Individual variation in allophonic processes of /t/ in Standard Southern British English

Abstract

According to many sociolinguistic studies, there is some inter-speaker variation that cannot be explained by differences in social factors such as age, socioeconomic class, geographical origin and gender or differences in contextual style. These inter-speaker differences would be more related to how an individual uses their language and how they express their identity in relation to their speech community (Johnstone 1996;Milroy & Milroy 1977, 1978. This view is particularly relevant for the field of forensic linguistics, in that it supports the premise that speakers show a particular combination of linguistic patterns that characterise their idiolectal style

Word-boundary glottalization and its cognitive aspects: A reaction-time study

“…In languages such as Hawaiian or Arabic, it is the primary allophone of the phoneme (Ladefoged & Maddieson, 1996;Maddieson, 1984), while in languages such as English or the Philippine language Ilokano, it is a regional or stylistic variant (Cruttenden, 2014;Olaya, 1967). Specifically, the oral plosive [t] (cat, later) in one accent of English may correspond to [ʔ] (glottalization) in other accents, or it may be conditioned by the environment or speaking style within one accent (see e.g., Fabricius, 2002;Gavaldà, 2016). Moreover, glottalization is often used as (2) a boundary signal of a lexical/grammatical unit, i.e., it has a demarcative function.…”

Phonetic variation of Irish English /t/ in the syllabic coda

“…The phonetic environment that is most conducive to the occurrence of flaps and taps is the coda of a stressed syllable or, in other words, the post-tonic position; the word water may be pronounced [»wç˘RÄ] and the phrase get it [»geRAIt]. The flap is one of the characteristic features of most American English (Boberg 2015) and also Australian English (Horvath 2004) varieties, but occurs also in Hawaiian Creole (Sakoda & Siegel 2004) and is reported by Hughes et al (2013) in several dialects of British English (in Leicester, Hull, Liverpool or Lancashire) and more recently even in Standard Southern British English (SSBE; Gavaldà, 2016). Most importantly for the purposes of the present study, flapped /t/ occurs in Irish English (Hickey 2004: 42;Kallen 2013: 52-57; see Section 1.2 below for more details).…”

“…Only twenty years later, Fabricius (2002) reports little difference between the use of glottalling between male and female speakers, hypothesizing that glottalling has lost (or is losing) its stigma; the receding of stigmatization is mentioned also by Hughes et al (2013: 67). More recently, Gavaldà (2016) shows T-glottaling to be quite frequent in speakers of SSBE and Schleef (2021) in London and Edinburgh. Though mostly associated with British English varieties, including ethnic varieties like British Creole (Patrick 2004) or London West Indian (Hughes et al 2013: 81), T-glottalling is attested in American English (Eddington & Channer 2010, Ostalski 2013, Seyfarth & Garellek 2020) and Australian English (Horvath 2004) as well, albeit to a much lesser extent.…”