Re: US Northern Cities Vowel Shift

Hej ...

BP Jonsson skrev:

> Can someone on this list please provide a concise description
> of the so-called US Northern Cities Vowel Shift?
I've never heard of this, but I'm quite curious because I live in a northern
US city (Boston)!

Bostonians are famous for dropping "r"s after vowels ("pahkin yoa cah" for
"parking your car") and adding "r"s where they shouldn't be (having "idears"
instead of "ideas"), but I don't know about any vowel shifts, except that
before an "r" (which usually drops) many people raise /a/ to /æ/, so you "pæk
yuh cæ" instead of "parking your car". But AFAIK this is peculiar to Boston
and environs -- I've never heard it from a New Yorker, for example, or from
someone from any other New England state besides Massachusetts.

Thomas Leigh