Talk:Pronunciation of English ⟨a⟩

æ tensing in General American
Ajd: Angr's edit was correct. You should give some time (a week at least?) for an editor to provide references before you go hacking away at something like that. ANAE is not the last word LiuLanDi 07:09, 19 October 2006 (UTC).
 * ANAE doesn't use the term "General American". But I would be interested to know what published source does describe General American (using that term!) as having the distribution of tense and lax /æ/ described in your edit. —Angr 07:19, 19 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I apologize for just blanking it; that was uncalled for. However, I stand by my claim that it's probably incorrect, based on (a) the fact that "General American" itself is very poorly defined and (b) although ANAE isn't the only game in town, it goes into great detail on the variety of /æ/-tensing systems that have been found and attested in the literature (since the distribution of /æ/-tensing is one of the main theoretical issues of present-day dialectology) and nothing like this has been even mentioned, let alone as being prevalent enough to be "General American". AJD 13:16, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

LiuLanDi, what is your intention in adding these links? If you want to back up your claim that "American Broadcast English" has the distribution of æ-tensing that you say it does by providing audio of Walter Cronkite and Johnny Carson speaking, that's still original research. It sounds like a great way to gather data to write your own paper to be published in a peer-reviewed venue, but that's not what Wikipedia is for. —Angr 09:53, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Angr, you're too damn fast! Keep your pants on!  I made the changes first and then started explaining them in the comments, but before I could press "Save page", you've already commented on it!  So far I wrote:


 * OK guys, I changed "General American" (a term I like, but it is indeed not well defined). Angr: the sources I used are not journal articles, they're videos.  However, Wikipedia's citation standards do allow those kinds of sources.  I spent a lot of time reviewing the standards before I added the citations.  Adj: interestingly, the Cronkite video shows that he is not so consistent with his pronunciation.  For example, he says "passengers"  with no tensing; then "passing" and "Titanic" with a little tensing.  Later, he clearly says "postmaster", "man", and "average" with tensing.  He says "amateurs" both ways, first with no tensing and then with.  Carson follows what I described exactly.  In his piece, the only tensing-causing consonants that are missing that would be tense are  (with you can clearly hear in Cronkite's "ham"), , , which is rare anyway, and  (which you can hear if you look on YouTube for the end of Cronkite's final newscast[] where he says "Dan Rather".


 * As far as "original research" goes, I really beg to differ. You and anyone else can clearly hear the tensing in the sources I provided.  There's nothing in the Wikipedia guidelines that say that only peer-reviewed journals can be used as citations.  What you're suggesting is kind of like saying that if someone reports that the sky looks grey today, that that's not acceptable unless an acceptable number of Ph.D's have agreed and verified it as acceptable fact.  Wikipedia is not simply a repository of conclusions made in journals.  That would be way too limiting.  Please 1) note the fact that I changed GenAm to A.B.E., and 2) listen to at least the "Amateur Radio Today" (6 mins), and the Carson (short, and you'll laugh your ass off!).  Looking forward to your remarks.  I'll also write a few more things later.LiuLanDi 10:45, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * For academic subjects like linguistics, there aren't really any reliable sources but peer-reviewed journals, books, and dissertations. If it's relevant to an article that the sky was gray on some particular day, I would expect it to be sourced at least from a weather report. And yes, encyclopedias as tertiary sources are in fact repositories of established knowledge that's already been published elsewhere. Changing GenAm to ABE doesn't really make any difference when American Broadcast English is just a redirect to General American and when that article implies there's no difference between the two terms. —Angr 11:06, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Please direct me to where Wikipedia guidelines say the likes of "for academic subjects like linguistics, there aren't really any reliable sources but peer-reviewed journals, books, and dissertations". So far I'm having trouble finding anything like that.  The sources I cited have been published elsewhere.  The pronunciations are clear, and are as I described them.  Did you listen to them?  Changing GenAm to ABE does matter because that way it's not such a sweeping statement.  Part of your and Ajd's complaint was that what I was describing was not (according to ANAE and the like) as widespread as I was implying.  Now, what it implies is that it is used by broadcasters (and therefore is considered a kind of "standard").LiuLanDi 11:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * That statement is mine, not Wikipedia's. Wikipedia's verifiability policy, however, does say "Articles should contain only material that has been published by reliable sources" (emphasis added). The links you provided are not publications of the claim that you have made; they are raw data from which an analysis could be made. If you want the statement you've written to stay, you have to show that someone has already published the claim about the distribution of tense and lax æ made in that paragraph. Giving us recordings where we can hear it for ourselves is not good enough. —Angr 12:07, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * OK. I'm going to remove it.  I can't say you're wrong at this point.  I am however interested in what you think of this "original idea".  You've been very careful to avoid mentioning any personal opinion on it, naturally.  But I am interested in your idea, as a linguist, of it's disputability.  If you have 15 minutes to look at those videos, please do.  The verifiability policy also says "Editors should provide a reliable source for material that is challenged or likely to be challenged".  I want to know if you challenge it.  Maybe I will in fact write my own paper about this.  : )  Thank you for your comments and guidance.  LiuLanDi 13:16, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I'll look at the videos when I get a chance. At the moment I'm at work and have no speakers on my computer anyway. I certainly don't challenge the assertion that Walter Cronkite and Johnny Carson have æ-tensing in some words. But in the absence of published sources on the matter, I do challenge the assertion that observed facts from the speech these two elderly men can be generalized to all of "American Broadcast English", and that "American Broadcast English" is a well enough defined construct for anyone to be able to say what does and does not belong to it. I think writing your own paper would be a great idea, but (1) you need to gather much more data than 15 minutes of video from two speakers, (2) you should avoid implying that a monolithic accent called "American Broadcast English" or even "General American" exists, (3) you should do acoustic analysis of the vowels to compare the formants of various tokens of /æ/ in various environments and not rely only on your ear to tell you "this one's tense, this one's lax". —Angr 13:36, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Nasal system
ANAE says in one place (I'm looking at the crappy online demo version) that æ is tensed before front nasals. "In New York City and the Mid-Atlantic States, short-a is split into tense (raised, fronted, ingliding) and lax (low front) categories by a complex set of phonetic, grammatical and lexical conditions. The core group of tense vowels is found before front nasals (ham, man, stand) and voiceless fricatives (half, last, bath) in closed syllables. Function words like am, can) remain lax." I want to edit that paragraph about the mid-Atlantic tensing to reflect this.  Does anyone know of a source that documents tensing before ?  I can't imagine someone saying "hang" like, except maybe in the North where they usually tense.LiuLanDi 15:15, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I believe [heŋ] for hang is characteristic of California English. There might be sources for it in that article. Certainly I remember User:Nohat, a Californian, reporting of his own speech that bank and bake have the same vowel, the only difference between them being the [ŋ]. —Angr 15:24, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I've heard that from people from Utah as well. But that has an upward glide (if any at all), not a centering glide.  Anyway, I've certainly never heard that in the Midwest or the East Coast.LiuLanDi 15:56, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Also, I don't think they tense before the other nasals in the West, e.g., so that wouldn't be much of a "nasal system".LiuLanDi 16:08, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I am a native of Louisiana. I also have [heŋ] for hang. And [siŋ] for sing, [pɪn] for pen, [mɛn] for man. However, am and can dont rhyme for me (pace the above), can is like man (but functional can is unstressed usually so it's not a good comparison).

