Talk:Phonological history of English close front vowels

Moved from Talk:Weak vowel merger

Hundred, pretended, cases

Is this what's happening to my "hundred", "pretended", "cases", etc.? Jimp 4Oct05

Hard to say without knowing more about you and your accent. Where are you from? --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 07:18, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Could be, but this is quite complicated. Accents which have two weak vowels don't all have the same distribution of them. I don't rhyme abbot /ˈabət/ and rabbit /ˈrabɪt/, so I wouldn't say I have this merger. However, I do have /ə/ in the last syllables of all the words you mention (although I do have a weak /ɪ/ in the first syllable of pretended /prɪˈtɛndəd/). I'm from northern England; RP is different, and has /ɪ/ in those plural and past participle endings, though not in hundred, according to the OED.--JHJ 16:27, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm from Sydney, Australia. I do rhyme abbot and rabit and my pretended is /prətendəd/. Jimp 19Dec05

Article content

I don't know what the article means by "While there are some dialects that have a variable distinction, there are very few dialects that maintain a complete distinction."--JHJ 16:27, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

They mean there are very few that always distinguish the two sounds in every or almost every case. The ones with variably distinction will distinguish it in some words or in some cases, but not for every case and word. LokiClock (talk) 21:20, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Moved from Talk:Kit-bit split

New Zealand English

I've changed the last two paragraphs:

Realization of the vowel in bit as [ə] is also found in New Zealand English. Unlike in South African English, that phoneme is always realized as [ə] and so there is no split and kit and bit rhyme in New Zealand English as /kət/ and /bət/. Some Australians commonly claim that New Zealanders say fush and chups for fish and chips, but that is an exaggeration, because the pronunciation for New Zealanders is actually like [fəʃ ən tʃəps] (with a stressed schwa sound), not *[fʌʃ ən tʃʌps].

New Zealanders conversely often claim that Australians pronounce fish and chips as feesh and cheeps, because /i/ is the closest equivalent New Zealanders have to the Australian /ɪ/. The Australian /ɪ/ is slightly more raised than the /ɪ/ in other accents.

into one much shorter one:

Centralized realizations of the vowel in bit is also found in New Zealand English. Unlike in South African English, this does not involve a phonemic or allophonic split.

New Zealand English does not have a kit-bit split, so a discussion of what happens in New Zealand English isn't really relevant. With those two paragraphs, the article is one-third about the kit-bit split and two-thirds about some different phenomenon that only involves the same phoneme and a similar realisation of it. It also seems a bit odd having so much discussion about perceptions of Australians' and New Zealanders' language use (and what they do) in an article about a phenomenon limited to South African English.

—Felix the Cassowary (ɑe hɪː jɐ) 03:57, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Hear! Hear! Jimp 03:55, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

... I've thus removed the following.

In New Zealand English this extends to stressed /ɪ/s as well, so that dinner is pronounced /dənə/.

This is not a vowel split/merger but a vowel shift. Jimp 13Jan06

Trigger for Lennon-Lenin

What is the trigger condition for the Lennon-Lenin merger? Linguofreak 23:37, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're asking. In dialects with the weak vowel merger (which is what it's really called, "Lennon-Lenin" is just an example of it), unstressed [ɪ] and [ə] are merged to [ə]. The "classic" example is roses vs. Rosa's: in accents without the merger, the two words are different, [rozɪz] vs. [rozəz], while in accents with the merger, the two words are homophonous as [rozəz]. Mergers aren't usually described as having "triggers" the way phonological rules are. Angr/talk 23:43, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it's really called the weak vowel merger so why did we end up with that title? Why? Because of User:DecGon a suspected sockpuppet. I've reverted him. Jimp 16:04, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

No, in my dialect "roses" as "Rosa's" are seperate ("roses" with /I/ "Rosa's" with /@/), but Lennon and Lenin are the same (both with /I/). So maybe we're actually talking two different phenomena here... Mine is a conditional phenomenon that I can't find the condition for. Random schwa's become /I/ with no (apparent) rhyme or reason, but some stubbornly remain schwa's (as in "Rosa's"), and every once in a while /I/ becomes schwa (as in the third i in "invincible", although the i's that become schwa's usually can be pronounced as either without sounding wierd). (BTW, for geographic reference, I speak American English of the Colorado variety.) Linguofreak 05:51, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Pin-Pen merger and Arkansas

I spoke with some people from Arkansas and they seemed to change /ɛ/ to a diphthong /ɛɪ/. For instance, he said 'spent' as /spɛɪnt/. Is there any source that has noted this?Cameron Nedland 20:12, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Pin-Pen merger and Texas

I and most people I speak with distinguish pen and pin, and I am a native Texan. The sentence saying that it has merged through all of Texas is unsourced and invalid, so I have changed it. LokiClock (talk) 21:24, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

I second the above statement. I was born and raised in Texas, and I distinguish pen and pin, along with nearly everyone else I know. However, older members of my family from more rural parts of Texas do not distinguish between the two words, so from what I can see the merger applies only to rural and older speakers, so saying it is completely merged for most speakers is completely wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.173.94.80 (talk) 00:45, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

EME?

The kit-bit split is a split of EME /ɪ/ found in South African English [...]

What is meant by "EME" here? -- Picapica 12:17, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Early Modern English. AJD 16:17, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

How can it be EME? South African English did not exist before the early to mid 19th century! Roger (talk) 14:41, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Lowering of /ɛ/ before g

I don't think I'm unusual in lowering /ɛ/ to /e/ before g (as in beg, egg.) Is there a name for this phenomenon? What is its geographical distribution? (I'm from California.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.167.203.61 (talk) 00:05, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

That would be raising, not lowering. I think it's pretty widespread in the western US. Grover cleveland (talk) 22:59, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

Some Thoughts

My ears and memory tell me that the pin-pen merger is very widespread in the United States. This article makes it seems as if few places outside of the South have this merger. That really doesn't seem to be the case. Turn on the TV sometime and you will hear many non-Southern people with this merger. Pronouncing pen with /ɛ/ sounds affected and pretentious (not to mention strange) to my ears, and I'm sure it sounds that way for many other Americans as well. As of now, there is no comprehensive guide to American English, so I figure my guess is as good as anyone's. I am not from the South, by the way. 208.104.45.20 (talk) 05:13, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Idea-smoothing is NOT original research

Just so that you know, I have been watching a lot of American television, and I can guarantee that many Americans DO in fact have idea-smoothing in their speech. The first and last episodes of Deep Space Nine have Odo (Rene Auberjonois or whatever) and Jake Sisko (Cirroc Lofton) respectively, both saying "idea" with /I@/ at the end, not /i:@/. Jonathan Kent (John Schneider) in Smallville also says it the same way.

