New England English
Eastern New England English encompasses Boston and Maine accents, and, according to some sources, the distinct Rhode Island accent. All Eastern New England English is famous for non-rhoticity, meaning it drops the "r" sound everywhere except before a vowel: thus, in words like "car", "card", "fear", and "chowder" (). The phrase "Park the car in Harvard Yard"—dialectally transcribed —is commonly used as a shibboleth, or speech indicator, for the non-rhotic Eastern New England dialect running from Boston north to Maine, and as far west as Worcester, which contrasts with the generally rhotic dialects elsewhere in North America. In all of Eastern New England, except Rhode Island, words like "caught" and "cot" are pronounced identically (both are often rounded, thus: ), because those two vowel sounds have fully merged. A phenomenon called Canadian raising occurs throughout Eastern New England, causing "writer" to have a different stressed vowel sound than "rider", and for the verb "house" to have a different vowel sound than the noun "house". and have relatively back starting positions. The "horse"–"hoarse" distinction is still present to some extent in some areas, as well as the "Mary"–"marry"–"merry" distinction in many speakers.
Phonological history of English high back vowels
This has remained as such in some Welsh, northern English, and American accents, so that, in a variety of Welsh English, "threw" is distinct from "through" . In the majority of accents, however, the falling diphthong turned into a rising diphthong, which became the sequence . This change had taken place in London by the end of the 17th century. Depending on the preceding consonant and on the dialect, this either remained as or developed into by the processes of yod-dropping or yod-coalescence. Hence the present-day standard English pronunciations of "duke" (or ), "new" , "few" and "rude" .