# American dialect re. caught/ cot pronounciation **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 7, 2005, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375 "2005-07-07T00:30:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/21 "2005-07-07T04:57:14Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Yup. > > And I’m another person who doesn’t know the diff between “pin” and “pen”. Actually, I feel kinda stupid because I never knew they _were_ different. How about sit and set? Why, you just set yourself right down here and eat! In New England (at leat the eastern part, cot and caught are pretty much the same. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/22 "2005-07-07T08:01:38Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > Then there’s “sure” and “pure” being pronounced to rhyme with either “fur” or “shore”. I would venture to say that Northeasterners usually do the latter while the rest of America typically takes the former. > > To my ears, “for” rhymes with “four” and “door”, as does “sure”. To my ears, the vowel in “poor” comes in somewhere between those of “door” and “tour”, but is definitely different from both. Especially, it’s also different from “pore”. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/23 "2005-07-07T09:35:38Z")
Observation: These threads are amusing because when someone says that they see no difference in pronounciation between Cot and Caught, you usually find that they also make no distinction between all of the other words that rhyme with those two. Posters then spend fruitless hours searching for some kind of example, any example, that will demonstrate the difference. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/24 "2005-07-07T11:48:50Z")
Not a new idea, but an existing IDEA (which is the acronym for the website itself): [http://www.ku.edu/~idea/](http://www.ku.edu/~idea/) They have various native and non-native speakers from around the world reading a passage of nonsense English with titles like “Comma Gets A Cure” but which features many of the sounds that are differentiation points between dialects (e.g. “cure” sounding like “shore” or “fur”). Apparently the nonsense factor keeps people from reading ahead too much and thus to speak slower and more clearly. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/25 "2005-07-07T12:13:20Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > Ok, Realitychuck-- ‘bought’ sounds like ‘for’ where you are? Like. . . like ‘boat’? ‘Cone’? That’s the first difference that is really different in my world. Interesting. Where are you from? Upstate NY. And it’s just the vowel sound that is the same; they don’t rhyme. However the “baw” in bought sounds the same as “for,” though there’s an extra “r” in “for” to moderate things. “Boat” sounds to me nothing like “for.” You actually say the letter “o” in “boat” and “cone,” but “for” has more of an “aw” (as in “awl”) sound. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/26 "2005-07-07T14:09:26Z")
[Long thread from last fall](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=277331&highlight=vowel) about all these vocalic phenomena (esp. “cot” vs “caught”). Lots of good reading, sound links, and general back-and-forth. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/27 "2005-07-07T14:36:16Z")
There’s something interesting happening here. The difference between “caught” and “cot” (known in usage circles as the “CIC/CINC” issue, for “caught is cot” or “caught is not cot”) is being defined as the difference between AH and AW. But in my accent that doesn’t make any sense. For me, “caught” and “cot” are both AW and AH is a _completely different sound_. For example, these are all AW: haughty, hottie, caught, cot, fog, bog, bot, fawn, fond, lot, fought, fraught. But _father_ is different. It’s an AH, which to me is very different from the set above – lower, unrounded, and centralised. Does anyone else make this distinction? And is this the time to mention – Mary/merry/marry horse/hoarse purl/pearl ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/28 "2005-07-07T14:36:34Z")
Those of you for whom “cot” and “caught” are the same – here’s the secret: It’s all in the lips. For speakers who distinguish the two vowels in these words, the vowel in “caught” is pronounced with much more rounded, puckered lips than the vowel in “cot” (where the lips are considerably open, and there is no hint of puckering). Pay attention to what your lips are doing when you pronounce “coot” (as in “old coot”). This is the familiar “long u” vowel … same as in “brute”, “suit”, etc. In English, “long u” is the vowel with the most pronounced lip-rounding. There are, of course, many vowels that have no lip rounding at all – the “short a” in “cat” has the least lip-rounding of all. OK. So now we have two reference vowels established – one with max lip-rounding (coot) and one with virtually none (cat). Pronounce both words over and over, alternating so that you get used to