Suprasegmentals

In describing vowels and consonants, the preceding description has emphasized segments, perhaps at the expense of obscuring recurring traits which may occur in groups of speakers and which may arise from shared features of the longer domain phenomenon of voice quality. However, there are certainly links between a number of features noted above for Glaswegian and features of voice quality in the same data. For example, /r/-vocalization to a vowel with secondary velarization with some pharyngealization in working-class speakers fits well with my earlier observation of raised and backed tongue body with possible retracted tongue root for the same speakers (Stuart-Smith 1999: 215).

Apart from the work of Brown and colleagues on Edinburgh intonation (e.g. Brown, Currie, and Kenworthy 1980), there has been surprisingly little research on intonation in Scottish English. Cruttenden (1997: 136) notes that for accents of Scotland other than those found in Glasgow, statements and questions will invariably show “a sequence of falling tones”. The main difference between the speech of Edinburgh and Glasgow is in terminating mid-to-low-falls in Edinburgh (e.g. Brown, Currie, and Kenworthy 1980) but a tendency towards high rising patterns in Glasgow (e.g. Macafee 1983: 36; Stuart-Smith 1999: 211). The extent to which these continue patterns from earlier forms of Scots is not known, though Northern Irish influence may be invoked to some extent to explain distinctive Glaswegian patterns (Macafee 1983: 37; on Irish English influence more generally). It seems unlikely that Glasgow’s ‘high rise’ is linked to the apparently rapid spread of high-rising terminal intonation patterns in southern accents of English English.

Even less has been said about rhythm in Scottish English, bar Abercrombie’s (1979: 67) comments that disyllabic words such as table are often pronounced with a short first syllable and long second syllable. This is also my impression when teaching rhythm to Scottish English students. Abercrombie also makes the observation that syllabification in Scottish Standard English tends to favor open syllables, so that a phrase like St Andrews will be syllabified into .