/ɛ/ and /e/

[svetlana14]

Dear all,

Please explain the difference between


/e/ and /ɛ/

in an article referred to below. Many thanks.



http://www.bl.uk/learning/langlit/sounds/case-studies/received-pronunciation/vowel-sounds-rp/

 

[jutfrank]

The first is referred to as conservative RP. This pronunciation is typically used by upper class British people.

The second is standard.

 

[svetlana14]

Thank you. Please explain what is the difference between these sounds. Thank you. Unfortunately, I did not catch the difference.

 

[jutfrank]

Didn't you listen to the clips?

The conservative RP sounds to me almost like how the word ear, (or air, if a bit slower) is pronounced in standard RP. It's longer than the standard sound.

The standard sound is the one in the words bed/head/said. It's a short sound.

It's difficult to describe any better than that without going into the specific mechanics.

 

[PHenry1026]

There should be virtually no difference in sound. In phonetic transcriptions /ɛ/ is typically used for American English phonetic transcriptions and /e/ is typically used for British English and European transcription.

I guess if you are using text to speech and you use /e/ in an IPA phonetic transcription in an American English Phoneme Dictionary you might notice a slight difference than in using /ɛ/.

The same idea also holds for /a/ and /æ/.

 

[Tdol]

I use RP long vowels, but I don't honestly think that I pronounce these words differently from non-RP British speakers, regional variations excepted. I think the conservative element of the RP being referred to is probably mostly located in the past. I would interested to see what Piscean has to say on the issue as an RP speaker a bit older than I/me/I am.

 

[jutfrank]

Tdol and Piscean

This discussion is of interest to me but I'm having trouble following you. Do you really think that the conservative RP as exemplified in the link sounds dated? For me it's clearly associated with class. Don't you agree?

So somebody of the upper classes would still use that pronunciation today and somebody from the, let's say, lower middle classes would not have spoken quite that way in the 1940s (unless they were trying hard to sound 'porsh').

I use RP long vowels, but I don't honestly think that I pronounce these words differently from non-RP British speakers, regional variations excepted.

Could you clarify what you mean here? (the underlined bits)

 

[jutfrank]

Piscean. Okay, I understand now. Thanks for clarifying.

 

[GoesStation]

Piscean, all three links lead to the same video of young Liz.