Social and linguistic aspects of Durham (eː)

Abstract

Like many vocalic variables which have been described for other varieties of English, Durham (eː) is correlated with a range of factors, some linguistic, others non-linguistic; in this paper, some of these correlations are presented, (eː) is one of three ‘long’ or ‘tense’ vowels which are variably realized as pure monophthongs or as opening or centring diphthongs; it is represented by words of the lexical set gate, wait, day, etc. The other two vowels are (oː), which occurs in words such as bone, goat and toe, and (ɔː), which occurs in torn, shore, etc., and variably in such items as law, walk and all (in which it alternates with /ɑː/). These three vowels probably show rather similar patterns of variation; however, in this study only (eː) will be considered.