Pronounciation of rebut
According to the Mac OS X's built-in dictionary app, the pronunciation of the word "rebut" is "rəˈbət". It is also the case on this site: https://vocabulary-words.com/rebut/
Shouldn't it be "rɪˈbʌt" instead?
pronunciation
New contributor
add a comment |
According to the Mac OS X's built-in dictionary app, the pronunciation of the word "rebut" is "rəˈbət". It is also the case on this site: https://vocabulary-words.com/rebut/
Shouldn't it be "rɪˈbʌt" instead?
pronunciation
New contributor
1
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago
add a comment |
According to the Mac OS X's built-in dictionary app, the pronunciation of the word "rebut" is "rəˈbət". It is also the case on this site: https://vocabulary-words.com/rebut/
Shouldn't it be "rɪˈbʌt" instead?
pronunciation
New contributor
According to the Mac OS X's built-in dictionary app, the pronunciation of the word "rebut" is "rəˈbət". It is also the case on this site: https://vocabulary-words.com/rebut/
Shouldn't it be "rɪˈbʌt" instead?
pronunciation
pronunciation
New contributor
New contributor
New contributor
asked 18 hours ago
bigfoot
1
1
New contributor
New contributor
1
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago
add a comment |
1
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago
1
1
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago
add a comment |
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
The "weak vowel merger": unstressed /ɪ/ often can be /ə/
In fully unstressed syllables, many English speakers don't have a clear distinction between /ə/ and /ɪ/. This has been called the "weak vowel merger". Most transcriptions of American English include the weak vowel merger, and generally transcribe the merged vowel as /ə/.
There are a few contexts where /ɪ/ is typically transcribed even in American English, though, like in the ending -ic as in the word static. I'm not to what extent this is predictable from the phonological context. In the context of Australian English, which is also supposed to show this merger, Cox and Palethorpe (2018) say "/ɪ/ is typically retained in suffixes
like -ish, -ic, -ism, -ing, and /ɪ/ often still occurs when the
following consonant is postalveolar or velar but this could
possibly be considered allophonic (or free variation) e.g.
paddock, stomach, beverage, manage" (p. 89).
Another complication is that some speakers who have this merger do use somewhat different qualities on average for word-final and non-word-final /ə/, and the word-final quality is retained even when a consonant like /z/ or /d/ is added by inflection. For speakers with this kind of "Rosa's" vs. "Roses" distinction, non-word-final schwa tends to be phonetically closer/higher than word-final schwa.
The complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/
In primary-stressed syllables, many English speakers don't have any distinction at all between /ə/ and /ʌ/. (Other speakers do report distinguishing stressed /ə/ and /ʌ/, e.g. in just "only" /ˈdʒəst/ vs. dust /ˈdʌst/.) If we assume that non-primary-stressed syllables containing /ʌ/ always have some kind of secondary or minor stress, then /ə/ and /ʌ/ are in complementary distribution for these speakers as long as we specify the stress pattern of a word.
This can be analyzed in different ways. One common way is to say that the phoneme /ə/ is phonologically restricted to unstressed syllables. But we could also say that /ə/ and /ʌ/ are not in fact distinct phonemes for these speakers.
Even if we don't actually adopt that viewpoint as a matter of technical analysis, the complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/ in the accents of these speakers means that we can unambiguously transcribe the phoneme /ʌ/ with the symbol "ə". Dictionary authors might choose to do this to reduce the number of unfamiliar symbols in their transcription scheme. I think that the symbol "ə" is more widely recognized than the symbol "ʌ", and most dictionaries are designed for a non-expert audience.
