New York City English, or Metropolitan New York English, is a regional

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of Linguistics, linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety (linguisti ...

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the Languages of the United States, most widely spoken lan ...

spoken by many people in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and much of its surrounding

metropolitan area A metropolitan area or metro is a region that consists of a densely populated urban agglomeration and its surrounding territories sharing industries, commercial areas, transport network, infrastructures and housing. A metro area usually com ...

. It is described by sociolinguist

William Labov William Labov ( ; born December 4, 1927) is an American linguist widely regarded as the founder of the discipline of variationist sociolinguistics. He has been described as "an enormously original and influential figure who has created much of ...

as the most recognizable regional dialect in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

. Its pronunciation system—the

New York accent The sound system of New York City English is popularly known as a New York accent. The New York metropolitan accent is one of the most recognizable accents of the United States, largely due to its popular stereotypes and portrayal in radio, ...

—is widely represented in American media with many public figures and fictional characters. Major features of the accent include a

high High may refer to: Science and technology * Height * High (atmospheric), a high-pressure area * High (computability), a quality of a Turing degree, in computability theory * High (tectonics), in geology an area where relative tectonic uplift ...

gliding Gliding is a recreational activity and competitive air sport in which pilots fly unpowered aircraft known as gliders or sailplanes using naturally occurring currents of rising air in the atmosphere to remain airborne. The word ''soaring'' is al ...

vowel (in words like ''talk'' and ''caught''); a split of the "short a" vowel into two separate sounds; variable dropping of ''r'' sounds; and a lack of the '' cot–caught'', '' Mary–marry–merry'', and '' hurry–furry'' mergers heard in many other American accents. Today, New York City English is associated particularly with urban New Yorkers of lower or mid

socioeconomic status Socioeconomic status (SES) is an economic and sociological combined total measure of a person's work experience and of an individual's or family's economic access to resources and social position in relation to others. When analyzing a family's ...

, descended from 19th- and 20th-century European immigrants. It is spoken in all five boroughs of the City and

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United Sta ...

's Nassau County, as well as in varying degrees among speakers in Suffolk County (Long Island), Westchester County, and Rockland County of New York State, plus Hudson and Bergen Counties in

northeastern New Jersey The Gateway Region is the primary urbanized area of the northeastern section of New Jersey. It is anchored by Newark, the state's most populous city. While sometimes known as the Newark metropolitan area, it is part of the New York metropolitan ...

History

The origins of many of New York City English's diverse features are probably not recoverable. New York City English, largely with the same major pronunciation system popularly recognized today, was first reproduced in literature and scientifically documented in the 1890s. It was then, and still mostly is, associated with ethnically diverse

European-American European Americans (also referred to as Euro-Americans) are Americans of European ancestry. This term includes people who are descended from the first European settlers in the United States as well as people who are descended from more recent Eu ...

native-English speakers. The entire Mid-Atlantic United States, including both New York City and the

Delaware Valley The Delaware Valley is a metropolitan region on the East Coast of the United States that comprises and surrounds Philadelphia, the sixth most populous city in the nation and 68th largest city in the world as of 2020. The toponym Delaware Val ...

(whose own distinct dialect centers around

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

and

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

) shares certain key features, including a

vowel with a

glide Glide may refer to: * Gliding flight, to fly without thrust Computing *Glide API, a 3D graphics interface *Glide OS, a web desktop *Glide (software), an instant video messenger *Glide, a molecular docking software by Schrödinger (company), Schr� ...

(sometimes called the ''aww'' vowel) as well as a

phonemic split In historical linguistics, phonological change is any sound change that alters the distribution of phonemes in a language. In other words, a language develops a new system of oppositions among its phonemes. Old contrasts may disappear, new ones ...

of the short ''a'' vowel, (making ''gas'' and ''gap'', for example, have different vowels sounds)—New York City's split not identical though to Philadelphia's. Linguist

has pointed out that a similarly structured (though differently pronounced)

split Split(s) or The Split may refer to: Places * Split, Croatia, the largest coastal city in Croatia * Split Island, Canada, an island in the Hudson Bay * Split Island, Falkland Islands * Split Island, Fiji, better known as Hạfliua Arts, enterta ...

