Lexical set
A lexical set is a group of words that all fall under a single category based on some shared phonological feature.
Wells Standard Lexical Sets for English
The Standard Lexical Sets for English introduced by John C. Wells in Accents of English are in wide usage. Wells defined each lexical set on the basis of the pronunciation of words in two reference accents, which he calls RP and GenAm.- "RP" refers to Received Pronunciation, the traditionally prestigious accent in England.
- "GenAm" refers to an accent of the General American type, which is associated with a geographically "neutral" or widespread sound system throughout the US.
| Keyword | RP | GenAm | Example words |
| ship, sick, bridge, milk, myth, busy | |||
| step, neck, edge, shelf, friend, ready | |||
| tap, back, badge, scalp, hand, cancel | |||
| stop, sock, dodge, romp, possible, quality | |||
| cup, suck, budge, pulse, trunk, blood | |||
| put, bush, full, good, look, wolf | |||
| staff, brass, ask, dance, sample, calf | |||
| cough, broth, cross, long, Boston | |||
| hurt, lurk, urge, burst, jerk, term | |||
| creep, speak, leave, feel, key, people | |||
| tape, cake, raid, veil, steak, day | |||
| psalm, father, bra, spa, lager | |||
| taught, sauce, hawk, jaw, broad | |||
| soap, joke, home, know, so, roll | |||
| loop, shoot, tomb, mute, huge, view | |||
| ripe, write, arrive, high, try, buy | |||
| adroit, noise, join, toy, royal | |||
| out, house, loud, count, crowd, cow | |||
| beer, sincere, fear, beard, serum | |||
| care, fair, pear, where, scarce, vary | |||
| far, sharp, bark, carve, farm, heart | |||
| for, war, short, scorch, born, warm | |||
| four, wore, sport, porch, borne, story | |||
| poor, tourist, pure, plural, jury | |||
| happ | copy, scampi, taxi, sortie, committee, hockey, Chelsea | ||
| lett | paper, metre, calendar, stupor, succor, martyr, figure | ||
| comm | catalpa, quota, vodka |
For example, the word rod is pronounced in RP and in GenAm. It therefore belongs in the lexical set. Weary is pronounced in RP and in GenAm and thus belongs in the lexical set.
Some English words do not belong to any lexical set. For example, the a in the stressed syllable of tomato is pronounced in RP, and in GenAm, a combination that is very unusual and is not covered by any of the 24 lexical sets above. The GenAm pronunciation of words pronounced with before a velar consonant in RP, such as mock and fog, varies between and and so the words belong to no particular lexical set.
Choice of the keywords
Wells explains his choice of keywords as follows:The keywords have been chosen in such a way that clarity is maximized: whatever accent of English they are spoken in, they can hardly be mistaken for other words. Although fleece is not the commonest of words, it cannot be mistaken for a word with some other vowel; whereas beat, say, if we had chosen it instead, would have been subject to the drawback that one man's pronunciation of beat may sound like another's pronunciation of bait or bit.
Wherever possible, the keywords end in a voiceless alveolar or dental consonant.
Usage
The Standard Lexical Sets of Wells are widely used to discuss the phonological and phonetic systems of different accents of English in a clear and concise manner. Although based solely on RP and GenAm, the Standard Lexical Sets have proven useful in describing many other accents of English. This is true because, in many dialects, the words in all or most of the sets are pronounced with similar or identical stressed vowels. Wells himself uses the Lexical Sets most prominently to give "tables of lexical incidence" for all the various accents he discusses in his work. For example, here is the table of lexical incidence he gives for Newfoundland English:- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- :
- happ:
- lett:
- comm:
Wells also uses the Standard Lexical Sets to refer to "the vowel sound used for the standard lexical set in question in the accent under discussion": Thus, for example, in describing the Newfoundland accent, Wells writes that " and are reportedly often merged as ", meaning that the stressed syllables of words in the lexical set and words in the lexical set are reportedly often pronounced identically with the vowel.
Lexical sets may also be used to describe :Category:Splits and mergers in English phonology|splits and mergers. For example, RP, along with most other non-rhotic accents, pronounces words such as "father" and "farther" identically. This can be described more economically as the merger of the and lexical sets. Most North American accents make "father" rhyme with "bother". This can be described as the merger of the and lexical sets.
Origin
In a 2010 blog post, Wells wrote:He also wrote that he claimed no copyright in the Standard Lexical Sets, and that everyone was "free to make whatever use of them they wish".
Extensions
Some varieties of English make distinctions in stressed vowels that are not captured by the 24 lexical sets. For example, some Irish and Scottish accents that have not undergone the fern–fir–fur merger split the lexical set into multiple subsets. For such accents, the 24 Wells lexical sets may be inadequate. Because of this, a work devoted to Irish English may split the Wells set into two subsets, a new, smaller set and a set.Some writers on English accents have introduced a set to refer to a set of words that have the vowel in standard accents but may have a different vowel in Sheffield or in south-east London. Wells has stated that he didn't include a set because this should be interpreted as an allophone of that is sensitive to the morpheme boundary, which he illustrates by comparing the London pronunciations of goalie and slowly.
, which documents the phonologies of varieties of English around the world like, employs Wells Standard Lexical Sets as well as the following supplementary lexical sets, as needed to illustrate finer details of the variety in discussion: