The diphthongs

The merger of NEAR and SQUARE is more noticeable for this Maori English speaker than for the Pakeha English speaker. Contrary to Bell and Johnson’s (1997) observations, the merger is to a closer onset. A close onset to the diphthong is also found in occurrences of the word where in the conversation (57 and 72 seconds).

The FACE vowel in the word list has a more distinctly two-part diphthong, but it is not clear if this is a result of a deliberate reading style.

The second part of the GOAT vowel is quite front (matching the GOOSE vowel), especially noticeable in a number of words in the conversation (e.g. home at 54 seconds, road at 62 and 96 seconds).

It is not clear that these realizations of diphthongs are characteristically Maori English, or just more generally broad New Zealand English.