My vowel in man is probably between the vowels in met and mat. I've never measured the formants though. With [ŋ] there's also the voiced velar phenomenon, where I have [eg] for egg and [leg] for leg (but I dont have this vowel for peg, beg, keg). It would be nice if someone pointed out a reference that summarizes this. peace – ishwar  (speak)  04:39, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The fact that "can" is a function word means that the vowel is usually reduced to a schwa. The auxiliary verb "have" does the same, as does "as".  This fact may have been overlooked by ANAE in their assessment of æ-tensing, causing the whole idea of "phonemic æ-tensing" to be wrong.LiuLanDi 14:29, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Not at all. Both "can" and "have" have strong, nonreduced pronunciations as well, as in "Yes, I can!" and "Yes, I have!" In accents with phonemic æ-tensing, those strong pronunciations of "can" and "have" are distinct from the pronunciations of the noun "can" and the verb "halve". I wouldn't expect to find the contrast in Louisiana, though. It's generally described as being confined to the NYC/Philadelphia area. —Angr 14:58, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
 * For me it's not contrastive, just a neutralization of [e~ɛ~æ] before [ŋ] that is realized as [e]. It's more like the Non-phonemic æ-tensing section in the article. So, can (aux) and can (n) are the same, as are have and halve. I have a contrast of [e] and [ɛ] before [n] when I speak self-consciously, however: bane [ben] vs Ben [bɛn] (although usually Ben is [bɪn] natively). bane has the same vowel as bang, bank, bake. Anyway, this is alluded to with the following: "many speakers from the South have the nasal æ-tensing system described above, particularly in Charleston, Atlanta, and Florida, and speakers from New Orleans have been reported to have a system very similar to the phonemic split of New York". It would be nice if someone identified these reports. I wasnt suggesting that ANAE is wrong, just that their different functions may make them different (as in the ANAE quote above). – ishwar  (speak)  15:52, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Angr, I agree. But I don't think ANAE brings that to light.  At least not in their crappy online demo version!


