Cot-caught merger

In many parts of North America (about half the United States and nearly all of Canada) /ɑː/ and /ɔː/ sound the same. This is in addition to the father-bother merger, where /ɑː/ and /ɒ/ sound the same. This means that *caught* /ɔː/ and *cot* /ɒ/ (also *father* /ɑː/ and *bother* /ɒ/) have the same stressed vowel /ɑː/. In this accent /ɔː/ appears only followed by /r/: north, force.

This accent (which is not General American) is so prevalent that it is used in Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary and in Cambridge Dictionaries Online for British English, US label. Note that Cambridge Dictionaries Online list two different American pronunciations, the one in Essential American English doesn't have the merger.

It can be conjectured that the spread of this merger via mass media has made some particular “modern” words to be pronounced with /ɑː/ even in dialects that have /ɔː/. For example "astronaut" pronounced as /ˈæstrəˌnɑːt/ in addition to /ˈæstrəˌnɔːt/.

Other names for this merger (better for those who have it) are "LOT - THOUGHT merger" or "PALM - LOT - THOUGHT merger". There is an area in the United States (in New England) where "lot" and "thought" are merged as [ɒ] but "palm"/"father" is different (as [ɑ]). This means that strictly speaking "LOT - THOUGHT merger" and "PALM - LOT - THOUGHT merger" are different concepts.

The cot-caught merger is present also in Europe, but there the father-bother merger does not appear (similar to the area in New England mentioned above). The rest of this article is about the North American merge.

## Comparison of phonemes

Sometimes we mark the CLOTH vowel with an asterisk, as follows:

\*: These words are pronounced with /ɔː/ in General American.
## Homophones

The cot-caught merger generates very few homophones.

* bot (computer program; shortening of *robot)* - bought; collar - caller; cot - caught; don (put clothes on)/Don (nickname of Donald) - dawn/Dawn; stock - stalk; tot (very young child) - taught;

The PALM - LOT - THOUGHT merger generates even fewer homophones.

* Bach *(composer)* - balk,*AmE* baulk*BrE*; la *(musical note)* - law; Ra *(sun god)* - raw

## Phoneme /ɑː/ in the PALM - LOT - THOUGHT merger

This phonetics article is valid in an area that includes roughly 50% of North America but is not General American, the accent used in television.

This article is valid in an area in North America where the following words have the same phoneme vowel: "start", "palm", "spa", "lot", "thought" and "law".

Many people pronounce /ɑː/ and /ɑːr/ with different vowels (e.g. lodge as [lɑdʒ] and large as [lɑːrdʒ]); however since the difference is predictable there is no problem using the same symbol in both cases (e.g. /lɑːdʒ/ and /lɑːrdʒ/).

Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary (MWLD) uses the cot-caught merger in its transcriptions. However, since it uses narrow notation, it uses three different symbols: /ɑː/ for "lot" and "lodge", /ɑɚ/ for "start" and "large" and and /ɑ/ for "safari".

## Common words

Some common words which practice the pronunciation of /ɑː/ include the following:

* with "a": father, iguana, llama, piñata, wad, wander, want, wash, wasp, watch, water

* with "al": almost, already, also, alter, always, false, salt

"al" as /ɑː/: calm, chalk, palm, talk, walk
* with "all": ball, call, fall, hall, mall, small, wall, wallet
* with "ar": are, aren't, arm, art, article, bar, car, charge, dark, department, far, farm, hard, harm, large, market, park, part, party, regard, smart, star, start, warrant, warranty

* with "o": B**o**ston, ch**o**colate, cloth, cost, f**o**llow, gone, got, hot, job, long, lost, lot, not, off, offer, office, often, on, possible, probably, problem, process, product, shop, song, strong, stop, top, wrong
* with "oa": abroad, broad
* with "ough": cough, ought, thought

past tense and past participle: bought, brought, fought, sought, thought
* with "aw": dawn, draw, flaw, hawk, jaw, law, lawn, raw, saw, shawl, thaw, yawn
* with "au": auction, August, Aussie, austerity, Australia, Austria, author, autumn, cause, clause, daughter, fault, launch, pause

past tense and past participle: caught - taught
* /ɑː/ or /ʌ/: bec**au**se, what
* /ɑːj/ or /ɔɪ/: lawyer

Spelling anomalies

* heart, knowledge

Homophones

* bomb - balm; caller - collar; knot - not;

## /ɑːr/ or /ɔːr/

*See Decoding exercises: "orV" and "orrV"*

Only the following five words are pronounced with /ɑː/ in this accent. Cambridge Dictonaries (“US” label) only agree in three words, marked with (\*).

* borrow,(\*) morrow(\*) (shortening of "tomorrow"), sorrow, sorry, tomorrow(\*)

According to Wikipedia, the following words are pronounced with /ɑː/ by some speakers and with /ɔː/ by others. Only words marked with (\*) have two pronunciations in Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary; the rest have only /or/, equivalent to this wiki's /ɔːr/.

* corridor, euphoric, foreign, forest, Florida,(\*) historic, horrible, majority, minority, moral, orange,(\*) Oregon, origin, porridge, priority, quarantine, quarrel, sorority, warranty, warren, warrior

## Anticipated pronunciation difficulties depending on L1

### Spanish

In Latin America American English is taught (the United Kingdom is far away). Spanish speakers tend to pronounce /ɑː/ according to the spelling. They will pronounce "palm" as [pam] and "lot" as \*[lot].

## See also

* Phoneme /ɔː/ in the PALM - LOT - THOUGHT merger

## References

1. ↑ William Labov,The Organization of Dialect Diversity in North America, The o/oh merger [i.e. The /ɑː - ɔː/ merger].
2. ↑ Wikipedia, Phonological history of English low back vowels § Cot–caught merger. Retrieved 14 April 2016.
3. ↑ JeffinNYC in Antimoon Forum, "cot" and "caught", page 1, June 22, 2010
4. ↑ Random House Dictionary in Dictionary.com, astronaut.
5. ↑ Merriam Webster's Learner's Dictionary
6. ↑ Cambridge Dictionaries Online - English.
7. ↑ Cambridge Dictionaries Online - Essential American English
8. ↑ See for example *Random House Dictionary* available in Dictionary.com.
9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Wikipedia, English-language vowel changes before historic /r/ § Mergers of /ɒr-/ and /ɔːr-/. Retreived 14 May 2015.
10. ↑ Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary.
11. ↑ Cambridge Dictionaries Online - English. We don't reference the American English section, because an unmerged accent is reported there.
12. ↑ Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary.