On Sat, 1 Jan 2005 11:09:03 -0500, Pascal A. Kramm <pkramm@...> wrote:

>>>> Duden German != spoken German in most areas. Not in all, but at least
>>>> in a lot of cases, so you're better off not taking it as a guideline
>>>> for anything. In essence, the Duden is quite useful to stop a desk or
>>>> chair from wobbling, but it's very unsuitable to make qualitative
>>>> statements about the actually spoken German.
>>
>>Your own variety of standard German seems to be much worse, since it has
>>long consonants, which is definitly not found in most varieties of
>>standard German.
>
>First, I never said something about my dialect having long consonants, no
>idea where you got that from...

I'm sorry, it was me who had the idea when I was relating your variety of
standard German to Swiss German, since both feature short /&/, which is
definitly not found in most varieties of standard German:

http://listserv.brown.edu/archives/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0410B&L=conlang&P=R5304


>Second, just because my variety has some features which you're apparently
>unable to handle still doesn't give you the right to condemn it and
>classify it as "much worse" than any other.

I'm sorry for the wording. Here's a second try: Your variety is less useful
"as a guideline to anything" than the Duden standard, because it features
peculiarties such as a short /&/ which are not found in most varieties of
standard German.


>The Duden variety has also lots of features which are definitely not found
>in most varieties of Standard German.

The pronunciation? That's new to me. Could you give some examples?


>>And don't forget that it's the Duden variety that is teached abroad,
>>not yours. So if your making any assertions on German on this list, you'd
>>better make them on the Duden variety, not on your local one.
>
>Sad, but true - it's the same problem as with English, where you won't find
>much native speakers who speak exactly that Oxford English you're taught in
>school/college.

I wasn't teached Oxford English. I think that foreigners are happy that
there is a widely accepted standard they can learn.


>>The prescriptive standard, that is, the variety of standard German that is
>>teached abroad, equals the Duden variety, and it is very differnt from
>>Pascal Kramms local variety. He seems to be stuck in the out of date point
>>of view that there's only one pronunciation of standard German, and for a
>>reason I can't figure he assumes that his own pronunciation (which is very
>>peculiar) is that only pronuciation of standard German, which is definitly
>>wrong.
>
>I never said anything like that, don't make it appear as if I did.

You haven't said it explicitly. You've implied it, since you've never
pointed out that you were talking about your local pronunciation when you
have claimed something to be pronounced like this or like that in German.

Have a look at the YAEPT, and you'll see that nobody says that this or that
is the pronunciation of English and that's it, but everybody says: In my
place, people pronounce this and that.

If you're making a statement on German pronunciation without specifying
where this pronunciation is used, people will assume you're talking about
the standard pronunciation unless they know German very well.

kru@s:
j.m.w.