From Newsgroup: sci.lang

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than rCyHenry VIrCOs thronerCO, anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm
--
Ruud Harmsen, https://rudhar.com
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Ruud Harmsen <rh@rudhar.com> wrote:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite >songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Me2.
--
Pancho
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Ruud Harmsen (uniqude punctuation amended):

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the
difference between `We built this city on rock and roll' (not
one of my favourite songs by the way; donrt know why) and the
present tense variant `We build this city...'?

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.
"There's a leak in this old building" irrelevantly comes to mind
by way of tangential association...

My general impression of modern English pronunciation is that is
lazy -- dirty and slurry, not sharp and well-articulated, as one
hears movies from the thirties. "movies from the thirties" will
soon be ambiguous, by the way...
--
() ascii ribbon campaign -- against html e-mail
/\ www.asciiribbon.org -- against proprietary attachments
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From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Anton Shepelev wrote:

Ruud Harmsen (uniqude punctuation amended):

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the
difference between `We built this city on rock and roll' (not
one of my favourite songs by the way; donrt know why) and the
present tense variant `We build this city...'?

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.
"There's a leak in this old building" irrelevantly comes to mind
by way of tangential association...

My general impression of modern English pronunciation is that is
lazy -- dirty and slurry, not sharp and well-articulated, as one
hears movies from the thirties. "movies from the thirties" will
soon be ambiguous, by the way...

Hmm, if you're going by how English (UK or American?) is
spoken in songs, that may not be the best source. Lots of
tv and movies, but that may not be the best either. How
about news broadcasts?


--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On 17/12/25 04:55, Ruud Harmsen wrote:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

I can't answer for non-native speakers, but as a native speaker of
English I find the difference obvious.

The matter is, however, more complicated than it sounds. 'd' and 't'
differ in both voicing and aspiration; but they are formed with tap-and-release, and the voicing and/or aspration happen only on the
release. In the case of "We built this city on rock and coal", the
release doesn't happen until the 'th' of "this".

In that case, you have to listen to vowel length. The vowel in "built"
is short and sharp. The vowel in "build" lasts just a bit longer.
--
Peter Moylan peter@pmoylan.org http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW
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From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Peter Moylan to Ruud Harmsen:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the
difference between `We built this city on rock and roll'
(not one of my favourite songs by the way; don't know why)
and the present tense variant `We build this city ...'?

I can't answer for non-native speakers, but as a native
speaker of English I find the difference obvious.

The matter is, however, more complicated than it sounds.

Pun detected.
--
() ascii ribbon campaign -- against html e-mail
/\ www.asciiribbon.org -- against proprietary attachments
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From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On 2025-12-17 01:07, Tilde wrote:

Anton Shepelev wrote:

Ruud Harmsen (uniqude punctuation amended):

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the
difference between `We built this city on rock and roll' (not
one of my favourite songs by the way; don-ot know why) and the
present tense variant `We build this city...'?

No idea.-a 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.
"There's a leak in this old building" irrelevantly comes to mind
by way of tangential association...

My general impression of modern English pronunciation is that is
lazy -- dirty and slurry, not sharp and well-articulated, as one
hears movies from the thirties.-a "movies from the thirties" will
soon be ambiguous, by the way...

Hmm, if you're going by how English (UK or American?) is
spoken in songs, that may not be the best source. Lots of
tv and movies, but that may not be the best either. How
about news broadcasts?

Around here, that's just as bad as anything else.
Our local newsies constantly mangle the language with mispronunciations,
wrong words, and bad grammar.

said meant
---- -----
surcumbed succumbed
interm interim
cloddy cloudy
restless relentless
multipeople multiple people
ordinance ordnance
Rocklin Rock Glen (a town)
sign Seine (the river)
temcher temperature
accredidation accreditation
hang ger hanger

temperature will be more lower tomorrow
more breezier conditions
a sporadic chance of thunderstorms
there were two fires. the second cause of the fire was...
when they evoked the emergency act
very impossible
very fall temperatures
there are a risk of showers
testifying in an alleged case
a man had saw a funnel cloud
--
My paper airplane doesn't fly.
It's stationery.
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

In article <10htmc6$3arla$1@dont-email.me>, peter@pmoylan.org says...

