Is Canadian English in Saskatchewan Becoming More American

Bibliographic Data

ID8727233
AuthorsJudith A Nylvek (corresponding author)
Year1992
Volume67
Issue3
Pages268-268
Publication date1992-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Speech (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-1283 • E-ISSN: 1527-2133
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/455564
OpenAlexW2312869108
LanguageEN
Citations received10

DURING THE PAST FOUR DECADES, research has revealed that, in many respects, Canadian English is a unique combination of language features found in both British and American English (McConnell 1979, 3; Avis 1956, 55). As a result of its settlement history and geographic location, Canada has ties to both the United States and Britain (Scargill 1974, 13), and often, Canadian English exhibits pronunciations and lexical variants associated with both British and American English (Scargill and Warkentyne 1972; Nylvek 1984). Avis (1956, 48) noted divided usage of the British diphthong /ju/ and the American monophthong /u/ among Ontario speakers of Canadian English. His study revealed that the British variant was preferred for some words, such as Tuesday, news, and dew, while the American variant was preferred for others, such as due and student (48). Scargill (1955, 28-29) found in his research in Alberta that the majority of the speakers in his sample displayed a predominantly American preference for the pronunciations of eleven selected words while a third of the sample preferred neither, but chose to use the American pronunciation for some words and the British for others. The data from The Survey of Canadian English also indicated that there was evidence of divided usage for some of the dependent variables examined (Scargill and Warkentyne 1972), revealing that the students often tended to prefer the American variants while the parents preferred the British variants (Warkentyne 1971, 195). Scargill (1974, 13) has asserted that this state of divided usage cannot continue for long, and research indicates that there is a definite tendency toward preference for American pronunciations (Scargill 1955; Warkentyne 1971; Nylvek 1984). The purpose of this paper is to examine data collected in Saskatchewan and study the distribution of responses for ten words which exhibit divided pronunciations in Canadian English. The hypothesis, then, is that younger speakers use pronunciations associated with American English to a greater degree than older speakers.' The words which have been studied, along with their respective American and British pronunciations, are either (/idor/ /aybar/), lever (/levar/ /livor/), lieutenant (/lutenant/ /leftenont/), missile (/misol/ /misajl/), schedule (/sk-/ /J-/), semi(/semaj/ /semi/), the letter z (/zi/-/zed/), new (/nu/ /nju/), student (/studont/ /stjudont/)

Geography · Political science · Lexicography and Language Studies · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Spanish Linguistics and Language Studies · History

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