North
American English Dialects, Based on Pronunciation Patterns
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(12-Aug.-2014) |
Individual
Words |
Most Common Second and Third Languages by State in the U.S. The following page is interesting, and was pointed out to me by several people, although it really has no direct correlation to the data presented here: gizmodo.com/the-most-common-languages-spoken-in-the-u-s-state-by-1575719698. Adj. 4-Oct.-2017 Web-Based Survey now completed A group of linguists had been gathering data on North American English dialects using a web-based survey. They asked for our help, and some of you helped with this survey. This survey is now closed, with 3903 total responses in December 2012. You can see some preliminary results at: pantheon.yale.edu/~clb3/NorthAmericanDialects. However, I find that some of their samples definitely do not represent the local dialect! 26-Dec.-2012 |
This is just a hobby of mine, that I thought might be interesting to a lot of people. Some people collect stamps. Others collect coins. I collect dialects. - Rick Aschmann. (Page last updated: May 2, 2018.
Thanks to all of you who have written expressing appreciation for the page! I don’t promise to respond to every e-mail, but I am still trying to answer all those who sent in a sample or other information, or even a complaint. Unfortunately, my life is always very busy, and I can only dedicate a small portion of my time to this, so I have trouble even keeping up with current correspondence about this page. Worse yet, from time to time this page gets posted to another popular blog, and I get a new surge of e-mail, so I have doubts of ever being able to answer it all. But I’ll keep working at it! 12-Aug.-2014 There are 8 major
English dialect areas in North America, listed below the map at left. These
are shown in blue, each with its number, on the map and in the Dialect Description Chart below, and are
also outlined with blue lines on the map. The first 6 of these begin at the eastern seaboard and proceed west,
reflecting western settlement patterns. The many subdialects are
shown in red on the map and in the chart, and are outlined with red lines on
the map. All of these are listed in the margins of the map as well.
In the Dialect Description Chart additional
features not shown on the map are provided for distinguishing the dialects. Recent additions • I did quite a bit of cosmetic adjustment to place name positioning and other things to make the map more readable. New! 5-Oct.-2017 • I adjusted the name of the Mat-Su Valley dialect in Alaska from Mat-Su Valley to Mat-Su Valley (North Central) to better clarify its status, as an Island of North Central in Alaska. New! 4-Oct.-2017 • Because native French speakers do not typically have the Canadian raising, I have now explicitly shown the pink Canadian-raising line as excluding the French-speaking area in Canada. (Earlier I had simply not shown it in this area, but the result was confusing even to me, so I put it in.) I also adjusted a few lines running across Hudson Bay. Adj. 4-Oct.-2017 • I adjusted the main map to match the New Orleans inset in its southeast corner and added St. Bernard Parish, reflecting the fact that apparently all of St. Bernard Parish has the same dialect. New! 13-Sep.-2017 • I have now finished reducing the size of the dots for cities and towns, except for the larger population centers, to reduce the clutter on the map. I have now completed this for all U.S. states and Canadian provinces. Adj. 13-Sep.-2017 • Oops! At some point I accidentally changed the color of the El Paso dialect from white to pink. It is now fixed. New! 13-Sep.-2017 • I made a number of cosmetic adjustments to the dialect descriptions and lines on the right side of the map (in the Atlantic Ocean), none of which affect the content of the map. New! 13-Sep.-2017
• Continuing survey: I only discovered in 2011 that many if not most Americans pronounce the “l” in words like “calm” and other words ending in “-alm”, which surprised me very much, since I don’t. Some also pronounce the “l” in “folk”, and even a few may pronounce the “l” in “talk”. See The Pronunciation of “-alm” and “-olk” and “-alk” for more details. I would love to know if you do or do not pronounce the “l” in such words, and where you grew up! Yes, I know many of you have sent in data, and I am still trying to get it all compiled. One thing that has discouraged me is that so far no very discernible pattern is emerging! 8-Dec.-2014
What’s New? All additions or changes within the last few months are marked with “ New! ” and the date, or with “ Adj. ” (for “Adjusted”.) To see this new information, simply search for these words.
Map Format I have made a number of adjustments to the map format based on comments and suggestions from people who write in. However, the main complaint, that the map is too complicated and confusing, I can’t really fix: the subject is complicated, and I am well aware that I have tried to include too many features. However, if people have ideas on how to make the map or web page less confusing, I am all ears! 8-May-2013 One thing that may help is that you can now view the file in layers. 16-Sep.-2014 Dialect Survey of Individual Words Many of you have written in to ask, “What about such-and-such a word? What is its distribution across North America?” And my answer has always been, “That’s not what this map is about, it’s about sound patterns affecting many words at once, it’s about phonemic patterns.” Not that I’m not interested, I am, it’s just that there is no place for this sort of information on my map. (The only such word that does appear on the map is the “on” line.) 17-Dec.-2015 However, finally someone has done just what many of you have wanted, they have mapped the distribution of lots of these individual words, as well as some grammatical constructions, and you can enjoy browsing through them here. If you don’t want to struggle through the whole list, a selection of some of the most interesting with whimsical comments can be found here. 21-Aug.-2013 The link for this site was sent in by Joshua Katz. Thanks! Also, Joshua has redone the maps to make a lot of them more readable, as for example his map of words for carbonated beverage. (Oops, these links seem to be obsolete. He still has this page, but most of the links on it do not work, though the one for the poster does, and this does have the carbonated beverage map and a few others. The last link in the previous paragraph shows several more, though some of the links don’t work there either.) 17-Dec.-2015 Sadly, they still don’t have
some of the ones I’m interested in, like “greasy/greazy”,
which has a north-south distribution similar to “on”! Does anyone know of a
map of this? 11-Nov.-2015 |
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Small-Scale Dialect Map
The small map below is the same as the Full-Scale Dialect Map that follows, but shows the entire width of the map (on most monitors). 24-Aug.-2010
Click on any part of this map to move to the equivalent part of the Full-Scale Dialect Map. (For now this only moves to the far left or the far right of the Full-Scale Dialect Map, so unfortunately it doesn’t work well for the middle portions, and you will just have to scroll over.) 24-Aug.-2010
Full-Scale Dialect Map
Instructions
For many of the cities or towns on this map, you can listen to an audio or video sample of speech of a native (more specifically, someone who was raised there, though not necessarily born there, and whose dialect clearly represents that place). All of the cities or towns with a green center have such an audio or video sample that can be listened to (and a few of the ones with pink centers do also). I will continue adding new audio and video samples, so check back from time to time. So far there are over 900 samples listed, more and more of which are from contributors! Thanks! 1-Sep.-2014
The cities and towns with a large dot are those which are larger or more important in each state or province. New! 13-Sep.-2017
Use the scroll bars to move around on this map, or, even simpler, start at the tiny map above and click the country (U.S. or Canada) that you want to look at. This will take you to the Small-Scale Dialect Map. Click again to zoom in further on your location. (For now this only moves to the far left or the far right of the Full-Scale Dialect Map, so unfortunately it doesn’t work well for the middle portions, and you will just have to scroll over.) 24-Aug.-2010
The entire map is clickable, taking
you to the list of samples for that state or province. Only those locations
with green centers, and a few with pink centers, have a sample so far. There will be
a few areas of the oceans and the legends that are not clickable, but all of
the states and provinces now are. Place the mouse over a particular state or
province to see its name. (The map
guides, showing the meaning of all the colors, are on the top right and bottom left of the map.) 25-Sep.-2013
Help! For many places I haven’t found an audio sample yet. If you know of an audio or video sample on the Internet that features a speaker who was raised in a particular place, and whose dialect clearly represents that place, please let me know, whether that place is currently listed or not! Although many of the people in these samples are prominent people, I actually prefer ordinary local people, but anyone at all will do, as long as their pronunciation represents the local dialect. (The ones I especially need, and cannot find, are those with an orange-yellow center.) Also, if you think that one of the audio examples does not truly represent the local dialect, please let me know in the same way. (Oh, but please keep the samples clean. I have a policy of not using a sample if it uses a word you can’t say on TV in the U.S.!) I will normally list your name as the contributor, to make this more of a community project, unless you’d rather I didn’t, in which case I will use initials. However, I will not publish anyone’s e-mail address. 10-May-2011
Numbered Locations: A number
of states (17 so far) now have so many locations mapped that there was no
longer room for all the names, so I was forced to go to a numbering system for such areas, since the scale of
the map is already big enough! I put the key to the numbers off the east coast of Canada. The area with the most
numbers is much of Kentucky and Tennessee and
neighboring areas, which are about as thoroughly mapped as they possibly
can be, thanks in part to enthusiastic contributor Eli K. in 2010. That’s the
kind of help needed to really fill out this map! Adj.
