sociolinguistics

Chapter 8: L. & Geography (Geolinguistics)

Explain the Northern Cities Vowel Shift

- typical of younger people's accent (but not of African-American origin)
- occurs particularly in Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland and Buffalo
- circular movement and one of the most dramatic changes in the pronunciation of English
- vowel of  nought (similarly: taught, caught, law,...) is moving downwards to the position of not
 not is moving to gnat [æ]
-  [æ] is altered to [ɪə]
-  net -->nut--> nought --> circle completed

Diskussion