There’s something interestingly typical going on here. Henry’s article displays an intense interest in matters of pronunciation and an obviously acute faculty of observation; but it also displays an almost complete ignorance of the concepts, skills and background knowledge that are relevant to the kinds of linguistic description that interest him. This combination of intense interest and spectacular ignorance is, I think, unique to the area of speech and language. You don’t find birders obsessively compiling a life list that includes insects and bats under the misapprehension that these are also members of the taxonomic class Aves. You don’t find photography enthusiasts who think that f-number is a measure of film speed, or that nikon is a noble gas used to prevent condensation inside lens assemblies.
Another Language Log, of course.
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