Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T09:26:49.609Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Out of the AIR and into the EAR: Another view of the New Zealand diphthong merger

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Margaret A. Maclagan  and
Elizabeth Gordon
Margaret A. Maclagan
Affiliation:
University of Canterbury
Elizabeth Gordon
Affiliation:
University of Canterbury
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this article, we report on the results of a study of the diphthongs EAR and AIR, which are merging for many New Zealand speakers. Each stage of the study, which has been repeated at five-year intervals since 1983, involves the analysis of word lists and sentences read by over 100 14- and 15-year-old school pupils. The results show a clear trend toward a merger to the EAR diphthong. This is also confirmed in a study carried out in 1994 of 79 speakers (selected according to age, sex, and socioeconomic class) reading six word pairs. The results from both of these studies differ from those reported by Holmes and Bell (1992). We suggest the reasons for the different results could be methodological, and that the mechanism of the merger is merger by approximation after the AIR diphthong became involved in the New Zealand front vowel chain-shift raising.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , March 1996 , pp. 125 - 147
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alpers, O. T. J. (ed.). (1923). College rhymes. Auckland: Whitcombe & Tombes.Google Scholar
Bauer, Laurie. (1986). Notes on New Zealand phonetics and phonology. English World-Wide 7:225–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bauer, Laurie. (1992). The second great vowel shift revisited. English World-Wide 13:253–268.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayard, Donn. (1995). Kiwitalk. Palmerston North: Dunmore.Google Scholar
Durkin, Mary. (1972). A study of the pronunciation and oral grammar and vocabulary of West Coast School Children. M.A. thesis. University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand.Google Scholar
Elley, Warwick, & Irving, J. C. (1976). Revised Socio-Economic Index for New Zealand. New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies. 11:25–36.Google Scholar
Elley, Warwick, & Irving, J. C. (1985). The Elley-Irving Socio-Economic Index: 1981 census revision. New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies 20:115–128.Google Scholar
Gordon, Elizabeth, & Deverson, Tony. (1985). New Zealand English: An introduction to New Zealand speech and usage. Auckland: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Gordon, Elizabeth, & Maclagan, Margaret. (1985). A study of the /i∂/~/e∂ contrast in New Zealand English. The New Zealand Speech-Language Therapists' Journal 38:16–29.Google Scholar
Gordon, Elizabeth, & Maclagan, Margaret (1989). Beer and bear, cheer and chair: A longitudinal study of the EAR/AIR contrast in New Zealand English. Australian Journal of Linguistics 9:203–220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gordon, Elizabeth, & Maclagan, Margaret (1990). A longitudinal study of the EAR/AIR contrast in New Zealand speech. In Bell, Allan & Holmes, Janet (eds.), New Zealand ways of speaking English. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. 129–148.Google Scholar
Holmes, Janet, & Bell, Allan. (1992). On shear markets and sharing sheep: The merger of EAR and AIR diphthongs in New Zealand English. Language Variation and Change 4:251–273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Labov, William. (1972). Some principles of linguistic methodology. Language in Society 1:97–120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Labov, William. (1994). Principles of linguistic change. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Lauder, Hugh, & Hughes, David. (1990). Social inequalities and differences in school outcome. New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies 25:37–60.Google Scholar
Lindblom, Björn. (1963). Spectrographic study of vowel reduction. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 35:1773–1781.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maclagan, David. (1994). A statistical analysis of some aspects of New Zealand English. Unpublished Bursary research project. Burnside High School, Christchurch, New Zealand.Google Scholar
Maclagan, Margaret. (1982). An acoustic study of New Zealand vowels. The New Zealand Speech Therapists' Journal. 37:20–26.Google Scholar