# Vowel-length indication



## bearded

Hello everyone

An indication in ''English definitions'' concerning entry ''wreak''



> UK:*/ˈriːk/US:USA pronunciation: IPA/rik/



Now what's the difference between /ri:k/ and (IPA)/rik/?
Not being a great expert on phonetics, I find that indication confusing/misleading - as if US speakers didn't mind the vowel length, which is utterly implausible.  Am I missing something?

Thank you.


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## elroy

The vowel is long in US English.  Perhaps the length is not indicated because vowel length is not _phonemic_ in US English (there is no short /i/ with which a long /iː/ could minimally contrast).  Slashes, as opposed to brackets, indicate *phonemic* transcription, not *phonetic* transcription, so the following makes sense for US English:

/rik/ (phonemic transcription; only phonemically relevant information matters)
[riːk] (phonetic transcription; information is given in phonetic detail, regardless of phonemic relevance)

(If we want to be extra-precise, we should use /ɹ/|[ɹ], but /r/|[r] is commonly used for convenience.)

*However*, I believe all of this applies to UK English as well, so I don't know why the length _is_ indicated for the UK pronunciation.


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## Awwal12

elroy said:


> [riːk] (phonetic transcription; information is given in phonetic detail, regardless of phonemic relevance)


But the vowel before /k/ is unavoidably cropped, probably with a glottal stop appearing. The exact transcription [ri:k] doesn't seem likely to me, as long as most standard varieties are concerned. (Alternatively, /i:/ is diphthongized to ~[ij], in BE in particular).

Sadly, transcriptions in square brackets are often still semi-phonemic.


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## elroy

Awwal12 said:


> But the vowel before /k/ is unavoidably cropped, probably with a glottal stop appearing.


I'm sorry, I'm not sure I know what you mean.  If the vowel is clipped, it's not clipped to such an extent as to be indistinguishable from a short /i/.  And I don't think there's a glottal stop.  I _think_ what you're thinking of is the fact that the /k/ is often realized as an ejective, such that the pronunciation is phonetically [ɹiːk'].  None of this, however, impacts the length of the vowel, which is clearly long (phonetically).



Awwal12 said:


> Sadly, transcriptions in square brackets are often still semi-phonemic.


This is true.  That's because phonetic transcription can be broad or narrow.  It depends on how much phonetic detail you want or know to give.  Still, the principle is that phonemic values and the language's phonological inventory are not relevant; rather, the basis for transcription is what is actually produced phonetically.


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## Awwal12

elroy said:


> I'm sorry, I'm not sure I know what you mean. If the vowel is clipped, it's not clipped to such an extent as to be indistinguishable from a short /i/


But there is no "short /i/" in GA phonological charts, only /i/ and /ı/, with a qualitative distinction (tense vs. lax). And in reality the "long" /i/ well may be acoustically _shorter_ than the "short" /ı/ (in different positions).


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## elroy

Awwal12 said:


> But there is no "short /i/" in GA phonological charts, only /i/ and /ı/, with a qualitative distinction (tense vs. lax).


Yes.  I meant a _hypothetical_ short /i/, or a short /i/ as found in another language, like Spanish or Italian or Arabic.



Awwal12 said:


> And in reality the "long" /i/ well may be acoustically _shorter_ than the "short" /ı/ (in different positions).


This is certainly *not* the case for the vast majority of words.  If it's true for any words, they're a small minority.  Do you have any examples?


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## Awwal12

elroy said:


> Do you have any examples?


Well, for starters, you can just thoroughly compare various GA pronunciations of, say, "bid" and "beat" or "big" and "beak" on Forvo. In many cases the clipping caused by the subsequent strong consonant at least completely outweighs any supposed difference in length.


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## elroy

Non-native speakers famously have trouble distinguishing between pairs like "Rick" /rɪk/ and "wreak" /riːk/.  Although the vowels differ in quality, they also differ in quantity, so if you are able to say /rik/ and /riːk/, you'll still be perfectly understood even though the quality of the short vowel is not native-like.  Although the difference in vowel length is not phonemic, it's an important perceptual cue.