 * ishwar, I was the one who was suggesting that ANAE is wrong, or not wrong per se, but somewhat sloppy in taking some things into account.LiuLanDi 17:19, 25 October 2006 (UTC)


 * ANAE: "As noted above, the nasal short-a system is the simplest of the short-a patterns. The /æ/ class is raised and fronted before any nasal consonant...; otherwise the nucleus remains in low front position. Figure 13.8 shows a typical example.... Words with /æ/ before velar nasals (banking) are among the lowest of the raised class, but still distinct from the unraised vowels. Many short-a systems show small variations from the pattern of Figure 13.8. Words with velar nasal codas (bank, bang) may be lax...."
 * I read this as meaning that tensing before /æ/ is the normal situation for the nasal short-a system, though exceptions exist. On the basis of that I'm reverting LiuLanDi's edit. AJD 23:16, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
 * What does figure 13.8 show? Are you looking at the online version?  Could you give a link?  Or a page number if you're looking at the print version?LiuLanDi 23:56, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Sorry about that. It's page 175, and it shows the short-a system of a woman from Columbus, Ohio. AJD 00:34, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't have the print version, but I'm looking at the online version. Can you tell me which woman from Columbus so I can listen to her sample?  I grew up in Cincinnati and while some people tense the "a" in bank a little, I don't think it's that widespread there.  Different neighborhoods have slightly different accents.
 * The point of your quote from ANAE above is that the "nasal system" is the simplest system. The reason I made the change in the article is that is says there that it is "geographically the most widespread".  That is what I am questioning.  Where did you get that?  I'm assuming you got it from ANAE, but as with the whole article, there are no numbered or otherwise specific references, so I can't verify.
 * I think this article needs those kinds of references (notes) because it is not clear what information comes from which source(s).LiuLanDi 05:05, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The woman from Columbus is Danica L., age 35. Cincinnati doesn't have quite a nasal system: it's got heavy influence from the New York pattern (according to Labov's paper "Transmission and Diffusion"), so it's unsurprising if /æ/ isn't much tensed before the velar nasal there.
 * The point of my quote from ANAE is merely to show that the source says that the nasal system includes tensing before all nasals, not just non-velar ones. Whether the nasal system is geographically the most "widespread" is hard to say precisely without a clear definition of "widespread": the continuous system is probably found over a greater area of territory, but the nasal system is predominant in a larger number of unrelated regions. I take no position on whether the nasal system is the simplest system. (Actually, I do take a position—I think it is the simplest, or at least the least marked—but it's not relevant to the discussion at hand.) AJD 05:45, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Then can you revise the sentence in [] that reads: "Geographically the most widespread is the 'nasal system'...."

Also, could you please insert inline numbered citations? Or if you think that's going to be too big a project for this article, could you insert inline citations in the style (Author, year), and page number for bigger works like ANAE? I think it would greatly improve the article. LiuLanDi 06:02, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I see you're already doing that! Thanks! LiuLanDi 06:05, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I clarified the intro sentence for the nasal system to reflect your explanation above. LiuLanDi 04:06, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Oops! I meant to change it to "one of the most widespread", which there's no doubt that it is. Any objection to that? AJD 04:09, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Personally I have a hard time with saying it's so widespread. But my personal opinions aren't so important here.  As Angr pointed out, even though one can clearly hear a more complex system (the one I outlined before and then later removed) in accents like Carson's and many (or most) of the predominant late 20th century newscasters', and that those announcers undoubtedly had a profound effect on the way people speak (especially on the perception of speaking "correctly"), there has been no published research in that direction, so that isn't supposed to be in Wikipedia.


 * After the introductory sentence there is a sentence describing the geographical distribution of the nasal system anyway, and that sentence is far more detailed than "one of the most...", so I think that's quite sufficient.


 * Objectively, "widespread" may not be the best word because it has two senses, one being 'occupying a wide space', and the other 'scattered over a wide space'. From what you have shown me and what I have been able to read in ANAE's online version, the nasal system exists in many places that are not connected to each other.


 * OK, what do you think? LiuLanDi 04:40, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I beg to differ
According to the article:


 * Mass (truncation of Massachusetts) has /æ/, not /eə/ like mass


 * Function words and irregular verb tenses have lax /æ/, even in an environment which would usually cause tensing:
 * and (a function word) has /æ/, not /eə/ like sand
 * ran (an irregular verb tense) has /æ/, not /eə/ like man

In my experience, "Mass" for "Massachusetts" and (especially) "ran" often do have /eə/ in New York (as in my own speech). (/æ/ does seem to be regular in "and" and in "Massachusetts.")

38.117.238.82 03:13, 29 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The source for that claim is Benua (1995), listed in the references. —Angr 06:04, 29 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Not sure how relevant sources from Labov in the 70s and 80s, or even Benua in 1995 (now 20 years ago) are. This page doesn't seem to reflect the reality in many of the relevant parts of the US-- i.e. nowadays in the many non-urban areas of the Northeast as well as California (the former supposedly being originally the source of the /ae/ tensing as per Labov?), /ae/-tensing doesn't even seem productive anymore. Bad, mass, clap and so on are all pronounced with /ae/, little difference from the British pronunciation except that it is occasionally long; sad and glad rhyme, and the only cases with something resembling /ae/-tensing seem to be before nasals (but this phenomenon is absent in New York City, Long Island, etc). Speakers seem to still consider this a "short A" and treat it so in speech, and yet the (former) /ae/ of rang, sang is pronounced, and considered, almost universally as /e/ (across at least non-Southern accents), the "long A". Only the elderly still pronounce rang with /ae/. --91.185.179.158 (talk) 15:55, 9 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I disagree. /e/ in rang is common but not universal among young speakers. I certainly know 20-somethings who say /æ/. Wolfdog (talk) 23:39, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I also disagree. I have a "tense" a in bad and mass (though not in clap).  (Though I raise the a, I usually don't put in a schwa after it.  This seems quite common throughout the country.)  Also, in my experience, the a of rang, sang, thank, etc. was usually /ae/, but with a short y glide after (/aej/), as in my own speech.  What seems to me to be the case is that this is merging with the I of thing, think, etc. (which is usually higher than a "normal" short i).  (I call it the "think/thank" merger.)  Anyone else think so? Kostaki mou (talk) 18:41, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