I don't know how to cite a television programme as a source, but there you go. If anyone else sees a programme with idea-smoothing in it, American or not, it might be worth mentioning it here, just so that people know it most certainly DOES exist in American English and many other forms of English. Avengah (talk) 02:48, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Saying "I heard it on a TV show" is original research. You have to find a published source that says idea-smoothing is found in North American English. —Angr 04:23, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Although René Murat Auberjonois (the actor who played Odo) is an American, he spent much of his childhood resident in Europe. —SlamDiego_←T 12:42, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Whether it is OR or not, I don't hear it that often. I have heard it, but I think the majority of Americans don't have it. 208.104.45.20 (talk) 19:58, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Also? "Idea smoothing", like almost all of the section headings in this article except "pin-pen merger", and some of the section headings in Phonological history of English low back vowels, is a neologism. The name "idea-smoothing" appears to have been invented for this article; I don't believe it's used by linguists. Likewise "met-mat merger", "lot-cloth split", and so on. AJD (talk) 21:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

"Lot-cloth split" was used by J. C. Wells in Accents of English in 1982, so that one's not a neologism. A lot of the others are, though. —Angr 04:10, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

I stand corrected on that one. AJD (talk) 04:17, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Wells also uses palm-lot merger for what we call the "father-bother merger"; that is, he defines the mergers, splits etc. in terms of his lexical sets--trap, goose, fleece, goat, and so on. Jack^(Lumber) 19:16, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

True. But "father-bother merger" is also a common name for that merger—indeed, much more common than "palm-lot merger". AJD (talk) 21:52, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

...probably because this phenomenon is peculiar to (and has been studied mostly in) North America, and Wells's lexical sets are more popular in the UK than they are in the U.S. Jack^(Lumber) 15:14, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I've got another one. Chakotay (Robert Beltram) in Voyager, Season 1 episode 7 "Eye of the Needle", at 5 minutes in. Clearly /I@/. Avengah (talk) 07:55, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

You're still doing “original research” here. (And you're proposing that the accent of a character supposedly raised on an utterly different planet be taken as American. The closest that one gets to an utterly different planet in America is probably California.) —SlamDiego_←T 08:49, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I think you'll find that Robert Beltram uses his normal accent to play the part. He doesn't put any kind of special accent on. Anyway, he's human in Voyager. Avengah (talk) 13:33, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

No one here denied that Chakotay were human (we also of course don't deny that the British are human), but he's plainly not an American. (Any American character on that show would be a time-traveller, or would have a hypothetical accent, and even then the hypothesis would likely be the work of hacks and of hams.) Now, for a bit, let's pretend that “original research” were allowed: Why are you referring us to Chakotay, instead of one of the appearances by Beltram that you'd heard by which you know he uses his ordinary accent?

Anyway, “original research” isn't permitted; an editor cannot use his own “ear” to legitimize content in an article. —SlamDiego_←T 10:33, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I can find myself going either way. Ironically, many people will say "veecul" for vehicle, but no one says "eye-dee" for idea. It's not really dialectic, though; the distinction is just so minor that no one really gives a crap. 75.118.170.35 (talk) 00:12, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Meet-meat merger and simple long e (mete)

The article seems pretty clear about the distinction and merger of ee and ea. But what it's not clear at all about is the status of long e, for example in the word mete. In non-merging accents, is mete pronounced like meet or meat? I know that, for long o, bone and moan had the same vowel in Early Modern English, but whether long e was the same as ee or ea in Early Modern English is not made clear. - Gilgamesh (talk) 07:12, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure e...e should be the same as ee. —Angr 09:31, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't want just a guess. Did you read this somewhere? A source, maybe? - Gilgamesh (talk) 11:11, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

If I remember, I'll check Accents of English later today. —Angr 11:32, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I still want to know. - Gilgamesh (talk) 01:06, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Words like mete (although not bone) originated in short vowels in OE. When those short vowels lengthened, they merged with ea oa not with ee oo. Hence mete would have sounded like meat. In Early Modern English, ea sounded like [e:] while ee sounded like [i:]. Benwing (talk) 05:55, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

However, there are exceptions to that rule, as Middle English spelling often didn't bother to distinguish the heights of its long mid vowels, for instance, Chaucer spells red as "reed" (which later convention dictates should be"read"), and modern spelling has the words lose and whore, which really ought to have two Os. 104.34.32.154 (talk) 21:09, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

We still need more information on the third lexical set described for Yorkshire dialects; the text as written is extremely unclear about it.

“The words team and cream, which have /ɪə/ in the traditional Yorkshire accents, have original long vowels, going back to Old English tēam and Old French creme respectively, while eat (< OE etan) and meat (< OE mete) have vowels that were originally short but lengthened by Middle English open syllable lenthening. This is the origin of the Yorkshire distinction. In accents with the distinction, the vowel /ɪə/ is usually represented by the spellings ea and eCe, as in neat and complete, and the vowel /ɛɪ/ is usually represented by the spellings ei and ey, as in receive and key, and the vowel /iː/ is usually represented by the spellings ee, ie and iCe as in feet, thief and suite, as well as plain e in the monosyllabic words be, he, me, she, the (when stressed), we and ye.”

This isn’t a two-way, but a three-way distinction. But the first paragraph talks about a “Yorkshire distinction” between originally long and lengthened vowels which the subsequent paragraph promptly ignores; I’m sort of confused by this. There are actually two distinctions going on here if both paragraphs are accurate: For (most? all?) unmerged speakers, there are three unmerged phonemes corresponding to FLEECE of other English dialects: CREAM /ɪə/, RECEIVE /ɛɪ/ and FEET /iː/; with MEAT words being merged with either CREAM (according to the second paragraph) or RECEIVE (according to the first paragraph).

What I’d like to see explained: is the RECEIVE vowel merged with the EIGHT vowel, as the spelling "eigh" would suggest? Is the /ɛɪ/ pronunciation "almost extinct" only for words like "cream", or is it also rare in words like "key"/"receive"? Do any speakers have only two lexical sets for these words? If so, which of the above three categories merge? 130.71.254.49 (talk) 14:52, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

Pen-Pin Homophone Differentiation

I tagged this with citation needed, as my personal experience living in Pen-pin merged areas shows that context is always adequate and clarification is not needed. If no citation can be found, I suggest this sentence be removed. 129.110.116.65 (talk) 09:00, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Article desperately needs audio examples

As a non-linguist who is not an expert in this field of study, I have a really hard time conceptualizing some of these pronunciation differences, and I don't know how to read IPA.

It would be very helpful for us laymen, for this article to include audio examples of what the distinguished pronunciation sounds like and what the merged sounds like. DMahalko (talk) 23:56, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Thirteen years later, and I have the same request. Even a simple, clear recording of a single word with different phonologies would be helpful (eg, happy [i] and [ɪ] at happy tensing) — HTGS (talk) 23:08, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

It would be fantastic to have a tool that can sound-out IPA.

I also can't read IPA; I'm not a phoneticist, and I find it difficult to make any sense of this article. I think tools exist that can sound-out IPA, but they seem to be scarce, and I've never come across one that could be embedded in a webpage. MrDemeanour (talk) 15:55, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

pin-pen merger and Texas (again)

I see the article says:

Although this merger was not complete in the South even in fairly recent times, there is very little variation throughout the Southern States in general, except that Savannah, Austin, Miami, and New Orleans are excluded from the merger. The area of consistent merger includes southern Virginia and most of the South Midland, and extends westward to include much of Texas.

