On Tue, 20 Aug 2002, Michael Everson wrote:
> At 10:10 -0700 2002-08-20, Andrew C. West wrote:
> >On Tue, 20 August 2002, John Cowan wrote:
> >
> > > It has no sound, but neither does Romance "h"; both
> >exist as a marker of etymology.
> >
> >But in fact the apostrophe may have a sound in dialectal English,
> >where it is used to represent a medial or final glotal stop (e.g. "a
> >drin' a wa'er" for "a drink of water" in Cockney English). In this
> >usage it is surely acting as a letter, not a punctuation mark.
>
> It is acting, as it did in its origins, as a graphic symbol showing
> the omission of an letter.
> --
> Michael Everson *** Everson Typography *** http://www.evertype.com
>
>
Tuesday, August 20, 2002
In English, at least in questions, the apostrophe signals more than just
omission of a letter. A co-worker here has a sign that says, What part
of "No" do you not understand? When written or spoken as a contration
this becomes What part of "No" don't you understand? in which "you" gets
transposed to follow the short form of not. When I see a line break with
n't on the new line I wince but keep on reading.
Regards,
Jim Agenbroad ( jage@LOC.gov )
The above are purely personal opinions, not necessarily the official
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