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Rhoticity in English refers to the situations in which English speakers pronounce the historical rhotic consonant , and is one of the most prominent distinctions by which English varieties can be classified. In rhotic varieties of English, speakers pronounce in all instances, while in non-rhotic varieties, speakers no longer pronounce in postvocalic environments – that is, when it is not followed by a vowel.〔Paul Skandera, Peter Burleigh, ''A Manual of English Phonetics and Phonology'', Gunter Narr Verlag, 2011, p. 60.〕 For example, a rhotic English speaker pronounces the words ''hard'' and ''butter'' approximately as and , whereas a non-rhotic speaker "drops" or "deletes" the sound, pronouncing them approximately as and . A non-rhotic speaker would still pronounce the in the words ''run'', ''tree'' and ''very'', and usually in the continuously spoken phrase ''butter and jam'' (the linking R), since in these cases the is followed by a vowel. The English dialects of Scotland, Ireland, and most of the United States and Canada preserve historical , and are thus termed the rhotic varieties. The non-rhotic varieties, in which historical has been lost except before vowels, include most dialects of Englandexcept the South West, the southern West Midlands, and parts of Lancashireas well as the English dialects of Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and some parts of the southern and eastern coastal United States. Loss of postvocalic began sporadically in informal speech in the 15th century, and by the 17th century postvocalic was weakened but still universally present. In the mid-18th century it was still pronounced in most environments, but may occasionally have been deleted entirely, especially after low vowels. By the 1790s, postvocalic -less pronunciation had become common in London and surrounding areas, and was increasing in use. By the early 19th century, the southern British standard was fully transformed into a non-rhotic variety. ==History== The earliest traces of a loss of in English appear in the early 15th century and occur before coronal consonants, especially , giving modern "ass (buttocks)" (Old English ''ears'', Middle English ''ers'' or ''ars''), and "bass (fish)" (OE ''bærs'', ME ''bars''). A second phase of -loss began during the 15th century, and was characterized by sporadic and lexically variable deletion, such as ''monyng'' "morning" and ''cadenall'' "cardinal". These -less spellings appear throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, but are uncommon and are restricted to private documents, especially ones written by women. No English authorities describe loss of in the standard language prior to the mid-18th century, and many do not fully accept it until the 1790s. During the mid-17th century, a number of sources describe as being weakened but still present. The English playwright Ben Jonson's ''English Grammar'', published posthumously in 1640, records that was "sounded firme in the beginning of words, and more liquid in the middle, and ends." Little more is said regarding until 1740, when one Mather Flint, writing in a primer for French learners of English, said: ''"...dans plusieurs mots, l’r devant une consonne est fort adouci, presque muet & rend un peu longue la voyale qui le precede."'' ("...in many words ''r'' before a consonant is greatly softened, almost mute, and slightly lengthens the preceding vowel.") By the 1790s, postvocalic -less pronunciation was becoming common in London and was quickly increasing in use. The 18th century English actor and linguist John Walker uses the spelling ''ar'' to indicate the long vowel of ''aunt'' in his 1775 rhyming dictionary.〔Labov, Ash, and Boberg (2006): 47.〕 In his influential ''Critical Pronouncing Dictionary and Expositor of the English Language'' (1791), Walker reported, with a strong tone of disapproval, that "...the ''r'' in ''lard'', ''bard'', () is pronounced so much in the throat as to be little more than the middle or Italian ''a'', lengthened into ''baa'', ''baad''...." Americans returning to England after the end of the American Revolutionary War reported surprise at the significant changes in fashionable pronunciation. By the early 19th century, the southern British standard was fully transformed into a non-rhotic variety. The adoption of postvocalic -less pronunciation as the British prestige standard in the late 18th and early 19th centuries influenced American port cities with close connections to Britain, causing upper-class pronunciation in the 19th century to become non-rhotic in many eastern and southern port cities such as New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, Alexandria, Charleston, and Savannah. Like regional dialects in England, the accents of other areas in America remained rhotic in a display of linguistic "lag" that preserved the original pronunciation of . Non-rhotic pronunciation continued to influence American prestige speech until the 1860s, when the American Civil War shifted America's centers of wealth and political power to areas with fewer cultural connections to the British elite. By 1870, New York City had become America's national center of commerce and entrepreneurship, and its political and economic leaders were increasingly self-made men with little connection to the old colonial elites and British non-rhotic pronunciation. This largely removed the prestige associated with non-rhotic pronunciation in America, such that when the advent of radio and television in the early 20th century established a national standard of American pronunciation, it became a rhotic variety that fully preserves historical . 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Rhoticity in English」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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