As in the statement above, I suspect that the lack of pin-pen merging occurs in many places in Texas, not just Austin. In fact, I live in Austin and the large majority of speakers here don't have a southern accent at all, although "y'all" is fairly widespread. A few people I know do have an accent of sorts, and they typically grew up in a small Texas town somewhere -- and even then their accent is not very strong. I think a lot of the reason for this is that most people who live here (like me) aren't from here, and hence the "native" accent is drowned in a sea of GA speakers. Same goes probably for the other large cities in Texas -- and probably throughout the south. A good friend of mine grew up in the suburbs of Houston and she has no accent (i.e. a GA accent!). A friend of mine grew up in Atlanta and he had no accent either. Benwing (talk) 06:04, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Technical trouble

I'm using IE, and I'm trying to make it so incoming links from Happy tensing take me to the right section, but it always jumps to a footnote after doing so. If anyone knows the secret, I'd be grateful. Victor Yus (talk) 19:01, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

People who never use long vowel sounds?

What's that called and is there an article or article section on it? I've noticed it most in the speech of people from the New Jersey and southern New York area. One example, instead of rādiator they say rădiator. Bizzybody (talk) 03:40, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

It's called a person without phonemic length distinction in their speech whose vowels are always phonetically short. In English, that sounds distinctively non-native due to pre-fortis clipping or, in Northern UK, Scottish Vowel Length Rule. — Peter238 (v̥ɪˑzɪʔ mɑˑɪ̯ tˢʰoˑk̚ pʰɛˑɪ̯d̥ʒ̊) 19:10, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

weak vowel merger

In which word rhymes with /ɨr/ ? Fort123 (talk) 19:09, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't know. I have no idea what words are supposed to end in an /ɨr/ that is potentially (or ever was) distinct from /ər/. Angr (talk) 20:27, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Maybe satyr ? Fort123 (talk) 22:19, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

@Fort123: /ɨr/ appears only word-medially before a vowel. Maryland is a good candidate for the analysis /ˈmɛərɨlənd/ as the normal pronunciation of the second vowel is /ə/ in the US and /ɪ/ in the UK. You'd have to do some research to find (near-)minimal pairs with other vowels. Crap, that's /rɨ/. In that case I don't even have an example for this sequence. I'm sure you could find one. Sol505000 (talk) 19:14, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

kit-bit and South African English

The article currently says this: "South Africans are often stereotyped as pronouncing "woman" and "women" the same way, as "women" has the vowel [ə]. In reality, they are distinct in South African English. "woman" is /wʊmən/ and "women" is /wəmən/, so they are distinct and never confused."

I have asked quite a few South African English speakers about this, and each and every one has told me that "woman" and "women" *are* homophonous, and I have observed confusion based on this. So, unless there's a legitimate source, I suggest this addendum be removed (it's not terribly relevant to the kit/bit split in the first place anyway).WmGB (talk) 11:39, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

meet–meat merger

It is not clear what merged into what in the introduction. Had the vowel in "meet" already shifted to [iː] back then? Because it continues with describing different stages of English, which is really confusing. --2.245.156.161 (talk) 05:00, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

I can answer this question. To start in Middle English, meet was pronounced as [meːt], and meat was pronounced [mɛːt]. During the Great Vowel Shift, meet became [miːt], and meat became [meːt]. Answering your question, right before the meet-meat merger, meet was pronounced as [miːt]. At this time, meat was pronounced [meːt]. The merger occurred by raising the vowel in meat from [eː] to [iː].74.102.216.186 (talk) 04:11, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

Fleece merger

Please add to the article answers to the following questions:

1. Why is the meat-meet merger also called the fleece merger?
2. Why is fleece written in lower caps? (If there's no reason for it, please remove.)

Thank you! DBlomgren (talk) 05:10, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Happy-tensing

The section on 'happy tensing' states that the use of the tenser 'i' form (equivalent to the 'ee' of 'fleet') is 'becoming more common in modern RP'. The only authority cited is a book by J. C. Wells finalised around 1980 (his Preface is dated January 1981). This is nearly 40 years old, and I would say that the 'old' pronunciation is now practically extinct. At least, I think the article should say that the tenser form *was* stated to be becoming more common around 1980 without implying that this is still the case. Personally, I think the 'old' form was a minority usage long before this. We now have easy access to many old recordings as a basis for comparison. For example, Kenneth Clark in his 'Civilisation' series in 1969 uses the 'new' form, and I presume Clark would be accepted as a true RP speaker. Or Patrick Macnee (an Old Etonian playing an upper-class character) uses the 'new' pronunciation in his role as John Steed in 'The Avengers' (mid-60s). In fact, I have not found any clear examples of the supposed traditional pronunciation from any period, though in some cases the speaker's vowels are so clipped that it is difficult to be sure quite what they are saying.109.149.2.121 (talk) 15:11, 2 April 2018 (UTC) [Added] For older examples one can turn to the films of Laurence Olivier, such as his Hamlet (1948) and Henry V (1944). The soliloquy from Hamlet and the famous St Crispin's Day speech from Henry V are easily accessible on YouTube. In both of these the 'happy vowel' occurs several times (in Henry V including the actual word 'happy') and in all of these, as far as I can tell, Olivier uses the supposedly 'new' pronunciation.109.149.2.39 (talk) 10:39, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

Exceptions to weak-vowel merger in General American

It recently occurred to me that there are certain words with /ɪ/ in Received Pronunciation that sometimes have /i/ in addition to /ə/ in General American: for instance, the first syllables of before and enough. In many of these the vowel is in an unstressed syllable immediately before the stress. I wonder if this is commented on in any sources. — Eru·tuon 22:24, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

Weak-vowel merger in non-rhotic accents

The article says that when a non-rhotic accent has the weak-vowel merger, then historic /ər/ automatically merges with the weak vowel as well. This is not true for German L2-speakers, who usually have a weak-vowel merger (or at most a very feeble and irregular distinction), but who commonly use [ɐ] for /ər/, which is distinct from /ə/. This means that chatted is [tʃɛtəd], but chattered is [tʃɛtɐd]. But I suppose there are no native accents that do this, are there? (Then nevermind.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.201.0.62 (talk) 00:15, 23 March 2019 (UTC)

No, there aren't. And if there are they're a really small group of speakers that I'm unaware of. Sol505000 (talk) 18:48, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Weak vowel merger in IPA transcriptions of North American English on Wikipedia

Moved from User talk:Sol505000 § Weak vowel merger

 – Sol505000 (talk) 11:23, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Please hold off on editing other American English-based dialect pages before we've had a discussion on this. Wolfdog (talk) 13:43, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: We need to establish a consensus to transcribe the schwa narrowly, rather than the other way around. Sol505000 (talk) 13:44, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

The merger is generally towards [ɪ] pre-consonantally (when in an unstressed final syllable). Listen to "rabbit" pronounced here. So "abbot"/"rabbit" gets [ɪ]. On the other hand, "affect"/"effect" (the vowel before a stressed syllable) gets [ə], which I generally recommend for non-final syllables ("cartilage"). There are likely other exceptions as well (obviously final /ən, əm, əl, ər/ are quite special, for example; you can see on American English these are often narrowly transcribed as syllabic consonants). If audio files are provided, I would follow the actual pronunciations you hear in them. Wolfdog (talk) 13:52, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: That's the phonetic output. Phonemically the vowel is /ə/ and using [ɪ] blurs the distinction between RP/Southern American English and most other North American English which does feature the merger. Using ⟨ɪ⟩ is a bad idea.

