now if you had a Southern monophthongized [aI:z] for "eyes," or traditional Boston-like [k_ha:] for "car" you might want to work on changing those when putting on a GenAm accent because those are immediately noticeable. But few people notice even true "pen-pin" mergers, which you're not.

Kirk   Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:36 pm GMT

<<Now if you had a Southern monophthongized [aI:z] for "eyes," >> Whoops. I meant [a:z] there. Sorry for the confusion.