Allen Esterson wrote: > On 4 April 2008 Beth Benoit wrote [snip]: > >> I have friends from Canada who say "aboot," "hoose" (for house). >> > > Don't know if this is relevant to Canada, but it sounds like Scottish > English, as in the well know 'saying', "There's a moose loose aboot the > hoose" > > Yes, Allen, it is almost certainly of Scots origin. Scots were the dominant ethnic group in English Canada for long while (just look at the names of the early Prime Ministers). But the sound is not really "oo." It is subtle and hard to render phonetically. It is just a slightly "tenser" (to use the linguistic term) "ou" (or "ow") than the very "lax" (again, to use the linguistic term) American version of the same sound (and almost all other vowel sounds). For Americans, if you set your lips like you were about to say "oh" and then say "ow" through that apature, you get about the right sound. But it is not universal across Canada. You hear it now in some parts of "old" rural and small town Canada (northern Ontario, parts of the Ottawa valley and back to Kingston, the farmlands of the prairies), and even in those places, it is not universal. I almost never hear it in and around Toronto, nor did I hear it much when I lived in Montreal (and it was still "legal" to speak English on the street) and Vancouver. It is rapidly dying out, the "victim" of massive immigration into Canada (42% of Toronto is now made up of "visible minorities") and of imported TV and movies from the US.
Chris -- Christopher D. Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, ON M3J 1P3 Canada 416-736-2100 ex. 66164 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.yorku.ca/christo/ "Part of respecting another person is taking the time to criticise his or her views." - Melissa Lane, in a /Guardian/ obituary for philosopher Peter Lipton ================================= --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