2-Oct.-2017
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Data from the Atlas of North American English (ANAE)
I am grateful to the Atlas of North American English (ANAE) by William Labov, Sharon Ash, and Charles Boberg, for a good part of the data on which this map was based. Specifically, much of the information on the map above and in the Dialect Description Chart below was obtained from ANAE chapter 11 (a draft version available on the Internet), as well as from many other chapters of the same work, with a few ideas from a much older version of the same: ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/home.html. (The Table of Contents of the draft version of the atlas can be seen at: www.ling.upenn.edu/phonoatlas/ANAE_ToC.pdf, but this does not link directly to the chapters. Links to each chapter are: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23.) 11-Nov.-2015
However, the names of a number of the dialects are my own, and I have made many adjustments to their borders (especially Inland and Lowland South, West Midland, and Allegheny Midland). Also, a lot of the data is from my own research and analysis. - Rick Aschmann
I discovered in late 2011 that much or all of the audio data upon which the atlas was based is now available on the Internet, on this website (select North American English Dialects). (Replaced bad link.) I will be adding samples from this site as I have time, marked as “ANAE info and audio”. 26-Jan.-2013
Map Notes
The following notes refer to numbers on the map, and show the corresponding section of the ANAE:
1: Pin-pen merger: See Map 9.5 in ANAE chapter 9 and www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/maps/Map3.html. This is the only feature in which I find myself in significant disagreement with the ANAE: I have found that the pin-pen merger area is much larger than they show, especially in the west.[1] (See The Pin-Pen Merger, The Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the Texas Cattle Drives below.) 6-Aug.-2011
2: Long /ō/ [oʊ] fronting: See Map 20.2 in ANAE chapter 20. 2: The boundary between central-back and central-front (the yellow dots) was used by the ANAE to define the boundary between North and Midland, but this line then extends into the West. The deep dip that it takes southwards in Utah and Nevada would seem to indicate settlement of these areas by Northerners, probably represented by the Mormon settlement. Thus this dip corresponds to a large degree to the “Mormon Corridor”. Many of these settlers were originally from the Palmyra, New York, area and from Kirtland, Ohio. Another northern contribution may have been the early northeastern organized crime influence in Las Vegas. Now I’m not saying that people in these areas sound like northeasterners: they don’t, they sound like westerners, with this one feature being dragged south because of this origin. 20-Jan.-2010
3: R-dropping: See Map 7.1 in ANAE chapter 7. R-droppers are also called non-rhotic English speakers, though I find this term rather obscure and academic, and prefer not to use it on a site like this, which is not for academics. There are two types of r-droppers, which I call Systematic R-droppers and Simple R-droppers. 11-May-2015
Systematic R-droppers are found in the northeastern U. S., in much of England, and in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, much of the Caribbean, and other places. Systematic R-droppers have linking and intrusive r’s. John F. Kennedy is an excellent example of a Systematic r-dropper. In a speech he gave prior to being elected, he says “The hungry children I sawr in West Vaginia.” This quote has one intrusive r, and one dropped r, both highlighted in red. In another speech during the Cuban missile crisis he says, starting at 4:55: “...Soviet foreign minista Gromyko told me in my office that he was instructed to make it cleah once again, as he said his govament had already done, Soviet assistance to Cubar, and I quote, ...”, which again has one intrusive r, and three dropped r’s, again highlighted in red. 11-May-2015
Simple R-droppers are found in parts of the Lowland South. As a general rule, they do not have linking and intrusive r’s. All of the areas in the South marked as r-droppers on my map are Simple R-dropper areas, though New Orleans shows some tendency to retain final r’s before a vowel, though not enough to make it systematic. (It turns out that Hawai’i Creole English is also of this type.) 11-Mar.-2016
Numerous examples of both kinds of r-droppers are given in the audio samples below. This pattern is receding, so occasionally only much older speakers retain the r-dropping in a given location. These are surrounded on the map by a dotted green circle, and in the chart below will be indicated with the phrase “Older r-dropper”. 3-Apr.-2010
4: Canadian and Tidewater raising: See Map 15.5 in ANAE chapter 15, noting only the info for the /ou/ [aʊ] vowel (which he writes /aw/), not the /ī/ [aɪ] vowel (which he writes /ay/). The ANAE does not show this information on any map for the Tidewater South, so I have gleaned the info from various sources, including stray comments in ANAE. This is also found in one, and apparently only one, of the New Orleans subdialects, St. Bernard Parish, which is far away from either Canada or the Tidewater South! Why this should be the case is a mystery. Adj. 16-Sep.-2017
5: Bite-bout line: See Map 14.1 in ANAE chapter 14.
