"The fundamental reason why accents differ is that languages change.
English pronunciation changes as time passes; and the developments which have arisen and become established in different places and among different social groups have not been identical. Present-day pronunciation patterns reflect the changes which have taken place, modifying earlier pronunciation patterns."
(Wells 1982: 93–94) During the history of the English language, major sound changes emerged in certain parts of England, leaving certain other parts unaffected. Eventually, the imperfect spread of sound changes resulted in differences between regional varieties.
The sound changes relevant to the discussion of the accents of England are the following:
The FOOT-STRUT Split (17th c.)
A split is a sound change whereby a sound starts turning into another one but some of its occurrences remain unaffected (either systematically or randomly) by the change, and as a result the original sound "splits" into two:
2.1 ENGLANDAND WALES: HISTORICALBACKGROUND
the old sound and the new reflex. If enough time passes after the introduction of the change, the original sound may undergo further changes and take a different course of development.
This is what happened to Middle English (=ME) [u], which split into present-day Standard English [] as in words like put (developing from the original vowel) and present-day RP [] as in words like strut (the "new"
sound – the quality of this vowel may slightly differ in other accents).
Phonologists have proposed that [] is retained mostly after labial consonants (which is not surprising, as [] itself is also a labial (rounded) sound), cf. put, full, butch(er), bull, etc., although there are cases of the vowel having been "unprotected" from the change by the labial (e.g., but, fun, pun). That limited set of examples which preserve the original rounded vowel are called FOOT-words, following the terminology of Wells (1982).
The FOOT-STRUT Split hasn't taken place in the broad accents of the north of England (i.e., north of the Severn–Wash line), and only partly so in Ireland, therefore in these systems [] is retained in all the examples mentioned above, and the phoneme [] is missing altogether. As a consequence, words like put and putt, could and cud, look and luck, stood and stud, etc. are often homophones.
Early dropping (beginning of the 18th c.) (as opposed to Later Yod-dropping in North America – see Chapter 4)
As the different spellings suggest, words like threw formerly contained a vowel different from the vowel in words like through. When there is one of
<u, eu, ew, ui, ue> in spelling, it indicates an original diphthong, something like [] or [j], the yod of which was dropped in most accents of English after palatals (e.g., chute, chew, juice, yew), after [r] (as in rude, crew, shrew, grew), and after consonant+[l] sequences (e.g., blue, flew, glue).
Certain conservative Welsh and north-of-England accents, however, retain the distinction, as Welsh threw [] vs. through [] illustrate.
R-dropping (18th c.)
The deletion of non-prevocalic [r] is responsible for one of the major divisions of the accents of English into rhotic* and non-rhotic* ones. Those accents of English whose speakers pronounce all orthographic* <r>'s are referred to as rhotic* accents (after the name of the corresponding letter in the Greek alphabet, rho). The other accents are non-rhotic*, that is, their
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speakers drop the <r> when it is followed by a consonant or a pause (i.e., nothing in speech), and they only pronounce it when it is followed by a vowel. As a consequence, word-final <r>'s are heard when they are followed by a vowel-initial morpheme like -ing, -er/-or, -ee, -y, etc. or a vowel-initial word (those []'s are called Linking-R), but they disappear when they are final or when they are followed by a consonant-initial morpheme like -(e)d (the <e> is mostly silent), -ment, -ly, etc., as in retirement and rarely, or by a consonant-initial word. Hence the difference between tire/tired vs tiring, bore vs boring, err vs error, refer vs referee, and fur vs furry. Similarly, Linking-R is pronounced in phrases like more exciting, your eyes, (to) err is (human), care about, centre of, tire us, etc., and between the sentences in, e.g., He doesn't care. I do or There's a spider. I'm scared.
The map above shows the approximate boundaries of rhoticity in England, with the rhotic* accents indicated by the shaded areas.
R-insertion (18th c.)
There are some cases when rhotic* speakers do not pronounce an [], and there is no <r> in spelling, however, many non-rhotic* speakers pronounce one, e.g., in sawing [], gnawing [], rumbaing [], baahing [] (of sheep). This is called Intrusive-R. Intrusive-R is only found in non-rhotic* accents, and it only appears at (certain) morpheme boundaries, after non-high vowels like [ ]. Similarly to Linking-R, under the same conditions as between a word and a suffix, Intrusive-R also appears between two words, as in visa application, (the) idea is, (the) Shah of (Persia), schwa insertion, law and (order), Gloria Estefan, etc., and between the two sentences in Try that sofa. It's softer or Call Maria. I need
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her. It is an interesting fact that Linking-R and Intrusive-R have a number of features in common, they are phonetically identical, and both of them characterize the non-rhotic* accents of English only – linking and intrusion go hand in hand with R-dropping.
The TRAP-BATH Split (also referred to as BATH-broadening) (18th c.) This is another split, whereby an original [ ~ ]-like vowel (that is, a low front vowel similar to Hungarian á or Present-day English []) split into (original) "flat" [], as in words like trap, and "broad" [] as in words like bath. Other examples of BATH-words include after, ask, can't, chance, class, dance, glass, grass, last, master, pass, path, staff. The TRAP-BATH Split hasn't taken place in the broad accents of the north of England (i.e., north of the Severn–Wash line), therefore in these systems [] (or []) is retained in all the examples mentioned above, and the phoneme [] may only appear in pre-r environments (e.g., car, part) and other, restricted examples like father.
H-dropping (completed by the beginning of the 19th c.)
In the working-class accents of most of England, the phoneme [h] is absent, therefore words like house, hit,
hammer, happy start with a vowel;
and words originally only differing in the presence vs absence of a [h]
become homophonous, e.g., hedge–edge, art–heart, arm–harm.
(A word of warning is in order here: the words hour, heir, honest, honour do not start with an [h]
even in RP/GA; while words like historic or hotel vacillate between the aitch-ful and aitch-less pronun-ciations even in RP/GA.)
The map illustrates how widespread it is to "drop one's aitches" (the shaded areas) in present-day non-standard English
(although this pronunciation feature still has very low prestige).
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Diphthong Shift (completed by the beginning of the 19th c.)
In Cockney and the local accents of much of the south of England, a chain of phonetic changes affects [] and the diphthongs:
bee bay buy boy
RP [] [] [] []
Cockney [] [] [] or [] []
you no now
RP [] [] []
Cockney [] [] [] or []
That is, the long high monophthongs become diphthongs starting with schwa, whereas the diphthongs change their first terms (e.g., the front vowel at the start of [] (similar to Hungarian á) is back [ ~ ] (more like Hungarian a), or the [] of [] is more close ([] is Hungarian o)). In broad Cockney, the vowel of now is usually a long monophthong [].
L-vocalization (completed by the beginning of the 19th c.)
In RP, word-final and pre-consonantal l is pronounced with a velar gesture – this is called dark-L [] (as opposed to the other, Hungarian-type clear-L), and it sounds as if an [o]-like vowel was inserted before it, e.g., milk [], shelf [], feel []. In several non-standard varieties of English, the []'s may even disappear, e.g., milk [], shelf [], feel []. This is called L-vocalization, as the consonant l is replaced by a vowel.
Glottal replacement (or Glottalling) (completed by the beginning of the 19th c.)
This is the replacement of a [t] by a glottal stop []. In Standard English (RP or GA, but mostly in GA) it can only happen within words when the [t] is followed by a syllabic nasal, e.g., [] as in button []. In several non-standard varieties of English, especially London* English, this can even happen intervocalically, e.g., butter [] (or []) or city [], and
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words like little can be re-spelt to reflect this pronunciation (accompanied by L-vocalization) as li'oo.