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The Southern Vowel Shift in the Speech of Women from Mississippi

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The Southern Vowel Shift in the Speech of Women from Mississippi Mississippi State University Scholars Junction Theses and Dissertations Theses and Dissertations 1-1-2015 The Southern Vowel Shift in the Speech of Women from Mississippi Whitney Leigh Knight Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/td Recommended Citation Knight, Whitney Leigh, "The Southern Vowel Shift in the Speech of Women from Mississippi" (2015). Theses and Dissertations. 4657. https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/td/4657 This Graduate Thesis - Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses and Dissertations at Scholars Junction. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholars Junction. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Automated Template C: Created by James Nail 2013V2.1 The Southern Vowel Shift in the speech of women from Mississippi By Whitney Leigh Knight A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Mississippi State University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in English in the Department of English Mississippi State, Mississippi August 2015 Copyright by Whitney Leigh Knight 2015 The Southern Vowel Shift in the speech of women from Mississippi By Whitney Leigh Knight Approved: ____________________________________ Wendy Herd (Director of Thesis) ____________________________________ Evelyn Wright Fogle (Committee Member) ____________________________________ Ginger B. Pizer (Committee Member) ____________________________________ Shalyn R. Claggett (Graduate Coordinator) ____________________________________ R. Gregory Dunaway Professor and Dean College of Arts & Sciences Name: Whitney Leigh Knight Date of Degree: August 14, 2015 Institution: Mississippi State University Major Field: English Major Professor: Wendy Herd Title of Study: The Southern Vowel Shift in the speech of women from Mississippi Pages in Study: 127 Candidate for Degree of Master of Arts Though previous research has documented the Southern Vowel Shift (SVS) in Alabama and Tennessee, none has focused on Mississippi. Also, the majority of research has focused on European-Americans. In this study, data was collected from women from northern and central Mississippi, with central residents evenly recruited from urban and rural areas. Of these, 15 were European-American and 19 were African-American. Participants read a word list including target vowels in the b_d frame. F1, F2, and vector length were analyzed to determine to what extent participants exhibited the SVS and Back Vowel Fronting. For the SVS, there were effects such that central residents shifted more than northern, rural residents shifted more than urban, and African-American residents shifted more than European-American. European-American women fronted /u/ and /o/ more than African-American women. These results suggest that African- American women from Mississippi do participate in the SVS but are not fronting their back vowels. DEDICATION To my mother and father and all the loved ones who supported me along the way. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This publication would not be possible if it were not for the support of my advisor, Dr. Wendy Herd, the Department of English at Mississippi State University, and the Office of Research and Economic Development. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION .................................................................................................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... iii LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................. vi LIST OF FIGURES .......................................................................................................... vii CHAPTER I. BACKGROUND ...............................................................................................1 1.1 Introduction ............................................................................................1 1.2 Vowel Shifts...........................................................................................2 1.3 Vowels in the South ...............................................................................6 1.4 Documentation of the Southern Vowel Shift .......................................12 1.5 Gender Effects .....................................................................................22 1.6 Rurality Effects ....................................................................................30 1.7 Race and Ethnicity Effects ...................................................................33 1.8 Predictions............................................................................................43 II. METHODS ......................................................................................................44 2.1 Participants ...........................................................................................44 2.2 Stimuli ..................................................................................................48 2.3 Procedure .............................................................................................49 2.4 Measurements ......................................................................................50 III. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS ..........................................................................51 3.1 Stage Iː /aɪ/ Monophthongization .........................................................51 3.1.1 Visualization of the data: Location and Ethnicity ..........................51 3.1.2 Statistical analyses of Location and Ethnicity ...............................54 3.1.3 Visualization of the Data: Rurality and Ethnicity ..........................59 3.1.4 Statistical analyses of Rurality and Ethnicity ................................62 3.1.5 Conclusions ....................................................................................63 3.2 Stage II: /e-ɛ/ ........................................................................................64 3.2.1 Visualization of the data: Location and Ethnicity ..........................64 3.2.2 Statistical Analysis: Location and Ethnicity ..................................66 iv 3.2.3 Visualization of the data: Rurality and Ethnicity ...........................74 3.2.4 Statistical analyses of Rurality and Ethnicity ................................76 3.2.5 Conclusions ....................................................................................79 3.3 Stage IIIː /i-ɪ/ ........................................................................................80 3.3.1 Visualization of the data: Location and Ethnicity ..........................80 3.3.2 Statistical analyses of Location and Ethnicity ...............................81 3.3.3 Visualization of the data: Rurality and Ethnicity ...........................88 3.3.4 Statistical analyses of Rurality and Ethnicity ................................90 3.3.5 Conclusions ....................................................................................92 3.4 Back Vowel Fronting: /ud/ vs. /ul/ .......................................................92 3.4.1 Visualization of the data: Location and Ethnicity ..........................93 3.4.2 Statistical analyses of Location and Ethnicity ...............................94 3.4.3 Visualization of the data: Rurality and Ethnicity ...........................97 3.4.4 Statistical analyses of Rurality and Ethnicity ................................98 3.4.5 Conclusions ....................................................................................99 3.5 Back Vowel Fronting: /o/ vs. /u/ ........................................................100 3.5.1 Visualization of the data: Location and Ethnicity ........................100 3.5.2 Statistical analyses of Location and Ethnicity .............................101 3.5.3 Visualization of the data: Rurality and Ethnicity .........................104 3.5.4 Statistical analyses of Rurality and Ethnicity ..............................105 3.5.5 Conclusions ..................................................................................106 3.6 Conclusion .........................................................................................107 IV. DISCUSSION ................................................................................................109 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................114 APPENDIX A. PARTICIPANT WORD LIST .......................................................................121 B. DIALECT BACKGROUND QUESTIONNAIRE ........................................123 C. PARTICIPANT RECRUITMENT MATERIALS ........................................125 v LIST OF TABLES 2.1 Participant hometowns and ethnicities .............................................................46 2.2 Participant ruralities and ethnicities .................................................................46 2.3 Target words analyzed .....................................................................................49 3.1 Vector Length of /aɪ/ in bide and bite for African Americans and European Americans ........................................................................................59 3.2 Vector Lengths of European Americans (EA) and African Americans (AA) from Wesson, Starkville, and Jackson ....................................................74 3.3 Vector Length for bead and bid for African Americans and
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