Rhoticity

The letter ( r) is difficult to many English learners and it is considered as a problem of

non- native speakers of English who come to pronunciation field which are rhotic in
their own languages ; therefore, normally rhotic in English.(r)tends to be the most
troublesome sound especially when it immediately precedes /l/in the same syllable
as in girl /g :l / or when it follows a vowel in the same syllable as in where /we /or
bear /bi /(Murray, 1996 : 132 ).This sound is made way in the back of mouth by
putting the back of tongue close to the back of mouth so that there is only a small
opening of air and the tongue-tip is curled back towards the roof of mouth (“retro
flexion”) .Historically ,a loss of /r/in English occurred during the 15 th century ,and is
characterized by sporadic and lexical variable deletion such as monyng “morning
“and cadinal “cardinal”. During mid-17 th century a number of sources that /r/ was
“sounded firm in the beginning of words and more liquid in the middle and ends .By
the 18th century English linguist John Walker uses the spelling of (ar)to indicate the
long vowel and reported that card was pronounced /kaad/ .(Labov, 2006 :47 ).By 19 th
century ,the southern British standard was fully transformed into a non – rhotic
variety . There are three different ways to pronounce/ r / sound. The first," Rachel",
so that’s a beginning R, an R that begins a word. The second is the word (proud) , so
the R is not the initial sound but in the beginning of the syllable , before the vowel .
The third is the word (father) which is the most difficult one and that is what we call
rhotic and non – rhotic sound .Rhotic accents (For instance, most varieties of
American English , Scottish English,Canadian English, Irish English Indian English and
Pakistani English) in which[ r ]can be pronounced in all places where it is found in the
spelling as following : Car /Ka:r / , Park /Pa:rk / , Farmer /fa:rmr/ .So, rhotic
accents of English are those with a surface manifestation of post – Vocalic
/r/.Accents having this characteristic are said to include rhoticity as a part of their
phonology and phonetics .While non-rhotic Accents of English(for instance ,most
England English , welsh English , New Zealand English , Australian English and south
African English )only have the r-sound if the next sound is a vowel – so not at the end
of a word , as in ‘car’ , or before a consonant as in ‘park’ . For example :Car /ka:/ ,
park /pa:k/ , farmer /fa:m / . There is an interesting set of problems associated
with the simple distinction between rhotic and non-rhotic accents; and they are
essentially problems of a phonological nature , concerning underlying
representation(McCully , 2009, P:143). In Iraqi Universities , the accent taught is
Received Pronunciation ,but students of English as foreign language
sometimes pronounce [ r ] as a rhotic sound ,other pronounce it as a non-rhotic
one .So this study will investigate this problem among EFL students in the
department of English /College of Education / Tikrit University
Since the production of consonants involves more or less radical change in the shape
and nature of the egressive ( out-breathing )air stream flowing through the vocal
tract ,we can regard consonants as specific subset of the range of potential sounds
generated by muscular activity in,and surrounding the vocal tract .
 The consonant / r / is more problematic than other consonant ,largely because it is
aconsonant whose phonetic implementation varies widely between language varieties
.

2-1-The Variety of /r / Sound Pronunciation

There are many varieties of /r / sound in the English language :

a-Coloring:in phonetics ,a perceived slight change in the quality 'color"of a vowel

sound due to the influence of somenearby sound. for example "r- coloring " occurs
when a vowel is affected by the resonance of a following r-type sound ,most notably
a retroflex; a following lh l can cause " h- coloring " (Crystal ,2003,82) .the "r-
coloring "is most common in back or central vowels where the forward part of the
tongue is relativelyfree to change shape (Roach ,2002 :66) . Consonant / r / cna affect
the pronunciation of a vowel . Thus we should notice that during the production of
the vowel ,the tongue curled slightly and is pulled back in the mouth (Avery
&Ehrlich ,1992:43).
b-Roll : A term used in phonetic classification of consonant sounds on the basis of
their manner of articulation .Also as a rolled consonant , or a trill, it refers to any
sound made by the rapid taping of one organ of articulation against another .Several
accents of English use an alveolar rolled [r] as in Welsh and Scots .French and
German are examples of languages where uvular rolled [R] can be heard in Scottish
English /r / may be pronounced as a flap (Ladefoged ,1982:153 ).
c-Flaps :It may be made by curling the tip of the tongue up and back, and then
allowing it to strike against the back part of the alveolar ridge as it returns to its
position behind the lower front teeth . As a place of articulation involves the
underside of the tongue and the back of the alveolar ridge , these sounds are usually
classified retroflex flaps , in the case of a very small trill where there is only a single
contact with the roof of the mouth , the movement is different from that in what it
sometimes called a tap or flap ( Crystal (b),2003:245).There are symbols that can be
used for different types of /r/ sound in a broad transcription , they can be transcribed
as/ r / . But, in narrower transcription this symbol may be symbolized by the special
symbol
[r] , and the post-alveolar (retroflex) flap by [r,].
d- Intrusive /r / : A type of linking occurring at word boundaries where two vowels
meet , the first one an “a " or an "o"sound ; [r]which is not warranted by the spelling '
intrudes' to facilitates transition between the two vowels , e.g. "banana and apple "
/banan r n apl / . McCully ,2009 :206 ) notices that / r /is stigmatized in some
varieties. BBC newsreaders used to be taught to avoid using intrusive / r / because
intrusive occurred more or lessreadily in the casual speech of those users of English .
A second notice is the vocalic context in which intrusive / r / occurs : It is invariably
preceded by a [ high ] vowel ; therefore , does not seem to occur in the following
phrases : " lay it " /leiit/ not /leirit / ; " do it" /du: it / not / du:rit / . Intrusive "r" : a
type of linking where a silent " r " from the spelling is pronounced to facilitate the
transition between two vowels at word - boundaries e. g. "there is [e r iz ] ; applies
only to accents of English where post vocalic " r "s are not pronounced (Daton &
Seidlhofer , 1994:176 ; O'connor ,1980 :61 )

