[WikiEN-l] IPA issues

[stevertigo]

Emily Monroe <bluecaliocean at me.com> wrote:
> Okay, but which pronoucation should we use? Australian English?
> British English? Canadian English? Does this matter with IPA?

If you look at the IPA for English page you'll see all of the major
English dialects represented, and yes there are substantial phonetic
differences between them - vowels particularly. Plain English is
flexible for all of these dialects such that spelling things out in
IPA isn't necessary. Using IPA to distinguish between English dialects
would be overcomplicating.

Dealing with foreign concepts however - that is, the 80% of the planet
that doesn't originate from an English-speaking culture - should
require using some basic pronunciation scheme. And like DGG said,
we're fortunate to have a single internaʃonal standard in the first
place.

-Stevertigo