6718: Re: 6689: Re: 6672: Name of the capital (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Martha O'Brien <mobfa1@scotus.francis.edu>

Regarding the pronunciation of "Port-au-Prince":

The method I used to study Kreyol also spelled it "Potoprens" and 
a French phonetics textbook which I have indicates that in 
"locutions figees" (and it seems to me that the name of a town 
would qualify), the liaison is required.  Therefore, if that rule indeed 
applies to "Port-au-Prince", the liaison would exist.  Nonetheless, 
the Haitians I know tend not to pronounce the "t" in French or in 
Kreyol--just the opposite of "maxetluc's" experience......So, 
perhaps it is another one of the many individual and regional 
differences which exist in any language.  Is the theory prespciptive 
or descriptive--and which should it be?