ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN THE NORTH OF IRELAND

The dialect of English language within the North of Ireland has a lot of influence from Scotland. In 1609 Gaelic language was suppressed by the British. English language in the north of Ireland is a mixture between English, Scot-English and Gaelic. In the northwest of the island, people developed their own style of English.

Typical accent in the north of Ireland is the rhotic (pronunciation of the r when it is preceded by a vowel) , for example: farm, first, etc.

There are other features in Irish English:

-/t/ isn’t pronounced as a plosive where it doesn’t occur word-initially in some Irish accents; instead, it is often pronounced as a slit fricative [θ̠]

-The distinction between w and wh is preserved , for example, wine vs. whine.

 -There is some variation with the consonants that are dental fricatives in other varieties (/θ/ and /ð/); after a vowel, they may be dental fricatives or dental stops ([t̪ʰ] and [d̪] respectively) depending on speaker.

-The distinction between /ɒː/ and /oː/ in words like horse and hoarse, is preserved, thought not usually in Dublin or Belfast.

-A distinction between [ɛɹ]-[ɪɹ]-[ʌɹ] in words like herd-bird-curd may be found.

-/l/ is never a velar, except in (relatively recent) South Dublin English.

-The vowels in words such as boat and cane are usually monophthongs outside Dublin: [boːt] and [keːn].

-The /aɪ/ in the word night may be pronounced in a wide variety of ways, e.g. . [əɪ], [ɔɪ], [ʌɪ] and [ɑɪ].

-The /ɔɪ/ in boy may be pronounced as [ɑːɪ].

-In some highly conservative varieties, words spelled with /ea/ and pronounced with [i:] in Received Pronunciation are pronounced with [eː], for example: meat, beat.

-In words like ``took´´, speakers use /uː/ instead of /ʊ/. This is most common in working-class Dublin accents and the speech of North-East Leinster.

-/eɪ/ often becomes /ɛ/ in words like gave (``gev´´) and came (``kem´´).

-Consonant clusters ending in /j/ often change:

     

           */dj/ becomes /dʒ/, for example: dew/due, duke and duty sound like ``jew´´,

             ``jook´´ and ``jooty´´.

           */tj/becomes /tʃ/, for example: tube is ``choob´´ and tune is ``choon´´.

Here, we’re going to show some videos about English accent in areas of the north of Ireland.