One of the distinguishing features of speech in the tidewater area of North Carolina and Virginia is the pronunciation of the Standard English diphthong 
as 
, where the initial vowel of the diphthong is raised to a more central position. Varieties of Southern States English found in these areas, such as Ocracoke Island, have this feature. Lumbee English, a variety of American Indian English, also has this feature.
Brewer & Reising (1982) provide data illustrating some identifying features of Lumbee English, a variety of American Indian English spoken in Coastal North Carolina, particularly around the Robeson County area. This review will focus on the data regarding the central diphthong. One of the major findings of this study is that while both white varieties of English in the tidewater areas of Virginia and Lumbee English have the central diphthong , the distribution of this feature is not identical.
Studies of coastal Southern States English (Tresidder 1943; Shewmake 1943; McDavid 1955; O'Cain 1977) have provided evidence indicating that, in non-Lumbee English varieties, the centralized diphthong occurs predictably before voiceless consonants, but not characteristically before voiced consonants.
In Lumbee English, by contrast, although the central diphthong is a feature of the variety, the findings are that Lumbee English speakers use the centralized diphthong in both the voiced and voiceless environments more than 1/2 of the time. It is also found that speakers in different communities have different percentages in the usage of the central diphthong.
The authors interpret this data as supporting evidence for the hypothesis that the central diphthong is a significant feature that establishes identity as a member of the Lumbee community.
The analysis proposed in this preliminary study is based on a sample of 11 oral history tapes from the Lumbee Regional Development Association. These are taped interviews and include 4 males and 7 females between the ages of 69 and 80 years old. These speakers come from three different Lumbee communities: Pembroke, Prospect, and Magnolia. The authors selected the words night, white, and light as tokens to study the distribution of in a voiceless environment. The following table illustrates their results:
As this table shows, is pronounced as:
( another representation of ) 52.7% of the time before a voiceless consonant
or 
36.8% of the time before a voiceless consonant
10.6% of the time before a voiceless consonant
Thus, one can see that the central diphthong is used over half the time in the environment preceding a voiceless consonant.
The authors also selected the words five, nine, spider, and piazza as tokens to study the distribution of in a voiced environment. The following table illustrates their results:
As this table shows, is pronounced as:
( another representation of ) 52.4% of the time before a voiced sound
or 26.6% of the time before a voiced sound
19% of the time before a voiced sound
Thus, one can see from the table that the central diphthong is used over half the time in the environment preceding a voiced sound.
A third analysis calculates the effect of community on the usage of the central diphthong. As stated above, the speakers are from three different communities. Five speakers are from the community of Prospect, five speakers are from the community of Pembroke, and one speaker is from the community of Magnolia. The results can be illustrated by the following table:
As this table shows, is pronounced as:
( another representation of ) in 38.6% of the tokens in Prospect, as opposed to 14.0% in Pembroke, and 0% in Magnolia
or in 12.3% of the tokens in Prospect, as opposed to 24.6% in Pembroke, and 0% in Magnolia
in1.8% of the tokens in Prospect, as opposed to 3.5% in Pembroke, and 5.3% in Magnolia
Thus, one can see from the table that the central diphthong is used more often by speakers in Prospect than in the other two communities.
The authors propose that these facts regarding the usage of the central diphthong in Lumbee English point to this feature being a salient indicator of membership in the Lumbee community. The fact that Lumbee English has a wider distribution of the central diphthong that differs from other dialects in the area, indicates that this feature is salient to the community. Also, the community of Prospect is considered to be one of the more conservative Lumbee areas, and consequently, the greater incidence of the central diphthong in that area, indicates that the central diphthong is a conservative feature of the Lumbee community.
© 2001 The Language Samples Project