"hiring" and "high ring"?

Guest   Thu Jan 18, 2007 11:46 pm GMT
Would you pronounce "high ring" the same as you pronounce "hiring"?
Travis   Thu Jan 18, 2007 11:52 pm GMT
No, as for me these are:

"high ring" : [%ha:I"RI:~N]
"hiring" : ["h@:IRI:~N]
User   Fri Jan 19, 2007 2:42 am GMT
No. The first one has two syllables: high ring. It ends in -ing. In the second one, there are three syllables, the first "high", the second "er", and the third rather than -ing, becomes "een".
Guest   Fri Jan 19, 2007 2:44 am GMT
I have the "een" thing too.

Also:

runneen

soakeen

fighteen
User   Fri Jan 19, 2007 2:51 am GMT
>> I have the "een" thing too.

Also:

runneen

soakeen

fighteen<<

Cool. Are you a fellow Pacific Northwesterner?
Guest   Fri Jan 19, 2007 3:50 am GMT
Yeah.
Guest   Fri Jan 19, 2007 7:50 am GMT
Yep, said the same way.
Lazar   Fri Jan 19, 2007 7:49 pm GMT
<<Would you pronounce "high ring" the same as you pronounce "hiring"?>>

Nope. "Hiring" has three syllables for me.

"high ring": ["haI.%r\IN]
"hiring": ["haI.@`.IN]
Ryan   Sat Jan 20, 2007 11:57 pm GMT
I used Canadian raising on "hiring" (even though I'm an American). High ring has no raising.
Uriel   Sun Jan 21, 2007 2:12 am GMT
They sound the same to me. I only use two syllables.
User   Sun Jan 21, 2007 4:20 pm GMT
I just noticed that sometimes I do use 2 syllables. But they're always distinct, because "hiring" is "highreen", which sounds way different than -ing.

Putting -ing rather than -een on "hiring" really sounds peculiar. Just because it's spelt that way doesn't mean it's supposed to be pronounced like that.
Lazar   Sun Jan 21, 2007 4:52 pm GMT
<<Putting -ing rather than -een on "hiring" really sounds peculiar. Just because it's spelt that way doesn't mean it's supposed to be pronounced like that.>>

But it's pronounced like that in my dialect. To me, "hireen" is the version that sounds peculiar. ;-)

Anyway, we've established that there's actually 3 different ways to distinguish "hiring" and "high ring" (disregarding the issue of stress).

Syllable count:

hiring - ["haI@`IN]
high ring - ["haI %rIN]

Canadian raising:

hiring - ["h@IrIN]
high ring - ["haI %rIN]

-ing raising:

hiring - ["haIrin]
high ring - ["haI %rIN]

I suppose if you aimed for maximum distinction, you could combine the three, lol.

hiring - ["h@I@`in]
high ring - ["haI %rIN]
Uriel   Sun Jan 21, 2007 11:03 pm GMT
I don't change -ing to "een". In rapid speech or when I'm gettin' down with my westernicity, I might change certain -ing words to -in (short I, no G), but that doesn't generally happen with the word "hiring".
Travis   Mon Jan 22, 2007 12:16 am GMT
>>I don't change -ing to "een". In rapid speech or when I'm gettin' down with my westernicity, I might change certain -ing words to -in (short I, no G), but that doesn't generally happen with the word "hiring".<<

I as well *never* pronounce -ing as [i~:n] (aka "een"), which sounds really weird to my ears, to say the least. I, on the other hand, do frequently pronounce -ing as [I~:n] (aka "in") or just [n=] in informal speech in general.
Lazar   Mon Jan 22, 2007 12:19 am GMT
Like Travis and Uriel, I often pronounce -ing as [IN] or [n=] ("in") in casual speech, but I never say [in] ("een").