Short "a"

Is there a term, or even a known reason for the different American pronunciations of words containing As, such as "fast" and "chance"?

In northern England, the vowel for both seems to be the same, very short.

Yet Americans use two quite different sounds, neither of which is really short, yet presumably each sound is an elongation, in different ways, of a short A. But why the difference? Why have two versions of a drawled, nasalised short A for different words?

Is it because of the particular consonant which follows the vowel that these different sounds came about once the genuine short A was abandoned?

I'm not exactly sure what you mean, because you're not using any kind of phonetic script. But if I'm not mistaken, you're saying that Americans use noticeably different vowels in "fast" and "chance". I think this is an overgeneralization. There are some American accents in which the vowel [{] becomes something like [E@] or [e@] before nasals, so "fast" and "chance" might have different vowels; but in my accent, and for many other Americans as well, there is little to no difference between the vowels in "fast" and "chance".

<<Is it because of the particular consonant which follows the vowel that these different sounds came about once the genuine short A was abandoned?>>

Again, I really don't know what you mean about "the genuine short A" being "abandoned". American English has preserved the phoneme /{/ in pretty much all instances in which it is found in Northern England, and in most cases it hasn't really diverged very much from the original pronunciation of [{].

North American English doesn't make a difference between long and short vowels, just tense and lax.

Lately, I have been trying to learn to speak pure General American, so my a's always sound about the same even before n's, d's, and g's so ban, bad, and bag have about the same vowel.

--"fast" and "chance" might have different vowels; but in my accent, and for many other Americans as well, there is little to no difference between the vowels in "fast" and "chance".--

But still there's an obvious difference that can be sensed. I don't want to generalize, but I don't think there's a single variation of our accent that does not make a difference between the vowel in "cast, fast, grasp" and the vowel in "sand, chance, dam" etc

>> But still there's an obvious difference that can be sensed. I don't want to generalize, but I don't think there's a single variation of our accent that does not make a difference between the vowel in "cast, fast, grasp" and the vowel in "sand, chance, dam" etc <<

Hmm. I can't really sense the difference. If I say "cast", and really prolong the "a" before saying the ending, the "a" to me sounds the same as that if I say the "a" in "sand". I'm not an expert in transcription, but I think I say:

cast [k{st]
sand [s{nd]
ban [b{n]
bag [b{g]
bad [b{d]

<<But still there's an obvious difference that can be sensed.>>

There's a little bit of allophony of /{/ before nasals in my accent, but I wouldn't consider the difference obvious, and until I learned about linguistics I never perceived them as different sounds. I'm trying to isolate the vowel that I use in "dam" and "chance", and it seems like it's just on the boundary between [{:~] and [E:~]. When I wrote my original post, I had in mind dialects where the pre-nasal allophony was much more noticeable, so I suppose I was a bit overzealous. For that I apologize.

<<I don't want to generalize, but I don't think there's a single variation of our accent that does not make a difference between the vowel in "cast, fast, grasp" and the vowel in "sand, chance, dam" etc>>

Not to be picky, but there are many dialects of American English in which there is tensing of the /{/ phoneme, but in which the tensing applies to both those sets of words. I'm pretty sure that both of those word sets would be conditions for tensing in the Philadelphia or New York accents; plus, there are accents in the Midwest, like Travis's, in which /{/ is realized as [E@] or [e@] in all situations.

>> Not to be picky, but there are many dialects of American English in which there is tensing of the /{/ phoneme, but in which the tensing applies to both those sets of words. I'm pretty sure that both of those word sets would be conditions for tensing in the Philadelphia or New York accents; plus, there are accents in the Midwest, like Travis's, in which /{/ is realized as [E@] or [e@] in all situations. <<

I speak General American, so I pronounce them all as lax.

>>Not to be picky, but there are many dialects of American English in which there is tensing of the /{/ phoneme, but in which the tensing applies to both those sets of words. I'm pretty sure that both of those word sets would be conditions for tensing in the Philadelphia or New York accents; plus, there are accents in the Midwest, like Travis's, in which /{/ is realized as [E@] or [e@] in all situations.<<

Actually, to be a pedant, such is [E{] or [e{] rather than [E@] or [e@], with [E] and [e] being onglides rather than offglides; also note that such may even be [I{] at times for some here. This is, yes, different from the typical NCVS-affected dialect, where the diphthong corresponding to historical [{] is centering rather than falling.

<<But still there's an obvious difference that can be sensed. I don't want to generalize, but I don't think there's a single variation of our accent that does not make a difference between the vowel in "cast, fast, grasp" and the vowel in "sand, chance, dam" etc>>

I'm from California and they all have the same vowel for me. If you're an American and you have different vowels for those you're probably from somewhere in the North or Northeast where traditional /{/ has experienced diphthongization in certain contexts.

<<Again, I really don't know what you mean about "the genuine short A" being "abandoned". American English has preserved the phoneme /{/ in pretty much all instances in which it is found in Northern England, and in most cases it hasn't really diverged very much from the original pronunciation of [{].>>

Yes, the General American /{/ is conservative as English vowels go, since, like English from Northern England it did not experience the "broad-A" split heard in RP and many other British accents.

<<Actually, to be a pedant, such is [E{] or [e{] rather than [E@] or [e@], with [E] and [e] being onglides rather than offglides; also note that such may even be [I{] at times for some here. This is, yes, different from the typical NCVS-affected dialect, where the diphthong corresponding to historical [{] is centering rather than falling.>>

Oh, sorry - I remembered that you used a diphthong for your /{/, but I forgot exactly what kind.

I think nobody has answered Delia's question so far,

"Is there a term, or even a known reason for the different American pronunciations of words containing As, such as "fast" and "chance"?

I'm interested too, and I want to know why those words sound different. I'm not saying americans don't use the same vowel, what I'm saying is that there's a difference when you compare "sat" and "matt" to when you compared "sat" and "man". I'm thinking that it has something to do with the fact that "man" is contains a "n" after the "a". I don't really know what it is, but I would love to understand it, so if anybody would be kind enough to help me I'll be more that grateful.

<<I'm interested too, and I want to know why those words sound different. I'm not saying americans don't use the same vowel, what I'm saying is that there's a difference when you compare "sat" and "matt" to when you compared "sat" and "man". I'm thinking that it has something to do with the fact that "man" is contains a "n" after the "a". I don't really know what it is, but I would love to understand it, so if anybody would be kind enough to help me I'll be more that grateful.>>

Delia's question is interesting but it can't be answered because it needs to be a bit more specific. As has been explained before, not all Americans have different vowels in "sat" and "man." I, for one, don't. Here's a recording of how I say them:

http://media.putfile.com/satmatman

And this is what I say on the recording:

""sat, mat, man

'sat' --The girl sat down and read a book.
'mat' --We left the key to the house under the welcome mat.
'man' --A tall man entered the store.""""

But I'm from California and judging by the fact Delia says the two sound different, Delia must not be from at least here. Anyway, yes, it's true that some dialects do have different vowels before an /n/ so it's likely that Delia's is one such example.

>> But I'm from California and judging by the fact Delia says the two sound different, Delia must not be from at least here. Anyway, yes, it's true that some dialects do have different vowels before an /n/ so it's likely that Delia's is one such example. <<

In the California vowel shift, isn't /{/ raised and tensed to [e@] or [I@]? I've heard several Californians and Arizonans that raise and tense that vowel, at least much more than I do.

(before nasal consonants only of course.)