Low Back /a/ to Low Central /a/

[Alice Faber]

At 8:47 AM -0400 5/28/2000, Dennis R. Preston wrote, ostensibly about
Re: Low Back /a/ to Low Central /a/:
>Herb's remark is right on. Here at MSU we have been looking at so-called
>"open-o" in lots of US dialects (which have the "cot-caught" distinction),
>and we find that absolutely none of them have a mid-back position. All of
>them are low-back. Kind of makes you wonder who Peterson and Barney
>recorded.

Well, given that they recorded in New Jersey and the women and
children were mostly Middle Atlantic speakers (the men were more
diverse), they might have had some NY-ish multithongal open-o tokens,
and since they made a single measurement from each vowel (as I
recall), they could easily gotten mid-back position for open-o. In
the NY and CT younger speakers I have measurements for, it's not
unusual for open-o to have a high back onset (as in GOOD), with
movement down to the traditional low back position.
--
Alice Faber                                       tel. (203) 865-6163
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