Maguire

The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Tyneside English Origin, Status and ‘Reversal’ : The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Tyneside English Origin, Status and ‘Reversal’ Warren Maguire University of Newcastle w.n.maguire@ncl.ac.uk www.students.ncl.ac.uk/w.n.maguire www.ncl.ac.uk/necte


Overview : Overview Introduction to the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ The origin and history of the ‘Merger’ Sociolinguistic analysis of the ‘Merger’ Conclusions


What is a Merger? : What is a Merger? What constitutes a merger? Is a merger the property of individuals, of speech communities, or of a language? Can a merger be restricted? (geographically, historically, socially, etc.) Can a merger be variable?


Traditional Geordie Joke : Traditional Geordie Joke Geordie hurts his knee and decides to go and see the doctor about it. He says to the doctor “Doctor, A’ve gorra bad knee.” The doctor examines Geordie’s knee and sees that it’s badly swollen. The doctor says to Geordie “How bad is it? Can you walk?” Geordie looks at the doctor and says “Work? Wey, A can hardly waak man!”   (adapted from Viereck 1966)


The “NURSE/NORTH Merger”(Wells 1982) : The “NURSE/NORTH Merger” (Wells 1982) “In the broadest Geordie the lexical set NURSE is merged with NORTH, /ɔː/: work [wɔːk], first [fɔːst], shirt [ʃɔːt] (= short). What is elsewhere a central vowel has undergone backing through the influence of /r/ [ʁ] which once followed.” (p.374) “It is the effect of uvular /r/ on a preceding vowel which has historically given rise to forms such as [bɔːʁdz] birds, [wɔːʁmz] worms in Northumberland: the [ʁ] has not only coalesced with the vowel, making it uvularized, but has also caused it to be retracted from central to back.” (pp.369-370)


History of the NURSE and NORTH Lexical Sets : History of the NURSE and NORTH Lexical Sets NURSE is derived from the historical sets NURSE, BIRTH, SERVE NORTH is derived from the historical sets FORCE, NORTH Note that eME /ɛr/ and lME /ɛr/ develop differently (DARK and SERVE respectively)


The Northumbrian ‘Burr’ : The Northumbrian ‘Burr’ [FM] Oh aye well them's all on the charts. All them marks is all on the charts for guiding ships. The Longstone Light, Longstone Lighthouse, [Int] Oh aye. [FM] and the Inner Farne [Int] Aye. [FM] And then the Stag Rock that's only the three lights that flashes [Int] Aye [FM] round about Holy Island round about this coast.


‘Burr-Modification’ : ‘Burr-Modification’ Uvulars are known to cause lowering and retraction cross-linguistically c.f. German diese [diːzə] vs. dieser [diːzɐ] “The Northumbrian /r/ is a uvular fricative [ʁ], which, as well as being produced at the back of the mouth, involves lip-rounding ... It is therefore to be expected that the Northumbrian [ʁ] will have even more backing and lip-rounding power than the [r] of R.P.” (Beal 1985: 41-42) Limits of ‘Burr’ and ‘Merger’ very similar, but not quite the same


Geography : Geography Distribution of the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ Distribution of the Burr (Påhlsson 1972)


Chronology of the ‘Merger’ : Chronology of the ‘Merger’ Found in dialect poetry and song throughout the 19th century Consistently recorded in traditional dialect from the end of the 19th century and throughout most of the 20th century (Ellis (1889), Wright (1905), the Orton Corpus (1928-1939) and the SED (1962-1971) Can still be heard fairly regularly in Northumberland and Tyneside today, particularly in the speech of older working class males


19th Century Evidence for the “NURSE/NORTH Merger” : 19th Century Evidence for the “NURSE/NORTH Merger” “The Newcastle Signs” (Cecil Pitt, 1806): The Three Kings and Unicorn, Bull’s Head, and Horse, Would prove, that the farther they went they’d fare worse. “The Glister” (William Armstrong, 1823) Thou mun run for a docter, the forst can be fund, For maw belly’s a’ rang, an’ aw’m varry fast bund. Ellis (1889): South Shields (AA´) = [ɔ̞ːə] in bird, church, corn, dirty, fir, first, fore, horn, lord, score, scourge, shirt, sword, third, thirty, turn, word, world, worm, worse


The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Traditional NbTE in the 20th Century : The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Traditional NbTE in the 20th Century Peripheral Nhb appears to preserve more archaic variants ME /ɛr/ (both SERVE and DARK) is represented by [ɑː] in NbTE, but only SERVE may have [ɔː] This follows the same division of ME /ɛr/ found in StE


