词汇大师(Wordmaster)--Sound Change, Part 1

First broadcast: January 12, 2005

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: the sounds of change.

RS: If you want a good example of how language changes, just picture a "mouse." Are you thinking of a rodent¹ -- or a device for moving the cursor on a computer screen?

AA: Shifts in language also involve pronunciation. In fact, our friend Ali the English teacher in Iran suggested this topic, since regional dialects can be confusing for English learners.

RS: Native speakers, too. If someone in Chicago offered us some "sacks," we might think it was for carrying our groceries, not for keeping our feet warm. "Sacks" is how Chicagoans pronounce what we call "socks."

AA: The linguist² William Labov at the University of Pennsylvania cites this example of a sound change in the United States called the "Northern Cities Shift."

WILLIAM LABOV: "Now what happens here is the short-a becomes 'ai' [like in "yeah"] in every single word, so that people have, say, 'theaht' and 'feahct'. In the meantime, the short words spelled with short-o like 'socks' or 'block' or 'cot' move into the position that was formerly³ occupied by 'ah.' So the man's name [John becomes] 'Jahn' -- that's a man's name, 'Jahn.' And the girl's name [Jan] becomes 'Jain.' So this is like a game of musical chairs. We call it chain shifting, in which five or six vowels⁴ all change places."

RS: William Labov and other researchers have been tracking sound changes for a big project, the Atlas⁵ of North American English, to be published in a few months.

WILLIAM LABOV: "Well, American dialects have been studied for a hundred years or so. But unlike European countries, America has never finished a map of the United States, only the eastern United States is covered and a few spots here and there. So we included both Canada and the United States in a study we started in 1992. And in about six years we covered the entire continent using a telephone survey of all the urbanized areas, the big cities. So it covers about two-thirds of the population of North America, and it represents them with about 800 speakers.

"And what's most remarkable⁶ is that the rapidly changing dialects of the United States form a very solid, clear picture. And instead of getting a pepper-and-salt effect, we find very clear and sharp divisions between the dialects of the United States, which are getting more different from each other as time goes on. The most important differences have developed in this huge area around the Great Lakes region which we call the Inland North, going from Buffalo⁷, Syracuse, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee. Those great cities occupying about 35 million people are all moving in a very different direction from the rest of the United States."

RS: "How do you go about describing how people talk? How do you put together an atlas -- you have to actually hear the people talk."

WILLIAM LABOV: "Well, yes, our Web site is in construction now, is being created by people at the University of Marburg [in Germany], is going to be quite a remarkable innovation in dialectology because on this Web site you will see the maps, you will see all the cities. And when you click on any one point you will be able to hear maybe a minute or two of speech from each person in that area. And, furthermore, you can hear the same word pronounced in many, many different cities across North America.

"The answer to your question about sounds is that we can measure sounds acoustically⁸ and the difference between 'mad,' 'maad' and 'maaad,' the difference between 'go' and 'gow' and 'gaow,' will show up very clearly in these measurements, which is one of our main businesses. So about 440 speakers of our 800 have been analyzed⁹ in that way."

RS: "So these are all from telephone conversations?"

WILLIAM LABOV: "Yep."

AA: "And you give them a list of words to repeat?"

WILLIAM LABOV: "We actually have mailed people word lists. We focus upon pairs of words very often which are the same in some areas and different in other areas. For about half the geographic¹⁰ area of North America, the words 'cot' and 'caught' are pronounced the same way, [and] 'Don' and 'Dawn.' So they will say 'Don Hock married Don Hock' whereas the people in New York might saw 'Dawn Hock married Don Hawk¹¹.'"

RS: We continue our conversation with University of Pennsylvania linguist William Labov next week on Wordmaster.

AA: We will also have a link to where you can learn more about the forthcoming Atlas of North American English, at our Web site, voanews.com/wordmaster.

RS: And our e-mail address is。。。。。。。。With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.

 

1 rodent   

n.啮齿动物；adj.啮齿目的

参考例句：

• When there is a full moon,this nocturnal rodent is careful to stay in its burrow.月圆之夜，这种夜间活动的啮齿类动物会小心地呆在地洞里不出来。
• This small rodent can scoop out a long,narrow tunnel in a very short time.这种小啮齿动物能在很短的时间里挖出一条又长又窄的地道来。

2 linguist   

n.语言学家；精通数种外国语言者

参考例句：

• I used to be a linguist till I become a writer.过去我是个语言学家，后来成了作家。
• Professor Cui has a high reputation as a linguist.崔教授作为语言学家名声很高。

3 formerly   

adv.从前，以前

参考例句：

• We now enjoy these comforts of which formerly we had only heard.我们现在享受到了过去只是听说过的那些舒适条件。
• This boat was formerly used on the rivers of China.这船从前航行在中国内河里。

4 vowels   

n.元音，元音字母( vowel的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Vowels possess greater sonority than consonants. 元音比辅音响亮。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Note the various sounds of vowels followed by r. 注意r跟随的各种元音的发音。 来自超越目标英语 第3册

5 atlas   

n.地图册，图表集

参考例句：

• He reached down the atlas from the top shelf.他从书架顶层取下地图集。
• The atlas contains forty maps,including three of Great Britain.这本地图集有40幅地图，其中包括3幅英国地图。

6 remarkable   

adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的

参考例句：

• She has made remarkable headway in her writing skills.她在写作技巧方面有了长足进步。
• These cars are remarkable for the quietness of their engines.这些汽车因发动机没有噪音而不同凡响。

7 buffalo   

n.(北美)野牛；(亚洲)水牛

参考例句：

• Asian buffalo isn't as wild as that of America's. 亚洲水牛比美洲水牛温顺些。
• The boots are made of buffalo hide. 这双靴子是由水牛皮制成的。

8 acoustically   

听觉上，声学上

参考例句：

• The hall is excellent acoustically. 这个大厅在传音方面极好。
• Moos Acoustically speaking, what happens before and after mating is most interesting. 默丝从象的叫声判断，交配前后发生的事情最有意思。

9 analyzed   

v.分析( analyze的过去式和过去分词 )；分解；解释；对…进行心理分析

参考例句：

• The doctors analyzed the blood sample for anemia. 医生们分析了贫血的血样。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The young man did not analyze the process of his captivation and enrapturement, for love to him was a mystery and could not be analyzed. 这年轻人没有分析自己蛊惑著迷的过程，因为对他来说，爱是个不可分析的迷。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 geographic   

adj.地理学的，地理的

参考例句：

• The city's success owes much to its geographic position. 这座城市的成功很大程度上归功于它的地理位置。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Environmental problems pay no heed to these geographic lines. 环境问题并不理会这些地理界限。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

11 hawk   

n.鹰，骗子；鹰派成员

参考例句：

• The hawk swooped down on the rabbit and killed it.鹰猛地朝兔子扑下来,并把它杀死。
• The hawk snatched the chicken and flew away.老鹰叼了小鸡就飞走了。