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between ?We built this city on rock and roll? (not one of my favourite songs by the way; don?t know why) and the present tense variant ?We
build this city ???

In that case, you have to listen to vowel length. The vowel in "built"
is short and sharp. The vowel in "build" lasts just a bit longer.

Right on!

It's like in Italian, where doubled consonants just shorten preceding vowels. "I build this wormhole using 24 magnets and it will work" has a liaison between d and t but "I built this wormhole using 23 magnets and
it didn't work" differs in the stop on t.

Of course 'd' is voiced and 't' not, which is another difference, but
the English 't' is more aspirated than in most civilized languages and
the 'd' I'm not sure about, as most English speakers are drunk most of
the time in my experience.

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Le 16/12/2025 |a 17:55, Ruud Harmsen a |-crit :

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than rCyHenry VIrCOs thronerCO, anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm

I think pronunciation is often hit and miss in songs, and it's easy to
mishear the words either accidentally or deliberately. Here's an example appropriate to the season:

While shepherds washed their socks by night,
All seated round the tub,
The Angel of the Lord came down
And helped them all to scrub....

These are majestic sentiments when backed by a church organ, and there
are many variants of them:

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/While_shepherds_watched_their_flocks>

<https://www.reddit.com/r/CasualUK/comments/a7bqm7/while_shepherds_wash_their_socks_by_night/>

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Kees van den Doel hat am 18.12.2025 um 07:25 geschrieben:

In article <10htmc6$3arla$1@dont-email.me>, peter@pmoylan.org says...

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between ?We built this city on rock and roll? (not one of my favourite
songs by the way; don?t know why) and the present tense variant ?We
build this city ???

In that case, you have to listen to vowel length. The vowel in "built"
is short and sharp. The vowel in "build" lasts just a bit longer.

Right on!

It's like in Italian, where doubled consonants just shorten preceding vowels.

May I question your knowledge of my mother tongue? The pronunciation of
double consonants in Italian is definitely longer than that of single consonants, unlike e.g. in English, French and German. About long vowels
in Italian: they should be there, if double consonants could shorten
them, but a monolingual Italian dictionary explains long vowels to
Italians using the "native" Italian words meeting and csbrdbs.

"I build this wormhole using 24 magnets and it will work" has a
liaison between d and t but "I built this wormhole using 23 magnets and
it didn't work" differs in the stop on t.

Of course 'd' is voiced and 't' not, which is another difference, but
the English 't' is more aspirated than in most civilized languages and
the 'd' I'm not sure about, as most English speakers are drunk most of
the time in my experience.

Now I see. You're trolling.

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On 18/12/25 17:59, Hibou wrote:

While shepherds washed their socks by night,
All seated round the tub,
The Angel of the Lord came down
And helped them all to scrub....

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall
And Humpty Dumpty had a great
Fall
On his head
That really left him dead, Fred.
Oh night divine ...
--
Peter Moylan peter@pmoylan.org http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Silvano <Silvano@noncisonopernessuno.it> wrote:

Kees van den Doel hat am 18.12.2025 um 07:25 geschrieben:

In article <10htmc6$3arla$1@dont-email.me>, peter@pmoylan.org says...

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between ?We built this city on rock and roll? (not one of my favourite >>> songs by the way; don?t know why) and the present tense variant ?We
build this city ???

In that case, you have to listen to vowel length. The vowel in "built"
is short and sharp. The vowel in "build" lasts just a bit longer.

Right on!

It's like in Italian, where doubled consonants just shorten preceding vowels.

May I question your knowledge of my mother tongue?

Of course not. He is kvandoel.