is found today even in the southern accents of England; thus, a single common origin of this split may trace back to colonial-era England. New York City became an urban economic power in the eighteenth century, with the city's financial elites maintaining close ties with the British Empire even after the Revolutionary War. According to Labov, New York City speakers' loss of the ''r'' sound after vowels (incidentally, not found in the nearby Delaware Valley) began as a nineteenth-century imitation of the prestigious British feature, consistently starting among the upper classes in New York City before spreading to other socioeconomic classes. After World War II, social perceptions reversed and ''r''-preserving (rhotic) pronunciations became the new American prestige standard, rejecting East Coast and British accent features, while postwar migrations transferred rhotic speakers directly to New York City from other regions of the country. The result is that non-rhoticity, which was once a high-status feature and later a city-wide feature, has been diminishing and now, since the mid-twentieth century onward, largely remains only among lower-status New Yorkers. Today, New York City metropolitan accents are often rhotic or variably rhotic. Other features of the dialect, such as the dental pronunciations of ''d'' and ''t'', and related ''th''-stopping, likely come from contact with foreign languages, particularly Italian and Yiddish, brought into New York City through its huge immigration waves of Europeans during the mid-to-late nineteenth century. Grammatical structures, such as the lack of inversion in indirect questions, similarly suggest contact with immigrant languages, plus several words common in the city are derived from such foreign languages.

Influence on other dialects

ns born in the twentieth century exhibit a short-''a'' split system that some linguists regard as a simplification of the very similar New York City short-''a'' split. Younger Philadelphians, however, are retreating from many of the traditional features shared in common with New York City. Due to an influx of immigrants from New York City and neighboring New Jersey to

southern Florida South Florida is the southernmost region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is one of Florida's three most commonly referred to directional regions; the other two are Central Florida and North Florida. South Florida is the southernmost part of th ...

, some resident southern Floridians now speak with an accent reminiscent of a New York accent. Additionally, as a result of social and commercial contact between

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

and New York City, the traditional accent of New Orleans, known locally as "

Yat Yat or jat (Ѣ ѣ; italics: ) is the thirty-second letter of the old Cyrillic alphabet and the Rusyn alphabet. There is also another version of yat, the iotified yat (majuscule: , minuscule: ), which is a Cyrillic character combining a ...

", bears distinctive similarities with the New York accent, including the (moribund)

coil–curl merger Rhoticity in English is the pronunciation of the historical rhotic consonant by English speakers. The presence or absence of rhoticity is one of the most prominent distinctions by which varieties of English can be classified. In rhotic varieti ...

, raising of to , a similar split in the short-''a'' system, and ''th''-stopping. Similarly, dialect similarities suggest that older New York City English also influenced

Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

and Albany, New York, whose older speakers in particular may still exhibit a short-''a'' split system that linguists suggest is an expanded or generalized variant of the New York City short-''a'' system. Certain New York City dialect features also understandably appear in New York City Latino English.

Recent developments

Though

argued in 2010 that the New York City accent is basically stable at the moment, some recent studies have revealed a trend of recession in most features of the accent, especially among younger speakers from middle-class or higher backgrounds. Documented loss of New York City accent features includes the loss of the

(now almost completely extinct), non-rhoticity, and the extremely raised long vowel (as in ''talk'', ''cough'', or ''law''). Researchers proposed that the motivation behind these recessive trends is the stigmatization against the typical New York City accent since the mid-1900s as being associated with a poorer or working-class background, often also corresponding with particular ethnic identities. While earlier projects detected trends of emphasizing New York City accents as part of a process of social identification, recent researches attribute the loss of typical accent features to in-group ethnic distancing. In other words, many of the young generations of ethnic groups who formerly were the most representative speakers of the accent are currently avoiding its features in order to not stand out socially or ethnically.

Pronunciation

The pronunciation of New York City English, most popularly acknowledged by the term ''New York accent'', is readily noticed and stereotyped, garnering considerable attention in American culture.Labov et al., 2006, p. 233 Some distinctive phonological features include its traditional dropping of ''r'' except before vowels, a short-''a'' split system (in which, for example, the ''a'' in ''gas'' is not assonant to the ''a'' in ''gap''), a

vowel (in words like ''talk'', ''thought'', ''all'', etc. and thus an absence of the

cot–caught merger The ''cot''–''caught'' merger or merger, formally known in linguistics as the low back merger, is a sound change present in some dialects of English where speakers do not distinguish the vowel phonemes in "cot" and "caught". "Cot" and "caugh ...

), absence of the

Mary–marry–merry merger In English, many vowel shifts affect only vowels followed by in rhotic dialects, or vowels that were historically followed by that has been elided in non-rhotic dialects. Most of them involve the merging of vowel distinctions and so fewer vowe ...

