INTRODUCTION:

In Unit 7, you learned about transitions from Middle English into what we now know as RP and GenAm via the Great Vowel Shift. The middle of the 18th Century marks what Wells calls, "The Great Divide." After 1750, GenAm and RP began to develop separately. In other words, changes in RP after this date had little or no effect on GenAm pronunciation. It is these later innovations in RP and GenAm that we will focus on in Unit 8. In the reading for this unit, Wells discusses three major categories of Innovations: British prestige, popular British, and GenAm.

The British prestige innovations discussed by Wells (section 3.2) occurred after the GenAm mainstream separated off from RP. These innovations have come to characterize RP and include the following:

  • Pre-R Breaking
  • Pre-Schwa Laxing
  • Monophthonging
  • R Dropping
  • R Insertion
  • Glide Cluster Reduction
  • Suffix Vowel Weakening
  • TRAP-BATH Split
  • START Backing
  • FORCE Mergers (1st and 2nd)
  • GOAT Advancement
  • Smoothing

Some further British innovations that Wells discusses (section 3.4) are not characteristic of RP, but are instead popular varieties of British English in the south-east of England. Since these sound changes are not found in the United States, they appear to postdate the colonization of North America. These innovations include the following:

  • H Dropping
  • Diphthong Shift
  • Happy Tensing
  • L Vocalization
  • Preglottalization

Finally, Wells discusses some GenAm innovations that took place after the United States separated from Britain (section 3.3). These sound changes include the following:

  • Vowel Changes Before /r/
  • Pre-R Vowel Laxing
  • Pre-R Schwa Deletion
  • LOT Unrounding/Loss of Distinctive Length
  • Later Yod Dropping in Strong Syllables
  • Yod Coalescence in Weak Syllables
  • Tapping
  • T Voicing

It is important that you understand these innovations because the regional dialect features that we will learn about in units 9-14 are based on these innovations.

READINGS:

Read: Wells, Accents of English 1, pp. 212-263.