The pronunciation of double consonants in Italian is definitely longer
than that of single consonants, unlike e.g. in English, French and German. About long vowels in Italian: they should be there, if double consonants could shorten them, but a monolingual Italian dictionary explains long
vowels to Italians using the "native" Italian words meeting and csbrdbs.

The classic Dutch/Italian case is mafia/maffia.
Italian 'mafia' is deliberately misspelled as 'maffia'
(in Dutch, and also in some other languages)
in order to make the natural Dutch pronunciation
resemble the Italian one.

The same goes for the 'u' from many foreign languages,
which is often misspelled as 'oe' in Dutch.
If you want Dutch language hits only search on 'Oekraine'.

"I build this wormhole using 24 magnets and it will work" has a
liaison between d and t but "I built this wormhole using 23 magnets and
it didn't work" differs in the stop on t.

Of course 'd' is voiced and 't' not, which is another difference, but the English 't' is more aspirated than in most civilized languages and the 'd' I'm not sure about, as most English speakers are drunk most of the time in my experience.

Now I see. You're trolling.

Of course not. He is being kvandoel,
and he has been that for as long as usenet has existed,

Jan



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From Newsgroup: sci.lang


Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@gmail.moc> posted:

Ruud Harmsen (uniqude punctuation amended):

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the
difference between `We built this city on rock and roll' (not
one of my favourite songs by the way; don-ot know why) and the
present tense variant `We build this city...'?

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.
"There's a leak in this old building" irrelevantly comes to mind
by way of tangential association...

My general impression of modern English pronunciation is that is
lazy -- dirty and slurry, not sharp and well-articulated,

It's curious that you say that, because it accurately describes
how Russian sounds to me, not at all like Polish, for example.

as one
hears movies from the thirties. "movies from the thirties" will
soon be ambiguous, by the way...

--
athel

Living in Marseilles for 38 years; mainly in England before that
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On Tue, 16 Dec 2025 18:55:50 +0100, Ruud Harmsen wrote:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than rCyHenry VIrCOs thronerCO, anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm

No problem.

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)
--
s|b
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

In article <10i08r7$47ec$1@dont-email.me>, Silvano@noncisonopernessuno.it says...

In that case, you have to listen to vowel length. The vowel in "built"
is short and sharp. The vowel in "build" lasts just a bit longer.

Right on!

It's like in Italian, where doubled consonants just shorten preceding vowels.

May I question your knowledge of my mother tongue? The pronunciation of double consonants in Italian is definitely longer than that of single consonants, unlike e.g. in English, French and German. About long vowels
in Italian: they should be there, if double consonants could shorten
them, but a monolingual Italian dictionary explains long vowels to
Italians using the "native" Italian words meeting and csbrdbs.

You didn't understand me, which is understandable since you're Italian
and not much has come out of that area after the fall of the Roman empire.

Suppose you sing "pala" on 2 quarter notes, say a B and a C, then in the
same tempo sing "palla": you'll see that the 'a' in the second word is shorter and the first 'l' pushes the 'a' out of way so to speak if you
know what I mean which I doubt since you're Italian.

Now I see. You're trolling.

That's better than being Italian, esp. if you don't know how to pronounce your own native language.
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Kees van den Doel <kwakende@kulketlekkel.nl> wrote or quoted:

Suppose you sing "pala" on 2 quarter notes, say a B and a C, then in the
same tempo sing "palla": you'll see that the 'a' in the second word is >shorter and the first 'l' pushes the 'a' out of way so to speak if you
know what I mean which I doubt since you're Italian.

There are sometimes extra rules for singing, so let's just stick
to speaking.

In Italian, when a consonant doubles, it basically gets longer.
Textbooks actually cover that part.

But the effect that doubling a consonant has on how long the vowel
before it is - that's a trickier thing. You don't usually see that
explained in textbooks; it's more of a research topic at this point.