, and the highly stigmatized (and largely now-extinct)

Vocabulary and grammar

There are some words or grammatical constructions used mainly in Greater New York City: *': a small neighborhood convenience store; used in recent decades, particularly in New York City though not on Long Island generally, it comes from Spanish, originally meaning "a wine storehouse" via the

Puerto Rican Spanish Puerto Rican Spanish (''español puertorriqueño'' ) is the variety (linguistics), variety of the Spanish language as characteristically spoken in Puerto Rico and by millions of people of Puerto Rican people, Puerto Rican descent living in the ...

term for "small store; corner store"; by extension, "

bodega cat A bodega cat (also referred to as a deli cat, store cat, or shop cat) is a type of working cat that inhabits a '' bodega'', which in New York City English refers to a convenience store or deli. Much like farm cats, library cats, and ship cats, ...

s" is the term for the cats that inhabit such establishments. These small stores may also be called , which is the short form of ''

delicatessen Traditionally, a delicatessen or deli is a retail establishment that sells a selection of fine, exotic, or foreign prepared foods. Delicatessen originated in Germany (original: ) during the 18th century and spread to the United States in the m ...

s''. *''bubkes'' : a worthless amount; little or nothing (from Yiddish; probably an abbreviation of ''kozebubkes'', literally, "goat droppings")Newman, Michael (2014). ''New York City English''. De Gruyter Mouton, pp. 113-114 *''dungarees'': an older term for

blue jeans Jeans are a type of pants or trousers made from denim or dungaree cloth. Often the term "jeans" refers to a particular style of trousers, called "blue jeans", with copper-riveted pockets which were invented by Jacob W. Davis in 1871 and paten ...

*''

egg cream An egg cream is a cold beverage consisting of milk, carbonated water, and flavored syrup (typically chocolate or vanilla), as a substitute for an ice cream float. Despite the name, the drink contains neither eggs nor cream. It is prepared by po ...

'': a mixture of cold milk, chocolate syrup, and seltzer (

carbonated water Carbonated water (also known as soda water, sparkling water, fizzy water, club soda, water with gas, in many places as mineral water, or especially in the United States as seltzer or seltzer water) is water containing dissolved carbon dioxide gas, ...

) *''have a catch'': to play a game of catch *''hero'': a footlong sandwich or " sub" *''

Mischief Night Mischief Night is an informal holiday on which children, teenagers and adults (both young and old) engage in jokes, pranks, vandalism and/or parties. It is known by a variety of names including Devil's Night, Gate Night, Goosey Night, Moving Nig ...

'': the night before

Halloween Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observanc ...

*''on line'': Metro New Yorkers tend to say they stand ' line, whereas most other New York State and American English speakers tend to stand ''in'' line. *': the small front staircase or steps up to a building (from the

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

word "") *''

punchball Punchball is a sport spawned by and similar to baseball, but without a pitcher, catcher, or bat. The " batter" essentially plays "fungo" without a bat, bouncing or tossing up the ball and then using a volleyball-type approach to put the ball (us ...

'' and ''

stickball Stickball is a street game similar to baseball, usually formed as a pick-up game played in large cities in the Northeastern United States, especially New York City and Philadelphia. The equipment consists of a broom handle and a rubber ball, ...

'': street variants of

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

, suitable for smaller urban areas, in which a fist or stick substitutes for the bat and a rubber ball (a "

Spaldeen A Spalding Hi-Bounce Ball, often called a Spaldeen or a Pensie Pinkie, is a rubber ball, described as a tennis ball core without the felt. These balls are commonly used in street games developed in the mid-20th century, such as Chinese handball (a ...

") is used *'' skel(l)'': a

vagrant Vagrancy is the condition of homelessness without regular employment or income. Vagrants (also known as bums, vagabonds, rogues, tramps or drifters) usually live in poverty and support themselves by begging, scavenging, petty theft, temporar ...

beggar Begging (also panhandling) is the practice of imploring others to grant a favor, often a gift of money, with little or no expectation of reciprocation. A person doing such is called a beggar or panhandler. Beggars may operate in public place ...

