22 The NORTH Lexical Set

north lexical set is one of the harder to get your head around, as it is paired with force, and a relatively small number of accents retain a contrast between the two. Examples of the north–force sets include horse–hoarse, for–four, war–wore. When an accent has this north–force merger, the items in force are spoken with the north sound, which is essentially the vowel in thought; this is especially true for non-rhotic accents. When an accent distinguishes between the two sets, force is pronounced with a more close articulation, generally in the range of /or/, while north is pronounced with a more open one in the range of /ɔr/. I’ve always found this difficult to remember, but perhaps this might help:

Oh, force is so forcefully close!

Aw, north is openly awesome, so drop your jaw!

I also think that it’s ironic that, on the vowel chart, north is “south” of force.

north has two ways of being pronounced, depending on whether it’s used in a rhotic accent or in a non-rhotic accent. In a non-rhotic accent such as those heard in the south of Wales, the West Midlands in England, India, the Caribbean or parts of the American South, in Boston and parts of Maine, north words feature the stressed vowel “aw,” or /ɔ ~ ɒ/. In some instances, such as some Southern US accents, non-rhotic north has schwa as an off-glide, e.g.[ɔə̯]. In a rhotic accent, such as those heard in some African-American accents and St. Louis, and in parts of the South, as well as in Scotland and parts of Ireland, north features the stressed vowel “awr,” or /ɔr ~ ɒr/. This book uses the standard phonetic notation of centring diphthongs offgliding from a nucleus on the periphery of the vowel space, in this case something in the range of [ɔ~ɒ~ɑ], moving toward a non-syllabic r-colored central vowel [ɚ̯~ɘ̯˞]. There are also accents of English that feature rhoticity with little or no off-glide, where the nucleus itself is rhotic, [ɔ˞ ~ ɒ˞ ~ ɑ˞]. The vowel in north is Free, so it can be in words with no consonant following it, apart from the silent/vowel ‹r› in its spelling: or, for, grantor, guarantor, nor, Thor, tor, war. (Note that that is the complete list of these words, excluding compounds like done-for, warlord.) The north Lexical Set only contains words with this vowel/diphthong followed by ‹r›; for those words without ‹r› in their spellinɡ, see thought.

Wells, who first defined the Lexical Sets, set out three subgroups for north:

1. north Ⓐ in free position, and derivative words, an extremely small group of words! (e.g. or, for, nor, war)
2. north Ⓑ in checked position, with a following consonant (e.g. resort, quart, warp)
3. north Ⓒ with intervocalic /r/ before a vowel (e.g. aura, aural, Laura, Taurus)

n.b. In RP, north Ⓒ is merged with lot: [ɒ] (e.g. aural) while cloth Ⓒ is merged with force Ⓒ & thought: [ɔ] (e.g. coral=choral). In other accents this might not be so.

• 🕊 Free: does not require a following consonant, and can exist on its own
• Can be a “centring diphthong”, that historically or in rhotic accents went/goes from the periphery to the centre, i.e. schwa.
• in stressed and unstressed syllables

Spellings

north Ⓐ: or#, ar# (compare force Ⓐ: ore#, oar#, oor#, our#)

north Ⓑ1: orC (no way to distinguish north Ⓑ from force Ⓑ1 by spelling)

north Ⓒ: aurV (compare force Ⓒ: orV, oarV)

There is no simple way to know north from force, especially force Ⓑ.

• north Ⓐ words are readily identified by spelling, with ‹or›, and ‹war› as in or, for, nor, war. Memorize the list as it is so short!
• north Ⓑ is ‹orC›, or ‹warC›, ‹quarC› (i.e. after /w/) as in short, order, quart, warn but force Ⓑ1 is ‹orC›, too, as in port, fort, torn, so that’s no help—you’ll need to look up any word spelled ‹orC›; note that there are more northⒷ ‹orC› words than force Ⓑ ‹orC› words.
• north Ⓒ is ‹aurV› as in aura, aural, Laura, Taurus.