Before you bring up New Zealand English, it's a special case as the dialect is AFAICS best analyzed as lacking unstressed vowels entirely, i.e. every vowel is stressable. It then makes sense to analyze the final schwa in sofa as STRUT as the checked-free distinction is rendered pretty much useless (either KIT or STRUT has to become a free vowel, it's wiser to choose STRUT on the phonetic basis). Sol505000 (talk) 13:58, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

Several of the edits you made were in narrow, phonetic transcriptions. That's why I reverted them. And why do you feel it's a "bad idea" to "blur the distinction"? In fact, many Americans do not have the distinction (despite it being, yes, common); so perhaps being careful and distinctive is actually the smarter approach. Rosa's roses is the classic example of how, even in supposedly "merged dialects", one should be careful with exact contexts and transcriptions; due to the inflectional suffix on the first word, most Americans say [ˈɹoʊzəz ˈɹoʊzɪz]. If we're agreeing to use narrow phonetics at all, that would be the appropriate transcription. Wolfdog (talk) 14:07, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

(In a Boston accent, for instance, you can phonemically write /plænət/, but if we're writing it phonetically, it's [pʰleənɪʔ]. Wolfdog (talk) 14:13, 3 January 2021 (UTC))

@Wolfdog: "Phonetic" doesn't mean "fully narrow". And I'm not buying that the correct symbol is ⟨ɪ⟩; if anything, it's ⟨ɨ⟩. Lenin is pronounced [ˈlɛnɪn] only in England, or perhaps also in Southern American English. It can be [ˈlɛnɨn] in those two dialects and General American, but Lennon cannot be [ˈlɛnɨn] in England (or maybe in Geordie it can... their vowels are strange), it can only be [ˈlɛnən] (or at best [ˈlɛnɘn]). In Australia, AFAIK, both are [ˈlɛnən], with a mid schwa. I don't hear a high schwa used very often in Australia, in fact it's very tempting to posit a strut-comma merger in Australian English. Shame Cox & Fletcher didn't explore that possibility (so that careless would be transcribed /ˈkeːlɐs/ with an unstressed /ɐ/ and pick-up /ˈpɪkˌɐp/, with a tertiary stress on up). This removes reduced vowels from AuE as well and explains why Australians hear mid central KIT as STRUT ("fush and chups"). Perhaps for that reason Australian STRUT is better written ⟨a⟩ (and KIT ⟨i⟩, as its so close and front): /ˈkeːlas/, /ˈpikˌap/. Sol505000 (talk) 14:17, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

I'm no expert in Australian and New Zealand English. American English is more my wheelhouse. There have been previous discussions for American English dialect pages to use fairly narrow transcriptions when we're dealing with phonetics. I'm happy for you to go with [ɨ] as a compromise, but it certainly merges perceptively with [ɪ], so I'd still personally recommend the latter. It's closer than the schwa in the cases I mentioned. (Plan it and planet are perfect homophones for me -- as for most Americans.) If you do go with [ɨ], I'd recommend at least finding sources that support that particular symbol; I believe there's been much discussion on the choice of symbol for that in the past, particularly at Help talk:IPA/English. I can try to dig through the archives if you really want. Wolfdog (talk) 23:57, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

(I can't comment too authoritatively on Australian English. Your theories are interesting. I could somewhat agree with your KIT analysis, but your STRUT analysis seems a little extreme to me... particularly /ˈkeːlas/. I realize that we're talking phonemics rather than phonetics, but I'm always biased towards my ears and therefore the latter.) Wolfdog (talk) 23:57, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: I'm not happy with ⟨ɨ⟩ (and certainly not ⟨ɪ⟩, as I've already said) as there is no consensus to transcribe the schwa narrowly. Should we ever reach it, there's also the word-final schwa which would then have to be transcribed with ⟨ɐ⟩. Then there's also the British KIT vowel that is centralized in some but not all unstressed syllables.

I'm writing the Australian strut-comma vowel with ⟨a⟩ so that it can still be analyzed as a short counterpart of palm/start. Indeed, I'd say that final schwas in Australia and New Zealand are unstressed instances of palm/start: /ˈkɔmaː/, [ˈkɔma]. You can then analyze race car as /ˈɹæis ˌkaː/, with a tertiary stress on car. Also compare happy /ˈhæpɪi/, [ˈhæpi ~ ˈhæpˌɪi] with pedigree /ˈpedəˌɡɹɪi/ [ˈpedəˌɡɹɪi] (EDIT: And indeed, in the case of NZE, treacle /ˈtɹɪikoː/, [ˈtɹɪiko] with claymore /ˈklæiˌmoː/ [ˈklæiˌmoː ~ ˈklæiˌmoːɐ̯ ~ ˈklæiˌmoː.ɐ]). This reintroduces the checked-free distinction even in NZE. Sol505000 (talk) 03:04, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

It's not clear to me what you're arguing for American dialects (as opposed to Australian and New Zealand ones). I'm mostly interested in reverting your changes to American dialect pages. In any case, we can't seem to come to agreements, and other voices are preferable to our ever-diverging back-and-forths. @Kwamikagami, J. 'mach' wust, LiliCharlie, Nardog, Kbb2, Peter238, and Aeusoes1: What do you think about the above discussion? Thanks. Wolfdog (talk) 14:37, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for pinging those users. Let me just warn them: ignore my rants about Australian/New Zealand English, please. They're irrelevant and mostly OR. Let's stay on topic. Sol505000 (talk) 14:43, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Tl;dr but my inclination is to not mull over it too much. As I said on Wolfdog's talk, both lexicographic and linguistic literature is very inconsistent in the treatment of /ɪ–ə/ in North American accents to the point that if we tried to be consistent we would get into the OR territory or alienate readers. Given Flemming & Johnson (2007), it might make sense to transcribe all word-internal /ə–ɪ/ with ⟨ɨ⟩, but even in works that employ it, I've never seen it used before primary stress, as in the first vowel in about or the second in possibility. So in that regard I lean towards Sol505000, but at the same time I hardly recall ever seeing -ic, -ish transcribed with ⟨ə⟩, for instance. So my suggestion, if I have to have any, is to try to follow whatever is the common practice in sources rather than to pursue consistency just for the sake of it. [wʌɾˈɪzəʔ] for what is it? strikes me as flat-out wrong, though, since there's a word boundary before the last vowel. Nardog (talk) 18:27, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

This source might be helpful, as it identifies minimal pairs for American English speakers. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt]} 19:43, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

I just mentioned that. Nardog (talk) 21:23, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

As for transcribing Rosa's roses, it would be weird to ignore one reduced vowel and transcribe another, as in [ˈɹoʊzəz ˈɹoʊzɪz] above. It would either be [ˈɹoʊzʌz ˈɹoʊzɪz] (if we're ignoring reduced vowels, which IMO is not a good idea) or [ˈɹoʊzəz ˈɹoʊzᵻz]. Also, English, or at least GA, does not have 2ary (or 3ary) stress. That's just a way to avoid transcribing reduced vowels. If we're going to do that (again a bad idea IMO), then to be consistent we would want [ˈɹoʊzʌ] for Rosa, vs e.g. [ˈɒmnɪˌbʌs] for omnibus. Without the fake 2ary stress (which in dictionaries has different meanings depending on whether it occurs before a 1ary stress mark or after), those would be [ˈɹoʊzə] and [ˈɒmnᵻbʌs].

