for speakers from Western and Central Canada. Note that and are indistinguishable and that and are very open. • Vowel length is a secondary phonemic feature of tense vowels in Canadian English, with the lowered variant of /ɛ/ and the
tense variant of /æ/ being distinguished entirely by length for some speakers • The phonemes (as in
boat) and (as in
bait) behave as
monophthongs phonologically, and are often pronounced as such, especially in the
Prairie Provinces.
Back vowel fronting The onset of unraised is usually low central , though it may be fronted before nasals. usually remains backed , unlike the fronted values found in the
South, the
Midland or
California. That said, fronted pronunciations of may exist for some younger speakers. In addition, some younger speakers front and lower . Unlike most
Northern American English, /u/ is generally fronted in Canadian English. In Victoria, where the historical distinction between post-coronal and is often maintained, the latter may be so front as to gain a -like onglide.
Low-back merger Almost all Canadians have the
cot–caught merger, which also occurs primarily in the Western United States but also often elsewhere in the country, especially recently. Few Canadians distinguish the vowels in
cot and
caught, which merge as (more common in Western and central Canada) or (more common in the Maritimes and eastern mainland Canada in which it can even be fronted). Speakers with the merger often fail to hear the difference when speakers without the merger, such as
General American (GenAm) and
Inland Northern American English, pronounce the vowels. The merger has existed in Canada for several generations. Some speakers may not exhibit the merger, especially older speakers and those living in rural areas or in the Prairies. The standard pronunciation of (as in
start) is , as in GenAm, or perhaps somewhat fronted as . As with Canadian raising, the advancement of the raised nucleus can be a regional indicator. A striking feature of Atlantic Canadian speech (in the
Maritime Provinces and
Newfoundland) is a nucleus that approaches the front region of the vowel space; it is accompanied by a strong rhoticity ranging from to . Words such as
origin, Florida, horrible, quarrel, warren, as well as
tomorrow, sorry, sorrow, generally use the sound sequence of , rather than . The latter set of words often distinguishes Canadian from American pronunciation. In Standard Canadian English, there is
no distinction between horse and hoarse. Loanwords that have a low central vowel in their language of origin, such as
llama,
pasta, and
pyjamas, as well as place names like
Gaza and
Vietnam, tend to have , rather than (which includes the historical , and because of the father–bother and cot–caught mergers). That also applies to older loans like
drama or
Apache. The word
khaki is sometimes pronounced (or even ). The pronunciation of
drama with is in decline, and studies found that 83% of Canadians used in 1956, 47% in 1999, and 10% in 2012. More generally, younger speakers tend to use more than they did before, though there's still quite a bit of variation. Some words, including
plaza,
façade, and
lava will take a low central phone , possibly distinct from both and .
Canadian Shift The cot-caught merger creates a gap in the short vowel subsystem and triggers a sound change known as the
Canadian Shift, which involves the front lax vowels . The of
bat is lowered and retracted in the direction of except in some environments, as is noted below. Indeed, is farther back than in almost all other North American dialects, and the retraction of was independently observed in
Vancouver and is more advanced for Ontarians and for women than for people from the
Prairies and
Atlantic Canada and men. Then, and may be lowered (in the direction of and ) and/or retracted, but studies actually disagree on the trajectory of the shift. For example, Labov and others (2006) noted a backward and downward movement of in
apparent time in all of Canada except the Atlantic Provinces, but no movement of was detected. Therefore, in Canadian English, the short
a of
trap or
bath and the broad
ah quality of
spa or
lot are shifted oppositely from those of the
Northern Cities shift, which is found across the border in
Inland Northern American English, and is causing both dialects to diverge. In fact, the Canadian short-
a is very similar in quality to Inland Northern
spa or
lot. For example, the production would be recognized as
map in Canada but
mop in Inland Northern United States.
/æ/-raising Unlike many American English dialects, remains a low-front vowel in most environments in Canadian English. Raising along the front periphery of the vowel space is restricted to two environments, before nasal and voiced velar consonants, and even then varies regionally. Ontario and Maritime Canadian English often show some raising before nasals, but it is less extreme than in many American varieties. Much less raising is heard on the Prairies, and some ethnic groups in
Montreal show no pre-nasal raising at all. On the other hand, some speakers in the Prairies and British Columbia have raising of before voiced velars ( and , with an up-glide rather than an in-glide, such that
bag may almost rhyme with
vague. For most Canadian speakers, is also realized higher as before .
Canadian raising Perhaps the most recognizable feature of Canadian English is "
Canadian raising," which is found most prominently throughout central and west-central Canada and in parts of the
Atlantic Provinces. For the beginning points of the diphthongs (
gliding vowels) (as in the words
height and
mice) and (as in
shout and
house), the tongue is often more "
raised" than in other varieties of English in the mouth when the diphthongs are before
voiceless consonants: , , , , , and . Before voiceless consonants, becomes . One of the few phonetic variables that divides Canadians regionally is the articulation of the raised allophone of that and . In Ontario, it tends to have a mid-central or even mid-front articulation sometimes approaching , but in the West and the Maritimes, a more retracted sound is heard, which is closer to . For some speakers in the Prairies and in Nova Scotia, the retraction is strong enough to cause some tokens of raised to merge with ;
couch then merges with
coach, and both words
sound the same (). Also,
about then sounds like
a boat, which is often inaccurately represented as sounding like "a boot" for comic effect in
American popular culture. In GenAm,
out is typically , but with slight Canadian raising, it may sound more like , and with the strong Canadian raising of the Prairies and Nova Scotia, it may sound more like . Canadian raising makes words like
height and
hide have two different vowel qualities. Also, for example,
house as a noun (
I saw a house) and
house as a verb (
Where will you house them tonight?) can then have two different vowel qualities: and . Especially in parts of the Atlantic Provinces, some Canadians do not have Canadian raising. On the other hand, certain non-Canadian accents use Canadian raising. In the United States, it can be found in areas near the border in dialects in the
Upper Midwest,
Pacific Northwest, and
Northeastern New England (like
Boston) dialects, but Canadian raising is much less common than in Canada. The raising of alone is actually increasing throughout the United States and, unlike the raising of , is generally not perceived as unusual by people who do not exhibit the raising. Because of Canadian raising, many speakers can distinguish between words such as
writer and
rider, which can otherwise be pronounced the same in North American dialects, which typically turn both intervocalic and into an
alveolar flap. Thus,
writer and
rider are distinguished solely by their vowel characteristics as determined by Canadian raising, which causes a
split between
rider as and
writer as (). ==Phonemic incidence==