feeling the lip rounding. Now you’re ready to explore some “gray area” between these extremes of lip rounding. For speakers who distinguish “cot”/“caught”, the position of the tongue during vowel production typically isn’t all that different (though “cot” trends toward a slightly lower tongue position). But the lip rounding is wildly different – “cot” is unrounded, “caught” is rounded to a significant degree – not as much as “long u”, but not all that much less, either. If you pronounce “cot” and “caught” the same, now you have to ask yourself: just how much rounding you apply to this vowel? If you apply significant rounding, work to keep your lips spread for “cot”. If both vowels are decidedly unrounded for you, work to apply extra, “exaggerated” rounding for “caught”. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/29 "2005-07-07T14:39:58Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > For example, these are all AW: haughty, hottie, caught, cot, fog, bog, bot, fawn, fond, lot, fought, fraught. > > But _father_ is different. It’s an AH, which to me is very different from the set above – lower, unrounded, and centralised. Still in all, sounds like you know your way around phonetics well enough to imitate the distinguished version of “cot” – just stick in that vowel from “father” and _voilà_. Might feel funny coming out of your month, and funny to your ears, but there you go. (Are you English, Scottish, or Irish, by chance?) ---
**Author:** ![capybara](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/capybara/32/202_2.png) [@capybara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capybara)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/30 "2005-07-07T14:43:24Z")
Ok, so, listening to the sound files on one of the linked sites in the other thread, it sounds like ‘caught’ and its ilk get pronounced with a mild diphong: Cau-wt. Perhaps I saw ‘cowl’ similarly, but not quite. I guess I don’t make that sound unless I’m speaking Dutch. Cot exactly equals caught, and both use the same short ‘a’ sound as something like father. Not ‘bath’, though, which is nasal. I learn something new every day. Interesting how phonemes vary within a culture. I have an accent! (Whenever I go deep south and open my mouth I feel like I’m instantly peggable as ‘not from around here’ and it makes me self conscious) ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/31 "2005-07-07T14:49:12Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > Ok, so, listening to the sound files on one of the linked sites in the other thread, it sounds like ‘caught’ and its ilk get pronounced with a mild diphong: Cau-wt. Some speakers may pronounce a diphthong in “caught”. But I think you are picking up on the extra lip-rounding – it’s sounding like a tack-on “w” to you. The great majority of speakers who distinguish “cot”/“caught”, however, maintain about the same degree of lip-rounding throughout the production of the vowel inn “caught”. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/32 "2005-07-07T14:57:17Z")
> [@bordelond](#): > > Still in all, sounds like you know your way around phonetics well enough to imitate the distinguished version of “cot” – just stick in that vowel from “father” and _voilà_. Might feel funny coming out of your month, and funny to your ears, but there you go. Actually, I can do it if I want, but not the way you describe it. If I stick my “father” vowel into “cot,” I get the Chicago/Cleveland twang. “Cot” exists in my accent. It’s _caught_ that I have to change, moving it up, adding more rounding, and pushing it slightly further. Putting it in I.P.A. terms: [a"] (print a with umlaut) - this is the centralized AH sound in my “father” [A] (script a) - this is the Chicago/Cleveland twang in “cot/caught” - completely unrounded, low, back vowel [A.] (turned script a) - this is the low, back vowel (but with only slight rounding) is my “cot/caught” vowel [O] (open o) - this is the “caught” vowel that doesn’t exist in my accent. When I make it, I sound very Bertie Woosterish to my ears > [@](#): > > (Are you English, Scottish, or Irish, by chance?) No. Ohioan (but not Cleveland). ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/33 "2005-07-07T15:20:21Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > “Cot” exists in my accent. It’s _caught_ that I have to change, moving it up, adding more rounding, and pushing it slightly further. Ah … gotcha. West coast folks (including British Columbia and Alaska) commonly have it the other way around – “cot”/“caught” both have that IPA “open o”. ---
**Author:** ![PigBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/97f17d/32.png) [@PigBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PigBoy)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/34 "2005-07-07T15:31:34Z")
Maybe this came up in the linked thread, but if not: [Obligatory dialect survey map for caught vs. cot.](http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q_28.html) (The map’s a bit difficult to interpret due to the large number of responses, but there it is.) Personally, I pronounce “caught” and “cot” differently, but the difference is rather slight. To someone who makes a greater distinction between the two, they’d probably sound the same coming from my mouth. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/35 "2005-07-07T17:01:39Z")
