Tense-lax neutralization

Tense-lax neutralization is the collective name for a set of conditioned phonemic mergers found in many North American English accents, according to which the historical "long" or "tense" vowel classes merge with the nearest "short" or "lax" vowel before intervocalic /r/.[1] (Wells 1982: 479–85) These mergers are generally not found in New York-New Jersey English or in Eastern New England (including the Boston accent), or in conservative Southern accents.

Contents
1 Mary-marry-merry
2 Mirror-nearer
3 Hurry-furry
4 "Florida oranges"
5 Phonological ramifications
6 References

Mary-marry-merry

Two of the best-known tense-lax neutralizations are known collectively as the Mary-marry-merry merger[2], which consists of the mergers before intervocalic /r/ of /æ/ and /ɛ/ with historical /eɪ/. This merger is quite widespread in the West, the Inland North, the Midland, and in Canada. A merger of Mary and merry, while keeping marry distinct, is found in the South and as far north as Baltimore, Maryland, and Wilmington, Delaware. In the Philadelphia accent the three-way contrast is preserved, but merry tends to be merged with Murray; likewise ferry can be a homophone of furry.

Mirror-nearer

Another widespread tense-lax neutralization is the merger of /ɪ/ with /iː/ before intervocalic /r/. For speakers with this merger, mirror and nearer rhyme, and the phrase spear it is homophonous with spirit. This merger seems to be nearly universal in North America, with the major exception again being the northeastern United States, and perhaps conservative Southern accents.

Hurry-furry

The merger of /ʌ/ before intervocalic /r/ with /ɝ/ is also widespread apart from the Northeast and the South. Speakers with this merger pronounce hurry to rhyme with furry. This is called the "Second nurse merger" by Wells (1982).

"Florida oranges"

Words that have /ɒ/ before intervocalic /r/ in RP are also subject to tense-lax neutralization in North American accents in which neutralization occurs, though the fact of neutralization has been obscured in some cases by further sound changes. Words of this class include, among others:

In Canadian English, all of these are subject to tense-lax neutralization; they are all pronounced with [-ɔr-], as in cord, replacing the original lax vowel. In the regions of the United States where tense-lax neutralization occurred, however, a further sound change affected the last four words on this list; they are typically pronounced with [-ɑr-], agreeing with the pronunciation in regions such as New York and Philadelphia where the neutralization never occurred.

The picture is confused farther by the fact that, in almost all North American dialects, the original short o has undergone a general merger with some other, tense, vowel (see caught-cot merger and father-bother merger). This means that, even in dialects such as Canadian English where tense-lax neutralization affected all of the words in the relevant class, there remain words like starry and sari, which synchronically have "short o" before [r] and thus appear to violate the merger. However, at the time at which tense-lax neutralization occurred, these words had a distinct vowel from short o, and thus were not subject to it. Furthermore, the fact of the caught-cot and father-bother mergers means that short o no longer strictly belongs in the category of lax vowels in these dialects, further obscuring the role of tense-lax neutralization in the history of these words.

Even in dialects without tense-lax neutralization (Boston, New York, Philadelphia), some of the words in the original short-o class often show influence from other American dialects and end up with [-ɔr-] anyway. For instance, there may be some speaker from the Northeast who pronounces, for example, Florida, orange, and horrible with [-ɑr-], but foreign and origin with [-ɔr-]. Exactly which words are affected by this differs from dialect to dialect and occasionally from speaker to speaker.

Phonological ramifications

Frequently, though not always, the result of tense-lax neutralization is a vowel that is identical to the corresponding r-colored vowel in syllable-final position. Thus, in merged accents, marry and merry generally have the same vowel as mare, mirror the same vowel as mere, and hurry the same vowel as her.

Not all dialects that have tense-lax neutralization in one vowel class have it in all classes. The aforementioned Philadelphia accent, for example, has tense-lax neutralization for "short e" and "short u" (both neutralized with syllabic r), but maintains "short a" as in carry as a distinct unmerged class before r. Among United States accents, the Boston and New York accents have the least degree of tense-lax neutralization. Some have observed that rhotic North American accents are more likely to have tense-lax neutralization than non-rhotic accents, but this cannot be said of rhotic British accents like Scottish English, which is firmly rhotic and yet many varieties have all the same vowel contrasts before /r/ as before any other consonant.

References

See also: Tense-lax neutralization, 1982, 1993, Baltimore, Maryland, Boston accent, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press