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The Northern cities vowel shift is a chain shift in the sounds of some vowels. It is called northern cities because it has taken place mostly in a broad swath of the United States, beginning near Syracuse, New York and extending west through Cleveland, Ohio, Chicago, Illinois, and north to Minneapolis, Minnesota. It can also be found in a Midland city: St. Louis, Missouri.
In this shift, the vowels in the words ket, cut, caught, cot, and cat have shifted from IPA [ɛ], [ʌ], [ɔ], [ɑ], [æ] to [ə], [ɔ], [ɑ], [a], [iæ] , and, in addition, the vowel in kit (IPA [ɪ]) becomes more mid-centralized.
The trigger of this is the diphthongization of /æ/ into /iæ/, a change identified as early as the 1960s. Then, /ɑ/ is pulled forward toward [a], occupying a position very close to the position of former /æ/, and in some very advanced speakers an identical position. The third stage is another pull, namely the lowering of /ɔ/ toward [ɑ]. The fourth stage is the backing of /ɛ/, a phonetic shift seen in some other accents, although less markedly and in fewer contexts; this is a push stage, because former /ɛ/ and fronted /æ/ sound similar, especially when /æ/ is not fully raised to [iæ] but only to [eæ]. The fifth stage is the backing of /ʌ/, pulled by /ɔ/ and at the same time pushed by /ɛ/. Finally, /ɪ/ is lowered and backed, although it is still distinct from /ɛ/ in all contexts. The shift is in progress throughout the Great Lakes cities, so some speakers might only have, for instance, the first two stages only, but none have, say, only the last stage.
The shift is more notable in Caucasian speakers and those who identify themselves with the region in which the vowel shift is occurring. Speakers of African American Vernacular English show little to no evidence of adopting the Northern Cities Shift. The NCS also is not being used by Canadian speakers despite the geographic proximity of speakers in the United States and Canada about the Great Lakes region.
One text worth consulting is Small-town Values and Big-city Vowels: A Study of the Northern Cities Shift in Michigan by Matthew J. Gordon published by Duke University Press (ISBN: 0822364786).
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