6: “On” line: See Map 14.2 in ANAE chapter 14. This is the only lexical item included in this analysis, but it seems to correlate with the phonological data, and as the ANAE points out, largely follows the North-Midland boundary. Why it turns north at its western end in the Dakotas and does some contortions is unclear. (The ANAE did not have Mitchell, SD or Ashley, ND, which are the surprises. I had earlier thought Mitchell was north of the line, but actually it is south of it.) Miles City, Montana, an outlier of Western North, is also below the line. In San Francisco the pattern seems to be reversed, with the “Don” group possibly representing a later influx of some type. 17-Dec.-2015
Dialect Description Chart
(17-Aug.-2015)
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vowel of “lot” /ŏ/ [a] almost as much as vowel of “let” /ĕ/ [ɛ] |
vowel of “cot” /ŏ/ [a] more fronted than vowel of “cut” /ŭ/ [ʌ] |
vowel of “too” /ōō/ [ᵿʉ] much more fronted than vowel of “toe” /ō/ [o(ʊ)] |
Vowel of “far” /är/ [aɹ] fronted |
Vowel of “caught” /ô/ [oə] strongly raised |
“hoarse” = “horse”, “mourning” = “morning”, “four” = “for” |
Unique Features |
Chapter and map in ANAE |
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Chapter and map in ANAE |
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yes |
Like Western North, but “cot”=“caught”. |
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yes |
Subtle differences from the
rest of the North Central, particularly /ŧħ/
[ð] becomes /d/ [d]. |
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Mat-Su Valley, Alaska * |
yes |
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yes |
Strongly like North Central, but with some admixture from the main Alaska dialect. (See Sarah Palin.) |
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yes |
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yes |
Vowel of “too” significantly more fronted than vowel of “toe”, “cot”=“caught”. |
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Alaska |
yes |
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yes |
Same as West (ANAE chapter 11 says there are significant differences, but does not make clear what they are.) |
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Silver City, NM |
yes |
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yes |
Same as West, but “cot”≠“caught”. |
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yes |
very little |
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yes |
Same as West, plus Canadian vowel shift, vowel of “cat” central, raising of “bite”, “bout”, Canadian raising. Adj. 2-Oct.-2017 |
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Atlantic Provinces |
mixed? |
yes |
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yes |
Vowel of “far” fronted (but not “father”). Canadian raising only partial. Adj. 2-Oct.-2017 |
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yes |
yes |
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yes |
Like the Atlantic Provinces, but with a strong Irish component. |
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Eastern New England (ENE) |
yes |
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no |
“far” & “father” fronted to [a], systematic r-dropping, “cot”=“caught”, “father” [a] & “bother” [ɒə] don’t rhyme. |
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NW New England |
very little |
very little |
yes |
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yes |
Vowel of “far” fronted (but not “father”), “cot”=“caught”. |
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mixed |
mixed |
mostly |
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almost all |
Back vowels strongly backed, defined as the “cot”≠“caught” area north of the line of yellow dots, except for the St. Louis Corridor.[2] |
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Western North |
mixed |
mixed |
mostly |
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yes |
Least distinctive dialect of the North, some sections are “General American”. |
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Inland North |
yes |
yes |
mostly |
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almost all |
Northern Cities Shift: /ă/ in “bat” strongly raised to [eə], most short vowels shifted. |
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St. Louis Corridor |
yes |
yes |
Mixed |
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mixed |
Northern Cities Shift: /ă/ in “bat” strongly raised to [eə], most short vowels shifted, but many other vowels like Midland. |
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Indiana North[3] |
no |
no |
yes |
Very similar to Western North, but separated from it geographically[4]. |
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Eastern North |
yes |
yes |
very little |
mixed |
yes |
Mostly like Western North, but some similarities to Greater New York City. |
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Albany |
yes |
yes |
very little |
yes |
yes |
Many vowels like Greater New York City, but no r-dropping. |
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Providence |
yes |
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no |
/ă/ in “cat” central [a], systematic r-dropping, “cart”=“cot”, which is not seen anywhere else in the world! |
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yes |
yes |
Various unusual vowels, systematic r-dropping, “bad” [eə] & “had” [æ] don’t rhyme, and “father” [ɑə] & “bother” [a] don’t rhyme for many speakers. For more details, see New York City and Its Offspring. 11-Mar.-2016 |
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The Hamptons |
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yes |
A lot like Greater New York City, but more research needed! |
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Downtown New Orleans |
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no? |
More like Greater New York City than anything else, although “bad” & “had” probably rhyme, and “on” rhymes with “Dawn”. For more details, see New Orleans. 11-Mar.-2016 |
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almost all |
In many ways is intermediate between Northern and Southern[5]. |
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Central Midland |
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almost all |
Least distinctive dialect in the U.S., many sections are “General American” |
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Canton, Ohio |
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yes |
“bat” strongly raised, “on” rhymes with “Don”, not “Dawn” |
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yes |
Many vowels are pronounced like Greater New York City, “pin”≠“pen”, unlike the surrounding area[6]. |
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West Midland * |
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yes |
“cot”=“caught”, unlike most of Midland. |
(19) |
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Allegheny Midland[7] |
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yes |
“cot”=“caught”, unlike most of Midland. |
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Pittsburgh |
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yes |
Pittsburgh vowel shift: “out” is pronounced [ˈat], with no diphthong, the way a Bostonian says “art”. |
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Oklahoma City * [8] |
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yes |
Like the parts of the Central Midland south of the pin-pen line. |
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East Midland * |
yes |
yes |
Like the Central Midland, with influences from Atlantic Midland. |
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Atlantic Midland[9] |
yes |
yes |
“bad” does not rhyme with “had”, like Greater New York City, but otherwise like East Midland. |
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North Florida |
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yes |
Like Central Midland, “pin”=“pen”. |
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South Florida |
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yes |
Like Central Midland, “pin”≠“pen”. |
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El Paso |
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yes |
“cot”≠“caught” like Central Midland, “pin”=“pen”. |
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Galveston * |
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yes |
Very similar to East Midland, or even to Atlantic Midland, except that “bad” rhymes with “had” |
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yes |
yes |
Very similar to East Midland, or even to Atlantic Midland, except that “bad” rhymes with “had” |
(11) |
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mixed |
Partial to full Southern shift: vowels of “ride” and “buy” have no diphthong: long /ī/ is [a]. In almost entire area “pin”=“pen”, except as noted below or on map. |
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Lowland South |
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mixed |
Partial Southern shift: long /ī/ vowels of “ride” and “buy” have [a], with no diphthong, but “right” is [aɪ]. |
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mixed |
Outlined in dark green rather than red, a catch-all for all R-dropping dialects in the South, includes or cuts across some of the dialects below. |
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mixed |
Outlined in pink rather than red, a catch-all for those parts of the coastal southeast that have the Tidewater raising, as explained on the map. It actually includes two areas that lack the Southern shift, Down East & Outer Banks, and Charleston. Adj. 2-Oct.-2017 |
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Savannah |
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yes |
R-dropping, “pin”≠“pen”. |
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yes |
East is R-dropping, west apparently not, “pin”=“pen”, French influence, th > t,d. |
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New Orleans, Mid City |
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yes |
See the New Orleans inset on the map and the New Orleans section below. Adj. 14-Sep.-2017 |
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New Orleans, Irish Channel |
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yes |
See the New Orleans inset on the map and the New Orleans section below. Adj. 13-Sep.-2017 |
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New Orleans, St. Bernard Parish |
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yes |
See the New Orleans inset on the map and the New Orleans section below. Adj. 14-Sep.-2017 |
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New Orleans, Peripheral |
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yes |
See the New Orleans inset on the map and the New Orleans section below. Adj. 14-Sep.-2017 |
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Inland South |
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almost all |
Full Southern shift: vowels of “ride”, “buy”, and “right” all have [a], with no diphthong. |
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Anomalous peripheral areas in the southeast that resisted the Southern shift: |
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Charleston |
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yes |
No Southern shift, R-dropping, vowels of “bait” and “boat” are not diphthongs, but simple [e] and [o]. |
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Down East & Outer Banks * |
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yes |
No Southern shift, long /ī/ [ɒɪ] vowel often almost like /oi/ [ɔɪ], “pin”=“pen”[11]. |
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Chesapeake Islands * |
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yes |
No Southern shift, long /ī/ [ɒɪ] vowel less like /oi/ [ɔɪ] than Down East & Outer Banks, “pin”≠“pen”. |
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* Those dialects marked with an asterisk are not in the Atlas of North American English (ANAE).
