Date:  Fri, 3 Feb 1995 06:07:00 EDT

From:  "David A. Johns" <DJOHNS[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]UFPINE.BITNET>

Subject: ProcessEEZ



Larry Horn says:



# Now of course 'process' is not in the same class as 'basis' or

# 'crisis' either declensionally or even orthographically, but (and

# this is crucial) it IS related to them semantically. It thus

# forms a minimal pair with an orthographically parallel

# NON-abstract NON-conceptual word like 'mattress', whose plural is

# never hyper-urbanized to 'mattressEEZ'. Nor do we have

# 'actressEEZ', 'countessEEZ', or (parallel to 'matrices')

# 'waitressEEZ'. Perhaps the proposed label of 'affectation' is

# indeed appropriate here, at least for the initial occurrences,

# but it would appear that there's no longer any conscious

# affectation involved for many speakers now that the long vowel

# version of the plural has become somewhat standardized.



I've heard 'biasEEZ', 'purposEEZ', and 'premisEEZ', all from

University of Florida faculty, which would support the affectation

hypothesEE (well, no, I haven't heard that, but parenthesEE is pretty

common among computer folks).



David Johns

Waycross College

Waycross, GA