Usually, unrounding to /ʌ/ did not occur if /ʊ/ was preceded by a labial consonant, such as /p/, /f/, /b/, or was followed by /l/, /ʃ/, or /tʃ/, leaving the modern /ʊ/. The origin of the split is the unrounding of /ʊ/ in Early Modern English, resulting in the phoneme /ʌ/. In Welsh English, the split is also absent in parts of North Wales under influence from Merseyside and Cheshire accents and in the south of Pembrokeshire, where English overtook Welsh long before that occurred in the rest of Wales. The split occurs in most varieties of English, the most notable exceptions being most of Northern England and the English Midlands and some varieties of Hiberno-English. The FOOT– STRUT split is the split of Middle English short /u/ into two distinct phonemes: /ʊ/ (as in foot) and /ʌ/ (as in strut). For some speakers in Northern England, words ending in -ook that have undergone shortening to /ʊ/ elsewhere, such as book and cook, still have the long /uː/ vowel.įOOT– STRUT split The vowel of the word sun in England Still other words, such as roof, hoof, and root, are variable, with some speakers preferring /uː/ and others preferring /ʊ/ in such words, such as in Texan English. Other words that underwent shortening later consistently have /ʊ/, such as good and foot. In a few of those words, notably blood and flood, the shortening happened early enough that the resulting /ʊ/ underwent the " foot–strut split" (see next section) and are now pronounced with /ʌ/. In a handful of words, some of which are very common, the vowel /uː/ was shortened to /ʊ/. The short /o/ remaining in words like lot has also been lowered and, in some accents, unrounded (see open back vowels). (Similarly, short /i/ has become /ɪ/.) According to Roger Lass, the laxing occurred in the 17th century, but other linguists have suggested that it may have taken place much earlier. During the Great Vowel Shift, Middle English long /oː/ was raised to /uː/ in words like moon Middle English long /uː/ was diphthongised, becoming the present-day /aʊ/, as in mouse and Middle English /ɔː/ of nose was raised and later diphthongized, leading to present-day /oʊ ~ əʊ/.Īt some point, short /u/ developed into a lax, near-close near-back rounded vowel, /ʊ/, as found in words like put. The Middle English open syllable lengthening caused short /o/ to be mostly lengthened to /ɔː/ (an opener back vowel) in open syllables, a development that can be seen in words like nose. Generally, the Middle English vowels descended from the corresponding Old English ones, but there were certain alternative developments. The short vowels were still written ⟨u⟩ and ⟨o⟩, but long /uː/ came to be spelt as ⟨ou⟩, and /oː/ as ⟨oo⟩. The same four vowels existed in the Middle English system. There was also a pair of back vowels of mid-height, /o/ and /oː/, both of which were written ⟨o⟩ (the longer vowel is often ⟨ō⟩ in modern editions). The Old English vowels included a pair of short and long close back vowels, /u/ and /uː/, both written ⟨u⟩ (the longer vowel is often distinguished as ⟨ū⟩ in modern editions of Old English texts). This article discusses the history of these vowels in various dialects of English, focusing in particular on phonemic splits and mergers involving these sounds. The STRUT vowel /ʌ/, which historically was back, is often central as well. Most dialects of modern English have two close back vowels: the near-close near-back rounded vowel /ʊ/ found in words like foot, and the close back rounded vowel /uː/ (realized as central in many dialects) found in words like goose. For the distinction between, / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
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