Diphthongs

SQUARE

Rhoticity in Scotland and Ireland is typically on a lengthened half-closed monophthong, [e(:)] SQUARE vowel, this co-existing with half-open [ε] in Orkney and Shetland and Urban Scots, and being the norm in Popular Dublin speech. [ε(:)] is also the form in rhotic South-west England. The Irish Rural North differs from the South in having [ə(:)]. Rhoticity in British Creole is attended by diphthongs [ie/iε]. In other, non-rhotic, accents the most usual regional form is a centring diphthong with half-open front onset, or a long half-open monophthong, [εə/ε:]. [ε:] is found also in RP (as distinct from the traditional RP diphthongal [eə]) and, with [e:], in the absence of rhoticity in British Creole. Characteristic of Liverpool, and found more widely in the Lancashire area, is [з:] (compare NURSE), a similar sound being recorded slightly further south in the west Midlands too.