Intonational variation in Liverpool English

Abstract

This paper investigates intonational variation in Liverpool English, a dialect of British English that is recognised as having a number of distinctive phonetic characteristics [15, 16]. One previously reported aspect of Liverpool intonation is the pres- ence of rising contours in declaratives as part of the traditional dialect [7]. Here we present a phonological Autosegmental Metrical analysis [9] and a phonetic analysis of intonation in different sentence types from 9 speakers. Results suggest that traditional Liverpool rising nuclear contours are common among 20–22 year olds from Liverpool. Through analysis of these data, we aim to contribute to descriptions of intonational variation in the UK, and wider studies of intonational variation and typology.