Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-hvd4g Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-25T01:36:25.579Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

(r) we there yet? The change to rhoticity in New York City English

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 June 2014

Kara Becker
Kara Becker*
Affiliation:
Reed College
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Labov (1966, 1972b) described the variable production of coda /r/ in New York City English (NYCE) as a change in progress from above in the direction of rhoticity. Since then, scholars have commented on the slow rate of change toward rhoticity in NYCE and characterized (r) as a superposed feature restricted to formal speech (Fowler, 1987; Labov, 1994; Labov, Ash, & Boberg, 2006). This study's ethnically diverse sample of speakers from the Lower East Side of Manhattan (n = 65) shows a mean rate of /r/ production of 68%, with young people, women, and middle-class speakers leading in the production of /r/ in apparent time. Speakers from five ethnic backgrounds—African American, Chinese, Jewish, Puerto Rican, and white—show coherence for the internal constraints on variable nonrhoticity. However, only Chinese, Jewish, and white speakers participate in the change toward rhoticity. These findings highlight the role of ethnicity in patterns of variation and change and demonstrate that the change toward rhoticity in NYCE has accelerated and is no longer restricted to formal speech.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , July 2014 , pp. 141 - 168
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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

Babbitt, E. H. (1896). The English of the lower classes in New York City and vicinity. Dialect Notes 1:457–464.Google Scholar
Baranowski, Maciej. (2007). Phonological variation and change in the dialect of Charleston, South Carolina. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Baugh, John. (1999). Out of the mouths of slaves: African American language and educational malpractice. 1st ed.Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Becker, Kara. (2009). /r/ and the construction of place identity on New York City's Lower East Side. Journal of Sociolinguistics 13(5):634–658.Google Scholar
Becker, Kara. (2010). Regional dialect features on the Lower East Side of New York City: sociophonetics, ethnicity, and identity. PhD dissertation, New York University.Google Scholar
Becker, Kara. (in press). The social motivations of reversal: Raised BOUGHT in New York City English. Language in Society 43(4).Google Scholar
Blake, Renee, & Shousterman, Cara. (2010). Second generation West Indian Americans and English in New York City. English Today 103(26):35–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bronstein, Arthur J. (1962). Let's take another look at New York City Speech. American Speech 37(1):13–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feagin, Crawford. (1990). The dynamics of a sound change in Southern States English: From R-less to R-ful in three generations. In Edmondson, J. A., Feagin, C., & Muhlhausler, P. (eds.), Development and diversity: language variation across time and space. Arlington: The Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington. 129–146.Google Scholar
Fought, Carmen. (1999). A majority sound change in a minority community: /u/-fronting in Chicano English. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3(1):5–23.Google Scholar
Fought, Carmen. (2006). Language and ethnicity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fowler, Joy. (1987). The social stratification of (r) in New York City department stores, 24 years after Labov. MA thesis, NYU Linguistics.Google Scholar
Frank, Yakira. (1948). The speech of New York City. PhD dissertation, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.Google Scholar
Hall-Lew, Lauren, & Yaeger-Dror, Malcah. (2014). New perspectives on linguistic variation and ethnic identity in North America. Language and Communication 35(1):1–8.Google Scholar
Hinton, Linette N., & Pollock, Karen E. (2000). Regional variations in the phonological characteristics of African American Vernacular English. World Englishes 19(1):59–71.Google Scholar
Hoffman, Michol F., & Walker, James A. (2010). Ethnolects and the city: Ethnic orientation and linguistic variation in Toronto English. Language Variation and Change 22:37–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hubbell, Allan F. (1950). The pronunciation of English in New York City: Consonants and vowels. New York: Colubmia University King's Crown Press.Google Scholar
Johnson, Daniel Ezra. (2012). Rbrul (Version 2.05). Retrieved from http://www.danielezrajohnson.com/rbrul.html. Accessed February 10, 2014.Google Scholar
