Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2025 November 26
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November 26
[edit]English semivowels
[edit]Does English have any words which have two semivowels on both sides of a vowel, such as a made-up words wawe, which would be pronounced [weɪw] and yaye, which would be pronounced [jeɪ̯j]? --40bus (talk) 22:15, 26 November 2025 (UTC)
- Wow. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 00:13, 27 November 2025 (UTC)
- Not really; the second W doesn't contribute a semivowel sound. "Wawa" works, but it's a proper name (a place name, a business name, etc.), not really an English word. --~2025-36752-20 (talk) 10:34, 27 November 2025 (UTC)
- In that case, Wowee! ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 18:48, 27 November 2025 (UTC)
- Isn't the second ⟨w⟩ in Wawa a plain /w/, like it is in stowaway (/ˈstəʊəˌweɪ/)? I think it is the other way around: the first ⟨w⟩ in wow is not a semivowel. But dayowl (seen here) should work. So would windowowl, should these critters become common enough to warrant their receiving a univerbated moniker. ‑‑Lambiam 12:19, 27 November 2025 (UTC)
- Lambiam, [w] is a semivowel. --Trovatore (talk) 05:22, 2 December 2025 (UTC)
- Possibly yo-yo, unless that's considered bisyllabic. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 12:51, 27 November 2025 (UTC)
- They're both non-syllabic vocoids, aka semivowels aka glides aka (subset of) approximants. English phonotactics prohibits them from occurring in coda except as the second components of diphthongs. Nardog (talk) 07:45, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- Isn't it ironic that linguisticians often use terminology that is incomprehensible to the great unwashed, the mere users and principal creators of the language? -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 21:22, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- No more so than that entomologists use big words for insects. runs away --Trovatore (talk) 21:27, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- Isn't it ironic that linguisticians often use terminology that is incomprehensible to the great unwashed, the mere users and principal creators of the language? -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 21:22, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- Not really; the second W doesn't contribute a semivowel sound. "Wawa" works, but it's a proper name (a place name, a business name, etc.), not really an English word. --~2025-36752-20 (talk) 10:34, 27 November 2025 (UTC)