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Colors: |
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Transitional areas within
main dialects |
Distinctive or innovative features of a given dialect |
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Transitional areas
outside main dialects |
Intermediate or partial features |
Other Sources
I have added and adjusted a lot of the information on the
map based on the following audio and non-audio data. - Rick Aschmann
Regional non-audio data
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Location |
Source |
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English, French, and indigenous mother-tongue areas of
Canada |
atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/site/english/maps/population.html#language 25-Sep.-2013 |
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French mother-tongue areas of Maine |
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Indigenous languages |
ethnologue.com/region/NAM 9-Sep.-2013 |
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the eastern boundary of Inland North |
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Greater New York City |
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Eastern boundary between Eastern New England and Providence |
ling.upenn.edu/~johnson4/pwpl_draft.pdf 30-Mar.-2010 |
Multiple-region audio samples found on the Internet
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Location |
Source |
Comment |
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Samples from almost all U. S. states and a few from
Canada |
International
Dialects of English Archive (IDEA) (or new clickable map: www.dialectsarchive.com/globalmap) |
This site has been completely redone, perhaps in 2013, and is vastly improved, since it now provides a lot more information about the speakers, including place of birth and sometimes a list of places where they have lived, plus a lot of other information! However, I still find that many of the samples do not represent well the bedrock pronunciation of the area, but instead represent those who have tried to sound less “local”. Also, locations are often limited (though I see that more have been added recently), and often only urban locations are given. Even so, in many cases the data is useful, and I have used it in the sound samples below, especially when clearer indications are given of “nativeness”, and now that more information has been provided, I will probably add more. If anyone finds any of these that I have left out and shouldn’t have, please let me know! (Because
this site changed its entire structure, none of the old links worked anymore,
and I have redone them all. The original site was web.ku.edu/~idea or web.ku.edu/~idea.) 8-Nov.-2013 |
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Samples only from north-central U. S. |
Again, it is not always clear if the speakers are natives
of the area in which they were interviewed, or if they represent well the
local dialect. However, it includes rural speakers, which can help fill in
holes. Used occasionally. If anyone finds any of these that I have left out
and shouldn’t have, please let me know! 11-Mar.-2016 |
Guide to the Sounds of North American English
In many places on this web page the pronunciation of a name or other word will be given after it. These pronunciation guides will have two forms: a phonemic guide between slashes / /, based on the Traditional Dictionary Pronunciation System (TDPS) that is found in many dictionaries, especially American ones[12], and a phonetic guide (providing the phonetic details) between square brackets [ ], based on the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). (Thanks, Maria Mikkonen![13]) 26-Aug.-2013
The advantage of the phonemic guide is that it allows different dialects to use the same pronunciation key and get the right result for each dialect. For this guide I have mostly followed the TDPS system used in the American Heritage Dictionary[14], rather than the one used by Merriam-Webster or others, since it is more complete and applies to more dialects. 31-Aug.-2015
However, I have included the phonetic guide as well, partly to give a more precise phonetic pronunciation of local variants, and partly because many have complained that they prefer the IPA or are familiar only with it. (This guide includes allophonic variation such as aspiration on voiceless consonants, which is conditioned by stress and word position. However, it would be impractical to represent all the fine detail, such as the rounding that many English consonants have, or the differences between “clear l” [l] and “dark l” [ɫ].) 18-July-2013
In the phonemic guide I have followed the American Heritage Dictionary system (a more complete analysis can be found on this Wikipedia page) to the letter, except for a few minor adjustments in the vowel system[15] and one in the consonant system (/ŧħ/ instead of /th/), and the following differences: 11-Mar.-2016
1. I write the syllable with primary stress using bold and underline, and syllables with secondary stress with just bold, rather than using an apostrophe after it like the AHD. In other words, I show the pronunciation of “underneath” as /ŭndərnēth/, whereas the AHD does it as /ŭn'dər-nēth'/. 31-Aug.-2015
2. I do not separate syllables with a hyphen except when absolutely necessary, as in “cartridge” /kärtrij/ versus “cartwright” /kärt-rīt/, or “mission” /mĭshən/ versus “mishap” /mĭs-hăp/; although technically in these two cases the underlining of the primary-stressed syllable gives enough information, even so the hyphens help to clarify.
3.
I show the pronunciation of
words like “needle” and “sudden” as /nēdəl/ and /sǔdən/, rather
than treating them as having syllabic /l/ or /n/, which they clearly have phonetically: [ˈniɾl̩, ˈsʌdn̩]. 2-Jan.-2012
The ANAE does not use either the TDPS or the IPA, but instead uses a completely different transcription
system, described in ANAE chapter 2. This system is phonemic, like
the TDPS.[16] 31-Aug.-2015
How Many Vowels are there in American English?
No, the answer is not: “Five: a, e, i, o u.” Granted, in traditional English spelling those are the vowel letters, yes, but I’m talking about our spoken language: How many significant vowel sounds are there? Well, if you consult any popular American English dictionary, and study the Pronunciation Key, there will be a long list of vowels. In the Pronunciation Key to the American Heritage Dictionary, 19 different vowel symbols are listed (not counting the ones only used in foreign words)! However, some of these are special vowels that only occur before the /r/ sound, which are “colored” by the /r/, so these can be separated out as special cases. And one of these vowels, /ə/, only occurs in weak syllables (completely unstressed syllables), never in stressed syllables, so it also can be separated out as a special case. This leaves us with 15 Ordinary Vowels that can occur in stressed syllables. Very few North American English speakers have all of these vowels: Many have 14 (lacking the /ä/ vowel), and many have only 13 (lacking both /ä/ and /ô/). Greater New York City has 16 Ordinary Stressed Vowels, the 15 in the American Heritage list plus one that is not usually listed in dictionary pronunciation guides, found in the word “bad”, which it makes sense to spell /â/, since in this dialect it is the same as the r-colored vowel that occurs before /r/ in words like “bearing”! This vowel also occurs in the Atlantic Midland dialect. (I had initially spelled this vowel as /ăə/, but there is no need to use additional symbols when this is not necessary.) 31-Aug.-2015
These 16 vowels are listed below in the second column, with sample words shown in the first column. Those with a breve ˘ over them, /ă,ĕ,ĭ,ŏ,ŭ,ŏŏ/, are those vowels that historically were short vowels in English (and still are in British English), while those with a macron ˉ over them, /ā,ē,ī,ō,ōō/, are those vowels that historically were long vowels in English (and still are in British English). In American English these vowels are no longer phonetically long or short, though the “short” ones tend to be phonetically lax, and the “long” ones tense. As a general rule the short/lax ones do not occur at the end of a word or syllable, only before a consonant; this rule has no exceptions in British English, though it does seem to have a few in American English. (The remaining Ordinary Stressed Vowels /ä/, /â/ (in Greater New York City and Atlantic Midland), /ô/, /oi/, and /ou/ fit in more with the long/tense group in terms of their pronunciation, history, and distribution.) (See also the section How I Use the IPA (and how I don’t) for more discussion about this.) 10-Nov.-2015
The remaining columns show what happens to vowels before final r, showing the “R-colored” vowels used in most of North America, and showing the Southern System in the final column, representing the system used in much of the South, which does not have “R-colored” vowels.