The idea that a vowel before a long or double consonant tends
to be shorter than a vowel before a short consonant isn't really
consistent. It depends on a bunch of factors, like what kind of
consonant it is or the word and stress pattern it shows up in.

|The tendency for a V preceding a long or geminate C to be
|shorter than a corresponding V preceding a short C is
|strongly non-systematic and influenced by different variables
|(such as the type of the C, the lexical/prosodic context etc.).
"The acquisition of Italian L2 phonology: consonant gemination"
(2010-02) - Chiara Celata, Lidia Costamagna


--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

s|b <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:

On Tue, 16 Dec 2025 18:55:50 +0100, Ruud Harmsen wrote:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between "We built this city on rock and roll" (not one of my favourite songs by the way; don't know why) and the present tense variant 'We
build this city rCa'?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than 'Henry VI's throne', anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm

No problem.

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

You really should look better.
alt.english.usage != alt.usage.english

Jan

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Op 18/12/2025 om 19:24 schreef Stefan Ram:

There are sometimes extra rules for singing, so let's just stick
to speaking.

In Italian, when a consonant doubles, it basically gets longer.
Textbooks actually cover that part.

But the effect that doubling a consonant has on how long the vowel
before it is - that's a trickier thing. You don't usually see that
explained in textbooks; it's more of a research topic at this point.

The idea that a vowel before a long or double consonant tends
to be shorter than a vowel before a short consonant isn't really
consistent. It depends on a bunch of factors, like what kind of
consonant it is or the word and stress pattern it shows up in.

Yes. I didn't buy PM's 'build' vs 'built' vowel length remark. One might
want to linger a bit more on a 'build' syllable than on a 'built' one,
but between 'built' and 'buil-ding' I wouldn't expect any differences in length.

Spanish is 'known' to have only one occurence of 'the five' vowels, but
in practice there are length (esp. in L.-Am.) and timbre (open/closed o
and e) differences. The main difference between 'pero' and 'perro' is
the vowel e: open in the latter, closed in the former. That's how I
prefer to utter them distinctly, I won't bother too much to
differentiate -r- and -rr-.

Spanish is also 'known' to have done away with geminate consonants, also
in writing, apart from -ll- and -rr- for their special digraph function.
So they've 'oposici||n, ilegal, inocente, inmortal, inmune'. Still there
are 'innovaci||n, innumerable' and similar, and there is, eg, 'obvio', a trendy filler word where I was in Argentina. Those are gemminates
alright in Spanish. I saw a shop making a spelling pun of it writing "El Ovbio" (another shop called itself "Al posho" ~pollo, yet another "El
Onze" ~once, but to my Flemish eyes that looked really like "Ours").
--
guido wugi
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On Tuesday or thereabouts, Ruud Harmsen declared ...

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than rCyHenry VIrCOs thronerCO, anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm

Maybe this will help others:

<URL:https://xkcd.com/2819/>

(I wonder how many of the Committee Randall knows by sight? Is there a
site I could cite?)

/dps
--
Killing a mouse was hardly a Nobel Prize-worthy exercise, and Lawrence
went apopleptic when he learned a lousy rodent had peed away all his
precious heavy water.
_The Disappearing Spoon_, Sam Kean
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From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Thu, 18 Dec 2025 15:13:52 +0100: "s|b" <me@privacy.invalid> scribeva:

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

I intended to change one to rCyalt.usage.englishrCO, but didnrCOt.

That makes me wonder: why do both groups exist? IsnrCOt that confusing?
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang


Ruud Harmsen <rh@rudhar.com> posted:

Thu, 18 Dec 2025 15:13:52 +0100: "s|b" <me@privacy.invalid> scribeva:

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

I intended to change one to rCyalt.usage.englishrCO, but didnrCOt.

That makes me wonder: why do both groups exist? IsnrCOt that confusing?

That's been a puzzle for at least 20 years. It's just history. alt.english.usage
is a better name, but alt.usage.english was too firmly established to be discarded. Most of us cheerfully post to alt.usage.english, but a few -- Steve, Anton, maybe some others -- continue to prefer alt.english.usage.
--
athel

Living in Marseilles for 38 years; mainly in England before that
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Den 19.12.2025 kl. 09.21 skrev Ruud Harmsen:

That makes me wonder: why do both groups exist? IsnrCOt that confusing?