add a comment |
Your Answer
StackExchange.ready(function() {
var channelOptions = {
tags: "".split(" "),
id: "97"
};
initTagRenderer("".split(" "), "".split(" "), channelOptions);
StackExchange.using("externalEditor", function() {
// Have to fire editor after snippets, if snippets enabled
if (StackExchange.settings.snippets.snippetsEnabled) {
StackExchange.using("snippets", function() {
createEditor();
});
}
else {
createEditor();
}
});
function createEditor() {
StackExchange.prepareEditor({
heartbeatType: 'answer',
autoActivateHeartbeat: false,
convertImagesToLinks: false,
noModals: true,
showLowRepImageUploadWarning: true,
reputationToPostImages: null,
bindNavPrevention: true,
postfix: "",
imageUploader: {
brandingHtml: "Powered by u003ca class="icon-imgur-white" href="https://imgur.com/"u003eu003c/au003e",
contentPolicyHtml: "User contributions licensed under u003ca href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"u003ecc by-sa 3.0 with attribution requiredu003c/au003e u003ca href="https://stackoverflow.com/legal/content-policy"u003e(content policy)u003c/au003e",
allowUrls: true
},
noCode: true, onDemand: true,
discardSelector: ".discard-answer"
,immediatelyShowMarkdownHelp:true
});
}
});
bigfoot is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
StackExchange.ready(
function () {
StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fenglish.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f479199%2fpronounciation-of-rebut%23new-answer', 'question_page');
}
);
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
The "weak vowel merger": unstressed /ɪ/ often can be /ə/
In fully unstressed syllables, many English speakers don't have a clear distinction between /ə/ and /ɪ/. This has been called the "weak vowel merger". Most transcriptions of American English include the weak vowel merger, and generally transcribe the merged vowel as /ə/.
There are a few contexts where /ɪ/ is typically transcribed even in American English, though, like in the ending -ic as in the word static. I'm not to what extent this is predictable from the phonological context. In the context of Australian English, which is also supposed to show this merger, Cox and Palethorpe (2018) say "/ɪ/ is typically retained in suffixes
like -ish, -ic, -ism, -ing, and /ɪ/ often still occurs when the
following consonant is postalveolar or velar but this could
possibly be considered allophonic (or free variation) e.g.
paddock, stomach, beverage, manage" (p. 89).
Another complication is that some speakers who have this merger do use somewhat different qualities on average for word-final and non-word-final /ə/, and the word-final quality is retained even when a consonant like /z/ or /d/ is added by inflection. For speakers with this kind of "Rosa's" vs. "Roses" distinction, non-word-final schwa tends to be phonetically closer/higher than word-final schwa.
The complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/
In primary-stressed syllables, many English speakers don't have any distinction at all between /ə/ and /ʌ/. (Other speakers do report distinguishing stressed /ə/ and /ʌ/, e.g. in just "only" /ˈdʒəst/ vs. dust /ˈdʌst/.) If we assume that non-primary-stressed syllables containing /ʌ/ always have some kind of secondary or minor stress, then /ə/ and /ʌ/ are in complementary distribution for these speakers as long as we specify the stress pattern of a word.
This can be analyzed in different ways. One common way is to say that the phoneme /ə/ is phonologically restricted to unstressed syllables. But we could also say that /ə/ and /ʌ/ are not in fact distinct phonemes for these speakers.
Even if we don't actually adopt that viewpoint as a matter of technical analysis, the complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/ in the accents of these speakers means that we can unambiguously transcribe the phoneme /ʌ/ with the symbol "ə". Dictionary authors might choose to do this to reduce the number of unfamiliar symbols in their transcription scheme. I think that the symbol "ə" is more widely recognized than the symbol "ʌ", and most dictionaries are designed for a non-expert audience.
add a comment |
The "weak vowel merger": unstressed /ɪ/ often can be /ə/
In fully unstressed syllables, many English speakers don't have a clear distinction between /ə/ and /ɪ/. This has been called the "weak vowel merger". Most transcriptions of American English include the weak vowel merger, and generally transcribe the merged vowel as /ə/.