bad-lad
What does long æ (æː) sound like? (It's hard to find in English IPA charts as it's not standard.) Njál 15:01, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I imagine it sounds just like the short æ, only longer. —Angr 15:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, how do you lengthen a sound? The closest thing I can imagine is doubling it, which would give you two discrete instances of the short vowel. Njál 19:05, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * It varies a bit from language to language, but in general a long vowel is held about 50% longer than a short vowel. Thus if the [æ] of lad is held for 100 milliseconds, the [æ:] of bad is held for about 150 milliseconds or so (warning: I'm pulling these numbers out of my ass for the sake of the argument; I have no idea what the actual durations are). —Angr 20:17, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * You can't really hear it if you're a native speaker of English, as short and long vowel distinction isn't phonemic. 128.192.98.204 (talk) 19:50, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No, it isn't phonemic, but it is audible. See Lfh's comment below, under .  I agree that "lad" isn't a terribly good choice to illustrate the split as it may be said long when stressed, and I think that's why the difference can be hard to hear.  "Had" or "ad" would be better for the short example of the pair, and for the longer one personally I think "mad" is clearer.  I find the difference immediately audible in the phrase "mad ad", and switching the vowels in those two words sounds very odd indeed. Richard New Forest(talk) 08:46, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Let me rephrase. It's not that you can't hear it... it's just that most native speakers don't notice it and don't realize there's a difference. Same thing with "lock" and "log."128.192.98.201 (talk) 19:13, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, I see what you mean, though I think most people would notice the wrong one. Not about "lock" and "log" though, or are you talking about American? (I think perhaps you must be American because you're not using logical quotes...) The difference between dark and clear "l" is another that English-speaking people don't easily notice.  Richard New Forest (talk) 10:57, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Vowel length is phonemic in Australia and New Zealand (sometimes also in England, e.g. when is realized as, or when the speaker has the bad-lad split). Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 12:45, 27 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Try saying this sentence, which contains three variants of the "short a": Ann's lad can can bad ads. (Meaning her son has the ability to take inferior advertisements off the air.) In my own speech, the long vowel is held more than 50% longer, in fact it is almost double the length.ralmin 23:33, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I think that sentence is a great demonstration but a poor experiment. Say "Ann's lad should nix bad ads", for example.  There's an added stress on the verb anyway, isn't there? 70.15.116.59 (talk) 16:56, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

jam
The example given for a distinction in "jam" is interesting, but I'm not sure it really applies only to fruit preserves. I think someone who is "caught in a jam" might have the same somewhat lenghthened æː (relative to "jam it in there") - but that's by American standards, which might be different, and I'm not sure about it. 70.15.116.59 (talk) 16:56, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

This distinction also exists in the New York metropolitan area
I'm not sure if the actual two vowels are exactly the same, but the split is the same as described. The only minimal pair I can think of is "have" and "halve". Rhyming with "have": dad, fad, had, lad, tad. Rhyming with "halve": bad, mad, pad, sad. (When Garrison Keilor's radio actors try to do a NY accent, they use the "mad" pronunciation for all such words, which isn't accurate. Probably using a Chicago pronunciation.)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.242.72.225 (talk) 21:33, 30 January 2015 (UTC)


 * To my knowledge, such a split does not exist in New York English. And living within the area, I rarely hear the vowel in bad, mad, etc. elongated.  With "halve," as the word is infrequently used, its pronunciation can be borrowed from an area with such a split.  However, I doubt the split is actually found in New York.  Typically, in the New York area, we use the "have" pronunciation for all words except "halve."74.102.216.186 (talk) 00:52, 9 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I think there's more variation than you think. I myself would use the elongated vowel in fad and tad, as well as in bad, mad, pad and sad.  Though I raise it, I don't diphthongize it. Of course, exposure to the media results in the blending of many accents.  Kostaki mou (talk) 18:25, 7 February 2017 (UTC)


 * You say you personally elongate the vowel in all of the words. There probably is more variation than I think. I'll take your word on that.  However, does the bad-lad split actually exist in New York English?


