glottalized intervocalic /y/?

[Wilson Gray]

I've heard it in Texas used by a then-young black woman who today
would be, like me, in her seventies. I've also heard it said elsewhere
- Missouri, California, on radio and TV, etc.

It seems to me to be a rather old and random phenomenon. But I haven't
really paid much attention to it. I couldn't even say for certain what
kinds of people - male, female, white, black, or whatever - I've heard
use it. I clearly recall that, down in Texas, the girl who stood next
to me in choir sang, "be ?ond the blue horizon." Aside from that, I
can say only that, unfortunately, I've heard it around everywhere that
I've ever lived and that I find it annoying.

FWIW, I've never heard the glottal-stopped pronunciation of "mayonnaise."

-Wilson

On Tue, Sep 9, 2008 at 8:32 PM, Yoram Meroz <ymeroz at earthlink.net> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Yoram Meroz <ymeroz at EARTHLINK.NET>
> Subject:      glottalized intervocalic /y/?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> As the title says, I am curious about a feature I have run into
> occasionally, where intervocalic /y/ surfaces as a glottal stop, for example
> /bi?and/ "beyond", sometimes with a bit of a y glide left, e.g. /mei?@neiz/
> "mayonnaise".
>
> I have mostly heard it in California, and mostly by young women, though I do
> not particularly associate it with a "valley girl" phonology.
>
> How prevalent is this? Has anyone published anything about it?
>
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