From: Andrew C. West (andrewcwest@alumni.princeton.edu)
Date: Wed Feb 04 2004 - 08:07:08 EST
On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 11:12:41 +0000, Michael Everson wrote:
>
> At 02:50 -0800 2004-02-04, Peter Kirk wrote:
>
> >As for Birmingham, I like the idea of analysing
> >it as a monosyllable [b?m©Øm] although I would
> >tend to think of the eng and the second m as
> >syllabic, but there is then a near minimal pair
> >with the interjection [mhm] meaning "no".
>
> [mhm] is a positive for me. It is [m?m] which is negative.
Hmm, my 2 1/2 year old dauhter is going through a stage of saying "mm mm"
(rising tone on first syllable) for "yes" and "mm mm" (falling tone on first
syllable) for "no", which is a very subtle distinction, especially as in
Mandarin Chinese "m" rising tone is an interrogative grunt and "m" falling tone
is an affirmaive grunt.
Andrew
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