 * Also, I am actually from Central Jersey. So, that may make the difference.  However, I have heard New York accents for most of my life.  If there were a distinction between the vowels in "had" and "bad," I think I probably would have heard it by now.  Yet again, there is a chance that the split exists and I just didn't hear it.[f.k.a 74.102.216.182]LakeKayak (talk) 20:37, 7 February 2017 (UTC)


 * I think we often tend to be unaware of pronunciation differences until they are pointed out to us. I assure you the difference does exist.  No doubt there are individual and perhaps local and generational differences.  Kostaki mou (talk) 20:53, 7 February 2017 (UTC)


 * I'll take your word for it.LakeKayak (talk) 02:43, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Rather
Rather has the broad A in Southeastern English English, right? I'm pretty sure I've heard it pronounced that way, but it's not mentioned in the article. 208.104.45.20 (talk) 23:26, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, it does, but the article makes no attempt (nor should it!) to give an exhaustive list of all "BATH" words. —Angr 05:57, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It's not a typical BATH word, as it has in northern England as well as the south-east; it is actually included in a list of words like this in the "British accents" section of the article.--JHJ (talk) 07:54, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Rather, half, calf, can't, and aunt. Note that in the word rather, the "A" is not followed by either a voiceless fricative or a sequence of nasal+consonant.  I have never heard a British speaker say rather, can't, or half with .  Wells says that half with a short vowel is confined to Northumberland and Tyne and Wear.  Jack (Lumber) 22:20, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Don't forget the expression "If I had my 'druthers." Kostaki mou (talk) 19:32, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

'Half' pronounced 'haff' is certainly traditionally heard across the North, eg 'haff past ten'. I'm sure a flat A in 'rather' is traditional in Yorkshire as it is in 'father' Vauxhall1964 (talk) 00:17, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think banana is another one. —Angr 06:15, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yep. Two or three centuries ago, whenever loanwords like banana entered the language BritEng would often map the low central vowel to .  USEng is inconsistent: banana has, lava has , pajama may have either, tomato is pronounced as it's spelled.  More recent loans, however, have  in BritEng (e.g. pasta), but consistent  in USEng--and the same goes for proper names like Nissan or Datsun.  Interestingly, Canadian English tends to have  in most such words; some Canadian speakers will even say , although this is a minority usage.  (We might argue that these tendencies are related at least in part to phonetic change, right?)  But there's more to it, of course; kebab entered the language in 1673, but it has  in Britain and  in the U.S.  And then there's khaki, or car key if you will...  Jack (Lumber) 19:09, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

bad-lad part two
I am really confused about the bad-lad split. I thought the vowel in bad was always lengthened when compared to the vowel in bat; is it lengthened even more with this split? I thought there was always a fortis vs. lenis distinction or voiceless vs. voiced distinction even in American English to some extent. Why wouldn't lad also be lengthened compared to bat? Thegryseone (talk) 15:18, 20 May 2009 (UTC)
 * The article doesn't say anything about the vowel of lad compared to that of bat; the point is just that in dialects with this split the vowel of lad is shorter than that of bad. It could still be longer than that of bat. (Though not necessarily - in Scottish English, there is no vowel lengthening before voiced stops as there is in American English and English English, see Scottish Vowel Length Rule. So maybe there is none in lad in Australian English either.) +Angr 15:49, 20 May 2009 (UTC)
 * This looks dubious: "The word lad does in fact have a long /æː/ in most British accents affected by the split today; a more accurate name would be the bad-had split, with the latter retaining short /æ/ in the vast majority of these accents." Proposing a "more accurate" name comes pretty close to original research.  (Also, for what it's worth, I have the bad-lad split in my accent and I do not pronounce "lad" with the long /æː/ of "bad" - but I guess that's OR too.) Lfh (talk) 21:35, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Mistitled?
This is more of a dialectal survey than a phonological history. The title implies that you would find information on, for example, what happened to the Old English /æ/ in Middle English; everything discussed in this article is from the past two or three centuries. -Branddobbe (talk) 07:22, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Audio Clips?
Considering that this is an article with a lot to do with pronunciation, a few audio clips may be very helpful for those who are not very familiar with the IPA and such.Monkeyface13 (talk) 03:45, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, someone was just asking about this on the lang ref desk but I had nothing to link to. μηδείς (talk) 21:04, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