(I have included the IPA equivalents of these vowels in brackets [ ] as well. However, keep in mind that the actual pronunciation of a given phonemic vowel may vary greatly from region to region. For example, the /ŏ/ vowel is pronounced as [a], an open front unrounded vowel, in much of the Inland North, but is pronounced as [ɔ], an open-mid back rounded vowel, in England. A whole gamut of vowel sounds in between these two occurs somewhere in North America: in much of Canada and in some other “cot”=“caught” areas the pronunciation is [ɒ], whereas most others use [ɑ] or [a] or something in between. Many other vowels have similar variants. The most distinctive Southern pronunciation is shown in a separate column. However, keep in mind that I have not listed all possible variants for any region.) 3-July-2010
If anyone finds that any of the symbols in the chart do not display properly on their web browsers, please let me know. Most of them are standard Unicode characters.
On Android phones and tablets: up until Android version 4.3 in 2013, in the standard Android browser and in Chrome the symbols /ȯ/, one of the R-colored vowels below, and uppercase /Ə/, used in the phonemic respelling section, did not display correctly. And up until version 5 they still hadn’t fixed a few of the IPA characters, like [ᵿ], which I use to show the Southern pronunciation of the vowel in “boot”, nor had they fixed other font problems, like for Ancient Greek, leaving me frustrated with my Android phone for a long time! However, now in version 5 they finally seem to have fixed all of these issues. However, if you have an older version of Android the solution is simple: just use the Firefox browser, which displays these characters properly in spite of Android. 31-Aug.-2015
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Ordinary Stressed Vowels |
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“R-colored” Stressed Vowels |
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Final Wells (sample words) |
phonemic |
IPA |
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IPA South †† |
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keepers |
droppers |
Southern System |
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beat bee fleece feel |
ē |
[i] |
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[ɪi] |
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fear, pier, |
îr |
[ɪɹ] |
[ɪə] |
intermediate |
/ēər/ [ɪiə(ɹ)], rhymes with “skier” |
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bit kit fill |
ĭ |
[ɪ] |
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[iə] |
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1 |
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bait bay face fail |
ā |
[eɪ/e] |
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[ɛɪ] |
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fair, bear, |
âr |
[eɹ] |
[eə] (British [ɛə]) |
For most speakers |
/ăr/ [æɹ/æə]: “hairy”=“Harry” /hărĭ/ [ˈhæɹɪ] which rhyme with “marry” /mărĭ/ [ˈmæɹɪ], but “merry” /mĕrĭ/ [ˈmeɹɪ] and “Mary” /mārĭ/ [ˈmɛɪɹɪ] are different. |
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bet dress fell |
ĕ |
[ɛ] |
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[e] |
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bat trap had |
ă |
[æ] |
┐ |
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[æ(ɪə)] |
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bad man |
â |
[eə] |
┘ |
(GNYC, Atlantic Midland) |
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1 |
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ah palm father Bach’s |
ä |
[a/ɑə] |
┐ |
(E. New England [a], GNYC [ɑə]) |
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far, farther, |
är |
[aɹ/ɑɹ/ɒɹ] |
[a/ɑ/ɑə] |
Nearly everyone has this![17] |
/är/ [ɑɹ/ɑə(ɹ)/ɒɹ] for many speakers, /ôr/ [ɔə(ɹ)] for others |
|
cot lot bother box |
ŏ |
[a/ɑ/ɒ/ɒəENE] |
┤ |
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[ɑ] |
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caught awe thought balks |
ô |
[ɒ/ɔ/oə/ɒəENE] |
┘ |
(Eastern U.S. See map.) |
[ɒʊ] |
|
for, horse, |
ôr
** |
[ɔɹ] |
[ɒəENE] |
See ANAE map 8.2 |
/är/ [ɑɹ/ɑə(ɹ)/ɒɹ] for many speakers, /ôr/ [ɔə(ɹ)] for others |
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1 |
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boat toe goat foal |
ō |
[o(ʊ)] |
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[əʊ] |
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four, hoarse, |
ȯr
** |
[oɹ] |
[oə] |
For most speakers, |
/ôər/ [ɒʊə(ɹ)], rhymes with “rawer” /ȯr/ [oə(ɹ)] in much of New Orleans |
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1 |
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cut strut rush, love, rough |
ŭ |
[ʌ] |
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[ə] |
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fur, urge, nurse, |
ûr |
[ɝ] |
[ɝ/ɜ/ɜɪ] |
Varies. |
/ûr/ [ɝ] or /ŭr/ [ʌɹ] or /ŏŏy/ [ɜɪ] |
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1 |
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foot foot full, took, put, bush |
ŏŏ * |
[ʊ] |
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[ʏ] |
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poor, tour cure, pure |
ŏŏr (yŏŏr)
† |
[ʊɹ], etc. ([jʊɹ]) |
[ʊə], etc. ([jʊə]) |
Many lack this, |
/ōōər/ [ᵿʉə(ɹ)], “poor” often /pôər/ [ˈpʰɒʊə(ɹ)] |
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boot true goose fool, spook |
ōō * |
[u] |
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[ᵿʉ] |
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(cute) cue beauty |
(yōō) † |
[ju] |
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[ɪʊ] |
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1 |
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bite by price |
ī |
[aɪ/ɑɪ] |
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[a/aɛ/aɪ] |
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bout now mouth |
ou |
[æʊ/aʊ/ɑʊ] |
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[æə] |
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Hoyt boy choice noise |
oi |
[ɔɪ] |
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[ɒʊɛ/ɔɛ] |
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Vowel that Only Occurs in Weak (Completely Unstressed) Syllables |
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“R-colored” Vowel that Only Occurs in Weak (Completely Unstressed) Syllables |
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about, item, civil, gallop, circus |
ə |
[ə] |
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[ə] |
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butter, motor, solar |
ər |
[ɚ] |
[ə] |
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Same |
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Other Vowels that Can Occur in Weak (Completely Unstressed) Syllables |
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permit (noun), colic, impose |
ĭ |
[ɪ] |
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[ɪ] |
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funny, linear |
ē (ĭ) ºº |
[i] ([ɪ]) |
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[i/ɪ] |
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situate, fruition, issue |
ōō º |
[u/ʊ] |
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[u/ʊ/əw/ə] |
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billowing, pillow, potato |
ō º |
[o/ʊ] |
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[o/ʊ/əw/ə] |
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(17-Dec.-2015)
Black: The black vowels are those which all Americans have as distinct vowels.
Red: The red vowels are those which many but not all Americans have, as distinguished from the other vowels. I decided to make /ŏ/ the default vowel of the /ä/ŏ/ô/ group for all but Eastern New England, since for those who make the distinction it is by far the most common. In other words, for those who say all three the same, only /ŏ/ will be used in the phonemic spelling. However, in Eastern New England it makes more sense to make the default vowel /ô/, because of the way it interacts with a following dropped r; e.g. “wad” and “ward” are pronounced the same in Eastern New England, but nowhere else in the world! They both come out [ˈwɒəd], which phonemically would be /wôd/ or perhaps /wô(r)d/. 17-Dec.-2015
Green: The green vowels are those which a small minority of Americans have, as distinguished from the other vowels, in particular regions or dialects.
