2.2 Drawl

Among linguists, drawl is typically thought of as an addition to a monophthong of one or more of the following: length, glides, or a drop in amplitude or pitch during the vowel (Habick 1980; Feagin 1986). The result of the last may be the impression of an added syllable, as in the folk transcription “cayut” for cat. Drawl was chosen due to its assumed salience for listeners and its long-established association with Southern speech. Ash (2003, 62) discusses the fact that, for reasons of vowel plot aesthetics, researchers often simply use one point, the nucleus, to demonstrate vowel placement. However, she stresses the need to investigate more than simply the nucleus: “As a purely linguistic feature, vowel trajectories, glides, and length need attention” (62). Drawl is indeed in need of extensive investigation. Some researchers have done work on this feature, including Sledd (1966), Feagin (1987, 1995), and Thomas (2003). Thomas (2003, 156) emphasizes the importance of this feature in the Southern English of the U.S., “Of all the phonological traits associated with the South, the most stereotypical yet the most enigmatic for researchers is the ‘Southern drawl.’”

2.3 The southern vowel shift

The term Southern Vowel Shift (SVS) is used for describing a particular chain shift, or a process of vowel pronunciation changes (vowel rotation) caused initially by movement of a vowel in acoustic space. Often, other vowels follow suit by moving to preserve systemic phonemic distinctions (Labov 1972, 105). The front vowels of the Southern shift are involved in a pull chain shift, which contrasts with a push chain shift (Labov 1994, 199)⁴. In a pull chain shift, a phoneme will vacate its original phonetic space, subsequently causing another phoneme to move into the no longer occupied space. This may cause yet another phoneme to move into the newly abandoned space, and so on. In the SVS, the front vowel chain shift is triggered by the nucleus of the (ay) diphthong (hide) vacating the low back vowel space during monophthongization, either shifting forward - as it does in Alabama speech - or raising to mid back vowel space (oy) as it does in the case of Ocracoke, North Carolina, as in [hoi] high (Schilling-Estes, e.g. 1997). The movement of (ay) is considered to be Stage 1 of the SVS and this movement is assumed to cause the nucleus of the (ey) vowel as in hate, to lower toward the former space occupied by (ay) (Labov et al. 2006, 125-127).

Labov and Ash (1997, 513) point out that complete monophthongization of (ay) allows (ey) to fall and take its place without the risk of confusing the two phonemes. Labov, Yaeger, and Steiner (1972) mention the Central Texas speaker who has (ey) lowering to the point of completely overlapping and surpassing the always monophthongal (ay). Thomas (2003, 161) also remarks

... Extreme lowering of /e/ to [æi] occurs only when /ai/ is monophthongized in all contexts. With /ai/ out of the way, so to speak, /e/ is free to widen because a broader range of variants can be identified perceptually as /e/.

In some parts of the South, the nucleus of (iy) as in heat, also lowers toward the space where (ey) was. Labov (1994. 119) displays a representation of this kind of shift, though he was using it to describe part of the Great Vowel Shift:

(1) /iy/  /ey/  /ay/  /oy/

( /a:/ ) (adapted from Labov 1994, 119, parentheses mine) According to Labov’s (1994) Principles of Chain Shifting, it is Principle I and Principle II that are at work in the front vowels of the American South. These Principles are:

(2) Principle I