> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mark E. Davis [mailto:markdavis@ispchannel.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 1999 11:12 PM
>
> It's actually much worse than that; I have done some analysis
> in the past, and on a
> average given line of English text you will have quite a few irregular
> pronunciations -- that is, cases where the pronunciation is
> not predictable from the
> letters without actually knowing the words involved.
>
Not surprising; that alone does not imply irregularity. Unless you define
"regular" to mean phonologically transparent; but I would challenge such a
definition. Rather than ask if the orthography allows non-speakers to
puzzle out the sound, I would ask if native speakers of normal intelligence
can learn to read with reasonable effort. A cultural rather than
"scientific" norm. Needing to know the language in order to be able to read
it is not a bad thing.
Philosophical question: if somebody with absolutely no knowledge of English
managed to produce sounds approximating an English utterance - say, "I've
fallen in the woods and I can't get up" - would they be, ontologically,
English sounds?
-gregg
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