credit: Gary Allman |
I think it was John Maidment who started the ball rolling when he put a posting online dealing with stress minimal pairs. I'd like to draw your attention to a subgroup, namely stress minimal pairs the members of which are semantically unrelated.
Consider /ˈtɔːment/ (= severe suffering) and /tɔːˈment/ (= to make someone suffer severely): They share the same number and types of phonemes and they are semantically closely related.
/ˈɪnsaɪt/ (= clear understanding) and /ɪnˈsaɪt/ (= encourage someone to do something) also share the same number and types of phonemes, but they are semantically unrelated (well, sort of). It this latter group I'm looking for. Here's a first list (some of the items may have identical stress):
- ˈessay (= writing) - esˈsay
- ˈforebear - forˈbear (vb)
- ˈforegoing - forˈgoing
- ˈincense - inˈcense
- ˈinsight - inˈcite
- ˈintern - inˈtern
- ˈtrusty - truˈstee
ˈwellspring - Well ˈspring!
ReplyDelete(Sort of, as you said ;)
These only work for some speakers:
ReplyDeletebillow ~ below
India ~ endear
canal - kennel
ReplyDelete