Pronunciation

Pronunciation:
A malleable linguistic facet

Jonathan Ramirez

Linguistics 1200
Christie Bogle
12/8/2014

Pronunciation

Abstract
This research looks at how Australians and Americans pronounce the word grocery. Two
prominent pronunciations are known: rosriz and groriz. It is predicted to hear Australians
pronounce grocery with the [s] sound instead of [], regardless of time spend living in the
U.S. The subjects examined were two females of the ages 19 and 46, both born in Australia. The
younger subject lived in Australia for 10 years before coming here, and the older subject lived in
Australia for 36 years. The method of assessment involves recording a casual conversation with
the subjects to attain natural speech. The results of the assessments are that both of the subjects
pronunciation of the word grocery is consistent.

Pronunciation

Introduction
The social rules of language differ drastically from the essential rules, especially in English. Of
the many social faux-pas of language, pronunciation is among them. The arbitrary
pronunciation of words varies from different regions of the world. Of the many words that are
pronounced differently around the world, grocery is one of them.
The etymology of the word grocery dates back to 1321, when it first appeared in writing.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word was originally grocer, but in 1436, the
y became acquired. The original pronunciation is gro[s]ery, but this may have been altered by
the diversity of accents, regions, and pronunciation acquired through generations.
Language is constantly changing; it is malleable by a variety of influences. Australian English
has been known to have diverged from British English after the founding of the colony of New
South Wales. The influence of early settlers from a variety of locations from the British Isles
quickly developed a distinct form of English. There is some degree of allophonic variation
between American English and Australian English, and for this reason it is predicted to hear
Australians pronounce grocery with the [s] sound instead of [], regardless of time spend
living in the U.S.
Review of Literature
In the textbook Contemporary Linguistics (OGrady, Archibald, Aronoff, & Rees-Miller, 2010)
the authors point out the variation between American English and British English during the
colonial-era:

Pronunciation

A good example of colonial-era variation is r-lessness (which makes modern British

English far sound like fah to most North Americans). By 1776, this feature was already
widespread in the south of England, and this was reflected in North American patterns. New
England and the coastal South were settled by people from the south of England who maintained
social and economic ties with English, and these areas were r-less (and to some extent, still are).
Other North American dialects were (and still are) r-ful. (p. 492)
Some differences in English and British dialects exist today, and also differ from
Australian dialects. The regional differences should allow differences to perpetuate, as OGrady
et, al. (2010) say.
Methodology:
Two participants were selected to participate in the study. The participants are females of the age
of 19 and 46, are white, and were born in Australia. The subjects were selected from a mutual
acquaintance. The subjects were arranged into two groups: one who has lived the latter 2/3 of her
life in the United States and one who has lived the first 2/3 of her life in Australia. The subjects
were arranged in that order in order to assess whether living in the United States affected the
pronunciation of the word grocery. The equipment used in this study was a phone voice
recorder and a paper and pencil for note-taking. A dialogue between the subject and the
researcher took place (in order to attain natural speech) relevant to the topic of grocery shopping.
The subjects were told that they were being recorded for the differences in tone of voice in
different age groups.
Results: In the dialogue, the subjects were asked questions relevant to grocery shopping, so
often, the word grocery would come up. Both of the subjects were consistent with their

Pronunciation

pronunciation of the word grocery as rosriz. In the beginning of the recordings, both of
the subjects were a little tense, but towards the end, the subjects were both relaxed and natural
speech was attained. Both of the subjects are from Australia and grew up speaking the
Australian version of English, as is evident by their use of boot to refer to the trunk of a
car. It is commonly said that a living in the U.S. alters ones dialect than that from the country
of origin; but how the subjects pronounce the word grocery has remained intact, regardless
of the time spent living in the U.S.
Implications
What the results confer is that certain aspects of ones language may be affected by migrating to
a new country or it may not. In this case, the subjects retained the pronunciation of the word
grocery. I commonly hear this word pronounced as groriz and not rosriz. What this
means to me is that the dialect of some individuals may not be affected by the dialectic
diversity of surrounding community. I can imagine that if I grew up pronouncing a word a
certain way and I migrated to a country or a state with a different pronunciation of the same
word, my pronunciation would not be altered as one may believe.

Pronunciation

References
Grady, W. (2010). Contemporary linguistics: An introduction (6th ed.). Boston, Mass.: Bedford/St.
Martins.