16. British and American accent types: comparison and contrast

The main defining feature of British-oriented accents is the absence of post-vocalic [r], which makes them all non-rhotic compared to North-America-oriented accents, which are predominantly rhotic.

Vowels

- BBC English General American [r] is vocalized,

e.g. here [hıə], pure [pjuə]

- Vowels before [r] are «r-coloured» (retroflexed),

e.g. here [hır], pure [pjur]

- The short vowel [ɔ] is replaced by the vowel [ɑ:]

e.g. dog [dɔg], stop [stɔp] e.g. dog [dɑ:g], stop [stɑ:p]

e.g. long [lɔη], sorry [sɔrı]

- The short vowel [ɔ] can also be replaced by the long [o:],

e.g. long [lo:η], sorry [so:rı]

- [ɑ:] and [o:] are differentiated

- [a:] and [o:] are not differentiated. This feature is called cot/caught merger and is most spread in the West (70 % of the lexicon) Historically long and short vowels are differentiated (the length ratio is 1.5:1) No distinction between (the length ratio is 1.2:1)

- [ж] is open

The GA [ж] vowel is closer than the RP [ж],

e.g. Merry Mary married [merı merı merıd]

- In many words in which RP has [ɑ:], in GA there is [ж],

e.g. dance [dжns], ask [жsk], pass [pжs].

Consonants

Word stress

1. The differences in stress are lexically determined, and, therefore, are hard to generalize:

RP a'ddress, 'adult, prin'cess, 'detail, maga'zine, week'end;

GA 'address, a'dult, 'princess, de'tail, 'magazine, 'weekend.

2. The American [r] is retroflex (pronounced with the tip of the tongue curled back) and is used in all the positions where there is an r in spelling.

3. The American [t] in the intervocalic position is realized as a flap: the tip of the tongue beats against the teeth ridge just once (better, letter)

4. The American [t] is nearly omitted after [n]. The preceding vowel is nasalized (twenty).

5. The American [t] is replaced by glottal stop before [m, n, 1, r, j, w]: That man, that one.

6. The American [j] is commonly weakened or omitted: news [nu:z], Tuesday ['tu:zdi]

7. The American [1] is "dark", i.e. non-palatalized, in all positions.

8. There are words, which are pronounced differently in GA: tomato [tə'meıtou], either [i:рə], schedule ['skedu:l], vase [veız].

9. Tertiary stress in American English: dictionary , ceremony.

10. French borrowings are assimilated in RP and have one primary stress on the initial syllable. In GA they are still stressed as in French, on the final syllable, or have two stresses, one primary on the last syllable and one secondary on the first: ballet, cafe, garage.

Rhythm

American rhythm is due to a great amount of secondary (or/and tertiary) stresses, compared with RP, which, together with a narrowed pitch range, produce the effect of smoothly flowing, monotonous, slurred speech: the proportion of accented vs unaccented syllables is 1 : 1, while in British English it is estimated at 1 : 2. RP speech is described as clipped, pointed, contrastive in the length of accented and unaccented syllables.

Intonation

Compared to RP, the intonation group in GA starts at a lower level (like in Russian) and flows within a narrower pitch range. Then it ends with a rise-fall. The final element is very prominent acoustically, and that is where the most important information point is normally located (in 80 % of cases).

RP 'What are you 'going to 'do about it?

GA 'What're you 'gonna "do about it?