On 21/05/22 04:32, Athel Cornish-Bowden wrote:
> On 2022-05-20 16:42:40 +0000, Jerry Friedman said:
>
>> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 9:54:59 AM UTC-6, ruudhar...@gmail.com
>> wrote:
>>>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 12:10:44 AM UTC-6, Ruud
>>>>>> Harmsen wrote:> >>>> The Emperor wears no cloths. I've said
>>>>>> it. (Or: I said it, I have been> >>>> saying it,
>>>>>> whatever.)
>>>>> Thu, 19 May 2022 09:41:58 -0700 (PDT): Jerry Friedman
>>>>>> "Clothes".
>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 3:03:34 PM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> Kloðze.
>>> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 4:10:47 PM UTC+2, Jerry Friedman
>>> wrote:> > /kloUz/ in AmE, /kl@Uz/ in BrE--I notice you use
>>> British spelling.
>>
>>> If you'll allow me, I would like to take this opportunity, in no
>>> way intending> to criticise or harm, to point out that Collins
>>> Dictionary states that the British> pronunciation would be
>>> [kləʊðz], and the American variant [kloʊðz] or [kloʊz].
>> Thanks for pointing that out.
>
> I am surprised. I could have sworn that there is no [ð] in the
> British pronunciation, but no doubt the compilers of the dictionary
> know. In Fowler-III Burchfield says that the pronunciation without
> [ð] was almost universal at the end of the 19th century but that it
> has subsequently been almost completely driven out by the spelling
> pronunciation (only "almost", because there is at least one person
> (me) who has no [ð]). I would like to see what Fowler-I or II say,
> but unfortunately Fowler-II is in my office, where I hardly ever go
> since Covid-19 appeared, and although Fowler-I should be at home
> somewhere I can't find it.
>
>> The OED agrees. I shouldn't speak so confidently about British
>> pronunciation. On the other hand, I don't think I've ever heard it
>> with the [ð] in America.

I certainly use the spelling pronunciation, with the fricative, and I
think that's fairly general in AusE. I don't know the answer for other
countries.

Now that I think of it, I don't hear the word often enough to be even
certain about the Australian pronunciation.

--
Peter Moylan Newcastle, NSW http://www.pmoylan.org

On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 6:37:35 AM UTC-7, Silvano wrote:
> Ruud Harmsen hat am 19.05.2022 um 08:10 geschrieben:
> > One problem is that in English the perfect tense denotes imperfect
> > aspect: actions in the past that continue, or have continuing effects,
> > into the present and even the future. Totally devoid of any logic.
> Perhaps it could help you if you used the more usual name "past
> progressive" or "past continuous" for the form "I was working" and
> "present perfect continuous" or "present perfect progressive" for "I
> have been working". The main point here is the continuous aspect, sadly
> missing in German. Is it missing in Dutch, too?
>
> If native speakers have nothing to say against it,
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_of_English_verb_forms> should be the
> base for the names of the various English verb forms.

I am not impressed by the linked Wikipedia article. Of course my
objections stem from my general linguistic stance and cannot be
laid out in such a short piece as this is. In one sentence: I think
the Wikipedia article is mired in the old misleading Latinate grammar.

Rather:

Morphologically an English verb starts with a modal which is followed
by one of sixteen different forms as determined by four binary features
called past, perfect, progressive and passive. The past functions as a
modal and there is an implicit modal called present that appears when
no other modal is present. And so on . . .

But note that the particle "to" also behaves like a modal except that it
forms a noun phrase rather than a verb phrase.

I acknowledge that I am the only person using the above analysis but
there are many other proposals for how to leave the old school grammar
behind.