æ tensing or æ-tensing?
I have changed the name of the section from the capital digraph to the lower case IPA symbol, since IPA letters don't have capital forms. But the question remains, should we hyphenate æ-tensing or not? I slightly favor hyphenation, but what I really care about is consistency. If anyone's got an opinion they should edit the article so the hyphenated or unhyphenated term is used consistently. μηδείς (talk) 21:03, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Broad and flat
This article sometimes uses the familiar terms 'short' and 'long' in relation to vowels, but at other times uses 'flat' and 'broad' apparently with the same meanings. I have never read any modern work of phonetics that uses the latter terms (except that 'flat' used to be used as a distinctive feature label with a completely different meaning). I would be glad of a reference to published work using 'flat' and 'broad' in a scientific way. If there isn't one, I would like to remove them from the article. Too often these terms crop up in ill-informed journalistic writing about local accents. RoachPeter (talk) 10:33, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty sure John Wells uses "broad" and "flat" informally in Accents of English, since "long" and "short" don't cover the difference in quality between /ɑː/ and /æ/, and constantly saying "the PALM vowel" and "the TRAP vowel" gets old quickly. Aɴɢʀ (talk) 10:40, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
 * You are right. Wells' 'Accents of English' vol.1 p. 134 explains that 'broad' and 'flat' can be useful in certain contexts, though he warns against confusing their meaning with other widely-used senses of the words. Apologies for raising this. RoachPeter (talk) 12:02, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Nothing to apologize for! It's certainly a point worth discussing. Aɴɢʀ (talk) 20:35, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, in American schools, the terms "long a" and "short a" are typically used specifically to mean /eɪ/ and /æ/, respectively. Thus, in order to avoid confusion from American readers, the terms "broad" and "flat" are used in the article.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.102.218.18 (talk) 21:56, 12 October 2016 (UTC)

"Broad" written for "flat"?
"Broad /æð/ in blather, gather, slather"

That "broad" should be "flat", right? &mdash;JerryFriedman (Talk) 19:10, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Yep. Angr (talk) 05:36, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

Raising towards [ɛ]
In Cockney, it is noted that the TRAP vowel /æ/ may be raised, resulting in [ɛ] (or [ɛɪ]), and surprisingly, Received Pronunciation notes that in RP, there used to be a similar tendency, even though the southeast, including Estuary English (often described as intermediate between RP and Cockney), preserves the [æ] realisation, and in the rest of England except East Anglia, it is even lowered to [a]. Is the raising of the TRAP vowel a southeastern innovation that was later pushed back again (say, in the course of the 20th century)? Also, is there any full-blown merger of the TRAP and DRESS vowels in any variety of English, at least for some positions (such as in Pat and pet), or is it generally avoided by raising or centralising the DRESS vowel too as in NZ English? I miss a discussion of the raising and any mergers like that here. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 15:07, 19 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I've never heard of a variety of English that merges TRAP and DRESS. As far as I know, only foreigners do that, e.g. my German roommate who once mentioned Medicine, Wisconsin, and I didn't know what he was talking about. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 20:25, 19 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I had a hunch, so I looked and offer you broad South African English, for one (under Afrikaans influence?), and that's a pretty major variety. Some more "exotic" varieties of English spoken in Asia, Africa, Oceania and the Caribbean (which you're less familiar with) may do the same – there are various semi-creolised varieties or true creoles such as Singlish which I don't know if they count, as Phonological history of English vowels does mention Malaysian and Singaporean English. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:52, 20 June 2014 (UTC)
 * See Open-mid front unrounded vowel and now again Phonological history of English high front vowels. (Special:WhatLinksHere/Zulu English set me on the right path.) --Florian Blaschke (talk) 01:33, 20 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Actually, practically all Germans raise [æ] to [ɛ], with some very few intent on sounding British might think of lowering it to [a] (which then would be basically the same as the shut vowel, German-style pronounced). Even if some realize the difference, the two vowels are just too near to each other to actually make a difference when speaking. One other so hard sound is - no, not th; that is easy. Not w, that is easy too. What is hard is to pronounce jump in a manner any different from chump.--2001:A61:260D:6E01:E116:8772:EE65:4D70 (talk) 01:46, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

"Metropolitan Western U.S."
I can't speak for the current situation of /æ/ in Boston, but I've not seen the the western "Metropolitan"what? region's /æ/ described as such in the table: Apart from what's already noted in California_English, California has regularly shown to be a pure nasal split system with a shift of /æ/ before non nasal consonants in any environment, /r/ notwithstanding, to [a]
 * Environment: /b/, /d/, /dʒ/,/ʃ/, /v/, /z/, /ʒ/ /f/, /s/, /θ/ and all other consonants = tense/lax [ɛə]~[æ]
 * E.g.: Grama, J., & Kennedy, R. (2009). Acoustic analysis of California vowels / Holland, Cory (2014). Shifting or Shifted The state of California vowels / Podesva, Robert J. et al (2013). The California Vowel Shift in a Rural Inland Community / Kennedy, R., & Grama, J. (2012). Chain shifting and centralization in California vowels: An acoustic analysis, etc...

Which puts it apart from Boston, never mind that Boston is an attested marry-merry-mary split area, opposed to the merged West, which should put them in separate columns for /r/. The /r/ row itself is also missing attested variations of the split/merger English-language_vowel_changes_before_historic_/r/

As for Oregon/Washington aka Pacific_Northwest_English, they've been shown to back /æ/ as well, along with raising of /æ/ before /g/
 * E.g.: Best,Katelyn et al 2013. Keep Portland weird Vowels in Oregon English / Conn, J. C. 2000. Portland Dialect Study: The Story of/æ/in Portland / Wassink, Alicia, et al. 2009. Effects of Gender and Style on Fronting and Raising of/æ/,/e:/, and/ε/before/g/in Seattle English / Wassink, A. B. 2011. Vowel reduction and merger in Pacific Northwest English / Freeman, Valerie 2014. Bag, Beg, Bagel: Prevelar Raising and Merger in Pacific Northwest English, etc...

