Date: Wed, 24 Jul 1996 11:43:34 -0600
From: Ellen Johnson EJOHNSON[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]MSUVX1.MEMPHIS.EDU
Subject: Re: WAFT and the Principle of Linguistic Entropy
Waft rhymes with raft for me. Yes, I'm Southern, and I hope I'm mistaken about
the assumption that some here seem to have made that this is the incorrect
pronunciation bc it's Southern and it's an educated word and Southerners are
uneducated. Or something like that. Although someone did note that it might
be more common among Scots-Irish descendants and it doesn't seem like such a
terribly unusual word to me. Anyway, the "broad-a" pronunciation of other
words (path, dance, aunt, etc) has some local prestige but can hardly be
considered standard AmEng. I guess I am just questioning the source of the
original determination of "wahft" as correct.
Linguistic entropy leading to change by analogy is part of what's interesting
about studying "literary words". Good idea for a project. Of course, Chambers
questions Labov's uniformitarian principle that lg changes today as it always
has by bringing up the issue of literacy. The influence of dictionaries upon
the pronunciation of infrequently spoken words is certainly a possibility.
Ellen Johnson
ejohnson[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]cc.memphis.edu