''bath'' and ''Mary''

Frances   Thu Oct 06, 2005 9:46 pm GMT
If you scroll down to the bit that says (where the table is):

Variation between /a?/ and /æ/

it says

"to contrast 100% 100% 100% 100% 71 94%"

I just don't understand that. I've only heard Australians say "to contrast" with /a?/. I don't understand how SA has a rating of 71% for that.
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh   Fri Oct 07, 2005 1:46 am GMT
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Kirk   Fri Oct 07, 2005 2:49 am GMT
<<Anyway, "long a" users are prevalent in South Australia. Settlement occurred in South Australia 1836 by free settlers. Other states don't use it so much, especially down the Eastern seaboard. These were earlier colonies (starting from 1788, convict colonies). I presume the shift from "short a" to "long a" occurred during this time in the UK.>>

Yes, that would make sense then. I think that's exactly when the change was spreading the fastest, after the dawn of the 1800s, so it makes sense that the change wasn't as complete for the colonies which settled earlier and that later colonies naturally had it as more prevalent in their speech--there had been nearly half a century able to pass in the meantine.

<<Kirk - weren't the elite in the UK speaking with a "short a" and Cockney with "long a" and then the elite adopted the "long a"?>>

Yes, it was originally a Cockney feature that "filtered upwards" towards the higher classes until it became even a completely standard feature of RP.
Lazar   Fri Oct 07, 2005 2:52 am GMT
<<Yes, it was originally a Cockney feature that "filtered upwards" towards the higher classes until it became even a completely standard feature of RP.>>

I wonder how it got to Boston, though... Maybe just as an affectation adopted in the 1800s?
Kirk   Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:49 am GMT
<<I wonder how it got to Boston, though... Maybe just as an affectation adopted in the 1800s?>>

Yes, Boston was more susceptible to the newly developed linguistic fashions which had been developing in England during the time, so it formed an entrypoint for some 19th century British phonological innovations, which would later spread to some other parts of New England. However, obviously the long-term success of such fashions was relatively limited (they never really left New England). I mean, you even live in the general Boston area and you're rhotic and don't have /A/ in the "bath-class" set :)
Rick Johnson   Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:21 am GMT
I have read that the Cockney long "a" filtered upwards although I think it seems unlikely. It could be the effect of having a German royal family and their pronunciation which filtered down into the upper classes.

I think it's difficult to put dates on these changes because even today the long "a" is only used in a small part of Britain- although someone should really tell Hollywood.

To my ears the Adelaide accent is quite significantly different from the accents of Melbourne, Syndney and Brisbane and sounds distinctly more South East English.

The Boston long "a" is quite different as it is more of an stretched "a" than an "ah" sound.
Frances   Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:24 am GMT
Rick - thats what most people say as well. However we often get accused of sounding like New Zealanders as well. :)
Kirk   Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:43 am GMT
<<I have read that the Cockney long "a" filtered upwards although I think it seems unlikely.>>

But linguists have long established the root of that particular change (as a Cockney feature which spread to other sociolects) and there's really no question where it came from. It's not a matter of opinion or conjecture ;)

<<It could be the effect of having a German royal family and their pronunciation which filtered down into the upper classes.>>

It would be interesting but I think it's very highly unlikely that has anything to do with it.

<<I think it's difficult to put dates on these changes because even today the long "a" is only used in a small part of Britain- although someone should really tell Hollywood.>>

Haha. I agree :) I'll send Hollywood a note. I'm only about a hundred miles south of Hollywood so my letter should reach there by tomorrow ;)
Rick Johnson   Fri Oct 07, 2005 10:51 am GMT
"Rick - thats what most people say as well. However we often get accused of sounding like New Zealanders as well. :)"

I used to find it hard to tell the difference between Aussie and Kiwi accents, but after only about a week of working in Melbourne (and spending time with Kiwis there) the differences in vowels sounds became obvious- from yes to yiss, and the "i" sounds which often have a West Coast Scottish influence so "trip" sounds like a short, sharp "trup" - I think this may be stronger in the S Island.
Inigo   Sun Oct 09, 2005 4:43 am GMT
In fact South Australia was first settled about a decade before Queensland and northern NSW, but for some time SA was almost exclusively English, while all other colonies/states had strong Irish and Scots representation from the outset.

While all Australians have long used a long (or broad) A in such words as bath, class, fast etc., chahnce, dahnce and plahnt were rarely heard outside South Australia or NZ until recent decades.

It's some consolation that the Eastenders didn't manage to elevate their beloved glo'al stop to widespread acceptance in the Antipodes.
Lazar   Sun Oct 09, 2005 6:09 am GMT
<<The Boston long "a" is quite different as it is more of an stretched "a" than an "ah" sound.>>

The Boston "father" phoneme is [a], which is much more fronted than the [A] that RP or GA would use there.
Kirk   Sun Oct 09, 2005 9:08 am GMT
<<It's some consolation that the Eastenders didn't manage to elevate their beloved glo'al stop to widespread acceptance in the Antipodes.>>

The glottal stop wasn't nearly as widespread back in those times in Southern England. If the Antipodes had been settled a century or so later it's likely they would've had more glottal stop influence in their dialects.
frances   Sun Oct 09, 2005 11:09 am GMT
"In fact South Australia was first settled about a decade before Queensland and northern NSW, but for some time SA was almost exclusively English, while all other colonies/states had strong Irish and Scots representation from the outset. "

Queensland was settled relatively for a long time but only broke off from NSW to form its own colony in 1859. I think Brisbane was settled in the 1820's, you can see it in some of the architecture it has. As for settlement in Northern NSW, not sure but I'm sure the "accent" was held in the middle by QLd to the North and Sydney to the south.
Inigo   Mon Oct 10, 2005 8:12 am GMT
Frances, the first white settlement anywhere in Queensland was in 1824, at what is now Redcliffe, at the northern end of Moreton Bay: it was a very small convict-only settlement, and moved after a few years to what is now the Brisbane CBD. This Moreton Bay settlement of NSW was not thrown open to free settlers until 1842, six years after the free settlement of SA, and few arrived until the latter half of the 1840s. No organised immigrants from anywhere in Europe arrived until the fifties. As you say, Queensland separated from NSW in 1859, but the population was still tiny until after the first Queensland gold discovery in 1867 at Gympie.

The only remaining buildings from the brief convict era are the Commissariat Store in George Street, and the Windmill in Wickham Terrace (which incidentally was the site of Australia's first experimental television transmissions in 1936). They were built in 1828-29.

I've never heard an Australian employ the glottal stop.
Shane Warne   Mon Oct 10, 2005 8:43 am GMT
How's thaaaaa' ?!