Dialect?

[xstitcher]

Can anyone explain why Canada or other words ending in a often sound like Canader when spoken by some people on the telly?

[Peter Pedant]

There was an old man from Anteega
whose wife said my dear what a pig you are
He said O my queen
is it my manners you mean
or do you refer to my figure ?

[237SJ]

I think I might ask for a Peter Pedant dictionary for Christmas :-)

[stuey]

Peter, is the "u" in Antigua called a Schwa?

[BlackadderV]

If you can hear a T in Machynlleth then they are not pronouncing it correctly, Welsh or not. The "ll" is an alien sound to the English ear so the nearest approximation is "tl". It takes a fair bit of practice to replicate the true "ll" sound.

[Peter Pedant]

No I think it is a silent letter

the schwa is a the neutral syllable and is the undotted i in Turkish

if you think about the Essex bottle - /bo''ul/

the apostrophe is a glottal stop - sorry glo''al stop
and the /u/ is the schwa - neutral sound of which there are a profusion in English. IPA sign is an upside down 'e'

Anglo Saxon was full of final unstressed vowels which became schwas and then dropped off completely - - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final-obstruent_devoicing which I was looking at earlier on in the day

[Peter Pedant]

Blackadder I asked a few welsh speakers (I keep in the cellar)
and ALL of them voiced a 't' - both north and south welsh so I was forced to accept that they knew and I didnt

[stuey]

OK, Peter. A schwa is called a neutral vowel. Could you give me an English example? I'm confused as to what a schwa is.

[BlackadderV]

The secret of "ll" is this: When you pronounce "l" the tongue touches the roof of the mouth. To pronounce "ll" try saying "l" but keeping the tongue away from the roof of the mouth and exhale slowly.