Canadian raising - writer and rider

When I was watching the sitcom "Reba", I noticed something peculiar (to me at least). The show takes place in Texas and they have heavily Southern accents. They apparenty pronounce "writer" and "rider" as homophones down there. Reba said that "he was a writer" and then he said he was a "motorcycle rider" and she said "Yeah, he writes books about motorcycles" (they were trying to fool somebody).

Anyway, to my point: I distinguish between these two words, with rider being longer. Even the words write/right and ride are different. I also distinguish the vowels between knife and knives and price and prize.

Is this a feature of Canadian raising? Because I think that my dialect has partial Canadian raising, but most definitely not completely.

To add:

The way Reba said both words sounds like the way I say "rider".

<<Is this a feature of Canadian raising?>>

Yes. I have pretty consistent Canadian Raising and I would say:

write ["r\6It]
ride ["r\aId]
writer ["r\6I4@`]
rider ["r\aI4@`]

<<In Canada and I think most of the Northern US, raising applies to both the PRICE and MOUTH sets, but other parts of the US often have raising only in PRICE.>>

Yes, here in Massachusetts it's quite common to have it for both sets. I have:

lout ["lEUt]
loud ["laUd]

<<In the South there's another way of having a writer-rider distinction: some speakers have a diphthong for PRICE only before voiceless consonants, so 'writer' [ɹaɪɾɚ] vs. 'rider' [ɹaːɾɚ].>>

Yes, that's true. Has anybody seen Paula Deen on the Food Network? She has the most awesome Georgia accent, and she very clearly pronounces /aɪ/ as [aɪ] before voiceless consonants, but [a:] eslewhere.

After reading about Canadian raising, I realized that I exhibit another feature where rider does not rhyme with spider. Does this happen with all or most people who have Canadian raising?

Does General American make the distinction between rider and writer? What parts of the United States don't do it?

<<Yes, that's true. Has anybody seen Paula Deen on the Food Network? She has the most awesome Georgia accent, and she very clearly pronounces /aɪ/ as [aɪ] before voiceless consonants, but [a:] eslewhere.>>

I love listening to Paula Deen talk. Her accent is awesome. I will have to pay attention to that the next time I see her on TV.

<<After reading about Canadian raising, I realized that I exhibit another feature where rider does not rhyme with spider. Does this happen with all or most people who have Canadian raising?>>

It doesn't happen here in New England - I use [aI] for both "rider" and "spider" - but I think it is common in some other parts of the country. Travis has this if I'm not mistaken.

<<Does General American make the distinction between rider and writer?>>

Well, I think traditional or textbook GA wouldn't have Canadian Raising, but I think it's become so common that perhaps it could be considered optional in GA.

>>After reading about Canadian raising, I realized that I exhibit another feature where rider does not rhyme with spider. Does this happen with all or most people who have Canadian raising?<<

This is a different case of Canadian Raising than the classical case outlined above. What this is tied to is historical /aɪ̯/ or /aʊ̯/ being followed by /r/ (generally preceded by /ə/ or an unstressed vowel) in the *next* syllable within the same morpheme, resulting in raising.

However, such does not seem consistent in all dialects, and indeed in the dialect here such results in Canadian Raising being phonemic, as there are certain words in the dialect here which should have such raising but don't, such as "fiber", "visor", and "miser" being [ˈfaːe̯bʁ̩ː], [ˈvaːe̯zʁ̩ː], and [ˈmaːe̯zʁ̩ː] rather than the expected [ˈfəːe̯bʁ̩ː], [ˈvəːe̯zʁ̩ː], and [ˈməːe̯zʁ̩ː]. Also, there is other variation which seems to indicate disagreement about morpheme boundaries; for instance, many here as [ˈpʰɰəːe̯ʁ̩] for "plier", implying that it is analyzed as being monomorphemic, but I have [ˈpʰɰaːe̯ʁ̩], implying that I analyze it as being multimorphemic.

>>D.oes General American make the distinction between rider and writer? What parts of the United States don't do it?<<

This is not clear, actually. Canadian Raising does not exist in GA, but allophonic vowel length *does*, and allophonic vowel length is sufficient to distinguish "writer" and "rider", as GA [ˈɹaɪ̯ɾɚː] and [ˈɹaːɪ̯ɾɚː]. However, many GA-like dialects seem to have *late* allophonic vowel length, where vowel length reflects near-surface forms rather than underlying forms, resulting in the two being homophones as [ˈɹaːɪ̯ɾɚː]. However, whether GA has early (reflecting underlying forms) or late (reflecting surface forms) allophonic vowel length seems undefined.

>><<Does General American make the distinction between rider and writer?>>

Well, I think traditional or textbook GA wouldn't have Canadian Raising, but I think it's become so common that perhaps it could be considered optional in GA.<<

I would agree. While classically GA is considered to lack Canadian Raising, Canadian Raising and *especially* Canadian Raising of historical /aɪ̯/ has spread so far south and is so accepted that it is effectively de facto standard throughout much of the northern US, just like the cot-caught merger is throughout the western US.

>><<In Canada and I think most of the Northern US, raising applies to both the PRICE and MOUTH sets, but other parts of the US often have raising only in PRICE.>>

Yes, here in Massachusetts it's quite common to have it for both sets. I have:

lout ["lEUt]
loud ["laUd]<<

Here in southeastern Wisconsin there are two sets, but the raising of historical /aɪ̯/ is far stronger than that of historical /aʊ̯/, which does occur but is generally quite weak and often one has to listen carefully to notice it.

For instance, I have the very markedly different vowel qualities in:

writer [ˈʁəe̯ɾ̥ʁ̩ː]
rider [ˈʁaːe̯ɾʁ̩ː]

but very similar vowel qualities in:

lout [ˈɰɐo̯ʔ]
loud [ˈɰa̠ːo̯d̥]

In the second pair, the difference in vowel length is far more noticable than that in vowel quality, whereas in the first pair, the difference in vowel quality is just as marked as that in vowel length (and note that allophonic vowel length is very strong here, much moreso than in GA).