Page 215 - DENG504_LINGUISTICS

Unit 16: Varieties of English Cardinal Vowel System

[kæt], rapid [ræpwd]), but not in word-final position. It is usually spelt a: act, fat, and only Notes
exceptionally ai: plait [plæt], plaid [plæd].
b. English back vowels. There are five back vowel phonemes in standard English: [Y:], []], []:], [ υ ]
and [u:]
1. [Y:] in RP does not coincide with cardinal vowel 5 [a] It is a more advanced, low, long,
tense, unrounded vowel. It is distributed in all three basic positions: are, cart, far. It is
normally spelt by the letter a followed by a silent r in syllable or word-final position: jar,
carpet. It is often followed by a silent l in words like palm, calm, balm. Sometimes f or ff can
follow: after, staff; or ss: pass, class, or s or n followed by another consonant: past, demand;
or th in word-final position: path, bath or, exceptionally, other letters: aunt[Y:nt], Berkeley
[bYY YY Y:klw], hearth [hY: θ ], father[fY: ð ], sergeant [sa : d¥c nt ] , memoir [memwa:], barrage
e
[bærY: ¥ ].
2 []:] is a genuine back vowel in RP. It is short, lax, open and slightly rounded. It is only
distributed in initial and medial position: on, pot, and never in final position. In some
accents of English the vowel is pronounced pretty close to the cardinal vowel 5 [a]. In
some varieties of American English it is still open and a little bit fronted, coming very
close to [:]Y so that it is often difficult to distinguish pot from part, for instance. The vowel
is usually spelt o. Other spellings are possible; ou, a and au in rare cases like cough, want,
or laurel.
3. []:] is closer and longer than []]. It is a long, tense vowel, more rounded than []], the
degree of aperture being between open and half-open. The vowel is distributed in all
three basic positions: awful, caught, flaw. It is usually spelt either aw or au: awl, drawn,
thaw, august, taught. The sequence or is also read []:] if it occurs in final position or is
followed by either a consonant or a silent e: for, sore, port. The sound is exceptionally spelt
oo in floor, door, oa in board, broad, coarse and hoard, ough in (n)ought, sought, wrought, and
a in water or wrath and ou in course, source.
4. [ υ ] is a short, lax, rounded vowel which is considerably closer than []:] its degree of aperture
being a little bit higher than the cardinal half-close. The vowel never occurs in initial
position and only exceptionally in final position, in the weak, unstressed form of the
preposition to, the verb do or the pronoun who. We can then say that its distribution is
restricted to medial position. The usual spelling for [ υ ] is the letter u in words like push,
cushion, pull, put. The letter o can also represent the sound after w: wolf, Worcester. In quite
a few words double oo is the spelling for the sound, followed by k: look, book; by t: foot,
soot, by d: wood, stood; by the lateral w: wool, or a nasal: room, broom, groom; ou appears as
the spelling of the sound in verbal forms like would, could, should.
5. [u:] is the highest back vowel of English. It is a long, tense, rounded vowel. It occurs in all
three basic positions, though pretty infrequently in initial position: oom, oomph, ooze, ugh,
uhlan; rude, baboon, crew, chew, tatoo. Romanian speakers of English should remember that
the vowel is closer and tenser than the preceding sound for which it must not be mistaken.
The sound is usually spelt u or oo: rule, root, taboo. O can be the spelling of [u:] in final
position in the stressed forms of to, who, etc, and in the noun ado. In words like route,
through, routine, soup, douche, the sound is spelt ou. In shoe, canoe, manoeuvre it is rendered
by oe. The sound is often preceded by the palatal [j] which is optionally inserted in words
like suit [su:t/sju:t] or fruit [fru:t/frju:t], and obligatorily in beauty and its derivatives, in
feud, music, mutiny, deluge, etc.
We can easily notice that all English front vowels’are unrounded, while the back ones, with the
exception of [a:] which is not, strictly speaking, a back vowel, since its pronunciation in standard
English is a little more advanced than that of cardinal vowel 5 [a] -display different degrees of
roundness. This means that only the primary cardinal vowel chart is relevant for English, as
there are no front rounded vowels or back unrounded vowels in this language (at least in RP)

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