Encyclopedia > Canadian raising

  Article Content

Canadian raising

Canadian raising is a phonetic phenomenon that occurs in varities of the English language, especially Canadian English, in which diphthongs are "raised" before voiceless consonants (e.g., /p/, /t/, /k/, /s/, /f/). For example, /aI/ (the vowel of "eye") and /aU/ (the vowel of "loud") become /^I/ and /^U/, respectively, the /a/ (as in "father") component of the diphthong going from a low vowel to the mid vowel /^/ (as in "up"). As /^U/ sounds similar to /oU/ (as in "road), the Canadian pronunciation of "about the house" may sound like *"a boat the hoas" to non-Canadians. Some stand-up and situation comedians exaggerate this to *"aboot the hoos" for comic effect.

Despite its name, the phenomenon is not restricted to Canada. The example above deals with the /aU/ diphthong, but, as noted, the /aI/ diphthong can be affected as well. So, whereas the General American pronunciations of "rider" and "writer" are identical (/raId@r/), those whose dialects include Canadian raising will pronounce them as /raId@r/ and /r^Id@r/, respectively. It is this raising of /aI/ which can be found in the United States, especially in the Pacific Northwest.

External links



All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License

 
  Search Encyclopedia

Search over one million articles, find something about almost anything!
 
 
  
  Featured Article
Grand Prix

... ...

 
 
 
This page was created in 21.4 ms