We used to make this distinction in pandialectical transcriptions, but a few years ago abandoned the high reduced vowels, transcribing them as full vowels, so that now ⟨ɪ⟩ and ⟨ʊ⟩ are ambiguous. Another bad idea, IMO, but I was outvoted and wasn't involved in WP enough any longer to make a fuss about it. — kwami (talk) 20:11, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Reg. the article link Aeusoes just posted, that would only apply to GA, of course, but since it shows a predictable positional difference that would rarely have exceptions for WP purposes, it would make sense to me to transcribe all GA reduced vowels as ⟨ə⟩, in order to avoid conflating them with the KIT vowel, which is a meaningful distinction. /ə/ would just have a variety of phonetic realizations, as is common with reduced vowels. — kwami (talk) 20:18, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

BTW, the JIPA article uses ⟨ə⟩ and ⟨ɨ⟩. Don't know why they think people reading JIPA wouldn't have font support for those vowels. The article is available at JSTOR. — kwami (talk) 20:25, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

It's just bad OCR. They aren't "thinking" anything. Nardog (talk) 21:26, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

In phonetic transcriptions, it seems like [ə] and [ᵻ] have some support here. In phonemic transcriptions, kwami, are you actually suggesting a single merged [ə]? For example, are you in favor of what is it phonemically as /wʌt ˈɪz ət/ or rabbit as /ˈræbət/? [Oops. Forgot to sign this two days ago. Wolfdog (talk) 23:21, 7 January 2021 (UTC)]

@Wolfdog: What other option do we have? Weak vowel merger means that there is a phonemic merger of /ɪ/ with /ə/ in unstressed syllables. Sol505000 (talk) 09:05, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

Well, the other option, as Nardog mentioned, is to follow the practices of actual sources. (Looking around, of course, I indeed see that they're not consistent.) OK, so let's do the merged vowel /ə/, when appropriate. As Nardog also stated already, a case like "what is it" could be excluded for morphological reasons. At the same time, my question to you Sol, is can we please, in narrower phonetic environments use [ə] and [ᵻ]? Again, there's some support for this from the larger group. These transcriptions can be helpful when we're focusing on particular details of dialect.

@Kwamikagami: I assume you're making a distinction between ⟨ᵻ⟩ and ⟨ɨ⟩, with a preference for the former (per, say, Pullum 1996)? Oh... also, what phoneme would you says the unstressed vowel in roses fits under? Wolfdog (talk) 12:34, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

I wasn't talking about phonemic transcriptions. In them, exclusive use of ⟨ə⟩ is perfectly reasonable (and preferable).

I would strongly discourage using ⟨ᵻ⟩, or any non-IPA symbol for that matter, unless there's an overwhelming good reason. What's wrong with ⟨ɪ⟩ or ⟨ɨ⟩? Nardog (talk) 14:09, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

I've been a fan of ⟨ɪ⟩ from the start, but kwami disliked it, arguing that As for transcribing Rosa's roses... It would either be [ˈɹoʊzʌz ˈɹoʊzɪz] (if we're ignoring reduced vowels, which IMO is not a good idea) or [ˈɹoʊzəz ˈɹoʊzᵻz]. Wolfdog (talk) 14:43, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

I object to ⟨ɪ⟩ because unreduced /ɪ/ is phonemically distinct, parallel to ⟨ə⟩ vs ⟨ʌ⟩. (And indeed there are dictionaries that transcribe the STRUT vowel as ⟨ə⟩, or actually as ⟨ˌə⟩.) I support a phonetic distinction between mid and high (and rounded) reduced vowels. Phonemically, I agree they should be merged where there's merger, but there's the question of whether RP maintains a distinction. I thought it did, but it would be nice to see a follow-up of the JIPA article demonstrating that. If it doesn't, then we should use ⟨ə⟩ in our pan-dialectical IPAc-en transcriptions. If it does, then I still object to current ⟨ɪ⟩ as being ambiguous. I suppose phonemic ⟨ɨ⟩ rather than former ⟨ᵻ⟩ would be okay. We've had vociferous objections in the past that it's not phonetically [ɨ], but if we have RS's that it's pretty close, we can override them. I'm half tempted to resurrect ⟨ˌ⟩ and label that "unstressed unreduced vowel" rather than 2ary stress, despite the contradiction to its supposed IPA definition, but I doubt that any dictionary uses it consistently that way, so that would probably just make a mess of things. — kwami (talk) 18:52, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

I think I'm still missing how unreduced /ɪ/ is phonemically distinct. Do yo have any examples? Are there minimal pairs? Wolfdog (talk) 22:52, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Can't think of a minimal pair off-hand, but contrast between /ɪ/ and /ᵻ/ (or whatever) in the common example battleship or e.g. absenteeship vs e.g. bishop or ketchup (vs. /ʌ/ in catch-up or mash-up). — kwami (talk) 00:48, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: I don't hear the distinction between /ɪ/ and /ᵻ/ in these words, but thanks for thinking of them! Wolfdog (talk) 01:17, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: You may have the kit-comma merger (to a lowered [ɨ]). I suspect it's more widespread in AmE, rather than being present just in Inland Northern AmE. I'd guess that it's present in idiolects spoken all over the country (like yours, presumably) and in some regional accents. Sol505000 (talk) 01:29, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

I'd need a minimal pair (even a forced one would be helpful) to let you know. I certainly know my typical KIT vowel is [ɪ], not [ə] like an Inland Northerner. Wolfdog (talk) 01:42, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Try planet vs. plan it (stress the it part). I can't think of anything better at the moment. Sol505000 (talk) 01:46, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

Well, yeah. I've mentioned those exact words/phrases above. But that's just the weak vowel merger.

