Talk:Australian English

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Talk:Australian English phonology
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Talk:Variation in Australian English

Yoi

I came here to see any discussion of the pronunciation of words similar to "you" as "yoi" when at the end of a phrase. Can anyone offer explanations or further examples? 63.225.255.119 (talk) 03:45, 24 March 2011 (UTC)BP, Boulder, CO, USA

As an Aussie, I have to admit that I'm not sure what you mean. I'm trying to imagine what Australian sound would sound to you like something spelt as "yoi" in Coloradan. Can YOU give examples of the kind of phrases you mean? HiLo48 (talk) 09:32, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

As an Aussie living abroad, I have been told on occasion that it sounds like I'm saying "oy" for a long "o" as in "boat". But I have never heard of anything similar for the "oo" vowel of "you". —Felix the Cassowary 23:50, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Is it possible BP is referring to the way "you" is pronounced on such TV shows as Kath & Kim? I wouldn't have spelt it yoi but I could see how it might sound that way to American ears. ~ Brother William (talk) 00:21, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Reincarnation of Errol Flynn? (And is Kevin Rudd cultivated?)

The Variation and changes section tells us that "Cultivated Australian English is spoken by some within Australian society, for example Kevin Rudd, Cyril Ritchard, Errol Flynn, Geoffrey Rush and Judy Davis..." (My bolding)

My attention was drawn to this just now by an edit adding Kevin Rudd. Nobody would argue with a claim that his accent is more cultivated than his successor, not even Julia, but on an absolute scale, I'm not so sure.

But more obviously, our Errol hasn't spoken with any accent at all for quite some time. Should he be there? Can we fix the tense? HiLo48 (talk) 03:43, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm my opinion Kevin Rudd's accent is General Australian. The Cultivated Australian accent was often heard on radio and television commercials before the 1970s. For example; 1968 KFC Commercial (male voiceover),1960s PK Chewing Gum Commercial (female voiceover) and 1939 Menzies Speech: Declaration of War.

If you compare that accent with the way Kevin Rudd talks you can notice striking differences in the 'A' sound (in 'mate', 'fate', 'create', etc) and the 'U' sound (in 'you').

As an Australian, I personally find it heartbreaking that the Cultivated Australian accent has been dying out since the 1970s, so much so that today's children wouldn't recognise it as an Australian accent at all. This is sad because the Cultivated Australian accent sounds pleasant and intelligent to my ear compared to the 'Strine' and General Australian accents of today, and would very so like to see a revival the Cultivated Australian accent one day. But a revival seems unlikely in the near future as Australia seems to becoming increasingly 'casual' (in general fashion, in speech and may aspects). --121.45.122.126 (talk) 16:45, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the posters above that Kevin Rudd does not speak the cultivated Australian variety of English. A *much* better example would be Alexander Downer, who is often given as an example in other sources. If nobody has any objection, I will substitute Kevin Rudd for Alexander Downer in the cultivated Australian section. 123.3.164.7 (talk) 01:58, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Agree. Supt. of Printing (talk) 02:06, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Pool, School Variation

I wouldn't consider the pronoucation of "pool" and "school" like "pewl" and "skewl" to be a South Australian trait at all. I've personally only heard South Australians pronounce the words as such when trying to immitate eastern state dialects. Most people in South Australia would pronounce "pool" and "school" more like "ball" or "haul". Funkeystu (talk) 10:25, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I was always under the impression it was a Brisbane in particular, but also Queensland thing.

But the article isnt saying all people in a given region pronounce these words a certain way, just they they exist more prevalently in whatever region. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Saruman-the-white (talk • contribs) 07:53, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Clutter

This article is getting cluttered up again with details which could be moved to (a) subpage(s). JIMp _talk·cont 01:14, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

done Saruman-the-white (talk) 07:51, 11 June 2011 (UTC) shorter than us, canadian english pages now.