Fri, 20 May 2022 17:59:12 +0100: Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk>
scribeva:

>On 20/05/2022 5:42 pm, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 9:54:59 AM UTC-6, ruudhar...@gmail.com wrote:
>>>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 12:10:44 AM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>>>>>>> The Emperor wears no cloths. I've said it. (Or: I said it, I have been
>>>>>>> saying it, whatever.)
>>>>> Thu, 19 May 2022 09:41:58 -0700 (PDT): Jerry Friedman
>>>>>> "Clothes".
>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 3:03:34 PM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>>>>> Kloðze.
>>> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 4:10:47 PM UTC+2, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>>>> /kloUz/ in AmE, /kl@Uz/ in BrE--I notice you use British spelling.
>>
>>> If you'll allow me, I would like to take this opportunity, in no way intending
>>> to criticise or harm, to point out that Collins Dictionary states that the British
>>> pronunciation would be [kl??ðz], and the American variant [klo?ðz] or [klo?z].
>>
>> Thanks for pointing that out. The OED agrees. I shouldn't speak so
>> confidently about British pronunciation. On the other hand, I don't
>> think I've ever heard it with the [ð] in America.
>>
>>> I have no independent verification of this, and I do not know how current or
>>> trustworthy this is. I intentionally do not use phoneme symbols, so as not to
>>> make any statement about any possible phoneme status of symbols used, nor
>>> of combinations thereof.
>>
>> Interesting.
>>
>>> Reference URI: https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/clothes
>>>
>>> This statement was provided without any guarantee or warranties whatsoever,
>>> express nor implied, pertaining to usability, usefulness, merchantability, typos,
>>> or bugfreeness.
>>>
>>> Peace.
>>>
>>> Better?
>>
>> It's a step in the right direction to make an effort.
>
>Thank you for reporting that. I've honoured Ruud's effort by
>unplonking him.

Thanks.
--
Ruud Harmsen, http://rudhar.com

Jerry Friedman formulated the question :
> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 9:54:59 AM UTC-6, ruudhar...@gmail.com wrote:
>>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 12:10:44 AM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>>>>>> The Emperor wears no cloths. I've said it. (Or: I said it, I have been
>>>>>> saying it, whatever.) Thu, 19 May 2022 09:41:58 -0700 (PDT): Jerry
>>>>>> Friedman
>>>>> "Clothes". On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 3:03:34 PM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen
>>>>> wrote:
>>>> Kloðze. On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 4:10:47 PM UTC+2, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>>> /kloUz/ in AmE, /kl@Uz/ in BrE--I notice you use British spelling.
>
>> If you'll allow me, I would like to take this opportunity, in no way
>> intending to criticise or harm, to point out that Collins Dictionary states
>> that the British pronunciation would be [kləʊðz], and the American variant
>> [kloʊðz] or [kloʊz].
>
> Thanks for pointing that out. The OED agrees. I shouldn't speak so
> confidently about British pronunciation. On the other hand, I don't
> think I've ever heard it with the [ð] in America.

I have had to play the samples several times to hear the difference. A
hair more thud in the Brit version, if I really concentrate.

>> I have no independent verification of this, and I do not know how current or
>> trustworthy this is.

It may take laboratory training and experience to do a proper
evaluation. It's definitely not as easy as spotting non-rhotic words,
and I think personally I'd even do better comparing pæθ to pɑ:θ.

/dps

--
Who, me? And what lacuna?

On 21/05/22 14:08, David Kleinecke wrote:
> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 6:37:35 AM UTC-7, Silvano wrote:
>> Ruud Harmsen hat am 19.05.2022 um 08:10 geschrieben:]

>>> One problem is that in English the perfect tense denotes
>>> imperfect aspect: actions in the past that continue, or have
>>> continuing effects, into the present and even the future. Totally
>>> devoid of any logic.
>> Perhaps it could help you if you used the more usual name "past
>> progressive" or "past continuous" for the form "I was working" and
>> "present perfect continuous" or "present perfect progressive" for
>> "I have been working". The main point here is the continuous
>> aspect, sadly missing in German. Is it missing in Dutch, too?
>>
>> If native speakers have nothing to say against it,
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_of_English_verb_forms> should
>> be the base for the names of the various English verb forms.
>
> I am not impressed by the linked Wikipedia article.

