Linguistics Fridays: Hietpas, Howell and Moquin on English sound change

Preview presentation of their work to be presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Dialect Society, January 2024.

Final stop aspiration: A Norwegian-English feature in Wisconsin English?

Laura Moquin, Nordic PhD student, UW–Madison

In English, final release of [p^h], [t^h] and [k^h] is optional, but in Norwegian, it is required. This study considers final stop aspiration as a possible example of phonetic transfer from Norwegian in the English of Western Wisconsin, an area known for its substantial Norwegian American presence. Data come from in-person recorded interviews with 16 English monolinguals. Aspiration periods after final stops were measured for duration in Praat (Boersma & Weenink 2022) and analyzed for frequency per speaker. Preliminary results indicate that multiple speakers exhibit this feature at a higher frequency than what is expected in American English (Davidson 2011). 

Which witch?: The merger of /ʍ/ and /w/ over time

Rachyl Hietpas and Norah Howell, Linguistics PhD and undergraduate students, UW–Madison

This study provides a diachronic look at the merger of /ʍ/ and /w/, which has until now only been studied synchronically. We examine recordings from two time periods separated by 30+ years from two dialect regions of American English, the southeast, previously noted to maintain the distinction, and the Midwest, previously noted to merge. We find that /ʍ/ usage has decreased over time and region correlates with usage. Southeastern speakers pronounced a higher proportion of <wh> words with /ʍ/ compared to Midwestern speakers in both time periods but had a larger decrease in /ʍ/ use between time periods.