@Wolfdog: It's not. I'm talking about the strong form of it that should have the unreduced /ɪ/ unless you have the kit-comma merger: [ˈpʰɫɛənɨt, ˌpʰɫɛən ˈʔɪt]. Sol505000 (talk) 01:54, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

Well it's too close to call. Obviously, the big distinction I would hear, saying those two aloud, is the different stress placement. However, on a side note, I'm a big fan of your use of the dark L. Maybe we're not so different, you and I, haha. Wolfdog (talk) 02:08, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

The best I can give you is this: for planet, [ˈpʰɫɛənɨʔ] and [ˈpʰɫɛənɪʔ] sound equally "normal" to me. Wolfdog (talk) 02:13, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Sounds like you have the merger then. Sol505000 (talk) 12:16, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

I guess I'm not following. My normal unreduced KIT is not a schwa. Therefore, what makes the "merger" I do have different from the weak-vowel merger? Last I checked, rhyming abbot and rabbit is the same process as merging plan it and planet is the same thing as the weak-vowel merger. Wolfdog (talk) 13:28, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Is this an acceptable rendering of /ə/ [1] (from 0:55 onwards)? The singer is Russian, but the way she sings look around sounds almost like lucky round ([lʊkɪɹaʊnd] when you ignore syllable boundaries EDIT: In fact the syllable boundaries are exactly the same) as pronounced in a Northern English accent. She seems to make the schwa too close and front in that phrase. Sol505000 (talk) 19:14, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Ha -- interesting choice. Yeah I hear that too. It even verges on [ɛ] to my ears. (If you're asking whether it's acceptable to an American, sure. I'd still naturally hear it as look around rather than a Yorkie's lucky round, though I agree with your description.) Wolfdog (talk) 21:35, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Also, I'm not sure if this is what you're wondering about, but the phonetic rule here seems to be that the merger is generally towards [ɪ] pre-consonantally when in a final syllable but towards [ə] when in word-initial position (around, ecclesiastic, illuminate, original, upon). There are even more rules that don't easily come to mind (impair and immortal, for example, don't seem to be part of the merging phenomenon and I don't have the mental bandwidth right now to figure out why); anyway, the merger is obviously very complexly conditioned. Wolfdog (talk) 21:45, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Wells's wording is AFAICR something to the effect of "/ə/ approaches /ɪ/ in closed non-initial syllables". The key word here is approaches. I don't think that [ɪ] is actually one of the allophones of /ə/ in North American English, at least not when not in contact with velars and palato-alveolars. I don't think irround (again, if I'm hearing it correctly as [ɪˈɹaʊnd]) is proper AmE, or even proper English in most dialects. Sol505000 (talk) 22:27, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

All this is explored in Flemming & Johnson (2007) and Flemming (2009). No need to reinvent the wheel. Nardog (talk) 22:32, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm a little confused as to where we're going here. I wasn't claiming around is [ɪˈɹaʊnd]; in fact, I did exactly the opposite: promoting a schwa instead. (On the other hand, I do indeed have a preference for [ɪ] in abbot.) Anyway, what we're trying to do here is agree on narrower phonetic transcriptions. I say we go with the sources with this official proposal: [ɨ] in closed non-initial syllables and [ə] elsewhere. [ə] in word-initial or word-final position, and [ɨ] elsewhere (again, there are special cases too, like before /l/, /n/, etc.). ([ɨ] seems to have the least resistance from editors here; I'm personally just as happy with [ɪ] and, at a normal conversational pace, hear no discernible difference between stressed "full" [ɪ] and any of the proposed variants for its reduced weak-vowel counterpart [ɪ~ᵻ~ɨ] in American English: my own native dialect.) So... Are we all agreed? Wolfdog (talk) 00:43, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

Word-initial and word-final ⟨ə⟩. Presumably immense begins with a non-reduced /ɪ/. — kwami (talk) 01:26, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

"Elsewhere" didn't cover Word-initial and word-final ⟨ə⟩ for ya? And if immense begins with a non-reduced /ɪ/, then isn't that irrelevant to this discussion, which is about reduced /ɪ/? (Wish I could've taken Nardog's original advice to not mull over it too much.) Wolfdog (talk) 01:35, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

I must've misread the rule. It would seem easier to say "[ɨ] internally and [ə] at the margins". Does the vowel ever occur in an *open* non-initial syllable, that we need to specify that it's closed? Maybe I'm missing something. — kwami (talk) 22:46, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

AFAIK /ə/ is never found before a vowel morpheme-internally. That's why extraordinary has /strɔː/ and [a] in [kaɾaoke] goes all the way up to [i] in karaoke. Nardog (talk) 23:36, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: (I've been misinterpreting the rule myself in some ways.) Yes, there does appear to be a distinction between open syllables and closed syllables. ack.nowledge uses [ɨ~ɪ], but a.cute uses [ə]. By the way, I think your proposal for "[ɨ] internally and [ə] at the margins" is a decent simplification. I'd tweak the wording a bit to [ə] in word-initial or word-final position, and [ɨ] elsewhere, for clarification. {The fuller reality if we really want to get into the weeds, AFAICT, is "[ə] in an initial or final open syllable, [ə~ɨ] in other open syllables, and [ɨ] in a closed syllable (except for [ə] in pre-/b, p/ position; also, pre-/l, m, n, r/ are special cases of syllabic consonants.} This is somewhat impressionistic based on my own accent.) Wolfdog (talk) 16:59, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami and Nardog: How would you transcribe Sturridge? /ˈstɜrədʒ/, [ˈstɚɨdʒ] or /ˈstɜrədʒ/, [ˈstɚɪdʒ]? AFAIK it's fronted in contact with velars and palato-alveolars. In those cases ⟨ɪ⟩ could be the most appropriate symbol. Also, what about the final schwa? It's closer to [ɐ] in most cases, especially when phrase-final. Sol505000 (talk) 09:17, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

I'd say follow the literature. ⟨ɐ⟩ is almost never used in broad(er) phonetic transcriptions, whereas ⟨ɪ⟩ is, as you point out, used before palato-alveolars and velars so that I'd find acceptable. The actual qualities of word-internal /ə/ (or whatever you may identify them as) are all over the place in the mid to close area with varying F2 (again, see Flemming), and AFAIK authors use ⟨ɨ⟩ as a catch-all symbol for those values. Apparently there are some tendencies depending on environments but no one can say where the vocalic segment ends and the co-articulation effect begins, and three symbols (if we use separate ⟨ɪ, ɨ⟩) is already more than enough to transcribe seemingly non- or at best marginally contrastive sounds with such variable qualities. Nardog (talk) 12:30, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

Can we come to some conclusions here? My first choice would be that merged American /ə/ can be phonetically transcribed on WP as [ə] and [ɪ]. However, [ə] and [ɨ] are used in the literature as well. (I believe that Sol, above, is trying to convince me that I have some additional merger of [ɨ] and [ɪ], not shared by most Americans?) Here's my current thinking on the wording (slightly updated): [ə] in word-initial or word-final position, and [ɨ] elsewhere; I'd be happy to add that to the American English page and remind readers that exceptions exist too. (Feel free to tweak it to either go more or less into the weeds.) Wolfdog (talk) 13:37, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

I find that reasonable. Simple, easy to follow, and not deviating from literature. Nardog (talk) 07:33, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

Sol, your efforts to replace every unstressed American English /-ɪŋ/ with /-əŋ/ don't seem to be widely accepted by other editors. Is there any good evidence for us to believe that this a weak-merged vowel environment? (Not every unstressed /ɪ/ is reduced, of course.) Why can't we just keep /ɪŋ/ in these cases? Wolfdog (talk) 22:29, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: Yes, the g-dropped forms such as [ˈtrɪpɨn] are a direct evidence that the vowel in question is /ə/. It's just phonetically fronted to [ɪ] before [ŋ]. Unless you have evidence that g-dropping also involves a switch from full /ɪ/ to reduced /ɪ/? Sol505000 (talk) 22:53, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

