Notes on the Length of Vowels (III)

5 jrE PREsENT in this note the results of a series of experiments carried VV out by Mr. Lehmann under the direction of Mr. Heffner in the investigation of the length of vowels before dental stops. These results are correlated with those previously published in American Speech, April 1937 and February 1940. There has been no essential change in the laboratory technique employed and described in the first article, April 1937. The average speed of the kymograph in these experiments has been approximately 125 mm. ps. and we are now recording on aluminum discs part of the material measured. Since the conditions of the experiment are rigidly controlled as to tempo, pitch and psychological 'set,' it is not deemed necessary to record on discs the entire experimental material. These recordings are used rather as an occasional check on the consistency of the pronunciations measured. Mr. Lehmann was born in Nebraska and moved to Wisconsin at the age of seven; since then he has been continually a resident of this state. His father was born in Nebraska, his mother in Wisconsin. His speech may be regarded as typical of a large group of Wisconsin speakers. The material used in these experiments is made up of monosyllabic English words beginning with a consonant and ending with a dental stop. We have so arranged the experimental orders that there may be no inS fluence of one word upon the next, and we have balanced the proportion of words beginning with voiceless stop to words beginning with voiced stop in order to avoid any possible distortion of our results by the influence, if any, of this difference.1 It may suffice to say that we have not found any evidence in our present data to support the thesis that initial voiced consonants are followed by longer vowels than are initial voiceless consonants. Mr. Lehmann has measured 1,r80 recordings of vowels before [d] and 1,r70 recordings of vowels before [t], a total of 2,550 measurements upon which his data rest. We have satisfactory distribution curves not only for each vowel, but for each word in these data. The following sample words of each category measured are listed here in the order in which the vowel symbols appear on our table for Lehmann's vowels before [t]: pit, guts put, pet, peat, boot, pert, bite, bait, pot, bout, bat, boat, bought.