Comment by thaumasiotes
3 days ago
>> It leaves um, uh, er and elongated versions (ummmm, uhhhhh) alone.
Something's already gone wrong here. Uh and er refer to the same sound. Uh is the American spelling. Er is British; to them a following "r" like that is just a kind of vowel.
"Er" is definitely distinct as an interjection, it's usually used instead of "um" to indicate a correction and does sound different.
Are you claiming that a rhotic "er" exists in American English, or that the British particle "er" is distinct from the British particle "erm"?
> it's usually used instead of "um" to indicate a correction and does sound different
Obviously people can hear the difference between vocalizing with your mouth open and vocalizing with your mouth closed. But there is no systematic difference in use, similarly to how there is no systematic difference in use between "uh-huh" and "mhm".
> Are you claiming that a rhotic "er" exists in American English, or that the British particle "er" is distinct from the British particle "erm"?
Neither. In Amrican English we're fully pronouncing the "r" when we say "er" instead of "um".
> Obviously people can hear the difference between vocalizing with your mouth open and vocalizing with your mouth closed.
That would be "uh" vs "um", not "er".
Regardless of American vs. British spellings, those are not the same sound. Some British people may pronounce them the same. Americans definitely pronounce them differently, though. For instance, the word “water” has a hard “r” sound at the end; Americans don’t pronounce it “watuh” like some British people do.
They are two names for the same sound. There is no particle "er" in American English. There could be one, theoretically, but there isn't.
Um… no. Quite different vowel sounds.
(Also, in case it wasn’t clear: I was quoting from the start of the article in that sentence.)
They're quite different vowel sounds in the same sense that "back" and "back" use "quite different vowel sounds" when pronounced by American vs British speakers.
But not in any other sense.
> in case it wasn’t clear: I was quoting from the start of the article in that sentence.
You don't seem to be quoting from the article at all, actually. You've combined two different sentences in a way that grossly misrepresents what the article says. But that's not really relevant to the point here.