There's really no reason for these simple inaccuracies to be here, especially next to the complicated systems of New York/Philadelphia/Baltimore being accurately presented Traptraptrap (talk) 08:22, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
 * It is not a split if there was never any historical splitting. Boston doesn't split merry, Mary and marry, the Midwest just merges them. Try not to give unwarranted weight or credence to speech errors like the merger in question, if you could. Tharthandorf Aquanashi (talk) 14:15, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Title
Nothing vastly better springs immediately to mind, but I'm not very happy with the title of this article. It seems to be largely about A's that might very well not be short in Modern English. W. P. Uzer (talk) 13:00, 9 October 2015 (UTC)
 * How about Pronunciation of English ⟨a⟩ (on the pattern of Pronunciation of English ⟨th⟩ and Pronunciation of English ⟨wh⟩)? It still doesn't quite get the scope, but it's much closer, as well as being more user-friendly, and we can link to other articles that deal with other aspects of ⟨a⟩ pronunciations. W. P. Uzer (talk) 10:47, 20 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm going to change this then (probably without the angle brackets to begin with, since that requires admin powers). Any objectors please move it back and discuss - if it turns out there are none, then I'll ask for the angle brackets. W. P. Uzer (talk) 07:54, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Distinction between phonemic and non-phonemic /æ/ tensing
Note that I have made one change in the list section. Previously, it said, "In some dialects, though, including the New York and Mid-Atlantic ones (such as spoken in Philadelphia), the "short a" sound can actually split into two entirely distinct phonemes, so that using a tense vowel rather than a lax vowel can potentially change the meanings of words or phrases." Note that this is actually inaccurate for New York English. I live in Central Jersey. And at least around here, there is a split between /eə/ and /æ/. However, no minimal pairs are formed in the split. Furthermore, when I have spoken to people New York accents, there were never any confusions between words like caf (meaning cafeteria) and calf.

On the other hand, which could be the cause of the confusion, when the short a proceeds /f/, /θ/ to a lesser extent, or /s/, it could be pronounced either way, even in the same sentence. I'll use the following sentence as an example: "A half of a mile is a half of a mile." This could be pronounced as any of these:
 * /ə hæf əv ə maɪˈəl ɪz ə hæf əv ə maɪˈəl/,
 * /ə heəf əv ə maɪˈəl ɪz ə hæf əv ə maɪˈəl/,
 * /ə hæf əv ə maɪˈəl ɪz ə heəf əv ə maɪˈəl/,
 * or /ə heəf əv ə maɪˈəl ɪz ə heəf əv ə maɪˈəl/.

Personally, I feel that this is more phenomenal, and that it is interesting; but it might just be me. Over and out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.102.218.18 (talk) 22:34, 12 October 2016 (UTC)


 * The NYC system is a phonemic split in the classic sense; the fact that no misunderstandings were created in communication between someone who doesn't have the split and someone who does doesn't prove that it's not a split. However, the NYC system is highly sociolinguistically stigmatized, and speakers can vary between using and avoiding the split system. That doesn't mean that the NYC system doesn't contain a phonemic split, just that people don't always use the NYC system. AJD (talk) 18:32, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

In that case, I am afraid I misunderstand the page. Could you, sir/ma'am, clear me up on what the classical definition of the split is? Thank you.74.102.216.186 (talk) 15:27, 1 November 2016 (UTC)


 * The classic definition of a phonemic split is: a sound change such that what was originally one sound (e.g., [æ]) becomes two (e.g., [æ] and [eə]), in such a way that it is not possible to determine simply from phonetic context which sound appears in which words. The variability of the NYC system complicates this a bit, but only insofar as speakers vary in terms of whether they use the NYC system or not; it doesn't affect the phonemic status of sounds within in NYC system itself. AJD (talk) 20:38, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Now I understand. There is such a split in New York City English. Some words with an are still pronounced [æn], and others are pronounced [eən]. (There are irregularities like any, Han (as in Han Solo), etc.) As a side note, such a split both has and has not taken hold of rhotic varieties of New York English found in New Jersey. In such varieties, we actually do perceive the two to be separate sounds. However, we pronounce all of the an class words as [eən]. Finally, as your understanding is better than mine, I have one more question to ask you. In New York English, are there any examples where the use of a tense [æ] versus a lax [æ] could result in a different meaning? However, I would prefer that the example not be can (as to be able) and can (as in a metal can) for two reasons. For one, the former is usually pronounced [kɛn]. For another, this pronunciation is sometimes used to prevent it from sounding like can't. But any other would be fine. I do thank you for all of your input.74.102.216.186 (talk) 03:06, 2 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I mean, I don't really accept your thesis that can is "usually" pronounced [kɛn] in NY English, at least according to the sociolinguistic literature. Anyway, it's hard to find a good example of a minimal pair other than that (especially since I don't know as much about the NYC system as I do about the Philadelphia system), but something like banner 'flag' vs. banner 'someone who bans something' would probably do it. AJD (talk) 10:31, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

It dawned on me a few days ago. One time, I was speaking to my parents about my brother's friend Aaron, which I pronounced as. However, my father thought that I said "Erin", which I would have pronounce as. My father misunderstood me because he pronounces "Aaron" as. Another good example of a minimal pair is "Mary" vs. "marry". Almost all of the minimal pairs in New York English occur before r. They rarely occur before n.