†† The pronunciation given here shows the most distinctive Southern pronunciation, specifically those areas which have experienced both Stage 2 and Stage 3 of the Southern Shift, as shown on Map 18.6 in ANAE chapter 18. Stage 2 covers most of the South, whereas Stage 3 only covers much of Alabama and parts of neighboring states. These stages are independent of and cut across the boundary between Inland Southern and Lowland Southern. 8-July-2013
* These two
sounds are actually spelled as /
/
and /
/ instead of /ŏŏ/
and /ōō/ in the AHD and most other dictionary pronunciation systems, but
since there is not a practical way to display such a combination in Unicode,
I have followed the example of this web site (part of reference.com, though they do not now use the AHD
pronunciation system), and this Wikipedia page, which is one of the most complete
treatments of the system. (Technically there is a way to do // and //
in Unicode, as contributor Brian Ewins showed me[18],
but I have tried them in various browsers, and they will not display
consistently.) 11-Mar.-2016
** Actually, some speakers have /ôr/ instead of /ȯr/, but all speakers have one or the other! See The horse-hoarse Merger and the card-cord merger. 17-Dec.-2015
† The /yōō/ sound is not a single sound, but is simply /y/ followed by /ōō/.[19] Thus, there really is no “long /ū/” vowel. Similarly, /yŏŏr/ is simply /y/ followed by /ŏŏr/.
ºº This vowel is often pronounced as /ĭ/ [ɪ] by Southern Americans and Britishers. 8-Feb.-2013
º According to Merriam-Webster, these two vowels are actually pronounced
the same, and are more properly represented as a neutral weak diphthong /əw/. They may be right for many speakers, and
are probably right for me in many cases, but no other dictionary that I have
found agrees with them. They are probably right for most Southerners, and
possibly for most Britishers. 8-Feb.-2013
[ENE] Pronunciations marked with this are only found in Eastern New England. 17-Dec.-2015
How Many Consonants are there?
(1-Aug.-2012)
The answer to this one is a bit less complicated, but again the answer is not based on the traditional English alphabet. Most English speakers have 24. (The /hw/ [ʍ] sound, which is usually spelled “wh” in English, is really just a combination of /h/ followed by /w/, and was originally spelled this way in Old English. Most English speakers no longer have this sound, though I and many other older speakers do in many parts of North America, and in certain regions, particularly the South, nearly all speakers do.) 8-July-2013
The AHD uses /th/, in italics, for the voiced “th” sound, as in “this” (which is different from the voiceless “th” sound, as in “thin”), and for a long time I did the same on this page, but I am now using /ŧħ/ for this sound, for several reasons, one of which is that using a formatting feature like italics limits the places this writing system can be used, and anyway I would prefer to keep italics for their usual purpose. 31-Aug.-2015
Note that the letters c, q, and x are not listed. This is because they are simply different ways of spelling sounds already listed: /k/ or /s/, /kw/, and /ks/ or /gz/. I show the comparison below:
|
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
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b |
ch |
d |
f |
g |
h |
j |
k |
l |
m |
n |
ng |
p |
r |
s |
sh |
t |
th |
ŧħ |
v |
w |
y |
z |
zh |
|
(hw) |
|
|
IPA |
b |
tʃ* |
d |
f |
ɡ |
h |
dʒ |
k* |
l |
m |
n |
ŋ |
p* |
ɹ |
s |
ʃ |
t* |
θ |
ð |
v |
w |
j |
z |
ʒ |
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(ʍ) |
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“church”, “nature” |
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“judge” |
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“sing”, “singer”, “finger” |
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“shush”, “nation” |
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“thin”, “bath” |
“this”, “bathe” |
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“pleasure”, “vision”, “genre”, “rouge” |
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(“which”, “whale”) |
*These often have an aspirated allophone, e.g. [kʰ], which I have represented in the phonetic guide for many names, though not in the phonemic guide.
(31-Aug.-2015)
The Stress Pattern of English,
and How it Messes with the Pronunciation
(8-Feb.-2013)
American English (and most other varieties of English) has three levels of stress on each syllable of a word, primary stress, secondary stress, or no stress. Only one syllable in the word can have primary stress, and this is the syllable that is pronounced with the greatest intensity or loudness. The other syllables can have either secondary stress or no stress. An example is the word “counterrevolutionary”, pronounced /kountərrĕvəlōōshənârē/ [ˌkʰaʊɾ̃ɚˌɹɛvəˈluʃəˌneɹi]. This word has 8 syllables, divided with hyphens as /koun-tər-rĕv-ə-lōō-shə-nâr-ē/ [ˌkʰaʊ-ɾ̃ɚ-ˌɹɛv-ə-ˈlu-ʃə-ˌneɹ-i]. It has one syllable with primary stress, /lōō/ [ˈlu], marked with bold and underline in the dictionary spelling and with [ˈ] before it in the IPA. It has three syllables with secondary stress, syllables 1, 3, and 7, marked with bold in the dictionary spelling and with [ˌ] before them in the IPA, and four with no stress, syllables 2, 4, 6, and 8. As is true with many words in English, especially long ones, every other syllable is weak (unstressed). 10-Aug.-2013
In stressed syllables (whether primary or secondary) all of the Stressed Vowels in the chart above can occur, but in completely unstressed syllables (weak syllables) in English a phenomenon called vowel weakening or neutralization occurs. As a result, most of the vowels in these syllables are weakened or neutralized to the vowel /ə/, and the rest of the vowels are weakened or neutralized to a very small group, listed under “Other Vowels that Can Occur in Weak (Completely Unstressed) Syllables” above. This vowel weakening is a characteristic of English in particular (though it does occur in other languages as well), but it does not occur at all in some languages, like Spanish, which makes it especially hard for English speakers to speak good Spanish or vice versa, since they are each always subconsciously trying to apply their own pattern to the other language. 22-Mar.-2013
We can see this weakening process in action in many groups of words in English. For example, “melody”, “melodious”, and “melodic” are spelled as if they should have the same vowel sounds, but in fact they do not, being /mĕlədē/ [ˈmɛlədi], /məlōdēəs/ [məˈloʊdiəs], and /məlŏdĭk/ [məˈlɑdɪk]. The vowel in the second syllable has three pronunciations, two stressed and one unstressed (weak), and the vowel in the first syllable has two. Spanish has equivalents of these three words, “melodía, melodioso, melódico”, but unlike English, the vowels are pronounced exactly as they are spelled in IPA, with no changes at all in the vowel quality, even though the stress falls on a different syllable in each word. 22-Mar.-2013
So, just to see if you’ve got the idea, take the word “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, invented for the Walt Disney movie Mary Poppins. How many syllables does it have? Which syllables are completely unstressed (weak)? Which syllable has the primary stress? The answers can be found in the endnote.[20] 22-Mar.-2013
R-coloring
(8-July-2013)
In the vowel section above, we saw that there are a limited number of vowel sounds that can come before /r/ at the end of a word, or when the /r/ comes before another consonant, and that these are usually “colored” by the /r/, that is, they are changed so that they don’t really match any of the ordinary vowels. (These vowels are also known as “r-controlled vowels”.[21]) Some speakers have as few as 5 of these r-colored vowels in stressed syllables, others have 6 or 7, and this variation is found in both North America and Great Britain. 11-Mar.-2016
What about words like “hire” or “sour”? Aren’t these additional vowels that can come before /r/? At first glance it might seem so, but in fact, in most if not all English dialects, these words actually rhyme with words like “higher” and “power”, meaning that they are actually two-syllable words pronounced /hīər/ [ˈhaɪɚ] and /souər/ [ˈsaʊɚ], so no new vowel before /r/ occurs.
For r-droppers the /r/ itself is usually dropped, but the vowel still remains unique, in most cases different from the ordinary vowels.