There are a few contexts where /ɪ/ is typically transcribed even in American English, though, like in the ending -ic as in the word static. I'm not to what extent this is predictable from the phonological context. In the context of Australian English, which is also supposed to show this merger, Cox and Palethorpe (2018) say "/ɪ/ is typically retained in suffixes
like -ish, -ic, -ism, -ing, and /ɪ/ often still occurs when the
following consonant is postalveolar or velar but this could
possibly be considered allophonic (or free variation) e.g.
paddock, stomach, beverage, manage" (p. 89).
Another complication is that some speakers who have this merger do use somewhat different qualities on average for word-final and non-word-final /ə/, and the word-final quality is retained even when a consonant like /z/ or /d/ is added by inflection. For speakers with this kind of "Rosa's" vs. "Roses" distinction, non-word-final schwa tends to be phonetically closer/higher than word-final schwa.
The complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/
In primary-stressed syllables, many English speakers don't have any distinction at all between /ə/ and /ʌ/. (Other speakers do report distinguishing stressed /ə/ and /ʌ/, e.g. in just "only" /ˈdʒəst/ vs. dust /ˈdʌst/.) If we assume that non-primary-stressed syllables containing /ʌ/ always have some kind of secondary or minor stress, then /ə/ and /ʌ/ are in complementary distribution for these speakers as long as we specify the stress pattern of a word.
This can be analyzed in different ways. One common way is to say that the phoneme /ə/ is phonologically restricted to unstressed syllables. But we could also say that /ə/ and /ʌ/ are not in fact distinct phonemes for these speakers.
Even if we don't actually adopt that viewpoint as a matter of technical analysis, the complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/ in the accents of these speakers means that we can unambiguously transcribe the phoneme /ʌ/ with the symbol "ə". Dictionary authors might choose to do this to reduce the number of unfamiliar symbols in their transcription scheme. I think that the symbol "ə" is more widely recognized than the symbol "ʌ", and most dictionaries are designed for a non-expert audience.
add a comment |
The "weak vowel merger": unstressed /ɪ/ often can be /ə/
In fully unstressed syllables, many English speakers don't have a clear distinction between /ə/ and /ɪ/. This has been called the "weak vowel merger". Most transcriptions of American English include the weak vowel merger, and generally transcribe the merged vowel as /ə/.
There are a few contexts where /ɪ/ is typically transcribed even in American English, though, like in the ending -ic as in the word static. I'm not to what extent this is predictable from the phonological context. In the context of Australian English, which is also supposed to show this merger, Cox and Palethorpe (2018) say "/ɪ/ is typically retained in suffixes
like -ish, -ic, -ism, -ing, and /ɪ/ often still occurs when the
following consonant is postalveolar or velar but this could
possibly be considered allophonic (or free variation) e.g.
paddock, stomach, beverage, manage" (p. 89).
Another complication is that some speakers who have this merger do use somewhat different qualities on average for word-final and non-word-final /ə/, and the word-final quality is retained even when a consonant like /z/ or /d/ is added by inflection. For speakers with this kind of "Rosa's" vs. "Roses" distinction, non-word-final schwa tends to be phonetically closer/higher than word-final schwa.
The complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/
In primary-stressed syllables, many English speakers don't have any distinction at all between /ə/ and /ʌ/. (Other speakers do report distinguishing stressed /ə/ and /ʌ/, e.g. in just "only" /ˈdʒəst/ vs. dust /ˈdʌst/.) If we assume that non-primary-stressed syllables containing /ʌ/ always have some kind of secondary or minor stress, then /ə/ and /ʌ/ are in complementary distribution for these speakers as long as we specify the stress pattern of a word.
This can be analyzed in different ways. One common way is to say that the phoneme /ə/ is phonologically restricted to unstressed syllables. But we could also say that /ə/ and /ʌ/ are not in fact distinct phonemes for these speakers.