I think it's a good article, but far too technical for learners of
English. In my opinion, the two things that learners need to know about
English verbs are:

1. The three forms present/past/past participle for each verb. Most of
these are regular, but the most common verbs are irregular. (The -ing
forms do not need to be memorised because they are completely regular.)

2. The fact that the progressive tenses - which typically do not have
related forms in other languages - are the most common tenses in English.

I disagree with Ruud that the perfect tenses in English have imperfect
aspect. The best way to express imperfect aspect in English is to use
progressive tenses, including the past progressive (I was doing, etc)
that are quite distinct from perfect tenses.

--
Peter Moylan Newcastle, NSW http://www.pmoylan.org

Sat, 21 May 2022 00:32:51 -0700: Snidely <snidely.too@gmail.com>
scribeva:

>Jerry Friedman formulated the question :
>> On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 9:54:59 AM UTC-6, ruudhar...@gmail.com wrote:
>>>>>> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 12:10:44 AM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>>>>>>> The Emperor wears no cloths. I've said it. (Or: I said it, I have been
>>>>>>> saying it, whatever.) Thu, 19 May 2022 09:41:58 -0700 (PDT): Jerry
>>>>>>> Friedman
>>>>>> "Clothes". On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 3:03:34 PM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen
>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>> Kloðze. On Friday, May 20, 2022 at 4:10:47 PM UTC+2, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>>>> /kloUz/ in AmE, /kl@Uz/ in BrE--I notice you use British spelling.
>>
>>> If you'll allow me, I would like to take this opportunity, in no way
>>> intending to criticise or harm, to point out that Collins Dictionary states
>>> that the British pronunciation would be [kl??ðz], and the American variant
>>> [klo?ðz] or [klo?z].
>>
>> Thanks for pointing that out. The OED agrees. I shouldn't speak so
>> confidently about British pronunciation. On the other hand, I don't
>> think I've ever heard it with the [ð] in America.
>
>I have had to play the samples several times to hear the difference. A
>hair more thud in the Brit version, if I really concentrate.

Those in Collins (for American English) are not very good, I hardly
hear any difference either, if there is one at all.

The samples in Merriam-Webster clearly show the difference, but I
suspect they are computer-generated.

--
Ruud Harmsen, http://rudhar.com

* Jerry Friedman:

> On Thursday, May 19, 2022 at 12:10:44 AM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>> Wed, 18 May 2022 16:05:49 -0700 (PDT): Jerry Friedman
>> <jerry_f...@yahoo.com> scribeva:
>>
>>>On Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 11:23:11 AM UTC-6, Ruud Harmsen wrote:
>>>> Wed, 18 May 2022 08:30:07 -0700 (PDT): Jerry Friedman
>>>> <jerry_f...@yahoo.com> scribeva:
>>>> >The difficulties you're having are not inevitable. There are probably a
>>>> >few people here who, now that they feel hostile toward you, will never
>>>> >stop.
>>>
>>>> That's what I said all the time.
>>>
>>>"That's what I've been saying all the time," unless you mean you're not
>>>going to say it any more. "That's what I've been saying" is probably
>>>more natural.
>
> I forgot a very idiomatic possibility: "That's what I've been saying all along."
>
>> I am unlearnable (to quote the late Franz Gnadiger) on the subject of
>> English tenses and aspects. I studied, or have studied, or have been
>> studying, the rules many times, and still I just don't understand them
>> and cannot apply them correctly. So I just gave up.
>
> OK, I admit it's very difficult, and no language I know anything about has
> anything like "I've been saying".

Japanese has a continuous form of the verb, but the usage rules are
quite different from English. And there's no perfect aspect integrated
in the tense system, so no equivalent to "I've been saying".

>> The Emperor wears no cloths. I've said it. (Or: I said it, I have been
>> saying it, whatever.)
>
> "Clothes".

I just heard someone say "clothing" with the vowel of "cloth" rather
than that of "clothes". Could've been an accident, though.

--
The wrong body ... now comes not to claim rightness but to
dismantle the system that metes out rightness and wrongness
according to the dictates of various social orders.
-- Jack Halberstam, Unbuilding Gender