An old question. It started out as alt.usage.english, but then someone
thought that it was illogical to have "usage" as an overgroup, so alt.english,usage was opened. It didn't succeed like the person had
hoped, so now we're stuck with that superfluous group until someone
kills it - the chance of which is indeed poor today.
--
Bertel, Kolt, Danmark

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Den 19.12.2025 kl. 10.05 skrev athel.cb@gmail.com:

That's been a puzzle for at least 20 years. It's just history. alt.english.usage
is a better name, but alt.usage.english was too firmly established to be discarded. Most of us cheerfully post to alt.usage.english, but a few -- Steve, Anton, maybe some others -- continue to prefer alt.english.usage.

Besides AUE sounds/feels better than AEU.
--
Bertel, Kolt, Danmark

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On 19/12/25 20:05, athel.cb@gmail.com wrote:

Ruud Harmsen <rh@rudhar.com> posted:

Thu, 18 Dec 2025 15:13:52 +0100: "s|b" <me@privacy.invalid>
scribeva:

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

I intended to change one to rCyalt.usage.englishrCO, but didnrCOt.

That makes me wonder: why do both groups exist? IsnrCOt that
confusing?

That's been a puzzle for at least 20 years. It's just history. alt.english.usage is a better name, but alt.usage.english was too
firmly established to be discarded. Most of us cheerfully post to alt.usage.english, but a few -- Steve, Anton, maybe some others --
continue to prefer alt.english.usage.

It all started because some news servers were permissive. You only had
to mistype the name of a newsgroup, and they would create it for you.
That's why Usenet had so many silly-looking group names, with zero
traffic (even back in the busy days of Usenet).

alt.usage.english has that order because it's part of the alt.usage
hierarchy. As far as I know there was never any provision for an
alt.english hierarchy. But one day someone accidentally typed it the
wrong way around, and hey presto the group was created.

The big attraction of AEU was that it had low traffic (because lots of
servers didn't carry it; officially it didn't exist). Back then AUE had
between 100 and 200 articles per day, and occasionally 300, and some
people found that too many to read, so they were more comfortable with
the low-traffic group.
--
Peter Moylan peter@pmoylan.org http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Anton Shepelev:

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."
--
Mark Brader | "If you need features not found in any language,
Toronto | you can try your hand at creating your own.
msb@vex.net | (Mind you, language design is incredibly difficult.
| It is easy to create an unholy mess.)" -- Chris Torek
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On 20/12/25 10:26, Mark Brader wrote:

Anton Shepelev:

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."

That's the song that started this thread.
--
Peter Moylan peter@pmoylan.org http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On Sat, 20 Dec 2025 08:47:10 +1100, Peter Moylan <peter@pmoylan.org>
wrote:

The big attraction of AEU was that it had low traffic (because lots of >servers didn't carry it; officially it didn't exist). Back then AUE had >between 100 and 200 articles per day, and occasionally 300, and some
people found that too many to read, so they were more comfortable with
the low-traffic group.

The other big attraction, during the period of gating to Google
groups, was that aeu attracted less spam than aue.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

Fri, 19 Dec 2025 23:26:29 +0000: msb@vex.net (Mark Brader) scribeva:

Anton Shepelev:

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."

Which is the one I mentioned in my original post, and which gave me
the idea for the post, when the announcer on Dutch radio of course
said it as "We builddis city on rock and roll."
--
Ruud Harmsen, https://rudhar.com
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On Thu, 18 Dec 2025 21:47:26 +0100, J. J. Lodder wrote:

s|b <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

You really should look better.
alt.english.usage != alt.usage.english

o-:
--
s|b
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: sci.lang

On Fri, 19 Dec 2025 09:21:58 +0100, Ruud Harmsen wrote:

I intended to change one to rCyalt.usage.englishrCO, but didnrCOt.

That makes me wonder: why do both groups exist? IsnrCOt that confusing?