Vowels Before /r/ in One-syllable Words[22]
|
r-colored vowels → |
îr |
âr |
är |
ôr |
ȯr |
|
ûr |
|
ŏŏr |
(yŏŏr) |
|
word final: |
fear jeer beard fierce |
fair mare there their |
far card barn heart |
for war cord horse |
four bore cored hoarse |
her were heard fern |
fir bird first dirt |
fur curd burn purse |
poor tour boor lure |
(cure) (pure) (demure) |
|
Scottish
pronunciation, not r-colored → |
ēr |
ār |
ăr |
ôr |
ōr |
ĕr |
ĭr |
ŭr |
ōōr |
(yōōr) |
|
(original system) |
[iɾ] |
[eɾ] |
[aɾ] |
[ɔɾ] |
[oɾ] |
[ɛɾ] |
[ɪɾ] |
[ʌɾ] |
[ʉɾ] |
[jʉɾ] |
(11-Mar.-2016)
Originally these r’s were not colored, but were just like all the other vowels, and at least one dialect retains this old system, Scottish English, which does not color these vowels at all, pronouncing them instead very much the way they are spelled. This system can be seen at the bottom of the table above. 11-Mar.-2016
Thus in Scotland “bird” has a vowel close to that of “beard” for many Americans, whereas “beard” has the same vowel as “beet”! (I have shown all of the /r/s in the Scottish pronunciation in the preceding chart as [ɾ], an alveolar flap, though the [ɹ] used in North America is also common in Scotland.) 11-Mar.-2016
The following chart shows how this system works in a selection of dialects, both in and outside of North America. Those items in dark red have a one-syllable r-colored vowel. Those items in orange have a two-syllable r-colored vowel sequence (these do not actually add any new distinct vowels to the system). Those items in blue are not r-colored in the indicated dialect, but are r-colored by many Americans. In each column the number and nature of the one-syllable r-colored vowels is given at the top of the column. As always on this page, if you know for sure that I have the pronunciation of one of these words wrong, please let me know. 11-Mar.-2016
|
|
Standard British: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/ (Older and regional has 7, like Eastern New England.†) |
Greater New York City: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/ |
Eastern New England: 7 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ȯr,ûr,ŏŏr/[23] |
Scottish: No r‑colored vowels |
Older Southern:[24] No distinct one‑syllable r‑colored vowels except sometimes /ûr/ |
New Orleans |
My pattern, General American: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/[25] |
My wife, West Midland: 5 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr/
[25] |
|
|
fear, jeer, beard, fierce |
/fîr/ [ˈfɪə][26] |
/fîr/ [ˈfɪə] [26] |
/fîr/ [ˈfɪə] [26] |
/fēr/ [ˈfiɾ] |
/fēə(r)/
[ˈfɪiə(ɹ)] |
/fîr/ [ˈfɪə] [26] |
/fîrər/ [ˈfɪɹɚ] |
/fîrər/ [ˈfɪɹɚ] |
|
|
fair, mare, there, their |
/fâr/ [ˈfɛə] |
/fâr/ [ˈfeə] |
/fâr/ [ˈfeə] |
/fār/ [ˈfeɾ] |
/făr/ [ˈfæɪ]
or [ˈfæə] |
/fâr/ [ˈfeə] |
/fâr/ [ˈfeɹ] |
/fâr/ [ˈfeɹ] |
|
|
far, card, barn, heart |
/fär/ [ˈfɑː] |
/fär/ [ˈfɑə] |
/fär/ [ˈfa] |
/făr/ [ˈfaɾ] |
/fôr/ [ˈfɒɹ]†
or /fô/ [ˈfɒʊ]† |
/fôr/ [ˈfɔə]† |
/fär/ [ˈfɑɹ] |
/fär/ [ˈfɑɹ] |
|
|
for, war, cord, horse |
/fôr/ [ˈfoː] |
/fôr/ [ˈfoə] |
/fôr/ [ˈfɒə] |
/fôr/ [ˈfɔɾ] |
/fôr/ [ˈfɒɹ]†
or /fô/ [ˈfɒʊ]† |
/fôr/ [ˈfɔə]† |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoɹ] |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoɹ] |
|
|
four, bore, cored, hoarse |
/fôr/ [ˈfoː] |
(or
/fȯr/ [ˈfoə]†) |
/fôr/ [ˈfoə] |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoə] |
/fōr/ [ˈfoɾ] |
/fôə/ [ˈfɒʊə(ɹ)]† |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoə]† |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoɹ] |
/fȯr/ [ˈfoɹ] |
|
her, were, heard, fern |
/hûr/ [ˈhɜː] |
/hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
/hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
/hĕr/ [ˈhɛɾ] |
/hŭr/ [ˈhʌɹ] or /hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
/hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
/hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
/hûr/ [ˈhɝ] |
|
|
fir, bird, first, dirt |
/fûr/ [ˈfɜː] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fĭr/ [ˈfɪɾ] |
/fŭr/ [ˈfʌɹ] or /fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
|
|
fur, curd, burn, purse |
/fûr/ [ˈfɜː] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fŭr/ [ˈfʌɾ] |
/fŭr/ [ˈfʌɹ] or /fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
/fûr/ [ˈfɝ] |
|
|
poor |
/pŏŏr/ [ˈpʰʊə] |
/pŏŏr/ [ˈpʰʊə] |
/pŏŏr/ [ˈpʰʊə] |
/pōōr/ [ˈpʰʉɾ] |
/pôə(r)/ [ˈpʰɒʊə(ɹ)] |
/pŏŏr/ [ˈpʰʊə]?? |
/pŏŏr/ [ˈpʰʊɹ] |
/pȯr/ [ˈpʰoɹ] |
|
|
tour, lure |
/tŏŏr/ [ˈtʰʊə] |
/tŏŏr/ [ˈtʰʊə] |
/tŏŏr/ [ˈtʰʊə] |
/tōōr/ [ˈtʰʉɾ] |
/tōōə(r)/ [ˈtʰᵿʉə(ɹ)] |
/tŏŏr/ [ˈtʰʊə] |
/tŏŏr/ [ˈtʰʊɹ] |
/tōōər/ [ˈtʰuɚ] |
|
|
(cure), (pure), (demure) |
/kyŏŏr/
[ˈkʰjʊə] |
/kyŏŏr/
[ˈkʰjʊə] |
/kyŏŏr/
[ˈkʰjʊə] |
/kyōōr/ [ˈkʰyʉɾ] |
/kyōōə(r)/ [ˈkʰjᵿʉə(ɹ)] |
/kyŏŏr/
[ˈkʰjʊə] |
/kyŏŏr/
[ˈkʰjʊɹ] |
/kyōōər/ [ˈkʰjuɚ] |
|
|
fire, tire |
/fīər/ [ˈfaɪə] |
/fīər/ [ˈfɑɪə] |
/fīər/ [ˈfaɪə] |
/fīr/ [ˈfʌɪɾ]?? |
/fīr/ [ˈfaɹ]
or /fīər/ [ˈfaɪə] |
/fīər/ [ˈfaɪə] |
/fīər/ [ˈfaɪɚ] |
/fīər/ [ˈfaɪɚ] |
|
|
sour, hour |
/souər/ [ˈsaʊə] |
/souər/ [ˈsaʊə] |
/souər/ [ˈsaʊə] |
/sour/
[ˈsʌʊɾ] |
/souər/ [ˈsæʊə(ɹ)] |
/souər/ [ˈsæʊə] |
/souər/ [ˈsæʊɚ] |
/souər/ [ˈsæʊɚ] |
|
(11-Mar.-2016)
† See The horse-hoarse Merger and the card-cord Merger. 11-Mar.-2016
R’s
Between Vowels: To Color or Not to Color
(8-July-2013)