It's still getting cluttered up. The phonology section has been undergoing a huge expansion thanks to an annonomous contributor. I'm not saying it's a bad thing to add this info. I'm just asking why it need be here. The phonology section now accounts for about 40% of the article (14,912 out of 33,606 bytes). Why? We have a whole article on this stuff. Let's give an overview here and let those interested in further details follow the links. JIMp _talk·cont 05:29, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I propose to merge much of the content of the Phonological features into the main article Australian English phonology. JIMp _talk·cont 00:45, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I have started by moving details about the consonants of AusE. JIMp _talk·cont 04:13, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I have fairly substantially reshaped the section. Most of the detail that was here is now at the main article. There were, however, a few details which didn't survive. Things which didn't ring true, things unsupported by the refs, things which were unclear, these had to go. JIMp _talk·cont 18:24, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

I have just redone the coverage of variations; merging sections, moving details to the main article & summarising. Let's keep things uncluttered. JIMp _talk·cont 17:10, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

An anonomous 211.30.163.86 has just reinstated some past version of his or her preference with the comment "This was a much better edit. The page is now too short and messed up." The clean up discussed above has been reverted along with several other edits.

I disagree. Each change made since the past version had some reason. Is it appropriate blindly to revert all of them on as vague and general grounds as stated? I put it to 211.30.163.86 that it is not. 211.30.163.86, are you coming back to pick through this and sort out the baby from what you percieve as the bath water?

I call on 211.30.163.86 to justify the claim that "This was a much better edit." Justify each change which you've reverted. I can't speak for other people's edits but those which I've made I've attempted to give grounds for both in edit summaries and here.

"The page is now too short ..." claims 211.30.163.86. No, there exists no minimum size. There used to a recommended 32 KB maximum for technical reasons. This is no longer in place, however, guidelines still state "Even so, the total article size should be kept reasonably low". In terms of bits and bytes the reversion increased the article size by about 11% to 35,681 bytes from a previous 32,010 bytes (so close to the former recommended maximum). But, of course, a number doesn't do justice. This 3671 bytes is 3671 bytes of what?

To a large extent it's 3671 bytes of clutter. "The page is now ... messed up." claims 211.30.163.86. No, the page is now (i.e. since the reversion) messed up. 211.30.163.86 has returned the phonology section to its former state: a disorganised point-form collection of various (sometimes dubious) phonological features instead of the concise but complete (each phoneme getting a mention) coverage of AusE phonology organised into subsections for vowels and consonants written in prose and accompanied by tables. More of the same clutter was reintroduced in to coverage of variations in AusE. The variation in "school", "pool", etc., for example, being but one sentence, needn't have its own subsection (nor even its own paragraph).

We're again bogged down with too many details, details which belong on the subpages, details which either were already on the said subpages or were moved there in the clean up (except those which were redundant, dubious, etc.). We're better off with a concise overview here not a clutter of various details.

I'm reverting the reversion. JIMp _talk·cont 06:57, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Medway Towns/Rochester

There is nothing in here about the accents of Rochester and the other Medway towns. Clearly this is not a "Cockney" accent, yet will have had major influence on Australian accent. Worth making link between Great Expectations, and the accents that Dickens would have grown up hearing at the time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.254.147.156 (talk) 14:16, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Never heard of either place. Would I be right in thinking they are towns with minor dialects of their own? If so it might not fit in so well with the broad and general content of this article that in terms of incluences speaks of broad regions ie south east of england. If the influence was as large as 1700s Irish and Cockney, which are mentioned, but I dont see how it can be as ive never seen this written on, and because there is no way a large enough percentage of early settlers could have originated from two towns, is there any source detailing this connection? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Saruman-the-white (talk • contribs) 07:10, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I feel the same way. No idea what or where these places are. Perhaps if the OP could elaborate a bit? HiLo48 (talk) 08:02, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Also given that the areas we mentioned such as 'the south east of england' and 'ireland' were large regions with millions of people (and contributed very large proportions of the founding population), mentioning just two towns that could not have had more than a few thousand inhabitants (and could have constituted zero point zero something of the founding population) seems to be maybe just a casual observation based on the sound of those accents or promotion of the towns? It would be like saying the accent of new zealand was influenced by england, scotland, the australian colonies ....... and the towns of Gunnedah and Narrabri. Saruman-the-white (talk) 04:37, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Pewl, Sewl, etc, again. Pointless without IPA

This section makes no sense. It talks about pool and school being pronounced like pewl and skewl. (As my spell checker is now assering.) This is bad enough without saying where and by whom pewl and skewl are pronounced, but pewl and skewl aren't even real words, so who knows how they are pronounced.