, or small-time street criminal *''s(c)hmuck'': an insulting term for an unlikeable man (from Yiddish ''shmok'': "penis") *''yous(e)'' (often ): the plural form of ''you'', in addition to ''you guys'' or, possibly performatively, ''yous guys'' The word ' tends to be used as a synonym for "weak", "someone unwilling or unable to defend himself" or perhaps "loser", though it appears to descend from an outdated New York

African-American English African-American English (or AAE; also known as Black American English, or Black English in American linguistics) is the set of English sociolects spoken by most Black people in the United States and many in Canada; most commonly, it refers t ...

meaning of ''male receptive participant in anal sex''.

Conversational styles

New York City speakers have some unique conversational styles. Linguistics professor Deborah Tannen notes in a ''New York Times'' article it has "an emphasis to involve the other person, rather than being considerate. It would be asking questions as a show of interest in the other person, whereas in other parts of hecountry, people don't ask because it might put the person on the spot." Metro New Yorkers "stand closer, talk louder, and leave shorter pauses between exchanges," Tannen said. "I call it 'cooperative overlap'. It's a way of showing interest and enthusiasm, but it's often mistaken for interrupting by people from elsewhere in the country." On the other hand, linguist William Labov demurs, "there's nothing known to linguists about 'normal New York City conversation'".

Notable speakers

The accent has a strong presence in media; pioneer variationist sociolinguist

describes it as the most recognizable variety of

North American English North American English (NAmE, NAE) is the most generalized variety of the English language as spoken in the United States and Canada. Because of their related histories and cultures, plus the similarities between the pronunciations (accents), v ...

. The following famous people are native New York City area speakers, demonstrating typical features of the accent. *

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* Michael Cohen *

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* The

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; prominently

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* Leah Remini *

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Don Rickles Donald Jay Rickles (May 8, 1926 – April 6, 2017) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. He became known primarily for his insult comedy. His film roles include ''Run Silent, Run Deep'' (1958) with Clark Gable, Carl Reiner's '' Enter La ...

Thelma Ritter Thelma Ritter (February 14, 1902 – February 5, 1969) was an American actress, best known for her comedic roles as working-class characters and her strong New York accent. She won the 1958 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, and received s ...

Joan Rivers Joan Alexandra Molinsky (June 8, 1933 – September 4, 2014), known professionally as Joan Rivers, was an American comedian, actress, producer, writer and television host. She was noted for her blunt, often controversial comedic persona—heavi ...

Ray Romano Raymond Albert Romano (born December 21, 1957) is an American stand-up comedian, actor and screenwriter. He is best known for his role as Ray Barone on the CBS sitcom ''Everybody Loves Raymond'', for which he received an Emmy Award, and as the ...

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Fictional characters

Many fictional characters in popular films and television shows have used New York City English, whether or not the actors portraying them are native speakers of the dialect. Some examples are listed below. *

The Bowery Boys The Bowery Boys are fictional New York City characters, portrayed by a company of New York actors, who were the subject of 48 feature films released by Monogram Pictures and its successor Allied Artists Pictures Corporation from 1946 through 195 ...

Archie Archie is a masculine given name, a diminutive of Archibald. It may refer to: People Given name or nickname *Archie Alexander (1888–1958), African-American mathematician, engineer and governor of the US Virgin Islands * Archie Blake (mathematici ...

and

Edith Bunker Edith Bunker is a fictional character on the 1970s sitcom ''All in the Family'' (and occasionally ''Archie Bunker's Place''), played by Jean Stapleton. She is the wife of Archie Bunker, mother of Gloria Stivic, mother-in-law of Michael "Meathead" ...

Bugs Bunny Bugs Bunny is an animated cartoon character created in the late 1930s by Leon Schlesinger Productions (later Warner Bros. Cartoons) and voiced originally by Mel Blanc. Bugs is best known for his starring roles in the '' Looney Tunes'' and '' ...

* ''

The Honeymooners ''The Honeymooners'' is an American television sitcom which originally aired from 1955 to 1956, created by and starring Jackie Gleason, and based on a recurring comedy sketch of the same name that had been part of Gleason's variety show. It fol ...

'' cast *

Terry Malloy ''On the Waterfront'' is a 1954 American crime drama film, directed by Elia Kazan and written by Budd Schulberg. It stars Marlon Brando and features Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, Pat Henning, and Eva Marie Saint in her film debut. ...

Meowth Meowth ( or , known as in the original Japanese language, Japanese version) is a List of Pokémon, Pokémon species in Nintendo and Game Freak's ''Pokémon'' franchise. Created by Ken Sugimori, Meowth first appeared in the video games Pokémon ...

from ''

Pokémon (an abbreviation for in Japan) is a Japanese media franchise managed by The Pokémon Company, founded by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures (company), Creatures, the owners of the trademark and copyright of the franchise. In terms of ...

