Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T16:18:50.320Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Canadian raising in a midwestern U.S. city

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 June 2009

Jennifer Dailey-O'Cain
Affiliation:
University of Michigan

Abstract

This article provides evidence from a small city in the northern United States for Canadian raising, the raising of /au/ and /ai/ to [AU] and [Ai]. As hypothesized, /ai/-raising is much more frequent and regular, but /au/-raising also occurs. Speech style is statistically significant only for /ai/-raising. The raising of /ai/ is not significant for gender or age, but /au/-raising seems to be led by young women. This evidence suggests that, while /ai/-raising has been fully entrenched in this phonological system for some time, /au/-raising is a new and separate change in progress. The /au/-diphthong is also often fronted when raised, a finding similar to several Canadian studies (Chambers, 1981a; Hung, Davison, & Chambers, 1993). This suggests that the Canadian varieties studied may not, as previously suggested (Chambers, 1981b), be conforming to the U.S. norm, but instead that the two varieties are converging.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1997

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Allen, Harold B. (1973). Linguistic Atlas of the Upper Midwest. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Allen, Harold B. (1989). Canadian raising in the upper midwest. American Speech 64: 7475.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Callary, Robert. (1975). Phonological change and the development of an urban dialect in Illinois. Language in Society 4: 155169.Google Scholar
Chambers, J. K. (1973). Canadian raising. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 18: 113135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chambers, J. K. (1981a). Linguistic variation and Chomsky's “homogeneous speech community.” In Kinloch, A. M. (Ed.), Papers from the Fourth Annual Meeting of the Atlantic Provinces Linguistic Association. New Brunswick, Nova Scotia: University of New Brunswick. 131.Google Scholar
Chambers, J. K. (1981b). The Americanization of Canadian raising. In Masek, C. S., Hendrick, R. A., & Miller, M. F. (Eds.), Papers from the parasession on language and behavior: Chicago Linguistic Society. Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society. 2035.Google Scholar
Chambers, J. K. (1989). Canadian raising, blocking, fronting, etc. American Speech 64: 7588.Google Scholar
Chambers, J. K., & Hardwick, Margaret F. (1986). Comparative sociolinguistics of a sound change in Canadian English. English World-Wide 7: 2346.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eckert, Penelope. (1987). The relative values of variables. In Denning, K. M. et al. (Eds.), Variation in Language: NWAVE-XV. Stanford, CA: Stanford University, Department of Linguistics. 101110.Google Scholar
Eckert, Penelope. (1988). Adolescent social structure and the spread of linguistic change. Language in Society 17: 183207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eckert, Penelope. (1989). The whole woman: sex and gender differences in variation. Language Variation and Change 1: 245267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eckert, Penelope. (1991). Social polarization and the choice of linguistic variants. In Eckert, P. (Ed.), Ways of analyzing sound change. San Diego: Academic. 213232.Google Scholar
Gordon, Matthew J. (1997). Geographical and social diffusion of language change: The case of the Northern Cities Chain Shift. Texas Linguistics Forum 37: 176187. [Proceedings of the 1996 Symposium about Language and Society.]Google Scholar
Herndobler, Robin. (1993). Sound change and gender in a working-class community. In Frazer, T. (Ed.), Heartland English: Variation and transition in the American Midwest. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. 137156.Google Scholar
Householder, F. W. (1983). Kyriolexia and language change. Language 59: 117.Google Scholar
Hung, Henrietta, Davison, John, & Chambers, J. K. (1993). Comparative sociolinguistics of (aw)-fronting. In Clarke, S. (Ed.), Focus on Canada. Philadelphia: Benjamins. 247267.Google Scholar
Hymes, Dell, & Fought, John. (1975). American structuralism. In Sebeok, T. A., Aarsleff, H., Austerlitz, R., Hymes, D., Stankiewicz, E., & Umiker-Sebeok, D. S. (Eds.), Historiography of linguistics. The Hague: Mouton. 9031178.Google Scholar
Joos, Martin. (1942). A phonological dilemma in Canadian English. Language 18: 141144.Google Scholar
Kimloch, Murray, & Ismail, Fazilah M. (1993). Canadian raising: /au/ in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Linguistica Atlantica 15: 105114.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. (1979). Metrical assignment is cyclic. Linguistic Inquiry 10: 421441.Google Scholar
Knack, Rebecca. (1991). Ethnic boundaries in linguistic variation. In Eckert, P. (Ed.), New ways of analyzing sound change. San Diego: Academic. 251272.Google Scholar
Kurath, Hans, & McDavid, R. I. Jr. (1961). The pronunciation of English in the Atlantic states. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1963). The social motivation of a sound change. Word 19: 273309.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1990). The intersection of sex and social class in the course of linguistic change. Language Variation and Change 2: 205255.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1994). Principles of linguistic change: Internal factors. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Labov, William, Yaeger, M., & Steiner, R. (1972). A quantitative study of sound change in progress. Philadelphia: U.S. Regional Survey.Google Scholar
McCarthy, John J. (1982). Prosodic structure and expletive infixation. Language 58: 574590.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McDavid, Raven I., & O'Cain, Raymond K. (1980). Linguistic atlas of the middle and south Atlantic states, Volumes 1 and 2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Milroy, James, & Milroy, Lesley. (1993). Mechanisms of change in urban dialects: The role of class, social network, and gender. International Journal of Applied Linguistics 3: 5777.Google Scholar
Primer, Sylvester. (1890). The pronunciation of Fredericksburg, Virginia. Publications of the Modern Language Association 5: 185199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vance, Timothy J. (1987). “Canadian raising” in some dialects of the northern United States. American Speech 62: 195210.Google Scholar
Woods, Howard B. (1993). A synchronic study of English spoken in Ottawa: Is Canadian English becoming more American? In Clarke, S. (Ed.), Focus on Canada. Philadelphia: Benjamins. 151178.Google Scholar