What a Kant!

So, I had a huge argument with Marcie (American, born to a German parent) about the pronounciations of the words Kant and cunt.

Disclaimer: I'm talking about the American pronounciation. So none of that British coont business!

To my German readers (all of them?): Say both words out loud.

Kant.

Cunt.

Hear a difference? I sure didn't.

I was sure the two were absolute homophones. But Marcie strongly disagreed.

And so did the IPA: They list Kant as /kant/ and cunt as /kʌnt/. I dismissed this, and Marcie's claim, based on the assumption that Americans just don't pronounce Kant correctly. I was assured that I wasn't mispronouncing cunt by the list of rhymes the Wiktionary gives: blunt, hunt, stunt. In my head, they all have the exact same vowel sound as Kant.

She argued that I don't hear the (tiny, she admitted) difference, because the ʌ sound just doesn't exist in German. Naturally, I wasn't convinced by that argument, at all.

So, how would we settle this? By hearing each other say the words out lout, of course. Skype to the rescue!


Well, turns out Marcie was right. The difference is small, but distinguishable. Although now I can't even recreate it anymore. So I don't really feel like I lost the argument. Chalk this one up to errors of measurment...