'' * ''

Mob Wives ''Mob Wives'' is an American reality television series that premiered on VH1 on April 17, 2011. The show focuses on the lives of several women residing in the New York City borough of Staten Island, whose family members and husbands have been arr ...

'' cast *

Rhoda Morgenstern Rhoda Faye Morgenstern, portrayed by Valerie Harper, is a fictional character on the television sitcom ''The Mary Tyler Moore Show'' and subsequent spin-off, ''Rhoda''. Character background The original opening of the series ''Rhoda'' establis ...

* ''

The Sopranos ''The Sopranos'' is an American Crime film#Crime drama, crime drama television series created by David Chase. The story revolves around Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini), a New Jersey-based American Mafia, Italian-American mobster, portraying h ...

'' cast *

Jerry Seinfeld Jerome Allen Seinfeld ( ; born April 29, 1954) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and producer. He is best known for playing a Jerry Seinfeld (character), semi-fictionalized version of himself in the sitcom ''Seinfeld'', which he ...

and

George Costanza George Louis Costanza is a fictional character in the American television sitcom ''Seinfeld'' (1989–1998), played by Jason Alexander. He is a short, stocky, balding man who struggles with numerous insecurities, often dooming his romantic rela ...

from ''

Seinfeld ''Seinfeld'' ( ) is an American television sitcom created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld. It aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, over nine seasons and List of Seinfeld episodes, 180 episodes. It stars Seinfeld as Jerry Seinfeld ( ...

'' * The

Three Stooges The Three Stooges were an American vaudeville and comedy team active from 1922 until 1970, best remembered for their 190 short subject films by Columbia Pictures. Their hallmark styles were physical farce and slapstick. Six Stooges appeared ...

Geographic boundaries

This accent is not spoken in the rest of

New York State New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. stat ...

beyond the immediate New York City metropolitan area. Specifically, the upper

Hudson Valley The Hudson Valley (also known as the Hudson River Valley) comprises the valley of the Hudson River and its adjacent communities in the U.S. state of New York. The region stretches from the Capital District including Albany and Troy south to ...

mixes New York City and Western New England accent features, while

Central Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

and

Western New York Western New York (WNY) is the westernmost region of the U.S. state of New York. The eastern boundary of the region is not consistently defined by state agencies or those who call themselves "Western New Yorkers". Almost all sources agree WNY in ...

belongs to the same dialect region as Great Lakes cities such as

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

and

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

, known as the

Inland North Inland Northern (American) English, also known in American linguistics as the Inland North or Great Lakes dialect, is an American English dialect spoken primarily by White Americans in a geographic band reaching from the major urban areas of Up ...

New York State

New York City English is confined to a geographically small but densely populated area, including all

five boroughs 5 is a number, numeral, and glyph. 5, five or number 5 may also refer to: * AD 5, the fifth year of the AD era * 5 BC, the fifth year before the AD era Literature * ''5'' (visual novel), a 2008 visual novel by Ram * ''5'' (comics), an awar ...

of New York City, as well as many speakers on Long Island: generally in Nassau County and somewhat in Suffolk County. Moreover, the English of the

forms a continuum of speakers who gather more features of New York City English the closer they are to the city itself; some of the dialect's features may be heard as far north as the state capital of Albany. A small portion of Connecticut speaks similar, primarily speakers in Fairfield County and as far as New Haven County.

New Jersey

The northeast quarter of

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, prominently

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula of ...

Hudson Hudson may refer to: People * Hudson (given name) * Hudson (surname) * Henry Hudson, English explorer * Hudson (footballer, born 1986), Hudson Fernando Tobias de Carvalho, Brazilian football right-back * Hudson (footballer, born 1988), Hudso ...

, and

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

counties, including the cities

Weehawken Weehawken is a township in the northern part of Hudson County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is located largely on the Hudson Palisades overlooking the Hudson River. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 17,197.

Hoboken Hoboken ( ; Unami: ') is a city in Hudson County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 60,417. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program calculated that the city's population was 58,69 ...

Jersey City Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.Bayonne Bayonne (; eu, Baiona ; oc, label= Gascon, Baiona ; es, Bayona) is a city in Southwestern France near the Spanish border. It is a commune and one of two subprefectures in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine re ...