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## Awwal12

It well may be - in otherwise _identical_ positions. But how is IPA supposed to reflect all the subtle differences in length? We could rightfully transcribe "wreak" as [ri:k] if we were able to draw a clear empirical quantity-based line between all short and all long vowels in English. But since the exact position can influence the length more than the inherent properties of the phoneme, it doesn't make real sense in phonetic transcription.


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## elroy

Awwal12 said:


> Well, for starters, you can just thoroughly compare various GA pronunciations of, say, "bid" and "beat" or "big" and "beak" on Forvo. In many cases the clipping caused by the subsequent strong consonant at least completely outweighs any supposed difference in length.


You bring up an interesting point.

I just said the words "bit," "bid," "beat," and "bead" to myself a bunch of times and here's what seems to be the case:

The vowels in *"bid" and "beat" *may be (almost) equal in length, but the "beat" vowel is certainly not _shorter _than the "bid" vowel, and there is still a clear difference in length between "bit" and "bid"/"beat" and between "bid"/"beat" and "bead."  In other words, where the final consonant is the same, there is always a clear difference.

This is me saying "bit," "bid," "beat," and "bead" in succession.


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## Awwal12

It's not a blind experiment, though (which is important). A little research is obviously needed here, or I'll come upon some public paper addressing the same issues.


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## berndf

Awwal12 said:


> But the vowel before /k/ is unavoidably cropped, probably with a glottal stop appearing. The exact transcription [ri:k] doesn't seem likely to me, as long as most standard varieties are concerned. (Alternatively, /i:/ is diphthongized to ~[ij], in BE in particular).
> 
> Sadly, transcriptions in square brackets are often still semi-phonemic.


I wouldn't know why. [ɹik] and [ɹi:k] are both easily pronounceable and clearly distinguishable. In Varieties of English where vowel length is phonemic, [ɹik] doesn't exist but only [ɹɪk]. It is quite common for languages with phonemic vowel length that long and short vowels are combined with qualitative shifts. I don't understand your point.


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## Awwal12

The point is that acoustic vowel length doesn't demonstrate consistent stability through all possible positions. And using [i:] and [ı] for vowels of the same length (albeit in different positions) looks absurd.


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## berndf

Awwal12 said:


> The point is that acoustic vowel length doesn't demonstrate consistent stability through all possible positions.


What makes you think that.


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## Awwal12

berndf said:


> What makes you think that.


Vowel clipping, basically. See above for our little discussion with elroy.

As far as I remember, in the dialects of the American South vowel length is dictated solely by the following consonant (if any), but it's just an extreme example.


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## berndf

Awwal12 said:


> Vowel clipping, basically. See above for our little discussion with elroy.
> 
> As far as I remember, in the dialects of the American South vowel length is dictated solely by the following consonant (if any), but it's just an extreme example.


Ah OK. Except for vowels where phonetic (not phonemic) vowel length supports qualitative distinction. Especially in Southern accents, the distinction between /ɛ/ and /æ/ relies almost exclusively on length. But I agree, that in accents without phonemic vowel length distinction, I would be reluctant to use the ":" sign, even in phonetic transcription.


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## elroy

I suppose another point is that since vowel length isn't phonemic, there is probably variation in the production of the "wreak" vowel among native speakers in terms of length.  In other words, it probably does get pronounced as a short [i] some of the time, and that's not problematic because there is still a difference in quality between "Rick" and "wreak."  Thus, when it comes down to it we can probably really only phonetically transcribe individual utterances in terms of length, rather than generalize to what all native speakers produce.  This is part of what makes phonetic transcription so tricky. 

I've often noticed that in Hebrew, another language without phonemic vowel length, there are many words that sound equally good to me with a long and short vowel, and I've often heard them both ways.