Okay, but what about r’s in the middle of words, with a vowel on both sides? Are the vowels before the /r/ still limited to these few r-colored vowels in the dialects that color their r’s? Well, no, certainly not, we can have words like “rerun”, “payroll”, and “prorate”. In other words, vowels that commonly occur at the end of a word, especially the historically long vowels, can freely occur before an /r/ in the middle of a word, when there is a clear syllable break before the r. 17-Dec.-2015
But what about the historically short vowels like /ă,ĕ,ĭ,ŏ,ŭ/? Surprisingly, these do occur in many dialects, especially in Britain but also in parts of eastern North America, but most Americans replace them with the r-colored vowels. Thus, the word “marry” is pronounced /mărē/ [ˈmæɹi] by Britishers and by many speakers in the Eastern U.S., From Maine to the South (and apparently also in Montreal), and most of these speakers would pronounce the words “marry”, “merry”, and “Mary” with three different vowels, but most Americans pronounce all three of these exactly the same, as /mârē/ [ˈmeɹi]. This feature of allowing /ă,ĕ,ĭ,ŏ,ŭ/ to occur before /r/ in the middle of a word (but not at the end) is one of the features that makes speakers from the east coast sound different from other Americans, even in the case of radio and television personalities who have otherwise modified their speech to General American. So how many vowels can come before an r followed by another vowel? It varies hugely from one dialect to the next! 17-Dec.-2015
The following chart shows a lot of these variations, though there are certainly others. Those items in black are not r-colored in any dialect. Those items in dark red have a one-syllable r-colored vowel. Those items in orange have a two-syllable r-colored vowel sequence (these do not actually add any new distinct vowels to the system). Those items in blue are not r-colored in the indicated dialect, but are r-colored by many Americans. In each column the number and nature of the one-syllable r-colored vowels is given at the top of the column. This does not count “tiring”, in which the r-coloring is two syllables, not one. As always on this page, if you know for sure that I have the pronunciation of one of these words wrong, please let me know. 21-Aug.-2013
|
|
Standard British: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/ (Older and regional has 7, like Eastern New England.†) |
Greater New York City: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/ |
Eastern New England: 7 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ȯr,ûr,ŏŏr/
[23] |
Scottish: No r‑colored vowels |
|
Older Southern: [24] No distinct one‑syllable r‑colored vowels except sometimes /ûr/ |
|
My pattern, General American: 6 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr,ŏŏr/
[25] |
My wife, West Midland: 5 r-colored vowels: /îr,âr,är,ôr,ûr/
[25] |
|
|
Rerun |
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹiːˌɹʌn] |
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹiˌɹʌn] |
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹiˌɹʌn] |
/rērŭn/
[ˈɾiˌɾʌn] |
|
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹɪiˌɹʌn] |
|
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹiˌɹʌn] |
/rērŭn/
[ˈɹiˌɹʌn] |
|
|
hero, zero, Nero |
/hîrō/ [ˈhɪəɹəʊ] |
/hîrō/ [ˈhɪəɹoʊ] |
/hîrō/ [ˈhɪəɹoʊ] |
/hērō/ [ˈhiˌɾo] |
|
/hērō/ [ˈhɪiˌɹəʊ] |
|
/hîrō/ [ˈhɪɹoʊ] |
/hērō/ [ˈhiɹoʊ] |
|
|
hearer, weary, nearing |
/hîrə/ [ˈhɪəɹə] |
/hîrə/ [ˈhɪəɹə] |
/hîrə/ [ˈhɪəɹə] |
/hērər/ [ˈhiɾəɾ] |
|
/hērə(r)/ [ˈhɪiɹə(ɹ)] |
|
/hîrər/ [ˈhɪɹɚ] |
/hîrər/ [ˈhɪɹɚ] |
|
|
mirror, miracle, pirouette |
/mĭrə/ [ˈmɪɹə] |
/mĭrə/ [ˈmɪɹə] |
/mĭrə/ [ˈmɪɹə] |
/mĭrər/ [ˈmɪɾəɾ] |
|
/mĭrə/ [ˈmiəɹə] |
|
/mîrər/ [ˈmɪɹɚ] |
/mîrər/ [ˈmɪɹɚ] |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
payroll |
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeɪˌɹəʊl] |
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeɪˌɹoʊl] |
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeɪˌɹoʊl] |
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeˌɾol] |
|
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰɛɪˌɹəʊl] |
|
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeɪˌɹoʊl] |
/pārōl/
[ˈpʰeɪˌɹoʊl] |
|
|
Mary, vary, Sarah, pharaoh |
/mârĭ/ [ˈmɛəɹɪ] |
/mârē/ [ˈmeəɹi] |
/mârē/ [ˈmeəɹi] |
/mārĭ/ [ˈmeɾɪ] |
|
/mārĭ/ [ˈmɛɪɹɪ] |
|
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
|
|
scary, hairy, parent, caring |
/skârĭ/ [ˈskɛəɹɪ] |
/skârē/ [ˈskeəɹi] |
/skârē/ [ˈskeəɹi] |
/skārĭ/ [ˈskeɾɪ] |
|
/skărĭ/ [ˈskæɹɪ] |
|
/skârē/ [ˈskeɹi] |
/skârē/ [ˈskeɹi] |
|
|
merry, very, heritage |
/mĕrĭ/ [ˈmeɹɪ] |
/mĕrē/ [ˈmɛɹi] |
/mĕrē/ [ˈmɛɹi] |
/mĕrĭ/ [ˈmɛɾɪ] |
|
/mĕrĭ/ [ˈmeɹɪ] |
|
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
|
|
marry, Harry, narrow, parish |
/mărĭ/ [ˈmæɹɪ] |
/mărē/ [ˈmæɹi] |
/mărē/ [ˈmæɹi] |
/mărĭ/ [ˈmaɾɪ] |
|
/mărĭ/ [ˈmæɹɪ] |
|
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
/mârē/ [ˈmeɹi] |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
starry, sparring |
/stärĭ/ [ˈstɑːɹɪ] |
/stärē/ [ˈstɑəɹi] |
/stärē/ [ˈstaɹi] |
/stărĭ/ [ˈstaɾɪ] |
|
/stärĭ/ [ˈstɑɹɪ] |
|
/stärē/ [ˈstɑɹi] |
/stärē/ [ˈstɑɹi] |
|
|
sorry, borrow |
/sŏrĭ/ [ˈsɔɹɪ] |
/sŏrē/ [ˈsaɹi] |
/sôrē/ [ˈsɒəɹi] |
/sŏrĭ/ [ˈsɔɾɪ] |
|
/särĭ/ [ˈsɑɹɪ] |
|
/särē/ [ˈsɑɹi] |
/särē/ [ˈsɑɹi] |
|
|
foreign, coral, horrible, Florida |
/fŏrĭn/ [ˈfɔɹɪn] |
/fŏrən/ [ˈfaɹən] |
/fôrən/ [ˈfɒəɹən] |
/fŏrən/ [ˈfɔɾən] |
|
/färən/ [ˈfɑɹən] |
|
/fȯrən/
[ˈfoɹən] |
||