I love this topic 🙂 It’s always astounded me that there are so many distinct pronunciations of common English words. That someone doesn’t hear or voice the difference in words like pin and pen has always amazed me, yet I know it’s true because I hear it all the time. To state the obvious, given enough time, closed systems anywhere will develop properties not evident outside it, hence regional dialects. The US, however, and the world for that matter, has become much more accessible by the average person in the last fifty years. Differences in pronunciation of common words smack us in the face more readily than before, simply because of the heightened prevalence of regional intermingling. The word ‘caught’ is a great example of this phenomenon. I was raised in Kansas, but went to college in New York. Since college I’ve done quite a bit of travelling in and out of the US, and this is what I’ve found: In New York there are generally two pronunciations of ‘caught’ that have stung my oh-so-precious ears: (a) Coowaht - This is used by the majority of native New Yorkers. (b) Cort - This is used by native New Yorkers who, over time, have attempted to correct their pronunciation of the word, and have mistakenly added an r sound. Usually spoken by older New Yorkers. In Central/Southern New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania I hear Cowaht a lot. This is very similar to the New York Coowaht, but with the coo sound, as is ‘blue’ replaced with the co sound, as in ‘though’. In Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota it’s pronounced Caht, with the a sound stretched so far that it almost, but not quite, sounds like Cat. Wyoming, and points West it’s generally pronounced Cot. I pronounce it Cawt, which rhymes with the word Awl, which is midway between the ‘ah’ sound and the long O (as in ‘oh’) sound. In the last few years, I’ve heard all of these pronunciations within driving distance of my office. How’s that for the world getting smaller? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/36 "2005-07-07T18:10:38Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > American dialect re. caught/ cot pronounciation Ok, so . . . . While we’re at it, the word _re_ is not an abbreviation. It’s a Latin word meaning “in the matter of,” the ablative form of the word _res_, meaning “thing” or “piece of business.” ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/37 "2005-07-07T18:11:20Z")
> [@Onomatopoeia](#): > > In the last few years, I’ve heard all of these pronunciations within driving distance of my office. How’s that for the world getting smaller? Or your driving’s getting faster. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/38 "2005-07-07T19:31:18Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > Or your driving’s getting faster. 🙂 Well, I guess that’d explain all those darned speeding tickets. ``` ...or **durned** speeding tickets, if you're from New York :) ``` ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/39 "2005-07-08T03:17:28Z")
Southerners pronounce the combo “aw”, and the combo “au”, as a diphthnong: **“aaaah” shading off to “wwwww”**. This sound is largely foreign to northeasterners, who pronounce a different sound that southerns do not hear or know: the pure “aw” NON-diphthong sound. (The only word I’ve heard Southerners speak that contains this sound in its pure form is “moment”, the first syllable thereof. More typically, it’s the vowel sound in “for” and “boy” but you have to remove the “r” and the “y” respectively to hear the pure vowel. Northeasterners pronounce this vowel-sound all by itself in words like “saw” and “lawyer” and “auto”, whereas we Southern-born folks would make diphthongs out of the vowels in those words). To a Southerner, “cot” is with the same vowel as the a in “father” or the o in “rock”. (All the same sound). “Caught” uses the diphthong, the “aw” sound as Southerners do it, k-aaa-aww-wwww-t. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2005, 10:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375/40 "2005-07-08T10:17:52Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > Northeasterners pronounce this vowel-sound all by itself in words like “saw” and “lawyer” and “auto”, whereas we Southern-born folks would make diphthongs out of the vowels in those words). > […] > “Caught” uses the diphthong, the “aw” sound as Southerners do it, k-aaa-aww-wwww-t. Didn’t Jeff Foxworthy say, “if you need three syllables to say ‘dog’ (d-aaa-awww-g)…” 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-dialect-re-caught-cot-pronounciation/311375.md?page=3)