I say Mahster, you say Masster

[pne]

Sometimes I think that the fact that my idiolect has the TRAP/BATH split means that I speak a prestige dialect.

(And that British varieties which don't have the split are not as close to the standard.)

Comments

NORTH/FORCE: split or merger?

[pne.livejournal.com]

Ah yes; careless vocabulary in my part. Perhaps "NORTH/FORCE differentiation" might have been more neutral. (It's a split from the point of view of my 'lect, but not, of course, from a historical point of view.)