Pronunciation of 'to' in today/tomorrow

Travis   Thu Dec 13, 2007 6:22 am GMT
Marc, obviously you have the California Vowel Shift. What is going on is that the vowel [A] has been backed all the way to [O] (which is actually rather extreme - I would not be surprised if it were actually [Q]) in the word "tomorrow" due to the CVS. It shouldbe remembered that California English is descended from NAE dialects which have [A] in words like "tomorrow" and "sorry".
Lazar   Thu Dec 13, 2007 6:33 am GMT
I doubt that that post above was written by Travis. Anyway, Marc, you said that /O/ contrasted with <ah>(=/A/) for you, so I don't doubt the phoneme you use there. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I've read of other Northern Californians who pronounce "tomorrow" in a similar way. It's just that this pronunciation definitely isn't predominant in the US.
Travis   Thu Dec 13, 2007 6:56 am GMT
>>I doubt that that post above was written by Travis. Anyway, Marc, you said that /O/ contrasted with <ah>(=/A/) for you, so I don't doubt the phoneme you use there. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I've read of other Northern Californians who pronounce "tomorrow" in a similar way. It's just that this pronunciation definitely isn't predominant in the US.<<

Actually, I did write that; I just missed the comment about there still being a contrast between /A/ and /O/ (ignoring the possibility for some very large shift from [{] to [A]). It was just that I associated a rounded vowel in "tomorrow" with Canadian and far northern US NAE dialects, so I figured that having a rounded vowel in that position in a California English dialect would have to be due to [A] > [Q] from the CVS.
Lazar   Thu Dec 13, 2007 7:39 am GMT
Okay, my bad.
Marc   Thu Dec 13, 2007 3:16 pm GMT
Actually, I perceive "Tomorrow" as having the "force" vowel ( [Or\] or [or\]), rather than the "father" vowel. I'm surprised that you say that the "father" vowel is predominant in the US, as I've only heard people use the "force" vowel. Outside of this area, I've traveled to Boulder, Colorado; Seattle, Washington; and Fargo, North Dakota, and I've only ever heard people use the "force" vowel in "tomorrow". So it leads me to believe that that is the most common version in the US. It surprises me that Wisconsin uses the "father" vowel.
Travis   Thu Dec 13, 2007 3:35 pm GMT
Actually, I should say something here that might be the reason why. I have noticed that it is not uncommon for NAE dialects these days to have the shift A > Q / _ r, aside from things like the CVS and the cot-caught merger. This is not entirely consistent, though; for instance, my own dialect from the West Side of the Milwaukee area preserves the FATHER vowel [A] as is before /r/, whereas that on the South Side frequently merges it with the COUGHT vowel [Q] (but *not* the NORTH/FORCE vowel [O], with which it stays distinct), despite their overall proximity.

I know of no actual words merged as a result of this at least here, because there are very few instances of /Qr/ in the dialect here. The only cases of /Qr/ here that I can think of are "already", "alright", and for some "sorry", due to the elision of /l/, but even these words seem to very frequently be shifted in the case of "already" and "alright", either to [AR] or [OR].

Even still, no merger between the FATHER/COUGHT and NORTH/FORCE vowels is occurring here. The only thing I can think of is that you simply do not perceive a difference between [Q], [O], and [o] before [r\] due to lacking a phoneme system which distinguishes such and not having trained yourself to hear the difference.
Travis   Thu Dec 13, 2007 3:46 pm GMT
>>(but *not* the NORTH/FORCE vowel [O], with which it stays distinct), despite their overall proximity.<<

should be:

>>(but *not* the NORTH/FORCE vowel [O], with which it stays distinct, despite their overall proximity).<<

and

>>but even these words seem to very frequently be shifted in the case of "already" and "alright", either to [AR] or [OR].<<

should be:

>>but even this seems to very frequently be shifted in the case of "already" and "alright", either to [AR] or [OR], and the use of /Qr/ in "sorry" is a compromise between the more dialect-native /Or/ in "sorry" and General American /Ar/ in "sorry".<<
Lazar   Thu Dec 13, 2007 4:23 pm GMT
<<Outside of this area, I've traveled to Boulder, Colorado; Seattle, Washington; and Fargo, North Dakota, and I've only ever heard people use the "force" vowel in "tomorrow".>>

I don't know about Boulder, but Seattle and Fargo are both areas where use of the FORCE vowel would be expected. From what I've read, the use of the FORCE vowel is predominant in the Pacific Northwest, and I think it probably would be predominant in North Dakota. I'm not sure about Colorado, but I think I've also read of some people from the Rocky Mountain area who do use the FORCE vowel there. But these three places are hardly a representative sample of the US. If you went to the Midlands or the South or the Northeast or the core NCVS area, you would hear people using the FATHER vowel.
Travis   Thu Dec 13, 2007 4:28 pm GMT
>>I don't know about Boulder, but Seattle and Fargo are both areas where use of the FORCE vowel would be expected. From what I've read, the use of the FORCE vowel is predominant in the Pacific Northwest, and I think it probably would be predominant in North Dakota. I'm not sure about Colorado, but I think I've also read of some people from the Rocky Mountain area who do use the FORCE vowel there. But these three places are hardly a representative sample of the US. If you went to the Midlands or the South or the Northeast or the core NCVS area, you would hear people using the FATHER vowel.<<

I was not surprised by the NORTH/FORCE vowel being used in "tomorrow" in Seattle and Fargo myself, but the two case which made me wonder was Boulder. I really had not heard of the use of NORTH/FORCE in words like "tomorrow" extending that far south in that area myself.