Chapter 7.2 Summary

The author devotes this pronunciation chapter to vowels. He introduces the book he believes the best for such a study, Krapp's The Pronunciation of Standard English in America, and reiterates that the difficulty scholars have is the same difficulty Krapp has, denoting sounds by way of signs. The writer launches into examples, beginning with the affectation of the a sound in many words.

The other vowels, he says, present fewer variations. They still have a history of change, including the e with its long, neutral, and substituting characteristics.

Chapter 7.2 Analysis

As can be expected, the writer discusses individual vowel sounds, the difficulty of discussing such sounds using signs or letters, and the differences in pronunciation and affectation. He begins with the a sound, which he reports is studied as 1) commonly, an affectation; 2) sometimes the compromised a; 3) other times rejected as being "too broad...