Phonetic transcription

Phonetic transcriptions were made generally in accordance with the conventions of the IPA, with some slight modifications to the set of vowel symbols used, as noted below. Phonetic transcriptions were guided primarily by auditory impression and secondarily by acoustic (spectrographic) observation.

Present day Norfolk Island English falls within the ‘cultivated’−‘broad’ accent continuum of Australian English (Bernard 1989). The speech of many Norfolk Islanders when they are not using Norfuk may be indistinguishable from Australian English to most ears. Contemporary Norfolk English has probably also come under some influence from New Zealand English. These influences of contemporary regional Englishes are relevant for the ecology of language use on Norfolk Island today. However, the predominant formative influence of English on Norfuk, the traditional vernacular, would have been from the variety of 18^th-century English spoken by the sailor Adams and the other Bounty mutineers, from the original generation of settlement on Pitcairn Island. Norfuk has its own highly distinctive accent and prosody, but it is frequently code-mixed with Norfolk English. Consequently, Australian English provides an appropriate phonetic frame of reference for evaluating Norfuk speech.

In deference to traditions of Australian English phonetics and to the habits of the transcriber, certain liberties have been taken with the IPA symbols for vowel quality transcription.

(a) The symbol [a] denotes a low (open) central vowel that is distinctively long [a:] or short [a] in Australian English (card - cud) with no significant difference in vowel quality. (The symbol [Λ] is traditionally employed, inappropriately for the lax vowel in AusE cud. A case may be made for adopting the symbol [ɐ] for the lax low central vowel of Australian English.) Norfuk [a:] sounds identical to the long open [a:] of AusE (hard) in some speakers and closer to the more retracted [a:] of RP in others.

(b) The symbol [ɔ:] represents a long rounded back mid-high vowel in AusE (bought, caught). It is actually closer to cardinal [o] and to the vowel quality of Australian English [ʊ] (put, could) than it is to the mid-low back and rounded cardinal [ɔ]. Habit is my poor excuse for preserving this transcription practice. There is a small quality difference between these two vowels in Australian English (aside from their obvious difference in length). The lips are slightly more protruded for [ʊ] than [ɔ].