Orton’s Suggestion : Orton’s Suggestion “The current vernaculars in the county [Northumberland] are not necessarily pure. It is indeed beyond question that they have been corrupted to a large extent by extraneous influences, and that they have absorbed a great deal from Standard English in the course of the last four or five centuries.” (Orton 1937:128) Orton suggests that [ɔː] in BIRTH and SERVE words (at least) is not “the true native development”, but is rather “of non-native origin”


Developing Orton’s Suggestion : Developing Orton’s Suggestion ME /ɛr/ only becomes [ɔː] in NbTE where /ɛr/ becomes [ɜː] in StE. Where StE has [ɑː] for ME /ɛr/, so does NbTE Hence, [ɔː] in SERVE (and perhaps BIRTH) appears to be derived from borrowing of early non-local /ər/ which, due to ‘Burr-Modification’, changed as follows: /ər/ > [əʁ] > [ɔʁ] > [ɔːʁ] > [ɔː] c.f. the change of lettER: /ər/ > [əʁ] > [ɔʁ] > [ɔʁ] ([ʚ])


An Irish English Origin for the “NURSE/NORTH Merger”? : An Irish English Origin for the “NURSE/NORTH Merger”? “The retraction of the NURSE vowel in T[yneside]E[nglish] may be a similar reflex to that found in some forms of Irish English (indeed, [ɔɹ] is stereotypical in Irish pronunciations of words like sir and thirty).” (Watt 1998:123)


Evidence for a ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Irish English : Evidence for a ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in Irish English William Dean Howells’s “An Imperative Duty” (1891): the word ‘sir’ is represented as sor and ‘first’ appears as forst in the speech of the Irish manservant Macafee (1996): bird/bord, burn/born (vb.), church/chorch, dirt/dort, further/ford(h)er, turf/torf, urchin/orchin


Assessing the Likelihood of Irish English Influence : Assessing the Likelihood of Irish English Influence When/Time: does an explanation based on Irish English influence fit with the known chronology of the linguistic feature and of Irish immigration to the area? Where/Place: does the geographical distribution of the linguistic feature fit with the geographical distribution of Irish immigration? What/Manner: was the linguistic feature in question a feature of Irish English?


NURSE and NORTH Lexical Sets in Irish English : NURSE and NORTH Lexical Sets in Irish English


Modern Tyneside English : Modern Tyneside English “In a less broad Newcastle accent, NURSE words have [ɜː] or something similar, e.g. rounded centralised-front [øː]. It appears that no hyper-correction of the type short *[ʃøːt] occurs: either the merger of NURSE and NORTH was never categorical, or speakers are unusually successful in sorting the two sets out again.” (Wells 1982: 375)


Data from the PVC (Watt and Milroy 1999) : Data from the PVC (Watt and Milroy 1999)


Summary of the PVC Data : Summary of the PVC Data “The distribution of the retracted variant [ɔː] among male speakers (it is hardly used at all by women) suggests that it is recessive; it is chiefly associated with older WC men” (p.39) The front pronunciation [øː] is particularly common in the speech of younger females Appears to confirms Wells’s statement, but has there been a reversal of the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’?


Can Mergers Be Reversed? : Can Mergers Be Reversed? “It is generally agreed that mergers are irreversible: once a merger, always a merger.” (Labov 1994: 311) “Given the right social conditions, it is reasonable to think that a distinction can be reintroduced into a speech community in a consistent way.” (Labov 1994: 342) “Some frequency of hypercorrect forms is thus inevitable among those trying to learn a phonemic distinction not native to their own dialect.” (Labov 1994: 312)


Watt (1998) : Watt (1998) Reversal of the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ has occurred due to dialect contact, in this case with higher status forms of English within the same speech community, which had not merged the NURSE and NORTH lexical sets


The Tyneside Linguistic Survey : The Tyneside Linguistic Survey 86 surviving interviews recorded in Gateshead in 1970. The projected sample size was 150, but it is not known how many of these interviews were ever carried out. Speakers are identified by codes, e.g. G052 Originally planned as a random stratified sample with extra speakers hand-picked from higher status areas to provide a greater coverage of non-localised speech types Now forms part of NECTE corpus (www.ncl.ac.uk/necte)


Analysis of the TLS : Analysis of the TLS Primarily an auditory analysis, with some supporting acoustic analysis The research presented here analyses tokens for 70 speakers All NURSE and NORTH tokens have been analysed, except for those words in which the vowel is final, and a number of weak forms such as of-course and sort-of


Social Make-up of the Sample : Social Make-up of the Sample


Numbers of Tokens : Numbers of Tokens Total number of tokens = 3510 Total NURSE tokens = 2316 Total NORTH tokens = 1194 Average NURSE tokens per speaker = 33 Average NORTH tokens per speaker = 17


The NURSE Vowel : The NURSE Vowel Massive variation, both between speakers, and within the speech of individuals It varies from a back mid round vowel to a front mid vowel (round or unrounded), and everything in between G216: It tends to get worse than dirt and I still watch it. G044: It was one of the dirtiest places I’ve been in, and the method they had of working was one of the worst.