Typically, New Yorkers have a three-way distinction between "Mary", "marry", and "merry". Sometimes, in the NY metropolitan area of New Jersey, especially for younger speakers, we only have a two-way distinction, pronouncing "Mary" and "marry" both as, while "merry" is still pronounced as. I'm sorry, sir/ma'am. It dawned on me after you had already replied.74.102.216.186 (talk) 01:18, 9 November 2016 (UTC)

a before r
In the section describing the vowel changes before r, the pages says that was lengthened before r, shifting to. Then, the page jumps right to describing the words cat and cart differing by vowel quality and length in Received Pronunciation, the former pronounced as and the latter as, without ever mentioning the retracting of  to. (The fronting of to  is described.)  Could anybody add in a line saying when  was retracted to ? Thank you.LakeKayak (talk) 22:37, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

trap-bath split and ae tensing
I personally think these should have their own articles. They are long and significant enough for articles on their own. Have all the information about them here makes the article lengthy. I have created articles for them. Fish567 (talk) 23:15, 30 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I feel there should be some time before the sections on this page are reduced. However, I have no objection to either split.LakeKayak (talk) 23:25, 30 January 2017 (UTC)


 * As the page /æ/ tensing has stood for a few months, now I have condensed the section on this page. I can let somebody else be the judge on Trap–bath split.  I don't know the topic well enough.LakeKayak (talk) 01:22, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

What is the origin of the terms "broad a" and "flat a"?
This one I am only a little curious about. And I want to see if anybody knows the answer – because I don't. Any help with this question is appreciated.LakeKayak (talk) 01:03, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

No æ lowering in Australian
As a native speaker of Standard or General AusE, cat [kæt] is noticeably higher/closer than cart [ka:t]. I can't say that I ever hear Aussies say caht [kat] for the feline unless they were affecting a toffee-nosed Queen's English. A low caht would likely be misheard as cut [kʌt].

To put it another way: in the triples cat–cart–cut, bat–Bart–but the cat and bat sound more distinct.

I hope we can find a reference that supports this observation and amend the table, which currently has a big tick for æ-lowering in AusE. ⁓ Pelagic ( messages ) 22:23, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Cox and Fletcher p. 65 give /æ/, /ɐ/, /ɐ:/ for bat, but, part in AusE. ⁓ Pelagic ( messages ) 23:26, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Ohno, I've fallen into the rabbit-hole of MD versus HCE transcription of Australian English. Does the frequency diagram at mean that the æ–ɐ distinction is more front-back rather than height? ⁓ Pelagic ( messages ) 00:55, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The lowering is sourced at Australian English phonology, which uses different symbols. Basically, ⟨a⟩ in this article (Pronunciation of English ⟨a⟩) stands for the open front unrounded vowel in bat, cat and trap, the same as the one found in RP. In Australian English phonology, it stands for the open central unrounded vowel in but, cut and strut (and part, cart and father when followed by a length mark: ⟨aː⟩). The latter is more narrowly transcribed as ⟨ä⟩ (a centralized cardinal ), but the diacritic is omitted because the vowel in bat is already transcribed with a different symbol, namely ⟨æ⟩ which captures its backness but not the exact height (you can specify it as ⟨æ̞⟩, a lowered ). Plus, the open central unrounded vowel is one of the most common vowels in human languages, and ⟨a⟩ (without any diacritic) is the most common symbol for it. It can also be transcribed as a lowered (⟨ɐ̞⟩), which is equivalent to ⟨ä⟩. Many Australian sources use ⟨ɐ⟩ without the diacritic, which captures its backness but not height (same as with ⟨æ⟩). But they do that without retranscribing  as, which is weird (because they could use ⟨a⟩ instead of ⟨ɐ⟩). Using ⟨a⟩ for the open central unrounded vowel is SO extremely common (Spanish, Italian, German, Swedish, Russian, Hungarian - just to name a few languages in which it is done) that nobody would bat an eye if they did that as well.
 * does not exist in Australian English, except maybe as a starting point of for some speakers. Sol505000 (talk) 03:56, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply, @Sol505000. I just found which talks about the very low-front sound. I could have been thinking wrongly about where æ-a-ä are meant to be, ignorant that descriptions like “/æ/ as in hat” refer to a higher sound in other dialects. If my /æ/ is really [a], then I need to rethink things. ⁓ Pelagic ( messages ) 11:41, 10 June 2023 (UTC)