, and

Newark Newark most commonly refers to: * Newark, New Jersey, city in the United States * Newark Liberty International Airport, New Jersey; a major air hub in the New York metropolitan area Newark may also refer to: Places Canada * Niagara-on-the ...

, plus Middlesex and Monmouth Counties, are all within the

New York City metropolitan area The New York metropolitan area, also commonly referred to as the Tri-State area, is the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban area, urban landmass, at , and one of the list of most populous metropolitan areas, most populous urban agg ...

and thus also home to the major features of New York City English. With the exception of New York City's immediate neighbors like Jersey City and Newark, the New York City metropolitan dialect as spoken in New Jersey is rhotic (or fully ''r''-pronouncing), so that, whereas a Brooklynite might pronounce "over there" something like "ovah theah/deah" , an

Elizabeth Elizabeth or Elisabeth may refer to: People * Elizabeth (given name), a female given name (including people with that name) * Elizabeth (biblical figure), mother of John the Baptist Ships * HMS ''Elizabeth'', several ships * ''Elisabeth'' (sch ...

native might say "over there/dare" . ''

The Atlas of North American English ''The Atlas of North American English: Phonetics, Phonology and Sound Change'' (abbreviated ANAE; formerly, the ''Phonological Atlas of North America'') is an overview of the pronunciation patterns (accents) in all the major regional dial ...

'' by

et al. shows that the New York City short-''a'' pattern has diffused to many ''r''-pronouncing communities in northern New Jersey like Rutherford (Labov's birthplace) and North Plainfield. However, in these communities, the

function word In linguistics, function words (also called functors) are words that have little lexical meaning or have ambiguous meaning and express grammatical relationships among other words within a sentence, or specify the attitude or mood of the speaker. ...

constraint is lost and the

open syllable A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological "bu ...

constraint is variable.

Notable speakers

The following is a list of notable lifelong native speakers of the rhotic New York City English of northeastern New Jersey: *

Jon Bon Jovi John Francis Bongiovi Jr. (born March 2, 1962), known professionally as Jon Bon Jovi, is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and actor. He is best known as the founder and frontman of the rock band Bon Jovi, which was formed in 1983. He ...

Danny DeVito Daniel Michael DeVito Jr. (born November 17, 1944) is an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He gained prominence for his portrayal of the taxi dispatcher Louie De Palma in the television series ''Taxi'' (1978–1983), which won him a Gold ...

Joey Diaz José Antonio Díaz (born February 19, 1963), known professionally as Joey "CoCo" Diaz, is a Cuban-American stand-up comedian, actor, and podcaster. After pursuing stand-up comedy full time in 1991 in the Colorado and Seattle areas, Diaz relocate ...

James Gandolfini James Joseph Gandolfini Jr. (; September 18, 1961 – June 19, 2013) was an American actor. For his role as Tony Soprano, the Italian-American Mafia crime boss in HBO's television series ''The Sopranos'', he won three Emmy Awards, five Scree ...

Ed Harris Edward Allen Harris (born November 28, 1950) is an American actor and filmmaker. His performances in ''Apollo 13'' (1995), ''The Truman Show'' (1998), ''Pollock'' (2000), and '' The Hours'' (2002) earned him critical acclaim and Academy Award n ...

Ray Liotta Raymond Allen Liotta (; December 18, 1954 – May 26, 2022) was an American actor. He was best known for his roles as Shoeless Joe Jackson in ''Field of Dreams'' (1989) and Henry Hill in Martin Scorsese's ''Goodfellas'' (1990). He was a Primeti ...

Joe Pesci Joseph Frank Pesci ( , ; born February 9, 1943) is an American actor and musician. He is known for portraying tough, volatile characters in a variety of genres and for his collaborations with Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese in the films ''Ra ...

Dick Vitale Richard John Vitale (; born June 9, 1939), also known as "Dickie V", is an American basketball sportscaster. A former head coach in the college and professional ranks, he is well known for his 41-year tenure as a college basketball broadcaster fo ...

Zakk Wylde Zachary Phillip Wylde (born Jeffrey Phillip Wielandt; January 14, 1967) is an American musician. He is best known as the lead guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne and as the founder, lead guitarist, lead singer, songwriter and producer of the heavy meta ...

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Chairman of the Board" and later called "Ol' Blue Eyes", Sinatra was one of the most popular ...

is an older example of a non-rhotic speaker from New Jersey.

