Talk:Pasifika

RFV discussion: June–September 2023

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Pasifika

The English pronunciation is given as /pʌˈsɪfɪkʌ/. I suspect /ʌ/ should probably be /ə/, for two reasons:

• If this is to intended to represent a New Zealand dialect, it should be labelled as such. If it is meant to be general, then /ʌ/ is not used in unstressed terminal syllables, and so should be /ə/.
• If /ʌ/ is meant to represent a lax vowel in New Zealand English, then this appears to be incorrect. New Zealand English does not have this vowel, according to [1]. — Paul G (talk) 07:17, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

EDIT: Being bold and changing to /ʌ/ to /ə/. See Collins. — Paul G (talk) 07:19, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

This speaker is clearly using a non-schwa vowel in the first syllable. I would expect this pronunciation would be more prominent among those who speak a Polynesian language. Perhaps monolingual English speakers would reduce the vowel. Personally I seem to want to have a schwa in the first syllable but not in the last, but my idiolect is mostly "idio-" and not very "-lect". This, that and the other (talk) 11:37, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

That speaker seems to say the first syllable of ‘pasifika’ in at least three different ways and being a Kiwi, her short ‘i’ vowel is somewhere in the region of a CUT vowel (wedge) or a COMMA vowel (schwa) in any case! —Overlordnat1 (talk) 13:27, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

In something based on Sāmoan or most other Polynesian languages, I would expect a straight 5-vowel pronunciation- not even /ʌ/ (maybe /ɑ/?). Chuck Entz (talk) 13:32, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Apparently resolved as the entry now gives the pronunciation as /pəˈsɪfɪkə/. If the pronunciation with phonemic STRUT vowels is real in NZ or Samoa (what would be the source of using STRUT vowels in this word, though? Samoan?), readd it with a label and sources... - -sche (discuss) 17:18, 8 September 2023 (UTC)