South-West Irish English
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South-West Irish English (also known as South-West Hiberno-English) is a class of broad varieties of English spoken in Ireland's South-West Region (the province of Munster). Within Ireland, the varieties are best associated with either the urban working class of the South-West or traditional rural Ireland in general, and they are popularly identified by their specific city or county, such as Cork English, Kerry English, or Limerick English.
Phonology
Among speakers in the South-West alone (famously Cork, Kerry, or Limerick), the vowel of {{sc2|DRESS}} raises to {{IPA|[ɪ]}} when before {{IPA|/n/}} or {{IPA|/m/}} (a pin–pen merger){{Harvcoltxt|Hickey|2007|p=313}} and sentences may show a unique intonation pattern. This intonation is a slightly higher pitch followed by a significant drop in pitch on stressed long-vowel syllables (across multiple syllables or even within a single one),{{Harvcoltxt|Hickey|2007|p=309}} which is popularly heard in rapid conversation, by other English-speakers, as an undulating "sing-song" quality.[http://www.englishireland.ie/english-courses-cork-ireland.htm "Learn English in Cork City & County"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171115152428/http://www.englishireland.ie/english-courses-cork-ireland.htm |date=15 November 2017 }}. Language Travel Ireland: Learn English by Living It. Language Travel Ireland, InnovationWorks, National Technology Park, Limerick, Ireland. 2010.
Among older speakers, {{IPA|/s/}} and {{IPA|/z/}} may respectively be pronounced as {{IPA|/ʃ/}} and {{IPA|/ʒ/}} before a consonant and so fist sounds like fished, castle like {{not a typo|cashle}}, and arrest like {{not a typo|arresht}}.Wells, John C. 1982. Accents of English: Volume 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 425.
Certain South-West features may also exist in Ireland outside that region but typically only in rural areas. An example is the backing, slight lowering, and perhaps rounding of {{sc2|MOUTH}} towards {{IPA|en|ɐʊ~ʌʊ~ɔʊ|generic=yes}}, so that, to a Dublin or General American speaker, about nears the sound of a boat. The consonants {{IPA|/θ/}} and {{IPA|/ð/}} (as in thick and those), which are typically dental in other Irish English varieties, are traditionally alveolar: {{IPAblink|t}} and {{IPAblink|d}}, respectively (thus, thick and those merge to the sound of tick and doze). {{sc2|GOAT}} and {{sc2|FACE}} are preserved as long monophthongs: {{IPAblink|o|oː}} and {{IPAblink|e|eː}}, respectively. Those varieties are all rhotic, like most other Irish accents, but the {{IPA|/r/}} sound is specifically a velarised alveolar approximant: {{IPA|[ɹˠ]}}.Hickey, Raymond (2007). Irish English: History and present-day forms. Cambridge University Press. pp. 14-15, 320. (Among some very traditional speakers, other possible {{IPA|/r/}} variants include a "tapped R", the alveolar tap {{IPAblink|ɾ|audio=y}}, or even a "uvular R", the voiced uvular fricative {{IPAblink|ʁ|audio=y}}, in rural south-central Ireland.Hickey, Raymond (1985). "[https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/44525934.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A8bec60486c61d4b7a275301d982eb95c R-Coloured vowels in Irish English]". Journal of the International Phonetic Association, Vol. 15, No. 2. p. 45.)
Features shared with both rural Irish English and working-class Dublin English include the vowels in {{sc2|LOT}}, {{sc2|CLOTH}}, {{sc2|NORTH}} and {{sc2|THOUGHT}} having a more open starting point and lacking a rounded quality: {{IPAblink|ä|ɑ~ä}}. Furthermore, for all of those varieties, {{sc2|PRICE}} and {{sc2|CHOICE}} may also lack a rounded quality, the lexical set {{sc2|START}} is very fronted ({{IPA|[æːɹ]}}), the {{IPA|/h/}} may be dropped before {{IPA|/j/}} (hue pronounced like you), a distinction remains between tern and turn,Hickey, 1985, p. 54. and
Grammar
South-West Irish English allows the use of a do be habitual aspect. Examples include I do be thinking about it or she does be late and replace Standard English constructions of those sentences: I think about it (often) or she is late (usually).Shimada, Tamami (2013). "[https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/760a/3a90faae7dc4019265bcc5829a6787812ce5.pdf The do be Form in Southwest Hiberno-English and its Linguistic Enquiries]". Tokyo University Linguistic Papers 33: 255-271.
Non-canonical constituent order is also possible, in which a sentence may be arranged as Thinking to steal a few eggs I was (rather than I was thinking to steal a few eggs) to give the first clause salience or emphasis.Shimada, Tamami (2010). "What grammatical features are more marked in Hiberno-English?: a survey of speakers’ awareness and its primary details." Bulletin of Graduate School of Social and Cultural Systems at Yamagata University 7: 8-10.
References
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Sources
- {{Cite book
|last=Hickey
|first=Raymond
|year=2007
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=p3vDuPNG7nUC
|title=Irish English: History and Present-Day Forms
|location=Cambridge, UK
|publisher=Cambridge University Press
|isbn=978-0-521-85299-9
}}
{{English dialects by continent}}
Category:Culture in County Cork
Category:Culture in County Kerry