Explanatory notes

Citations

General and cited references

* * Becker, Kara & Amy Wing Mei Wong. 2009. The short-a system of New York City English: An update. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics. ''Volume 15, Issue 2 Article 3. pp: 10–20. http://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol15/iss2/3/ * Becker, Kara & Elizabeth Coggshall. 2010. The vowel phonologies of white and African American New York Residents. In Malcah Yaeger-Dror and *Erik R. Thomas (eds.) ''African American English Speakers And Their Participation In Local Sound Changes: A Comparative Study''. American Speech Volume Supplement 94, Number 1. Chapel Hill, NC: Duke University Press. pp: 101–128 * Becker, Kara & Elizabeth L. Coggshall. 2009. The Sociolinguistics of Ethnicity in New York City, 2009, Language and Linguistic Compass, 3(3): 751–766.4 * * Becker, Kara. 2010. ''Regional Dialect Features on the Lower East Side of New York City: Sociophonetics, Ethnicity, and Identity''. Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, NYU. * Bonfiglio, Thomas Paul. 2002. ''Race and the Rise of Standard American''. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 214–225. * * Cutler, Cece. 2007. Hip-hop language in sociolinguistics and beyond. Language and Linguistics Compass, 1(5):519–538. * Cutler, Cece. 2008 Brooklyn Style: hip-hop markers and racial affiliation among European immigrants. International Journal of Bilingualism, 12(1–2), 7–24. * * Hubell, Allan F. 1972. The Pronunciation of English in New York City. NY: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. * Kurath, Hans and Raven I. McDavid. 1961. ''The Pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States''. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. * Labov, William,

Paul Cohen Paul Joseph Cohen (April 2, 1934 – March 23, 2007) was an American mathematician. He is best known for his proofs that the continuum hypothesis and the axiom of choice are independent from Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory, for which he was award ...

, Clarence Robins, and John Lewis. 1968. ''A study of the Non-Standard English of Negro and Puerto Rican Speakers in New York City, V. 1: Phonological and Grammatical Analysis''. Washington, DC: Office of Education, Bureau of Research/ERIC. * Labov, William,

, Clarence Robins, and John Lewis. 1968. ''A study of the Non-Standard English of Negro and Puerto Rican Speakers in New York City', V. 2: The Use of Language in the Speech Community''. Washington, DC: Office of Education, Bureau of Research/ERIC. * * Labov, William. 1972a. ''Language in the Inner City: Studies in the Black English Vernacular''. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. * Labov, William. 1972b. ''Sociolinguistic Patterns''. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. * Labov, William (1994) ''Principles of Linguistic Change: Volume 1: Internal Factors'' Blackwell * Labov, William (2001) ''Principles of Linguistic Change: Volume 2: Social Factors'' Blackwell * * * Labov, William (2007
"Transmission and Diffusion"
''Language'' June 2007 * Newman, Michael (2005). "New York Talk" in ''American Voices'' Walt Wolfram and Ben Ward (eds.). p. 82–87. Blackwell. . * * Schneider, E. W., Kortmann, B. (2005), A Handbook of Varieties of English: A Multi-Media Reference Tool, Mouton de Gruyter, , p. 284 * * * * * Wells, J. C. 1982. ''Accents of English. ''3 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. * Wolfram, Walt. 1974. ''Sociolinguistic Aspects of Assimilation: Puerto Rican English in New York City''. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. * Wolfram, Walt & Natalie Schilling Estes (2006) ''American English'' 2nd edition Blackwell * Wolfram, Walt & Ward, Ben (2005) ''American Voices: How Dialects Differ from Coast to Coast'' Blackwell *

External links

from the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. T ...

's Language Samples Project
A paper by Labov on dialect diversity, including information on NY dialect phonology

The site of the New York Latino English project, which studies the native English spoken by New York Latinos.
A site with samples of speech in various dialects, including New York

AM New York's feature on the New York accent
* Demonstration of NYC English raised and tensed /ɔ/, i.e., the THOUGHT vowel in words like 'coffee' and 'sausage.' {{English dialects by continent American English City colloquials

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

Languages of New York (state) Languages of New Jersey Working-class culture in New York City

History

Influence on other dialects

Recent developments

Pronunciation

Vocabulary and grammar

Conversational styles

Notable speakers

Fictional characters

Geographic boundaries

New York State

New Jersey

Notable speakers

See also

Explanatory notes

Citations

General and cited references

External links