In general, EFL students are taught the two main ways of pronouncing the determiner "either" are the British [ˈaɪðə] and the American [ˈiːðər] varieties. However, I've repeatedly heard from specific North American individuals (face-to-face and on TV) another pronunciation: [ˈaɪðər]. My specific question here is: does that phenomenon take place because of some dialectical/idiolectical/sociolectical background? Thanks!
4
-
I was intrigued that you identify just one pronunciation as the American variety. I use ˈiːðər ˈaɪðər or ˈiːðər. I can say it ˈiːðər way and generally pick whichever fits best with the meter of the sentence. ˈaɪðər is really okay.– virmaiorCommented Feb 14, 2014 at 2:24
-
Indeed, it doesn't matter at all in American English, and they don't indicate anything about the speaker.– JDongCommented Feb 14, 2014 at 2:27
-
related: english.stackexchange.com/questions/776/…– user16723Commented Feb 14, 2014 at 5:20
-
fwiw, [ˈaɪðə] and [ˈaɪðər] are really the same pronunciation just represented using the normal phonetic system for British English and American English, respectively. Many British English accents are rhotic and would pronounce the /r/ and some American English accents are non-rhotic and would not pronounce the /r/– nohatCommented Feb 26, 2014 at 23:47
Add a comment
|
1 Answer
Many Americans do indeed use the latter two pronunciations interchangeably; one individual will use both, on different occasions. I don't agree that there is no difference at all, however. To me and I think many Americans, there is a very slight sense that "eye-ther" (American "long i") is more formal, elegant, higher-class than "ee-ther" (American "long e")—simply because it sounds more British to Americans.
