Talk:Th-fronting

Historical independence
Surely fronting in Estuary English cannot be independent of Cockney? At any rate, I'm pretty darn sure that Wells doesn't claim so. I'll reword. Grover cleveland (talk) 15:37, 23 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Wells concluded that Estuary English was just a media concoction. I heard him say this in a speech on English pronunciation about three years ago.  Epa101 (talk) 12:29, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Other languages
Perhaps some mention of θ → f in other languages could be made. Proto-Indo-European *dh shows up in Latin as f (e.g. facio < *dheh1-), presumably through an intermediate stage *θ. Greek words with θ were borrowed into Russian with f (e.g. Foma for Thomas, Afanasi for Athanasius etc.). —Angr (talk) 16:45, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Arab's of Persian Gulf
There are several dialects within Persian Gulf's Arab people, one of which is Bahrani Arabic dialect. Th-fronting is used in this dialect. 89.31.192.180 (talk) 08:20, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Been around in England for a lot longer than many think (fink)
Leeds University have the incidental material from the Survey of English Dialects online. They are organised by county report here. If you go through these, you'll notice that [variable] TH-fronting was reported in many locations across England, and not just in the dialects that are most associated with TH-fronting (e.g. Cockney). For example, TH-fronting is not normally associated with Yorkshire accents, but it was reported in 16 of the 33 sites in Yorkshire. These speakers were born in the late 19th century and spoke in ways far removed from Standard English. This suggests that TH-fronting is not a new phenomenon.

I get the impression that it is more common when the TH is not word-initial.

Would anyone object to my adding something to the article to indicate this? Epa101 (talk) 12:35, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Do you have a secondary source for this info? The survey seems to be a primary source, and we have to treat primary sources with a certain amount of caution to avoid original research. Angr (talk) 17:57, 2 December 2012 (UTC)


 * No, I do not at present. I understand the problem with original research on this.  I recall this comment which suggests that Joan Beal identified TH-fronting in northern England in the mid-19th century.  I might try to track down that article and see if it makes the claim.  I presume that would count as a secondary source.  Epa101 (talk) 22:47, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, it would if it contains her analysis of the situation and not just "raw data". Angr (talk) 23:40, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm now convinced that the Beal article does not exist. However, I did find an Upton reference for TH-fronting in Yorkshire in the 19th century, and shall add that now. Epa101 (talk) 20:45, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

It is obviously much older: Pepys' diaries from the 1660s call Rotherhithe "Redriffe" --86.156.217.255 (talk) 22:03, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Here in the US, th-fronting was long treated as a speech impediment. Elementary schools would provide speech therapy to children who couldn't pronounce "th" correctly. Best regardsTheBaron0530 (talk) 14:15, 28 September 2020 (UTC)


 * I am Canuck, but I couldn't say TH for a while and I never had any speech therapy - maybe it is because my parents also couldn't. Cool fact though --CommieKarlovy (talk) 20:35, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Merger or push chain
Are th and f actually merged, so that thought and fought are homophones? Or is /f/ fronted further to [ɸ]? Steinbach (talk) 15:26, 27 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty sure they're actually merged, so that thought and fought are homophones. Angr (talk) 15:34, 27 December 2012 (UTC)
 * 8 years late, but, yes, they are homophones with th-fronting. --CommieKarlovy (talk) 14:21, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Not for everyone. I'm watching a YouTube vid on cockatiels, and the narrator pronounces //f, v// as labiodental [f, v], but //θ, ð// as bilabial [ɸ, β] (and yes, that with [ð]). The distinction appears to be consistent. So I suspect there is regional variation as to whether this is actually a merger. — kwami (talk) 08:18, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

Cockney example
In the recorded example, while with some generosity one might hear the first mention of “Thursday” as th-fronting, at least to my ears the second one has a decided th sound. --Janko (talk) 11:31, 23 October 2014 (UTC)


 * He's also mimicking another's voice in that instance, so perhaps his mother didn't have the fronting? — kwami (talk) 08:22, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

African American Vernacular English
I thought it was pronounced like a T or D sound. Malcolmmwa (talk) 07:36, 8 December 2019 (UTC)
 * AAVE is not a monolith. Both occur. Steinbach (talk) 11:44, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Th-fronting in Scotland
In my opinion, this phenomenon is not uncommon in Scotland. It is worth mentioning it in the article. Are there any scholarly articles about this? —  GPodkolzin   Talk 22:16, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It occurs in modern urban Scots/Scottish English, as mentioned under "Increase in use". Steinbach (talk) 11:45, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Update needed
The article speaks about th-fronting "currently making its way" into Estuary English, that is, into middle class speech, and cites a paper from 1999. Over twenty years have passed, so by now we should be able to say whether th-fronting has become established. Has it indeed spread upward, or is the feature still stigmatised as a sign of working-class background? Steinbach (talk) 18:50, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Russian
Should we include a section about the words in Russian that were fronted, to the point that F became the standard pronunciation (and eventually the letter representing the theta sound was removed, after having been preserved as a F sound for historical and etymological reasons)? One notable example is the name Fyodor (as in Fyodor Dostoevsky). Malcolmmwa (talk) 06:09, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Not always a merger
I've wondered about this for a while, and have noticed on YouTube (as I mentioned above) that some Brits maintain a distinction, with /f v/ vs /ɸ β/. Can this be referenced anywhere? — kwami (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2021 (UTC)
 * So you've just edited the article based on some YouTube video you watched, and then you're asking for references? That is certainly not how WP:V or WP:NOR work. Nardog (talk) 08:39, 20 May 2021 (UTC)
 * They weren't claiming it, and we could use the vid as an example, just as people commonly use vids as sources for the pronunciation of names. I was wondering if we had a RS description of it.
 * I also noticed this in the movie Legend, but didn't know how accurate the actors were. (Though it would be odd for actors to create new sounds if it was supposed to be a merger.) In the YouTube vid, he's not acting. — kwami (talk) 10:31, 20 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I got that, and that's even worse. You edited a claim in without even knowing if there are reliable sources that support it. If that's not original research I don't know what is. Nardog (talk) 10:59, 20 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Our claim was demonstrably wrong, and has been for years. That needs correction. — kwami (talk) 12:23, 20 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Then demonstrate it with a reliable source. The WP:BURDEN is on you. Nardog (talk) 02:49, 21 May 2021 (UTC)
 * What you're hearing is probably :, fricatives with double dental-labiodental articulation. Or something like that. I'll try to look for a source. But the underlying phonemes are still as the merger isn't complete in any native non-African and non-Asian English. Sol505000 (talk) 09:14, 22 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Do you have a ref that the merger isn't complete in the UK? I'm finding variation with this particular speaker, some clearly labiodental and some clearly not (and thus not [θf ðv]). So far only finding variation with th, but can't be sure the same variation doesn't occur with f v (e.g. can't be sure it's not a full rather than partial merger, or full merger to [f] only in initial position, etc). John Wells (p.c.) has never heard of bilabial th. — kwami (talk) 22:14, 22 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Try the page 328 of AoE. I can't comment on the bilabial th as I've never read anything about it, and I don't trust my hearing that much anyway. All I know is that can be bilabial in Ireland. Sol505000 (talk) 22:49, 22 May 2021 (UTC)
 * AoE notes that people maintain an underlying distinction, but not a surface distinction when they use the labial variant. So for those who have a bilabial th, perhaps f v are always labio-dental, and th optionally either? This is such a marked pronunciation that I have a hard time believing it hasn't been described. — kwami (talk) 23:28, 22 May 2021 (UTC)