I saw alt.usage.english twice, instead of alt.english.usage, so it's
definitely confusing for me.
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s|b
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Anton Shepelev:

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

Mark Brader:

"We built this city on rock and roll."

Peter Moylan:

That's the song that started this thread.

So, Anton didn't seem to remember the start of the thread.
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s|b <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:

On Thu, 18 Dec 2025 21:47:26 +0100, J. J. Lodder wrote:

s|b <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:

(Why did you add alt.english.usage twice in your crosspost?)

You really should look better.
alt.english.usage != alt.usage.english

o-:

Try it with two eyes,

Jan
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In article
<RqidnWRJKNe4Qtj0nZ2dnZfqn_udnZ2d@giganews.com>,
msb@vex.net says...

Anton Shepelev:

No idea. 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."

Like Jerusalem

Janet
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Peter Moylan wrote:

On 20/12/25 10:26, Mark Brader wrote:

Anton Shepelev:

No idea.a 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."

That's the song that started this thread.

A quick google (the AI summary at the top, probably not
definitive)


Songs with "Build" or "Built" in the Title/Chorus:

"The House That Built Me" - Miranda Lambert: "I was never really here
until I saw this house/And the roof was on fire, and the water was
high/But it was home, and the walls were warm/And I was safe and sound...".

"We Built This City" - Starship: "We built this city on rock and roll".

"Build" - The Housemartins: "It's build a house where we can stay / Add
a new bit every day".

"Proud of the House We Built" - Brooks & Dunn: "I'm proud of the house
we built / It's stronger than sticks, stones, and steel".

"Build My Life" - Pat Barrett: "Build my life upon your word / Build my
life upon your love".

"Build" - Healy: "I'm just tryna build my block up".


Songs with "Built" in the Lyrics:

"Believer" - Imagine Dragons: "You break me down, you build me up,
believer, believer".

"The Hexx" - Pavement: "never build a building till you're 50, what kind
of life is that?".

"Built the Wall" - Luke TheNotable: "built the wall it's so dang tall".
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Tilde used thar keyboard to writen:

Peter Moylan wrote:

On 20/12/25 10:26, Mark Brader wrote:

Anton Shepelev:

No idea.a 99% of English speech I hear is in songs, and I can't
seem to remember a song with the words `build' or `built'.

"We built this city on rock and roll."

That's the song that started this thread.

A quick google (the AI summary at the top, probably not
definitive)

Songs with "Build" or "Built" in the Title/Chorus:

"The House That Built Me" - Miranda Lambert: "I was never really here until I
saw this house/And the roof was on fire, and the water was high/But it was home, and the walls were warm/And I was safe and sound...".

"We Built This City" - Starship: "We built this city on rock and roll".

"Build" - The Housemartins: "It's build a house where we can stay / Add a new
bit every day".

"Proud of the House We Built" - Brooks & Dunn: "I'm proud of the house we built / It's stronger than sticks, stones, and steel".

"Build My Life" - Pat Barrett: "Build my life upon your word / Build my life upon your love".

"Build" - Healy: "I'm just tryna build my block up".

Songs with "Built" in the Lyrics:

"Believer" - Imagine Dragons: "You break me down, you build me up, believer, believer".

"The Hexx" - Pavement: "never build a building till you're 50, what kind of life is that?".

"Built the Wall" - Luke TheNotable: "built the wall it's so dang tall".

Um, 2 of the 3 in the "built" section have "build" in the quoted part.


-d
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Ruud Harmsen <rh@rudhar.com> posted:

As a non-native speaker, can you hear, and make, the difference
between rCLWe built this city on rock and rollrCY (not one of my favourite songs by the way; donrCOt know why) and the present tense variant rCyWe
build this city rCarCO?

I can.

Not hard, is it? Easier than rCyHenry VIrCOs thronerCO, anyway.

Source: https://rudhar.com/fonetics/build.htm

By sound, build = billed, but built has no homophone, unless bill't is a word. --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2