No, I don't think that does constitute "direct evidence." The informal, casual version of "going to" as "gonna" drops and alters entire phonemes. Wouldn't the actual test be to find a word with an established /əŋ/ and match it up alongside a word with an established /ɪŋ/, for example to determine if a minimal pair exists? Unfortunately, I know of no words that contain /əŋ/. If anything, only /ɪŋ/ exists. (Even Merriam-Webster, for example, which agrees with you in giving /ə/ for words like rabbit, still gives their equivalent of the KIT vowel to mooring.) Wolfdog (talk) 23:15, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: It does. The British g-dropped form is [ˈtrɪpɪn] (at least in areas where the distinction is present, in Norfolk it's normally [ˈtrɪpn̩] or something like that), with a weak [ɪ] as in the second syllable of Martin that prevents syllabic consonant formation. -ing is like the plural marker -es after sibilants in that it features /ə/ (however it's realized phonetically) in accents with the weak vowel merger. I'm sure that Kwami or someone else can come up with a source for that. There are no words with /əŋ/ that don't stem from earlier /ɪŋ/ in English (nor, AFAIK, Dutch, German, Danish, etc.) Sol505000 (talk) 23:41, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

There are no words with /əŋ/ full stop. That doesn't automatically imply a merger. I appreciate the crosslinguistic knowledge but, yeah, I'd love to see the sources. I've already provided you one for my side. Unless we can produce those, let's change the transcription back to what most editors concur with. Wolfdog (talk) 00:07, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

@Wolfdog: No, not full stop. You're obviously confusing phonemic transcription with phonetic transcription. On what basis are you claiming that the switch from [ɪŋ] to [ɨn] in accents with the weak-vowel merger involves replacing a full [ɪ] with a reduced [ɨ] (which is the same as /ə/ in those accents?) Are there any examples of that in English? Ping is phonemically /pɪŋ/ because it features a stressed vowel which by definition (well, one definition at least, but I'll spare you an off-topic rant) is unreduced (full). The second vowel in tripping is very similar if not the same because of the phonetic environment it's in. The fact that the allophonic range of /ə/ overlaps with /ɪ/ in this context (and the fact that there are no other instances of /əŋ/ that are not etymologically /ɪŋ/) doesn't automatically mean that tripping is phonemically /ˈtrɪpɪŋ/. Reduced vowels often (not always) have a wider allophonic range than full vowels. The weak vowel merger is a very good reason for which dictionaries should use broad phonetic transcription for American English. Flapping is another reason. Sol505000 (talk) 00:13, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Not sure if this is relevant, but there's not only g-dropping, there's also pre-nasal vowel raising. Did you consider that millions of Californians pronounce /ɪŋ/ as [iŋ] in stressed as well as unstressed syllables, and that "underlying" /əŋ/ would seem at least counter-intuitive to those speakers? — In any case, I scent OR. Love —LiliCharlie (talk) 01:16, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

@LiliCharlie: The weak vowel merger changes the underlying phoneme but not the actual sound (allophone) in the second syllable of tripping, presumably due to the fact that, as I've already said, there are no other instances of /əŋ/ in English that are not historically /ɪŋ/ (or /inɡ/, if you want to go that far). In New Zealand English, [ɪ] is retained before [ŋ] as well, even though the sound has centralized to [ə] in other environments - see Bauer, L.; Warren, P. (2004), "New Zealand English: phonology", in Schneider, E.W.; Burridge, K.; Kortmann, B.; Mesthrie, R.; Upton, C. (eds.), A handbook of varieties of English, pp. 587–588. I transcribe ring and writing /ˈɹiːŋ, ˈɹɑɪtiːŋ/ (and sofa /ˈsɐʉfɐ/, compare sofas /ˈsɐʉfəz/ in New Zealand English phonology because the fact that the kit-schwa merger is so complete in that variety means that /ə/ pretty much ceases to be a weak vowel. Also, we specify the height of the schwa in /ɐʉ/ (written as such, rather than with ⟨əʉ⟩, as in Australian English), so we might as well do that in other environments (and, in addition to that, specify the backness in ring and writing). I don't see a reason not to transcribe Californian writing /ˈraɪtəŋ/ and ring /ˈrɪŋ/ (or, perhaps, /ˈriŋ/). In that dialect, /ə/ is an unstressed-only (= weak) vowel that has a wide allophonic range.

Don't Californians at least sometimes use the forms trippin' and writin'? If so, are they ever pronounced [ˈtɹɪpin] and [ˈɹəiɾin]?! I don't think so - I'd expect [ˈtɹɪpɨn, ˈɹəiɾɨn], as in other American dialects (in NZE, these are certainly [ˈtɹəpən, ˈɹɑɪɾən]!). If my assumption is correct, then the correct phonemic transcription of those words is (IMO unquestionably) /ˈtrɪpəŋ/ and /ˈraɪtəŋ/. The close front [i] is just an allophone of schwa before a phonetic [ŋ] (for this reason, I'd oppose transcribing /ˈrɪŋ/ as /ˈriŋ/. This seems to be an allophonic effect exerted upon by the following phonetic [ŋ], regardless of whether the syllable is stressed). There are examples of fully peripheral allophones of /ə/ in other dialects, most notably word- and especially phrase-final /ə/ can be as open as [ä] (I think that this counts as a peripheral vowel) in Cockney, South Africa and New Zealand (I've always thought of that as retaining the quality of the former /a/ (or /aː/? I'm not sure) in this position, as the vowel is often written a in this position). The Californian shift from [ɪ] to [i] before [ŋ] is also a restoration of the former [i] quality that has been retained in the Birmingham dialect (Brummie).

I know that /əŋ/ (as in rung) can arise due to the strut-comma merger (in Wales) and (presumably only in a few words, probably loanwords) foot-comma merger (in southern England). Those are separate issues, but the former does make me question the validity of positing the strut-comma merger in accents with the weak vowel merger.

Also, quoting Nardog, Wells mentions this in the preface to LPD, saying such vowels are transcribed as /ɪ/ before palato-alveolar and velar consonants (and in prefixes re-, e-, de- until 2nd ed.) unless "no separate indication is given for AmE", where the merger is only implicit. That's the source we needed I guess? Sol505000 (talk) 09:52, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

I would use /ɪŋ/ too. I've never seen /əŋ/ used in this way in a paper or book. Contrasts are limited before /ŋ/ because its occurrence is limited, but /əŋ/ still occurs as a result of assimilation. I'm sure many speakers with the weak vowel merger still distinguish taking care and taken care, even when no alveolar occlusion is made for the nasal. /i/ and /ɪ/ famously neutralize before /ŋ/, so one could say it's underlyingly /iŋ/ and the merger is complete, but we'd need a source for that, and even if we found one, I wouldn't use it in articles since it's rarely, if ever, seen in literature. Nardog (talk) 12:57, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

@Nardog: But this assimilation is phonetic. The phonemic structure of words is analyzed according to their pronunciation in isolation, not in running speech. Can cockney [bæːʔˈwəikəɡɐɤ] 'about a week ago' be analyzed as /bæʊt ˈwɪik əɡʌʊ/? No, because the /t/ can be tapped or affricated instead, which restores the indefinite article that is dropped after glottal stops: [bæːɾəˈwəikəɡɐɤ] etc., with /ə/ realized as [ə] and not as a phonetic zero, as in a week ago [əˈwəikəɡɐɤ]. Similarly, taken care is underlyingly /tekən ˈkɛr/, with an underlying alveolar nasal which can surface as either alveolar or velar and which apparently does not trigger the same [ɪ] allophone in the latter case as the underlying velar nasal in taking care /tekəŋ ˈkɛr/ (which can be realized as alveolar when "the g is dropped", unless a velar follows).

