Vowels FACE

This vowel shows more variation in the South than in any other part of North America. In the past, a monophthongal form,  , occurred inconsistently in plantation areas. In the Low Country of South Carolina/Georgia, the monophthong occurred in pre-pausal position and ingliding  occurred in other contexts. These forms are now nearly obsolete, though the nucleus of FACE has remained higher in the Low Country than in other parts of the South. Today, lowering and/or retraction of the nucleus are widespread in rural white Southern speech. The shift may be moderate–i.e., [εi – or more extreme – i.e., [æi ~ зi] . The more extreme forms are found largely in areas in which PRICE is monophthongal in all contexts, which include the southern Appalachians, the Ozarks, Texas, the Piney Woods belt, and parts of the North Carolina coastal plain. The more moderately shifted forms tend to occur where PRICE remains diphthongal before voiceless consonants.