If north and force are distinct, you have to figure out whether cloth is merged with lot or thought, which will tell you whether cloth Ⓒ goes with north (which is merged with lot) or force (which is merged with thought).

Pronunciations

Assuming that north isn’t merged with force, the north lexical set’s vowel in the non-rhotic version, and the nucleus of the diphthong in the rhotic version, is often pronounced with a mid-open back vowel, usually completely rounded. Realizations in non-rhotic accents are in the range of [ɒ~ɔ̞~ɔ]; rhotic north is realized as [ɑɚ̯ ~ ɒɚ̯ ~ɔɚ̯]. All of these realizations assume that north is more open than force, which is more close.

Personal Pronunciation: Preparation

We’ll begin our investigation of your Personal Pronunciation of north by answering the question of whether you have a rhotic or non-rhotic accent. When a word has ‹r› in its spelling after a vowel, do you pronounce it? For a rhotic speaker, words like beer, bare=bear, boor, boar, bar will have an /r/ sound after the vowel; for a non-rhotic speaker they will not. If you are a non-rhotic speaker, try saying north with an /r/ sound; if you are a rhotic speaker, give north a try without one. Go for it: or, for, nor, tor, Thor, war! Now, experiment on your own with an audio recorder, or with a classmate, friend, coach or teacher to identify how north in your speech compares with north in others’ speech.

• For the non-rhotic version, ask whether your vowel is a monophthong, a single action, or whether it has any movement to it—does your tongue move as you make the vowel—making it a diphthong? Though it is less likely that it does for a non-rhotic speaker, if you did notice a slight off-glide, where does it off-glide to? (For example, it might off-glide to schwa [ə]; try on words like corn, swarm.) If you don’t have an off-glide, then all you have is a nucleus!
• For the rhotic version, explore the nucleus of the sound before you off-glide into the r-colored coda of the diphthong. For some speakers, there is a significant shift from the nucleus where the north diphthong begins, and where the diphthong ends after the off-glide. For others with quite strong r-coloring, the rhotic quality is added to the nucleus. Rather than becoming r-colored over time, these speakers begin rhotic and may either stay there, or increase their r-coloring (rhoticity). If you start out being rhotic, then we would transcribe your north vowel with a rhotic diacritic right on the nucleus, e.g. [ɔ˞] or [ɒ˞]. You can add multiple “wings” to indicate more rhoticity if you would like, e.g. [ɔ˞ ˞ ˞]. Though it’s not “strictly-ipa-ballroom,” it’s fun and it works.

Before we begin with the nucleus of your north vowel, try to ascertain whether your version of it is merged with force. Compare these force/north minimal pairs to see if they match:

If they match: you have the north–force merger, and so the challenge for you is to explore trying out a new pronunciation. Generally, I find that those with a rhotic accent and this merger tend to need to explore opening up north words, and it can even help to try them with a non-rhotic accent first to see if that helps. Meanwhile, speakers with a non-rhotic accent and this merger may need to explore both closing force words towards [o] and opening north words towards [ɒ] in order to get enough of a contrast between the two.

If they don’t match: you don’t have the north–force merger, and so you’re blessed with the instinctual ability to distinguish between the two sets. In your explorations, you’ll want to be clear when and how you do it, and try to notice if any of the words listed here and on the north pages don’t match your expectations. Just because a word is listed here doesn’t mean your idiolect, or the accent you speak, has it in the same groups. As accents and language are always on the move, always changing, you may well be halfway through the process of a merger or a split, and so words haven’t “settled” yet into sets.

Personal Pronunciation: Articulation Options

In order to hear what you’re doing, start by lengthening the sound of your north nucleus, and then attempt to subtly move it around within the vowel space—up, forwards, down, and back—in tiny increments. Each tiny move should make a subtle difference in the sound of your vowel. As it is a mid-open to open back vowel in many accents, as you experiment you should feel the top surface of the back of your tongue moving delicately up and down—towards/away from your soft palate and uvula—making more or less space in the back of your mouth. For many speakers, north has a lot of lip rounding, though for some they find that they have very little—whichever you do naturally, try doing north with both very little and with a lot. Compare the nucleus of north with palm, thought, or lot, and see how great the contrast is between the vowels.