Weren't you the one who said that The weak vowel merger means no contrast between /ɪ/ and /ə/ in unstressed syllables, so /ˈkɛrləs/ is the correct phonemic notation for the pronunciation with the merger, regardless of the phonetic quality of the merged vowel (unless you're wacky enough to transcribe all schwas as /ɪ/).? Sol505000 (talk) 13:12, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

But do you have a source that says the merger entails the analysis of -‍ing ought to be /əŋ/ rather than /ɪŋ/ or /iŋ/? Just because they don't contrast doesn't necessarily mean /ɪ/ can never occur in unstressed syllables, just that /ə/ can't also occur in the same environment. Also, we're talking about notation. One could argue using an archiphoneme /N/ in ramp, rant, rank is more "correct", but we use /m, n, ŋ/ because it has more currency and is accessible to readers. Show us a source that consistently uses /əŋ/ for -‍ing, and only then can we start debating whether to adopt it in our articles. Nardog (talk) 13:25, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

@Nardog: Bolinger's Intonation and Its Parts: Melody in Spoken English may be what we're looking for, but I'd have to recheck it to be sure.

I know, but the /ɪ/ in battleship doesn't vary with /ə/ like the second vowel of tripping and writing does (when the g is dropped). Also, don't forget that -ing is an inflectional suffix and as such it's expected to contain a weak vowel. We seem to have a WP:DUCK-like situation here. And sources can get things wrong, even the majority of sources. Jahr 'year' and ja 'yes' are homophonous as [jaː] for most speakers of German, yet pronunciation dictionaries distinguish them as [jaːɐ̯] (a non-IPA notation as neither [aːɐ̯] nor [aɐ̯] exist in German, AFAIK) vs. [jaː]. Sol505000 (talk) 14:09, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

So, back to my original argument: In the absence of explicitly-worded evidence either way, why aren't we just going with the transcription supported by 1) virtually all dictionaries as far as we know and 2) a majority of editors? Wolfdog (talk) 20:46, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

I just reverted a mistaken change to the pronunciation of Natchitoches, Louisiana where the edit summary was saying to not assume a weak vowel merger. The existing pronunciation given was more representative of how the city's name is pronounced than the edit. Carter (talk) 17:00, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

@Tcr25: If speakers who don't have the weak vowel merger pronounce the second vowel as /ɪ/ then the revert was unjustified, per MOS:DIAPHONEMIC. Sol505000 (talk) 07:58, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

@Sol505000:, Natchitoches is a Caddo word that came into English as a place name through French. The pronunciation is sourced to a WP:RS. To insist MOS:DIAPHONEMIC and a different transcription (absent a more relevant WP:RS) falls into WP:OR. Carter (talk) 14:06, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

@Tcr25: Not if it can be proven that speakers without the merger use /ɪ/ in that word. I'll check the sources I usually consult. Sol505000 (talk) 14:31, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

@Sol505000:, the sources should also be more relevant. I'd note that MOS:DIAPHONEMIC does state "Local pronunciations are of particular interest in the case of place names." Carter (talk) 15:01, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

(Massively delayed, so I'm not pinging). We specifically do *not* transcribe the weak vowel merger on Wikipedia. Transcribing "Lenin" as /ˈlɛnən/ is simply wrong according to Help:IPA/English (it's not a "local pronunciation" like /təˈmeɪtoʊ/ vs. /təˈmɑːtoʊ/), which our transcriptions link to and therefore should agree with per MOS:LEADPRON. Sol505000 (talk) 01:31, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Rather you should point to the last paragraph of Help:IPA/English#Dialect variation. MOS:DIAPHONEMIC was understandably confusing, so I just added a note there. Nardog (talk) 01:44, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Northern Ireland and Black Country

We could mention here that in many broad conservative varieties of the Black Country dialect ‘meat’ has a long e unlike ‘meet’ and I’ve heard some odd short vowels in Northern Ireland, such as ‘pen’ sounding like ‘pan’ to me (as an Englishman) and of course some of the Protestants there famously say ‘flag’ as ‘fleg’. Overlordnat1 (talk) 22:19, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

Happy tensing attested by linguists as early as 1780 with no mention in this article.

I am not into orthoepy and am not in possession of any works on linguistics, but I noticed that there is evidence of all three realisations of the happY vowel in some of the earliest English pronouncing dictionaries: Kenrick (1773) gives [ɪ], Sheridan (1780) gives [i] as distinct from both [ɪ] and [iː], whilst Walker (1791) gives [iː]. Ergo, the statement that it had not been mentioned by linguists until the early XX century seems false – and by quite a margin; not being very confident in the field, I hope someone with better access to writings on English phonology might be able to find some more information on this topic and perhaps improve the section. Walker. --Maciuf (talk) 12:56, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

References

Scottish

Never mind the far far rarer Scottish (and Kiwi and South African) variant ‘fush and chups’, why no mention here of the standard Scottish pronunciation (which I would personally say is more common in Glasgow and Ayrshire than elsewhere) of ‘fesh and cheps’? Overlordnat1 (talk) 07:23, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Examples of ‎Pin–pen merger and ‎Weak vowel merger

Should every example be sourced? With recent additions the tables are looking strange, with peculiar examples like Lemmy || Limmy, Seine || sin, seraph || serif, Stata'd || started and Lennon || Lenin. IMO examples should include common words, not names or smth like 'Stata'd' (what does it even mean?). Artem.G (talk) 07:47, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

Stata’d looks like nonsense to me as not only can I find no evidence that Stata can be used as a verb, or what it would mean if it were used that way, but the pronunciation we have for the first syllable of Stata isn’t one that many people would use for the first syllable of started in any case. By all means delete the offending example from this article. Overlordnat1 (talk) 09:45, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

I strongly feel that xamples of words that become homophones under merger should be a handful of illustrative examples involving common words, not exhaustive lists of every pair of words or pseudowords that could become confusable. AJD (talk) 14:15, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for comments! I removed some examples as discussed, abd added few sources. Feel free to trim the tables, if you think some entries are wrong. Artem.G (talk) 09:14, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

Rosa's

Surely you mean Rose's here? 142.205.202.71 (talk) 17:32, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

No. Nardog (talk) 22:13, 2 July 2023 (UTC)