Canadian slang

"aboot" insted of "about"

it's more like Valley Girl / RP ''a boat'' than ''a boot'' ;)
Canadian raising is not obligatory in Canadian English.
Most men in British Columbia prefer the General American pronunciation of these words...BC women prefer the raised pronunciation, but it may be the CBC tv influence, women like watching TV ;)

''I was surprised during my first visits to British Columbia in the early 1970's how many British Columbians were fond of California and even claimed to have relatives living there.''

not only people from BC, but people from all parts of Canada LOVE California, Californian accent, Californian slang/expressions... go figure

>>That's not entirely accurate. Here in Ontario, the vowel in 'about' (and other words with /aU/ before voiceless consonants) is [EU]; it sounds sort of like 'ew'. The only part of Canada where I've heard of non-obligatory Canadian Raising is Vancouver (not counting Newfoundland, which has a completely different accent than the rest of Canada).<<

Actually, [EU] is rather close to the pronunciation that some younger people have for /o/ here, which is actually more like [8}] or more extremely [9Y]. I myself actually sporadically have this pronunciation, in alternation with the [o] more typical of the dialect here, while my (younger) sister has it more frequently than myself. Most people here don't seem to have this pronunciation, even though I know at least one person from here who has it has their primary pronunciation of /o/,

in California, both MOUSE and LOUSY have [AEu], AE is {, the vowel in General American ''black, track, fast''

>>There is a similar pronunciation [8U] that occurs here, though I don't think the off-glide is ever fronted. I think most speakers here have [o] pre-consonantally, with varying amounts of diphthongisation in open syllables.<<

This sort of pronunciation seems relatively common in the English-speaking world overall, with slight differences (for example, California English has the fronting but lacks the offglide). General American lacks such fronting, for the most part, but even then its [oU] is fronter than, say, Standard German [o:]. The dialect here is actually rather atypical in that it traditionally has an [o] or, word-finally for some in more careful speech, [oU] which is probably further back than the General American [oU] (and only very slightly fronted relatively to Standard German [o:]). (The presence of [8}] or [9Y] in speech here seems to be a relatively recent innovation or borrowed feature which has not spread throughout the general population yet.)

<<I've also read reports about how many people in Western Canada feel closer to western U.S. Cities like Denver, Las Vegas and Los Angeles (Honolulu?) than they do to eastern Canadian cities like Toronto, Ottowa and Montreal). >>

That's so true!
I'm from Ontario and I feel much closer to new york and detoit and other major north eastern US cities than I do to the provinces in both the west and east. I read about some study that showed how different parts of Canada relate to different parts of the US better than they do other provinces in Canada because of the vast range of climate and lifestyles. like the west relates to denver, vegas an LA and ontario (and im sure others) relate to detroit and new york and places like PEI and newfoundland relate more to maine and rhode island. it's kinda cool actually. i dont know about quebec... it's like a whole different world over there... i mean that in the best way possible lol

*I'm from Ontario and I feel much closer to new york and detoit*

but you cannot hide your -valley girl in fargo- accent