I just deleted the section for this reason. User:Saruman-the-white has reverted my delete with the Edit summary "this is one of the most widely observed differences though. it would be better for someone who knows the correct IPA codes to replace it with those instead. it is talking about the "pewl" vs "pool" (rounded "oo") sound". Since I don't know how pewl and skewl are pronounced, I cannot tell what the "widely observed" difference is. Saruman-the-white is right in saying that IPA would be good. My argument is that without IPA this section is pointless. I don't do IPA. Anybody? HiLo48 (talk) 09:48, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree its stupid where IPA is used, but its worse to delete it. Better to wait for someone who understands IPA to put it in. because its one of the most dramatic and widely observed observations. and if you arent aware of it, "piule" might be another way to write pewl? although i knew what "pewl" refered to as soon as i saw it. as opposed to the rounded vowel of "pool" "school" as might be heard by malcolm turnbull as opposed to julia gillard's "puuuule". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Saruman-the-white (talk • contribs) 11:58, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Well I've lived in Victoria all my life and I don't understand how "pewl" & "skewl" are meant to be pronounced by spelling them in this way, unless it is rhyming with dual, as in "pyule" & "skyule", in which case, I don't know of anybody who pronounces them in this way! Most of what I hear for the pronunciation of these words is, as I would put it, the same as for fool, rule, cool & tool. Supt. of Printing (talk) 12:21, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

If what you mean by "ew" is the sound in "few", "new", "pew" & "hew" (as Supt. of Printing reads it), then I'd say your respelling makes some sense, IPA would be better but it would make sense, "pyool" & "skyool" might be a little clearer but "pewl" & "skewl" would work as a respelling. The IPA for this "ew" is "/juː/" so you'd have "/pjuːl/" and "/skjuːl/" but I've never heard this either nor have I even heard of it. If this "/juː/" sound (the sound of "you", "ewe" & "yew") is not what you mean, and I don't believe it is, then I can't say the respelling gets your point across and I"m afraid I'm not sure that it could be said to make any sense at all.

Anyhow, how did your source put it? You'd expect a reliable source to have IPA, right? If we don't have a reliable source, can we dig one up? It is "widely observed", right? If we can't dig up a source, then how best to put it is rather a moot point.

More generally, though, I'd like us to consider whether this is the place for this. We have separate articles for AusE phonology & variation. Let's not bloat this one with these minute details. JIMp _talk·cont 15:04, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

This little section is unsourced. It is written as if the pronunciations of pewl and skewl are globally consistent and well known to everyone. They are neither. Therefore, to say People...say "pool" and "school" like "pewl" and "skewl" has no obvious meaning. These two points tell me that, unless both a source, and a better statement than the above italicised one can be found now, the section should go. HiLo48 (talk) 17:13, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Source: this "australian voices" series from maquarie univ. seems to have the most info on regional differences. you can even listen to recordings from their studies. http://clas.mq.edu.au/australian-voices/regional-accents

it includes pool and school

thanks.

Saruman-the-white (talk) 10:15, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it includes pool and school, but doesn't mention pewl and skewl. I note the source doesn't try to explain the difference in words, but instead point people at the recordings. Are we allowed to refer to such recordings as a source? HiLo48 (talk) 10:23, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

That's a good question. My gut feeling is that this is a reliable source for the statement that there are differences in pronunciation of these words but we cannot go so far as saying what the difference is (unless we can actually reproduce the recordings). To make an attempt to transcribe them would be an exercise in original research, which might fail, as I believe "pewl" and "skewl" do. The difference I hear seems to be allophonic not phonemic (it's the same "oo" vowel (/uː/) just just pronounced differently, no one's adding a "y" sound (/j/)) ... but I'm no linguist ... and even if I were and I went and gave a full description of what I hear with IPA & all, it would still be original research. JIMp _talk·cont 13:36, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

well the source at least says "The vowel in words like "pool", "school" and "fool" varies regionally" in writing so if nothing else that can go in. although the difference seems obvious. one is a rounded "oo" (the sound in "yule") and one is a light "oo" sound (the sound in "loo"). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Saruman-the-white (talk • contribs) 04:05, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

The vowels in "yule" and "loo" are the same phoneme so no respelling can do them justice. The difference is allophonic; IPA (in square brackets, not slashes) would be appropriate but if it can't be sourced, as I've mentioned, it would be original research. The best we can do, therefore, is to paraphrase what the source does say: the vowel varies regionally. JIMp _talk·cont 07:12, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

soundbytes

if possible, i think it would benefit to have some sound bytes posted near the linguistic section. --ProfPolySci45 (talk) 03:15, 23 February 2012 (UTC)