88  The sounds of English
Standard and regional accents 89
in the previous paragraph, there is considerable re-alignment of vowels b t hi, so that merry and marry (and sometimes Mary too) may be pronounce same while short and sport may have different vowels (hi/ in the fo, ,„ ' [o:] in the latter, corresponding to GB hoi).
Differences of realisation are always numerous between any two sj ^ English pronunciation and only the most salient will be mentioned. Ann, vowels this includes the realisation of the diphthongs /ei/ and ho/ as monoph ' [e:] and [o:], hence late [leit] and load [lo:d], Among the consonants, hi phonetically [i], i.e. the tip of the tongue is curled further backwards ir " GB, or else a similar auditory effect is achieved by bunching the body of iul tongue upwards and backwards (this latter form of hi is now intruding in:.. ( * HI intervocalically following an accent is usually a voiced tap in GA, e j [bers] and may sometimes become [d] producing a neutralisation bet.- .-u V and /d/; and III is generally a dark [1] in all positions in GA, unlike GB whewf it is a clear [1] before vowels and a dark [1] in other positions (see §9.7.1). -j
A wholesale change in the realisation of the short vowels in GA is inci i^i k; reported, sometimes called the 'Northern Cities Shift',35 although it now seems! more widely spread than this. The vowel principally affected by this shift [s f&M, which becomes closer to [e] or [es], or even [e] or [eo]. This affects b(. !i i :.,-"e words like sad which have /a/ in GB and those words like after where i _■ i \ hi corresponds to I ail in GB. In other areas of the U.S. including Columbus ■ Ohio, and Jackson, North Carolina, short vowels seem to be going in the opposite', direction, i.e. /i,e,a/ are lowering and losing a tendency to diphthongisatiom'
7.12.2 Standard Scottish English (SSE)
There are nowadays taken to be three languages in Scotland: Gaelic. Scots and (Scottish) English. The Northumbrian dialect of Old English spread into the south and east of Scotland at much the same time as it spread through Englai J and has continued in use as present-day Scots. A different type of English v. is re-introduced from the south of England in the eighteenth century but was subsequently much influenced by Scots; it is this that is now described as Scottish English. Most speakers in Scotland will slightly or considerably vary their style of speech between Scots and Standard Scottish English according to different situations. The typical vowel system of Scottish English involves the loss -the GB distinctions between I ail and hi, between lull and Iul, and between and A)/. Thus the pairs ant and aunt, soot and suit, caught and cot are pronounced the same. On the other hand there may be a phonemic split corresponding to Gb Id; while most such words have a vowel of an [e] quality, a small group of wo: i!s have a vowel of an [e] quality, e.g. heaven, eleven, next.
SSE also has no /is,tra/ because, like General American, it is rhotic and beard and dour are pronounced as /bi:rd/ and /duir/ (= [dyw]). Similarly GB Is:/ (formerly /&>/) is followed by an hi, so fare GB Its:/ becomes SSE [fe:.iD Some speakers will also have different sequences of (short) vowel plus
. .-iJ'i
, m GB ''■>:/ in bird, serve and turn; others have the same r-coloured @3pf*eifV"V1'1 s\ih words. Rhoticity in SSE is declining with many speakers now rpji^HJ I' ' Shj- (i.e. pre-pausa! and pre-consonantal hi may be treated differ-l^P&Ay    '"' '\ ,r (he lexical incidence of vowels before hi may not correspond
\\,\port with boat.
fS^tf'J'' ^''^rid sport may have different vowels as in GA, short rhyming with
= r:--js»?,',r^    '0,ve|s corresponding to GB hil and I sol are typically monophthongal "   ,. The •»!> ^ ^merican)j e.g. gate and boat are [geit] and [bo:t]. Moreover the 4* n llv"E ' n t0 soot and suit is not like either of the GB vowels in these V*3*""' "i" s considerably fronted to something like [y], hence [syt]. More gener-'  " * systemic durational difference between long and short vowels,
I'-word
•.lie:--
is no S .IB.
"  ' j,K., differences from GB in the realisation of the consonants lies m the 1   l, r in [f]- e.g. red [red] and trip [trip], though there is variation between \,..\ 11 .the usual type in GB), the use of [j] being more common in post-BwLlic positions and generally more prestigious. The phoneme III is most commonly PrV m )T| all positions, little [hü] and plough [plau]. Finally, intervocalic III ? '^Vn it.il'sed as a glottal stop (like London below), e.g. butter [bhiir-].
7 12.3 London English, Estuary English (EE) and Multicultural London English (MLE)
71 w,. -i dialectal type of London speech is called Cockney. Unlike the previous wo \ai .tlieš above (General American and Standard Scottish English), Cockney Is „= n lieh a class dialect as a regional one. In its broadest form the dialect of . i ,-\ includes a considerable vocabulary of its own, including rhyming slang. f;:-'$ut the characteristics of Cockney pronunciation are spread more widely through £ London speech than its vocabulary; this type of pronunciation we henceforth iki "is popular London or broad London, The prevalence of a Cockney pro-111, n in London is now much challenged by the growth of what has come :l. be known as Multicultural London English (MLE), dealt with towards the end of this section.
I r I ké the previous two types of pronunciation there are no differences in the inventory of vowel phonemes between GB and popular London and there j j atively few (compared with GA and SSE) differences of lexical incidence, "r 're .ire. however, a large number of differences of realisation. The short front »■«.vi-: tend to be uniformly closer than in GB, e.g. in sat, set and sit, so much so that sal may sound like set and set itself like sit to speakers from other regions. Additionally the short vowel /a/ moves forward to almost C.[a]. Among the long Jv most noticeable is the diphthongisation of !h/ (= [si]), An/ (= [ou]) and Iiich varies between [oo] morpheme-medially and [owa] morpheme-fmally, thus head [baid], boot [baut], sword [sood], saw [owa]. Broad London speech also uses distinctive pronunciations of a number of diphthongs leil - [at], hil = [cu], ■-■> = [au] and laul = [a:], e.g. late part], light [kit], no [nau], now [na:]. The