A century of "intrusive" R in English

[@Unpainted_Huffhines]

My favorite intrusive R has always been in "Law Enforcement" Sounds like "Lore Enforcement", like police that go around and make sure everyone's myths and legends are in proper order.

[@djdissi]

😂🏆

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

And Brits love the TV series Laura Norder.

[@grahamh.4230]

@@DrGeoffLindsey Or Laura Noda - every time you add an extraneous r, you have to take away two of the Rs that are actually supposed to be there 😛

[@Laura_Norda]

@@DrGeoffLindsey Tis my user name lol 😂

[@duxnihilo]

Margaret Thatcher used to say "Law And Order" so much that some people would call her 'Lauren Order'.

[@askarufus7939]

I'm native polish speaker learning english. I was talking with my english speaking friend and he kept saying those R's so I asked "why you do this?" but he couldn't hear it even after my explanations 🧐 Now I can just send him this video 😅

[@ibpants]

I couldn't hear it either until I switched my GPS voice to English and it said "Montana Ravenue".

[@TrevelyanOO6]

It won’t help. Even with seeing the insertion in the subtitle I still couldn’t hear them.

[@Rayn-Drop]

@@TrevelyanOO6 Sort of late, but I was hearing /l/ in place of some of those /r/ sounds. You may be able to hear /l/.

[@SEB1991SEB]

The Intrusive R is the reason why the joke "What do you call a dinosaur with one eye? Do you think he saurus" makes a lot more sense in the English accent than it does in the American accent. Because in the English accent the words "saw us" are often linked together with the Intrusive R, so that you actually pronounce them like the word 'saurus'.

[@joannalink6171]

Although weirdly it's told in Jurassic Park by a character with a rhotic accent...

[@SEB1991SEB]

@@joannalink6171 Yeah I noticed that too. You can make the joke in the American accent too, it just wouldn’t sound as good.

[@ajbonmg]

Meanwhile, in reverse, we have this one that only works in an American accent, and not any British accent: Knock knock. Who’s there? Apple. Apple who? Knock knock. Who’s there? Apple. Apple who? Knock knock. Who’s there? Orange. Orange who? Orange you glad I didn’t say Apple again… Because 'Orange' sounds like 'aren't' in American, but nothing like it in any British accent.

[@SEB1991SEB]

@@ajbonmg Yeah I noticed that alright. There are a few other jokes that don't sound as good in the British accent either that I can't think of now.

[@tfh5575]

the joke would land in new york or boston

[@losarpettystrakos7687]

3:16 Interesting... As a non-native speaker, who has never heard about this Gentleman, I would have thought that his actual Name is Vanilla Rice. 🙂

[@tigrafale4610]

Or Vaniller Ice 🤷‍♂️

[@jacob8949]

Might as well call himself Rice Pudding.

[@lounirs]

As a non native speaker, the difference is so subtle to me that i struggle to really hear lmao

[@TungerManU]

he was massive in the 90s, I can't believe you haven't heard of his hit single "Rice Rice Baby"

[@PutinsMommyNeverHuggedHim]

omg 💀💀💀

[@Swenglish]

As a Swedish person, I first noticed this phenomenon as a kid, having access to MTV UK and hearing constant mentions of one "ChristinaRaguilera".

[@Gambit771]

Christiana aguilera. At worst it is Christinah aguilera but never christinaraguilera.

[@AdamOwenBrowning]

@@Gambit771 it would be pronounced and heard "raguilera" and that's the whole point of this video, it's attempting to show you how that R would creep in. I'm a native Englishman and if you are too, you can simple say her name a few times outloud with these comparisons from the video to show where the intrusive R might pop up.

[@Gambit771]

@@AdamOwenBrowning Doesn't pop up for me. Almost as if there isn't one rule and it isn't an 'r' but more of a 'ah' sound for those that speak like that. A softer sound.

[@MSHOOD123]

@@Gambit771 that's true, many people don't link the rs, unless they're very posh

[@Swenglish]

@@Gambit771 It depends on your accent, is kind of the whole point. It's not a consistent thing across all accents.

[@rhyscrowley266]

As a child I had terrible spelling and was always told to sound it out and would always add Rs to words. I would said their was an R sound and was always told there wasn't and my whole life I thought it was crazy as I could hear an R so clearly! This had brought me so much peace at last

[@cynthiajohnson6747]

I had the same problem

[@Antinoüs-Dionysos]

"to sound it out" generally seems to be a terrible advice for English spelling

[@AaronPaulIbarrola]

​​@@Antinoüs-Dionysos"Sounding it out" is even worse advice when learning French. Lol

[@mr.sidious9163]

​@@AaronPaulIbarrolaAt least French reading has consistent rules (with a few exceptions)

[@flyingduck91]

telling people to "sound it out" doesnt work in english

[@TerezatheTeacher]

Let's all appreciate the huge amount of research and editing that went into this. Thank you. Awe-inspiring, as always ;)

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Ore-inspiring, perhaps? :)

[@TerezatheTeacher]

@@DrGeoffLindsey 😀 Definitely!

[@ignatiusqi9736]

@@DrGeoffLindsey sounds like good news for mining corporations

[@xcvxc1338]

Jonathan Gideon Aiglon, this is not how I have raised you! You’re going to apologize to Miss Tereza first thing tomorrow!

