(no subject)

[doyle]

Just a heads-up - anybody doing that American English meme, could you put it behind a cut-tag? It's screwing up my layout...

ETA: trying to take it myself, and this question -

16. The second syllable in pajamas sounds like:

The A in jam
The A in father

*weeps* Those two sounds are identical in my accent! How do I pick?!

Comments

[owl]

I did it for the craic. It concluded I was from Dixie.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

Word. I think the HTML is wonky with the tables that provide the results.

[zoicite.livejournal.com]

hahaha, go with father, dude.

I just tried pronouncing father the same way that I pronounce jam and it was not pretty. ;)

[nightchik.livejournal.com]

Really? I think the first one is suppose to be like "I am" and the second is supposed to be like "ahhhh." I mean, I think that's what they were trying to get at, but I'm sure the whole thing is screwy. :D So you must say j-ahh-m... um, sort of?

I came out part American English and part Yankee.

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

jah-m, fah-ther, yeah, that's about it... at some point during the night I will no doubt get procrastinaty enough to make a phone post demonstrating my accent.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

In America, "a in jam" is a hard-ish a where the jaw isn't dropped and instead the lips are spread to the sides of the mouth. Like saying "a.m.". It's almost like saying j-a.m., but quicker. ;-) That's the best way that I can think to explain it.

[owl]

Like jaym? How do you say gem, then?

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

Gem has a more gutteral vowel sound.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

Phonetically, it's along the lines of g-eh-m, only it's one syllable and not three. :)

[moireach.livejournal.com]

Hee, I'm American and that's not at all how I say it! I think you mean you draw it out to almost two syllables, right? That's very Southern. ;) I say it to rhyme with "damn," a short a, a la "cat".

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

No - I say it with one syllable. ;-) Maryland isn't that Southern. I never thought to explain it that way - rhyming with "damn". That makes more sense.

[nightchik.livejournal.com]

hee.

[taraljc.livejournal.com]

...whereas I took it and thought "that's not how you spell pyjamas..."

My accent is all over, tho. Seriously. Most Americans think I'm Canadian, when they first meet me, because of my vowels. But my cadences are totally whacked. My sister sounds nothing like me--she says "pellah" instead of "pillow" and "melk" instead of "milk."

[captainlucy.livejournal.com]

Jam: the a is pronounced like Ah.

Father: The a is pronounced like Aaaah. Slightly longer & softer.
Oo-er.