The existence of broad "a" in Boston

Here's the survey question:

E. When you say father and bother, do they rhyme, like feather and weather? Yes No

People who respond "No" to this question have the "New England broad a" (/a/, a low central vowel, the vowel in "park the car" as said by a Bostonian) in their dialect. For these speakers, /a/ is distinct from the low back vowel in "cot." (transcribed here as "A". They say [fath\] 'father' but [bAth\] 'bother', so they don't rhyme.

People who respond "Yes" have merged the two vowels and have only /A/. They say [fAth\] 'father' and [bAth\] 'bother', which rhyme.

The data

Virtually everyone who lives in the Boston area retains both vowels (said "no"), as do many speakers in western and northern NH. See MA Graph.

However, speakers in southeastern NH, the part of the state closest to Boston, are the most likely to have merged the two vowels (said "yes") -- making their dialect quite distinct from the Boston dialect. See NH Graph.

It is pretty clear that this merger is on the increase in southern NH when we compare old and young speakers:

	Percent UNMERGED (= like Boston)
	Older than 50	Younger than 50
Manchester area	100%	64%
Concord area	100%	42%

As time progresses, it appears that NH will resemble MA less and less in this respect. Here's a bit more on the topic.

Return to general discussion.

Please address questions or comments to Naomi Nagy. This page was last updated 6/14/05.