e- Rounding consonants may have rounded lips in / w / , the basic consonantal

articulation itself consists of lip - rounding , this lip - rounding in consonants is
regarded as a secondary articulation , and it is usual to refer to it as labialization . In
BBC, it is common to find / S / and / tS / and / r / with lip -rounding e. g ."red " is
pronounced as /wed / ( Roach , 2002:68 ; Crystal 9b0 , 2003 : 245 ) .

f- Uvular : an articulation involving the back of the tongue and the uvula , as in
French [ ] in " rouge " [ ] (Ladefoged ,1982 :285 ).

g-Retroflex : it is a term used in phonetic classification of consonant sounds on the

basis of their place of articulation . It refers to a sound made when the tip of the
tongue is curled back in the direction of the front part of the hard - palate - just
behind the alveolar ridge . The degree of retroflexion varies considerably between
sounds and dialects . The quality of / r / sound traditionally associated with American
English , and with many rural British dialects ( especially in the south west ) . It
illustrates one main group of retroflex 'r' ( the vowel is said to be "r-colored" or
rhoticized ).

h-Rhoticity : a form of English in which / r /can occur after a vowel and within a
syllable in words such as "car" , " bird ". Most forms of Midwestern American
English are rhotic . Whereas ,most forms of English spoken in the southern parts of
England are non-rhotic (ibid,:284 ).One of the significant problems with rhoticity
concerns the occurrence of / r / in accents known as non-rhotic .
We can find that in transcription of the phrases appears ; "fear is " / fi riz / , " hammer
is" , /ham riz /. Where it appears in these contexts in non- rhotic accents /r/ is known
as linking /r/ ;Since one of its function is precisely to link a syllable -final vowel with
the vowel of following syllable .( in different words ). Therefore, the appearance of
/r/in the context can be seen as an aspect of transition of connected speech. The
technical term is "liaison ".Two other observations are pertinent:
1-Where /r/ appears in these specific contexts then the syllable to which it relates
appears in a word which definitely has /r/ historically. We must think here of the
structure of centering diphthongs, as appears in non- rhotic varieties, their
transcription such as /i / or / e / for air , seem to contain a historical trace , and
2- non- rhotic accents have constraint whereby / r / may appear in syllable onsets, but
not codas .There are two important ideas :first , that there may be distinctive features
attached to each phoneme ; and a second, that there may be such things as
phonological rules which work in underlying representations , converting them to
surface ( phonetic)forms ( McCully ,2009 :174-6 ).
Rhoticity specifies an acoustic property rather than a particular tongue position.
Sounds that have the value [retroflex ] usually have the value of the feature
[rhotacized ]. But , it is possible and often happens that sounds having a high value of
the feature [rhotacized ] are not [retroflex].
O'Connor (1980:61) mentions that at the end of words Received Pronunciation has /r/
only if the immediately following word begins with a vowel , so the word "never" if it
occurs before a pause or before a word beginning with a consonant as in "never
better", is pronounced as /nev bet / pronounced /nev r gen / .. This is called linking /r/
.
Varieties of English which have / r / after a vowel many - post-vocalic /r /- are
called "rhotic accents ". Such accents include Irish Englishes, varieties SW British
English , many prestige types of American Englishes, and Scottish Englishes . For
all these accents , /r / is distributed not only in syllabic onsets , but also in syllabic
coda . On the other hand , there are many other varieties of English , including RP ,
Northern English varieties and Antipodean Englishes where / r / does not appear to
be allowed to occur in syllabic codas after vowels . Such accents would be described
as non- rhotic .
There is an interesting set of problems associated with the simple distinction
between rhotic and non-rhotic accents , and they are essentially problems of a
phonological nature ,concerning underling representation (McCully ,2009:143 ). o
Two hundred years ( and more ) ago, most if not all accents of English had rhoticity .
and therefore rhotic and non- rhotic accents display the following kinds of structure in
words such as "car " , " fear " and " hammer " :
Rhotic accents Non- rhotic accents
<car > /kar/, /ka:r/ /ka:/ , /kae:/
<fear> /fir∂/, /fi∂r/ /fi ∂ /
<hammer> /ham∂r/, /ham∂r / /ham∂ /
( ibid :173 )
This phenomena is the topic of this research .