A sociophonetic investigation of the 'Scottish' consonants (/x/ and /hw/) in the speech of Glaswegian children

Eleanor Lawson, Jane Stuart-Smith

Research output: Contribution to conferencePaperpeer-review

Abstract

Glaswegian, like other forms of Scottish English, is generally regarded as having two extra consonant sounds, /x/ in e.g. loch vs lock, and /wh/ in e.g. whine vs wine. It has been recently observed that /x/ and /wh/ tend to be replaced by /k/ and /w/, particularly by younger speakers. This paper considers the evidence for the loss of /x/ and /wh/ in the speech of 16 Glaswegian children, using auditory and acoustic analysis. In particular, we investigate the extent to which the Scottish consonants are simply being replaced by variants of /k/ and /wh/. Auditory analysis, confirmed by acoustic analysis, of the sounds in read wordlists and conversations suggests that Glaswegian children may indeed be losing the Scottish consonants. However our analysis also shows that the process of change seems more complex than previous accounts suggest, which may have implications for understanding the mechanism of sound change in general.
Original languageEnglish
Pages2541-2544
Number of pages4
Publication statusPublished - 7 Aug 1999
Event14th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences - San Fancisco, United States
Duration: 1 Aug 19997 Aug 1999
Conference number: 14
https://www.internationalphoneticassociation.org/icphs/icphs1999

Conference

Conference14th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences
Abbreviated titleICPhS-14
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySan Fancisco
Period1/08/997/08/99
Internet address

Keywords

  • Scottish consonants
  • velar fricative
  • labial-velar fricative
  • speech acoustics
  • sound change

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'A sociophonetic investigation of the 'Scottish' consonants (/x/ and /hw/) in the speech of Glaswegian children'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this