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The great American vowel hunt

Jon Skillings Editorial director
Jon Skillings is an editorial director at CNET, where he's worked since 2000. A born browser of dictionaries, he honed his language skills as a US Army linguist (Polish and German) before diving into editing for tech publications -- including at PC Week and the IDG News Service -- back when the web was just getting under way, and even a little before. For CNET, he's written on topics from GPS, AI and 5G to James Bond, aircraft, astronauts, brass instruments and music streaming services.
Expertise AI, tech, language, grammar, writing, editing Credentials
  • 30 years experience at tech and consumer publications, print and online. Five years in the US Army as a translator (German and Polish).
Jon Skillings

Most of us probably don't make much of a distinction when pronouncing "do" and "dew." There's a subtle difference in the pronunciation of the vowels, but for linguist William Labov, a significant one. He's on the trail of what he calls the "northern city shift."

You can hear Labov describe some of the changes to the pronunciation of American English in this NPR interview, and you can play around with an interactive map (with audio) based on his book "Atlas of North American English" via the Web site of publisher Mouton de Gruyter. (Registration required to get to the free demo.)