Winters, StephenJones, Jacqueline2015-12-242015-12-242015-12-242015Jones, J. (2015). I Bag Your Pardon: The Albertan ae/ɛ Vowel Shift as a Window into Community Grammars (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/26408http://hdl.handle.net/11023/2717This thesis explores a vowel shift by speakers in Alberta in which [æ] is shifting before [g]. A production experiment was designed to examine the direction, extent, and sources of this change. I hypothesized that differing prompt modalities might elicit productions that could be used to support the existence of a triadic grammar, where productions are influenced by the community (auditory), the self (pictorial), and the standard (orthographic) grammars. I hypothesize a refinement of Ohala’s Active Listener hypothesis to include “super” and “inactive” listeners as other possible sources of sound change. The results show this is an in-progress merger by approximation and that changing the prompt modality altered listener productions. Auditory prompts had the greatest influence on production: Those most likely to merge the vowels [æ] and [ɛ] were more likely to mimic auditory cues. This indicates that super perceivers spread sound change to a greater degree.engUniversity of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.LinguisticsLanguage--ModernAnthropology--CulturalLinguisticsEnglishAlbertaSound ChangeVowelsVowel Mergermaster thesishttp://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/26408