Kurath, Hans. (1949). A word geography of the Eastern United States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Kurath, Hans, & McDavid, Raven I. Jr. (1961). The pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1966). The social stratification of English in New York City. 2nd ed.Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1968). A study of the non-standard English of Negro and Puerto Rican speakers in New York City. New York: Columbia University.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1972a). Language in the inner city; studies in the Black English vernacular. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1972b). Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1994). Principles of linguistic change: Internal factors. Vol. 1. Malden: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (2001). Principles of linguistic change: Social factors. Vol. 2. Malden: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (2006). The social stratification of English in New York City. 2nd ed.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Labov, William. (2007). Transmission and diffusion. Language 83(2):344–387.Google Scholar
Labov, William, Ash, Sharon, & Boberg, Charles. (2006). The atlas of North American English: Phonetics, phonology, and sound change. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Labov, William, Rosenfelder, Ingrid, & Fruehwald, Joseph. (2013). One hundred years of sound change in Philadelphia: Linear incrementation, reversal, and reanalysis. Language 89(1):30–65.Google Scholar
Mather, Patrick-Andre. (2012). The social stratification of /r/ in New York City: Labov's Department Store study revisited. Journal of English Linguistics 40(4):338–356.Google Scholar
McDavid, Raven I. Jr. (1948). Postvocalic /r/ in South Carolina: A social analysis. American Speech 23:192–203.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mele, Chrisopher. (2000). Selling the Lower East Side: Culture, real estate, and resistance in New York City. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Miller, Corey A. (1998). R-lessness in Philadelphia. In Verma, M. K. (ed.), Sociolinguistics, language and society. New Delhi: Sage Publications. 79–98.Google Scholar
Myhill, John. (1988). Postvocalic /r/ as an index of integration into the BEV speech community. American Speech 63:203–213.Google Scholar
Nagy, Naomi, & Irwin, Patricia. (2010). Boston (r): neighbo(r)s nea(r) and fa(r). Language Variation and Change 22:241–278.Google Scholar
Niedzielski, Nancy A., & Preston, Dennis R. (2003). Folk linguistics. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana, & Tagliamonte, Sali. (2001). African American English in the diaspora. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Preston, Dennis R. (1996). Where the worst English is spoken. In Schneider, E. W. (ed.), Focus on the USA. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 297–360.Google Scholar
Rickford, John R. (1999). African American vernacular English: Features, evolution, educational implications. Malden: Blackwell Publishers.Google Scholar
Rickford, John R.. (2006). Down for the count? The Creole Origins Hypothesis of AAVE at the hands of the Ottowa Circle, and their supporters. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 21(1):97–155.Google Scholar
Schonweitz, Thomas. (2001). Gender and postvocalic /r/ in the American South: A detailed socioregional analysis. American Speech 76(3):259–285.Google Scholar
Sen, Ann L. (1979). English in the Big Apple: Historical backgrounds of New York City speech. The English Journal 68(8):52–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shousterman, Cara, Blake, Renee, & Kelley, Lindsay. (2009). Rethinking AAE research: The use of postvocalic /r/ by two groups of black New Yorkers. Paper presented at New Ways of Analyzing Variation 38, University of Ottawa.Google Scholar
Thomas, Erik R. (2007). Phonological and phonetic characteristics of African American Vernacular English. Language and Linguistics Compass 1(5):450–475.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinreich, Uriel, Labov, William, & Herzog, Marvin L. (1968). Empirical foundations for a theory of language change. In Lehmann, W. & Malkiel, Y. (eds.), Directions for historical linguistics. Austin: University of Texas Press. 97–195.Google Scholar
Wolfram, Walt. (1969). A sociolinguistic description of Detroit Negro speech. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
Wolfram, Walt. (1974). Sociolinguistic aspects of assimilation: Puerto Rican English in New York City. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
Wolfram, Walt. (2007). Sociolinguistic folklore in the study of African American English. Language and Linguistic Compass 1:1–22.Google Scholar
Wong, Amy Wing-mei, & Hall-Lew, Lauren. (2014). Regional variability and ethnic identity: Chinese Americans in San Francisco and New York City. Language and Communication 35:27–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yaeger-Dror, Malcah, Kendall, Tyler, Foulkes, Paul, Watt, Dominic, & Johnson, Daniel Ezra. (2009). Perception of ‘r’ by trained listeners. Paper presented at the Linguistic Society of America Annual Meeting, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Yaeger-Dror, Malcah, & Thomas, Erik R. (eds.). (2010). African American English Speakers and their participation in local sound changes: A comparative study. Vol. 94. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Zentella, Ana Celia. (1997). Spanish in New York. In Fishman, J. A. & Garcia, O. (eds.), The multilingual apple: Languages in New York City. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 167–201.Google Scholar