LL-L: "Phonetics" [E/S] LOWLANDS-L, 01.OCT.1999 (04)

[Lowlands-L Administrator]

 =========================================================================
 L O W L A N D S - L * 01.OCT.1999 (04) * ISSN 1089-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
 Posting Address: <lowlands-l at listserv.linguistlist.org>
 Web Site: <http://www.geocities.com/~sassisch/rhahn//lowlands/>
 User's Manual: <http://www.lsoft.com/manuals/1.8c/userindex.html>
 =========================================================================
 A=Afrikaans, Ap=Appalachean, D=Dutch, E=English, F=Frisian, L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German), S=Scots, Sh=Shetlandic
 =========================================================================
 You have received this because your account has been subscribed upon
 request. To unsubscribe, please send the command "signoff lowlands-l"
 as message text from the same account to
 <listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org> or sign off at
 <http://linguistlist.org/subscribing/sub-lowlands-l.html>.
 =========================================================================

From: John M. Tait [jmtait at altavista.net]
Subject: LL-L: "Phonetics" [E] LOWLANDS-L, 30.SEP.1999 (02)

Andy: anent yer speir aboot thon squiggly i, tak a leuk at J.C. Catford
(Vowel Systems of Scots Dialects, Transactions of the Philological Society,
1957). Here he uises thon same sign - the ane uised bi Johnston - as
central atween /e/ an /o/, an kythin in words like <bit>. Sae I dout it's
juist anither wey o writin [I], richt eneuch, unless Johnston is uisin it
different.

James Scobbie wrote:
>
>Long time no post. In Glasgow English (both middle and working class)
>the /u/ is very central (in terms of F2) whereas /o/ (and /open-o/)
>are pretty back. Also, /u/ is not as high a vowel (in terms of F1) as
>either /i/ or /o/. Impressionistically, I've heard even lower and
>fronter /u/ from other speakers that are almost a rounded retracted /e/.

Is this the sound - which I think of as almost like Swedish [y], though
your description of it as lower doesn't seem to tie with this - with which
some Central Scots pronounce words like _true_, _blue_, _oot_, etc?

Catford (see above) comments, in a footnote:

'For the high-vowel pair /i~u/ the contrast may be chiefly
unrounded~rounded since /u/ in some dialects is realized as a central, or
even an advanced central, rounded vowel.' This ties in with Sandy's
impressions of the phonetic quality of the /u/ phoneme in Central Scots.

>In Scots, is the central /u/ usually pretty high? Is the lowered /u/
>a glaswegian thing, a Scottish English thing (rather than Scots) or
>is it connected a merger of /I/ and /u/ in some words (meaning
>that "good" and "bid" rhyme?

Just to make sure I understand the question, I'll run through a lot of old
hat:

In Scots - as opposed to SSE - _good_ does not have the /u/ phoneme, but
the historical /2/ phoneme - still preserved as a distinct phoneme in
Shetlandic and some other conservative dialects. In Central Scots, this
then merged with the /I/ phoneme in short SVLR environments (hence _bid_
and _guid_ rhyme), and with the /e/ phoneme in long SVLR environments, so
that _muin_ and _puir_ are pronounced [mIn] and [pe:r]. In North East Scots
it merged with the /i/ phoneme giving [min], [pi:r]. In Scots, other words,
like _doun_ [dun] have the /u/ phoneme. So in the Scots system it's not
really /u/, but /2/, which merges with /I/, leaving /u/ as a distinct
phoneme in other words. In both SSE and Scots systems, /u/ remains distinct
from /I/, e.g.

SSE - sound [sound]; soon [sun]; sin [sIn]
Scots - soond [sun(d)]; suin /s2n/, CS [sIn]; sin [sIn]

(Similarly, although the SSE /ou/ phoneme corresponds to /u/ in Scots,
there is also a separate /ou/ phoneme in Scots, in words like _growe_
[grou], SSE grow [gro:].)

There is thus no system in which /u/ merges with /I/. Catford (Vowel
Systems of Scots Dialects, Transactions of the Philological Society, 1957)
shows /u/ as contrastive with /I/ in all seven dialect types which he uses
as examples.

By central /u/, then, do you mean the vowel which occurs in SSE in words
like _good_ /gud/ (cognate with Scots _guid_ /g2d/, Central Scots [gId]);
or the vowel which occurs in Scots in words like _doun_ /dun/ (cognate with
SSE _down_ [doun])?

My impression is that they are both pronounced the same - in other words,
there are two different systems, Scots and SSE, and Scots speakers simply
use the same sound to express the Scots /u/ phoneme, in words like _doun_
and _oot_ (but not _guid_ and _puir_), as they use to express the SSE /u/
phoneme, in words like _good_ and _poor_. It's important to distinguish
between the two systems - Scots and SSE - not helped by, and in spite of,
the fact that many speakers pick and mix - saying, for example 'hoose' and
'poor' with the same vowel sound, whereas strictly speaking, 'poor' [pu:r]
(<=> Scots 'puir', /p2r/, Central Scots [pe:r]) belongs to the SSE system,
and 'hoose' [hus] (<=> SSE 'house' [hous]) to the Scots one.

I wonder if this could give rise to an idiolect in which /u/ would be
completely merged with /I/? If all the words which have /u/ in Scots were
pronounced with [ou], as in SSE; and all those which have /u/ in SSE were
pronounced [I], as in Scots, this would give rise to an idiolect without an
/u/ sound altogether:

hypothetical idiolect: sound [sound]; suin [sIn]; sin [sIn].

I suppose it would be possible, though I find it a bit difficult to imagine
that any pick-and-mix idiolect would be so consistent. But you never know.
Perhaps someone conscientiously avoiding the Scots /u/ pronunciation of
words like 'hoose', but blissfully unaware that they were pronouncing words
with SSE /u/ with the Central Scots /I/, might do it. I doubt it, though.
It seems to be more likely that SSE /ou/ (<=> Scots /u/) and SSE /u/
(<=>Scots /2/) merge into a common /u/ in words like 'hoose' and 'poor'.

Are we both speaking about the same thing here?

John M. Tait.

==================================END======================================
 * Please submit contributions to <lowlands-l at listserv.linguistlist.org>.
 * Contributions will be displayed unedited in digest form.
 * Please display only the relevant parts of quotes in your replies.
 * Commands for automated functions (including "signoff lowlands-l") are
   to be sent to <listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org> or at
   <http://linguistlist.org/subscribing/sub-lowlands-l.html>.
 * Please use only Plain Text format, not Rich Text (HTML) or any other
   type of format, in your submissions
 =========================================================================