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## gburtonio

The difference in transcription between the UK and US versions is not in itself supposed to represent any phonetic difference between the two varieties. It merely reflects two different transcription traditions/conventions. Transcriptions for US English that use the IPA (and many US dictionaries don't use the IPA symbols) don't use the length mark, but the reasons for this (already discussed above – there is also a difference in vowel quality between /iː/ and /ɪ/, length is not in itself phonemic, pre-fortis clipping means that in many cases a 'long' vowel is not actually any longer than a 'short vowel' when the latter appears before a lenis consonant) just as easily apply to transcriptions of British English, and in fact British phoneticians have suggested that the length mark is unnecessary.

Geoff Lindsey suggests using /ij/, arguing that the vowel transcribed as /iː/ is actually a vowel + glide combination.


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## bearded

Again many thanks to all of you for your  responses and the interesting discussion.


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## berndf

gburtonio said:


> but the reasons for this (already discussed above – there is also a difference in vowel quality between /iː/ and /ɪ/, length is not in itself phonemic


This is not necessarily proof of length being non-phonemic. There are other languages that undeniably have phonemic vowel length and feature the same /iː/ and /ɪ/ opposition, like, e.g., Latin or German. Many languages with phonemic vowel length have separate quality grids for long and short vowels.


gburtonio said:


> pre-fortis clipping means that in many cases a 'long' vowel is not actually any longer than a 'short vowel' when the latter appears before a lenis consonant)


It could also be argued that this is as a sign of length phonemicity and not of the opposite. The other day I have watched a documentary about the London docklands and once the narrator pronounced _dock_ with the length appropriate for _dog _and it sounded absolutely weird. In languages without phonemic vowel length it might sound "unusual" to use pronounce a word with a deviant vowel length but it wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb.

I am not going so far as saying that British (RP and RP close varieties) English must necessarily be regarded as having phonemic vowel length but I am not convinced it shouldn't be regarded as such either. I am ambivalent about this.


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## Sobakus

It's a general observation that if a language exhibits conditioned alternations of vowel length, it means that length is a phomenic, distinguishing feature in that language; or it reflects an intermediate stage in the process of it becoming phonemic. To my knowledge this usually happens due to borrowing from a language variety where it's already phonemic; it's very rarely that it develops entirely independently - this normally happens via intervocalic consonant loss and vowel contraction.

An observation specific to English is that these conditioned alternations are reversible, i.e. ostensibly it's a rule that shortens or lengthens vowels that are phonemically long or short respectively in well-defined environments, and if someone fails to apply it they will still be understood. Thus there's no phonemic split between the outcomes of this rule, even in accents with final stop devoicing because the devoicing acts on consonants that are still phonemically voiced.

The vowels traditionally transcribed as /ee ~ i:/ and /oo ~ u:/ phonologically pattern with diphthongs and are clearly distinct from single short vowels. The former pattern with vowel+consonant sequences in that they close syllables for the purposes of stress assignment and can occur at the end of a word, while short vowels apart from the schwa can't (to see for yourself, try getting an English speaker to pronounce short vowels at the end of a word).

Even more specifically and as others have mentioned, these two vowels are analysed by many modern accounts as diphthongs or vowel-consonant sequences /iy/ and /uw/ parallel to /ey/, /ay/, /ow/ etc, at least for most varieties. This account still generally leaves American English with the phonemically long low back vowel /ɑ:/, though it can be interpreted as a diphthong ending in the epiglottal/pharyngeal glide, so can be transcribed as /ah/ (let's not mention the _thought_ vowel ).

The argument that "the exact realisation depends on the environment, therefore indicating length in phonetic transcription doesn't make sense" is a complete non-sequitur. The phonetic transcription exists precisely in order to specify exact realisations that depend on the environment, with more or less accuracy as required. And as explained above, the existence of lengthening/shortening rules doesn't invalidate phonemic length either, quite the contrary.


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## Forero

In my English, there is no difference in length between the vowel of _wreak_ and the vowel of _rick_.


berndf said:


> Ah OK. Except for vowels where phonetic (not phonemic) vowel length supports qualitative distinction. Especially in Southern accents, the distinction between /ɛ/ and /æ/ relies almost exclusively on length.


This is false, as far as I know.