The NORTH Vowel : The NORTH Vowel Less variation than for the NURSE vowel Typically a mid back round vowel (e.g. [ɔː]), or a centralised mid back rounded vowel (e.g. [ɔ̈ː]) G054: Oh aye, sometimes, I use a lot of Geordie expressions. I don’t speak a lot of Geordie, you know. G323: I always say I was born a century too late.


Phonetic Parameters : Phonetic Parameters Frontness/backness seems to be the most significant factor in the variation of the NURSE and NORTH vowels Height appears to be less important Roundness is potentially significant for central and front variants of the NURSE vowel, but I do not discuss it here Length and other features, such as rhoticity, have not been analysed


Front/Back Scale : Front/Back Scale As a result, all NURSE and NORTH vowels are classified on a discrete scale from front to back: F - Front e.g. [ɛː] cF - Central front e.g. [ø̈ː] C - Central e.g. [ǝː] cB - Central back e.g. [ɔ̈ː] B - Back e.g. [ɔː]


Social Motivation for Variation in the NURSE Vowel : Social Motivation for Variation in the NURSE Vowel Gender: striking difference between the frequency of the various pronunciations for males and females Age: younger speakers (from 17-30) have fewer back variants of the NURSE vowel Socio-economic status: back variants of the NURSE vowel are restricted to speakers with a lower socio-economic status


Social Motivation for Variation in the NORTH Vowel : Social Motivation for Variation in the NORTH Vowel Gender: no obvious gross difference between males and females Age: there doesn’t appear to be any obvious age effect Socio-economic status: young middle class females appear to use more B variants, whilst cB is more frequent in the speech of their working class counterparts


Merger or Non-merger? : Merger or Non-merger? Given the degree of variation in the NURSE and NORTH vowels, what is the status of the reported ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ in the TLS corpus? Was the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ a near merger? If it was a merger, how has it been reversed?


Non-merger (individual speakers) : Non-merger (individual speakers)


Merger or Near-merger (individual speakers) : Merger or Near-merger (individual speakers)


Between Merger and Non-merger(individual speakers) : Between Merger and Non-merger (individual speakers)


Summary of the TLS Data : Summary of the TLS Data 43 speakers (61.5%) – no merger; 8 speakers (11.5%) – merger or near merger; 19 speakers (27%) – some overlap of the NURSE and NORTH lexical sets The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ was indeed a merger (in production at least) for some speakers in the TLS The ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ is characteristic of older working class males. Greatest phonetic differentiation of the two lexical sets is characteristic of young middle class females


Is the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ a Merger? : Is the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ a Merger? Depends what we mean by ‘merger’ NURSE and NORTH are pronounced the same by some speakers We do not know how these speakers perceive the two lexical sets Many speakers in the community do not pronounce NURSE and NORTH the same, or at least only do so some of the time The ‘Merger’ is restricted geographically, socially and historically


Has the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ Been Reversed? : Has the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ Been Reversed? Depends what we mean by ‘merger’ Since it is well reported historically, but largely restricted to WC males in the TLS and older WC males in the PVC, it appears that the ‘merger’ is being lost, i.e. reversed There is some evidence for hypercorrection of NORTH (i.e. centralised pronunciations), but on a narrower phonetic scale than suggested by Wells


What is a Merger? : What is a Merger? The term ‘merger’ covers a range of different phenomena, from complete collapse of a phonetic/phonological distinction within a language, to partial, or even variable, loss of phonetic/phonological distinctions, restricted geographically, historically and socially If a merger must be complete within a language, then the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ is not a merger. If the term ‘merger’ encompasses partial or variable loss of distinctions, restricted geographically, historically and socially, then the ‘NURSE/NORTH Merger’ is as good a candidate for merger as any other


Warren and Hay (2004) : Warren and Hay (2004) “Since the merger is ongoing within the community at large, it is inevitable that our participants will have encountered both merged and non-merged systems … part of this experience involves developing knowledge (explicit or implicit) of the kinds of speakers who do or do not have a merged system. As a consequence of their experiences, our participants have developed something of a hybrid system, where their own merged production system exists alongside a perceptual system that is sensitive to characteristics of the speaker.” (p. 26)