An investigation of postvocalic /r/ in Glaswegian adolescents

Jane Stuart-Smith and Robert Lawson

Department of English Language, University of Glasgow

1. Postvocalic /r/ in Scottish English

Scottish English is typically described as rhotic (e.g.Wells, 1982: 10-11). Postvocalic /r/ is variable:

[] - trills are rare and/or stereotypical (Ladefoged and Maddieson, 1996: 236)

[] - alveolar taps are more often noted (e.g. Johnston 1997)

[] [] – approximants – retroflex and post-alveolar - are also common (e.g. Johnston 1997)

2. Postvocalic /r/ is changing

Changes to postvocalic /r/ have been reported in working-class speakers in Edinburgh (e.g. Romaine 1978) and Glasgow (Johnston 1997; Stuart-Smith 2003):

-vowels produced with secondary articulation (pharyngealization/uvularization/velarization) – or a very weak approximant

- vowels without audible secondary articulation, i.e. similar to vowels in syllables without /r/

4. Research Questions

This is a small-scale study to begin investigating

1. What is the realization of postvocalic /r/ in young working-class Glaswegian speakers?

2. What are the acoustic characteristics of postvocalic /r/ in flux?

5. Methodology

12 male working-class informants

from Glasgow:

1m = 10-11 years

2m = 12-13 years

3m = 14-15 years

4m = 40-60 years

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

CT JSS RL

transcriber

no

. of

toke

ns

Vh

V

V^

r

1M

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

CT JSS RL

transcriber

no

. of

toke

ns

Vh

V

V^

r

2M

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

CT JSS RL

transcriber

no

. o

f to

ken

s

Vh

V

V^

r

3M

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

CT JSS RL

transcriber

no

. of

toke

ns

Vh

V

V^

r

4M

Auditory results summarized in charts above collapse the

transcriptions into broad categories and reveal variability

in response from transcribers (cf. Plug and Ogden 2003).

How do you hear them? (Listen to the samples file.)

3. Acoustic characteristics of /r/

Differing acoustic properties (e.g. Ladefoged and Maddieson 1996):

- lowered F3 – retroflex and post-alveolar approximants

- high F3 – uvular articulations

Postvocalic /r/ in Dutch also shows variable ‘deletion’ and (Plug and Ogden 2003):

- longer vowels

- differing vowel and consonantal quality

10 words were selected from a read wordlist recorded onto DAT:

hat ban fan (cat)

heart barn farm car far card

Speech digitized into CSL at 44,100 Hz:

- auditory analysis (three transcribers)

- (parametric) acoustic analysis using Praat: duration of vocalic portion; vowel quality (midpoint; track: 5 pulses up to and including end of vocalic portion)

References

Johnston, P. (1997) 'Regional Variation', in C. Jones (ed), The Edinburgh History of Scots, 433-513.

Ladefoged, P. and Maddieson, I. (1996), The Sounds of the World’s Languages, Oxford: Blackwell

Plug, L. and Ogden, R. (2003), ‘A parametric approach to the phonetics of postvocalic /r/ in Dutch’, Phonetica, 60, 159-86

Romaine, S. (1978), ‘Postvocalic /r/ in Scottish English: Sound change in progress?’, in P. Trudgill (ed.), Sociolinguistic Patterns in British English, London: Arnold, 144-57.

Stuart-Smith, J. (2003), ‘The phonology of Modern Urban Scots’, in J. Corbett, J. D. McClure, and J. Stuart-Smith, The Edinburgh Companion to Scots, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 110-37

Wells, J. C. (1982), Accents of English, 3 vols, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

6. Auditory analysis

- Older speakers showed most articulated /r/: [] [] [] and even []

- Younger speakers showed:

- rare weakly approximated taps/approximants

- pharyngealized/uvularized vowels

- vowels with no audible colouring

- odd instances of vowels followed by [h] or []

4m1 farm

4m2 car

3m1 far

2m1 card

1m3 car 3m3 far

This research was partly supported by ESRC grant no. R000239757. We are very grateful to Claire Timmins and Jim Scobbie for their help in preparing this poster.

7. Acoustic analysis - duration

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

hat cat ban fan heart card barn farm far car

ms

1m1

1m2

1m3

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

hat cat ban fan heart card barn farm far car

ms

2m1

2m3

2m4

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

hat cat ban fan heart card barn farm far car

ms

3m1

3m2

3m3Overall, the vocalic portion of words with /r/ is longer than those without /r/ (p = .0039).

This is regardless of whether an apical /r/ is heard (red dots) or not.

There is also some variation.

8. Acoustic analysis – vowel quality (midpoint)

500

600

700

800

900

1000

1100

10001200140016001800F2 (Hz)

F1

(Hz)

a - 1m2 ar - 1m2 a - 1m3 ar - 1m3

500

550

600

650

700

750

800

850

900

10001100120013001400150016001700F2 (Hz)

F1

(Hz)

a - 2m1 ar - 2m1 a - 2m3 ar - 2m3 a - 2m4 ar - 2m4

500

550

600

650

700

750

800

850

10001100120013001400150016001700

F2 (Hz)

F1

(H

z)

a - 3m1 ar - 3m1 a - 3m2 ar - 3m2 a - 3m3 ar - 3m3

Midpoint formant values show that words with /r/ are generally more retracted than for words without /r/.

Words heard with /r/ (red dots), tend to be even more retracted.

F3 values were not always easy to measure, because F3 was often difficult to identify, especially in younger speakers. Measures tend to show high, rather than lower, F3 values, suggesting possible uvular articulation for some tokens. (See samples file and formant tracks.)

9. Acoustic analysis – vowel quality (formant track)

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

4000

4500

5000

endend-1end-2end-3end-4end-5

heart F1

heart F2

heart F3

card F1

card F2

card F3

barn F1

barn F2

barn F3

farm F1

farm F2

farm F3

far F1

far F2

far F3

car F1

car F2

car F33m1

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

4000

4500

5000

endend-1end-2end-3end-4end-5

ban F1

ban F2

ban F3

fan F1

fan F2

fan F3

cat F1

cat F2

cat F3

hat f1

hat f2

hat f3

3m3

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

4000

4500

5000

endend-1end-2end-3end-4end-5

heart F1

heart F2

heart F3

card F1

card F2

card F3

barn F1

barn F2

barn F3

farm F1

farm F2

farm F3

far F1

far F2

far F3

car F1

car F2

car F33m3

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

4000

4500

5000

endend-1end-2end-3end-4end-5

cat F1

cat F2

cat F3

hat F1

hat F2

hat F3

3m1

Sample tracks from 3m1, heard as rhotic shows slight dip in (high) F3 in most words with /r/.

Sample tracks from 3m3, whose /r/ is heard as pharyngealized, shows high, flat F3.

10. Summary

• auditory analysis confirms a range of possible realizations for postvocalic /r/ in Glaswegian adolescents, with (‘coloured’) vowels as the most common outcome (as Johnston 1997: 511)

• acoustic analysis shows that syllables with /r/ (though without audible apical articulation) tend to be longer, and show lower F2 and high(er) F3

postvocalic /r/ is certainly changing, but as in Dutch, the outcome is usually still distinct from words without /r/. More work is needed to ascertain the articulatory nature of these changes.