In some environments, the _e_ in _bed_ and the _a_ in _bad_ become falling diphthongs in Southern American English, and even triphthongs in some dialects, and their first elements can become a little higher, but they are still distinguished from each other by quality alone.

On the other hand, the vowel of _bad_ in dialects exhibiting the Northern Cities Vowel Shift, when diphthongized, can sound a lot like the vowel of _bed_ in Southern dialects.

The vowels of _lead_ (the verb, not the metal) and _lid_ can also break into falling diphthongs, distinguished mainly by their second elements, not by vowel length, but for me the _r-_ and the _-k_ both seem to inhibit diphthongization in _wreak_ and _rick_.


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## berndf

Forero said:


> In some environments, the _e_ in _bed_ and the _a_ in _bad_ become falling diphthongs in Southern American English, and even triphthongs in some dialects, and their first elements can become a little higher, but they are still distinguished from each other by quality alone.


I know what you mean but that is not the accent I had in mind. I made some experiments cutting about 1/3 from the middle part of /æ/ (from the middle part not to destroy a possible off-glide) of records by southern speakers who in my ears didn't distinguish /ɛ/ and /æ/ significantly by quality and presented this to native American speakers and I they perceived it as /æ/ in the original recording and as /ɛ/ in the edited version. You might have been one of my guinea pigs, I am not sure. It was quite a while ago.

It is not unusual that vowel pairs that ago qualitatively very close but distinguished by length as well get confused when the quantity support is missing. This is the reason for the ō/u and ē/i mergers in Vulgar Latin.

The same two close vowel pairs exit in German and I have done the same experiments with German speakers where also heard *oh*_nmächtig_ as *u*_nmächtig_ when I has shortened the vowel of the recording.


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## Forero

berndf said:


> I know what you mean but that is not the accent I had in mind. I made some experiments cutting about 1/3 from the middle part of /æ/ (from the middle part not to destroy a possible off-glide) of records by southern speakers who in my ears didn't distinguish /ɛ/ and /æ/ significantly by quality and presented this to native American speakers and I they perceived it as /æ/ in the original recording and as /ɛ/ in the edited version. You might have been one of my guinea pigs, I am not sure. It was quite a while ago.


Cutting out the middle part was a good idea, if you could do it seamlessly enough.

I was talking about the Southern AmE accents I grew up with and the accent I still have.

I missed this experiment, but I would be interested in hearing your samples.

Were your guinea pigs also Southern speakers?


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## Awwal12

Sobakus said:


> The argument that "the exact realisation depends on the environment, therefore indicating length in phonetic transcription doesn't make sense" is a complete non-sequitur.


The argument was about marking vowel fragments of basically identical length as having different length.


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## Sobakus

Awwal12 said:


> The argument was about marking vowel fragments of basically identical length as having different length.


This happens because canonical, phonemic length is being marked in the phonetic transcription without taking into account the phonetic rules of shortening/lengthening. The ostensible reason is that not all American varieties have these rules (but the vast majority today do). The solution is to mark the actual phonetic length when using the phonetic transcription. You suggested that marking any sort of length makes no real sense in the phonetic transcription:


Awwal12 said:


> But since the exact position can influence the length more than the inherent properties of the phoneme, it doesn't make real sense in phonetic transcription.


This argument is a non-sequitur. American English vowels have both phonemic and phonetic (post-rules) length which can and should be indicated when necessary. Again, there are degrees of accuracy inside the phonetic transcription and such phenomena may not be indicated when the author doesn't think it's important, or when they don't want to limit the transcription to only those varieties that have a particular phonetic feature. The fact that some phenomena aren't always faithfully transcribed is no reason to say that it makes no sense to transcribe them.


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## berndf

Forero said:


> Cutting out the middle part was a good idea, if you could do it seamlessly enough.
> 
> I was talking about the Southern AmE accents I grew up with and the accent I still have.
> 
> I missed this experiment, but I would be interested in hearing your samples.
> 
> Were your guinea pigs also Southern speakers?


Sorry, I am travelling. I will respond when I am back. I'll look if I can still find some of those files.


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