Even if we don't actually adopt that viewpoint as a matter of technical analysis, the complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/ in the accents of these speakers means that we can unambiguously transcribe the phoneme /ʌ/ with the symbol "ə". Dictionary authors might choose to do this to reduce the number of unfamiliar symbols in their transcription scheme. I think that the symbol "ə" is more widely recognized than the symbol "ʌ", and most dictionaries are designed for a non-expert audience.
The "weak vowel merger": unstressed /ɪ/ often can be /ə/
In fully unstressed syllables, many English speakers don't have a clear distinction between /ə/ and /ɪ/. This has been called the "weak vowel merger". Most transcriptions of American English include the weak vowel merger, and generally transcribe the merged vowel as /ə/.
There are a few contexts where /ɪ/ is typically transcribed even in American English, though, like in the ending -ic as in the word static. I'm not to what extent this is predictable from the phonological context. In the context of Australian English, which is also supposed to show this merger, Cox and Palethorpe (2018) say "/ɪ/ is typically retained in suffixes
like -ish, -ic, -ism, -ing, and /ɪ/ often still occurs when the
following consonant is postalveolar or velar but this could
possibly be considered allophonic (or free variation) e.g.
paddock, stomach, beverage, manage" (p. 89).
Another complication is that some speakers who have this merger do use somewhat different qualities on average for word-final and non-word-final /ə/, and the word-final quality is retained even when a consonant like /z/ or /d/ is added by inflection. For speakers with this kind of "Rosa's" vs. "Roses" distinction, non-word-final schwa tends to be phonetically closer/higher than word-final schwa.
The complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/
In primary-stressed syllables, many English speakers don't have any distinction at all between /ə/ and /ʌ/. (Other speakers do report distinguishing stressed /ə/ and /ʌ/, e.g. in just "only" /ˈdʒəst/ vs. dust /ˈdʌst/.) If we assume that non-primary-stressed syllables containing /ʌ/ always have some kind of secondary or minor stress, then /ə/ and /ʌ/ are in complementary distribution for these speakers as long as we specify the stress pattern of a word.
This can be analyzed in different ways. One common way is to say that the phoneme /ə/ is phonologically restricted to unstressed syllables. But we could also say that /ə/ and /ʌ/ are not in fact distinct phonemes for these speakers.
Even if we don't actually adopt that viewpoint as a matter of technical analysis, the complementary distribution of /ə/ and /ʌ/ in the accents of these speakers means that we can unambiguously transcribe the phoneme /ʌ/ with the symbol "ə". Dictionary authors might choose to do this to reduce the number of unfamiliar symbols in their transcription scheme. I think that the symbol "ə" is more widely recognized than the symbol "ʌ", and most dictionaries are designed for a non-expert audience.
edited 15 hours ago
answered 16 hours ago
sumelic
45.9k8108211
45.9k8108211
add a comment |
add a comment |
bigfoot is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
bigfoot is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
bigfoot is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
bigfoot is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Thanks for contributing an answer to English Language & Usage Stack Exchange!
- Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!
But avoid …
- Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.
- Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.
To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.
Some of your past answers have not been well-received, and you're in danger of being blocked from answering.
Please pay close attention to the following guidance:
- Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!
But avoid …
- Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.
- Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.
To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
StackExchange.ready(
function () {
StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fenglish.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f479199%2fpronounciation-of-rebut%23new-answer', 'question_page');
}
);
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Sign up or log in
StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Sign up using Google
Sign up using Facebook
Sign up using Email and Password
Post as a guest
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
Required, but never shown
1
I agree that the first syllable should have /ɪ/, not /ə/. I don’t think this is a case of the archephoneme /ɨ/ (as in roses or enough). The second syllable is just a matter of transcription, though. /ʌ/ never appears in unstressed syllables and /ə/ never in stressed ones, so some (American) systems consider /ʌ/ the stressed variant of /ə/ and write them both as /ə/.
– Janus Bahs Jacquet
16 hours ago
The built in dictionary you’re referencing is probably the New Oxford American Dictionary.
– Laurel
16 hours ago