Transcribing north: Decide which vowel/diphthong symbol best suits your north Lexical Set. Is it more close [ɔ̝], mid-open [ɔ], a more open ɔ [ɔ̞]; or is it more in the range of [ɒ̝ ~ ɒ ~ ɒ̞] or even [ɑ̝ ~ ɑ ~ ɑ̞]?

If your north vowel (or its nucleus) is… (use whichever vowel symbol is appropriate for you)

• high, use the raised diacritic [ ɔ̝ ], a small T pointing up
• open, use the lowered diacritic [ ɔ̞ ], a small T pointing down
• pushed forward, use the advanced diacritic [ ɔ̟ ], a tiny plus sign +
• pulled back, use the retracted diacritic [ ɔ̠ ], a tiny minus sign –
• if you add lip-rounding, use the more rounded diacritic [ ɔ̹ ], a tiny ɔ, which represents the lips rounding/projecting forward (to the left),
• if you have little lip-rounding, especially on a symbol assumed to be rounded like [ɒ, ɔ, o], us the less rounded diacritic [ ɔ̜ ], a tiny c, which represents the lips relaxing/moving back (to the right).
• if you have no lip-rounding, i.e. your lips are spread, you might use the unrounded equivalent symbols that match the traditional rounded ones. If you have completely unrounded [ɔ], then you might use [ʌ̠], and if your lips are actually spread, you could use the double-ended arrow diacritic for “lip spreading”: [ʌ͍̠]. Note that I use the minus sign diacritic for “retracted” as ʌ has traditionally been associated with an open-mid central vowel roughly equivalent to [ɐ]. The sound we’re going for is fully back!

If you have a rhotic north diphthong, your coda might be

• close-mid central, so use an r-colored reversed-e, [ ɘ˞ ]
• mid central, so use an r-colored (or “flying”) schwa [ ɚ ]
• open-mid central, so use an r-colored turned epsilon (or “flying three”), [ ɝ ]

Alternate Pronunciations

Experiment with the north Word Lists, Phrases and Sentences with the following vowel/nucleus options:

Rhotic nucleus: Also experiment with adding r-coloring to the nucleus (i.e. not to the end but to the beginning) from none to as much as you can make, e.g. [ɑ̟ɚ̯, ɑ̟˞¹ɚ̯, ɑ̟˞²ɚ̯, ɑ̟˞³ɚ̯, ɑ̟˞⁴ɚ̯, ɑ̟˞⁵]. As you add rhoticity to the nucleus, the bunching and/or curling action of the tongue means that the off-glide also becomes more rhotic. At the most extreme levels, there is so much bunching/curling on the nucleus that there really is no room to move towards the off-glide.

Rhotic off-glide: Now experiment with diphthongs that have a purely non-rhotic nucleus, and off-glides that range from least open to most open [ ɘ˞, ɚ, ɝ ], and/or from no r-coloring, to as much r-coloring as you can make, e.g. [ ɘ, ɘ˞¹, ɘ˞², ɘ˞³, ɘ˞⁴, ɘ˞⁵]. Jump around, trying to mix and match: [oɘ̯˞⁵, ɔ̝ɝ̯¹, ɤə̯, o, ʌ̠ɚ̯³, ɔ˞²].

As you move the vowels in the directions recommended, see whether that modified oral posture might inspire you to move the articulation of consonants and other vowels in the word in similar ways. Does it remind you of an accent other than your own?

I am indebted to John Wells’ original list of north words, and to Jeremy Sortore’s list, available online: https://voiceandspeech.site/north-force-reference-list/ ⧉.

Word List for north Ⓐ in a Free Syllable, followed by a pause, or by a suffix

KEY: ◾︎north in stressed syllable ◽︎north in unstressed syllable