[@koshobai]

​@Real Aiglon I think it's just shorthand for "let's all take a moment to (proactively) acknowledge [someone or something]". Annoying to read? Oh, perhaps some time off of KZbin would help. I pay for no ads so it helps remove the frustration from the experience; here's hoping that you feel less annoyed in the future!

[@weirdlanguageguy]

4:04 that's incredibly interesting! I've never heard of trilled linking r's before Thank you very much for this information!

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Other British singers performing that role use trills too!

[@weirdlanguageguy]

@@DrGeoffLindsey I'll have to look that up!

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

@@weirdlanguageguy Actually all the clips are here www.englishspeechservices.com/blog/linking-r/

[@YaShoom]

@@DrGeoffLindsey That is, it would seem that in English the "fuzzy" er is normal, and in the British in general it is missed a lot, but if the British begin to make it stronger, then they get a very frightening trill, instead of "Flap T" (Rowan Atkinson remembered in the episode where he took the exam and the teacher said "grrrreen" - in English it really sounds scary and what's funnier, the teacher already screamed with the usual "R", although it's less scary))). Can you explain the pattern when the British say the usual "R", when "Flap T" and when "Trell"? p.s. kzbin.info/www/bejne/aGq9nouhfqiHZ8k

[@tmhood]

Trilled or flapped r's always sound artificial to me. They are used by actors, opera singers, school teachers and people trying to sound posh, because at some point in their lives they've picked up the idea that that is the "correct" way to pronounce the letter r. Very, very few people grow up trilling their r's, it's an affectation that's consciously adopted.

[@djnunnelly]

It blows my mind hearing the intrusive r flipped or even rolled in some of these examples.

[@yf.f4919]

As a European, rolling R's are a must when speaking English. Everything becomes so much simple.

[@AtlasJotun]

@@yf.f4919 It's a must for everyone except native speakers; hearing the 'r' rolled where it shouldn't can make understanding difficult. Some English speakers can't roll or flip their 'r' because they've never needed to in their native tongue. I struggle with Indian accents in particular, since those folks tend to roll everything!

[@PiousMoltar]

@@yf.f4919 As an Englishman, rolling Rs are impossible. Most of us can't do it.

[@A-A_P]

It seems the intrusive r is of the same quality as all the other r-s in one's speech. The rolled r sounds came from accents that seem(ed) to indeed use such sounds normally(as such a trill has been a feature of posh english to a degree)

[@browncoat697]

@@AtlasJotun Most English dialects never use a rolled r to my knowledge. Off the top, I can only think of (broadly) Scots and Irish dialects of English that use it, and even then it only appears in certain instances. Americans sure as hell don't, we have our famous "bunched."

[@dothedo3667]

I've always thought that intrusive R is by far the weirdest feature of British English. I remember being a young child and hearing characters say "grandmer and grandpa" and just thinking "Wtf, why? How does that make sense?"

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Remember there are non-rhotic Americans who do it too!

[@missopowers]

@@DrGeoffLindsey As an American who has spent a lot of time in Ireland and the UK, I was constantly surprised by the pronunciation of 'drawing' as something sounding like 'droring,' or like some hitherto unknown activity involving one's drawers, whether they be pants or the storage units of a chest. You touched upon this a bit (not to sound indelicate), but I feel that there is more to be said by one who is knowledgeable in these oddities.

[@ZER0ZER0SE7EN]

@@DrGeoffLindsey JFK used to talk about "Cyuber" when speaking about "Cuba".

[@jamesleonard2870]

I picked up on this oddity when I left California for university in London. But I also remember hearing it primarily from US east coast speakers as well

[@louiseogden1296]

​@@missopowersNot for nothing is 'drawer' often misspelt 'draw' where I live in the south of England. Drives me nuts because I work in maintenance and facilities and so talk about drawers a lot over email...

[@sarahchaprobin32]

So interesting! As a Scot who never ever puts an intrusive r in where it’s not written, I’ve always felt a really strong sense of irritation when I hear one. Not least because my name ends in a vowel sound and so people add it in when they say my name!

[@boobsbr]

As a non-native speaker, it sounds sooo weird.

[@md95065]

I agree, There is one example, in particular, (which I don't believe was mentioned in the video) which really irritates me, and that is the typical "English" pronunciation of "drawing" as "drawRing" - I quite literally want to scream when I hear that.

[@joda7129]

@@md95065 english people are a bane on this planet

[@jasonwatkins7767]

I understand what you mean, Sarahr.

[@majorlycunningham5439]

Ass-mar! A lil ol infamous jest from Lord of the Flies. Apparently, one of the characters had an accent that our English teacher described to us as Cockney, which is spoken by the lower class of a locale in Britain. So yes, Cockney uses the intrusive R along with Received Pronunciation..

[@MikeIsCannonFodder]

I'm an American software developer and one of our tools makes use of an algorithm with the acronym SHA, pronounced shaw. We had training on this tool by a British guy and not only did he always pronounce it shawr, he spelled it in his handouts either SHAR or SHAr. Doubly intrusive R! That was my first time really noticing what I've also seen called the phantom R, and after that it really stood out when British and others speak.

[@TheGreatAtario]

Possibly dangerous! "shar" meaning shell archive or "sha" meaning secure hash algorithm

[@robinbennett3531]

I'm confused. Is this the intrusive W? How do you say SPA? Us brits say SPAR, not SPAW, though some of us pronounce Rs and Ws the same! I love the differences in our accents, and I'm sure you knew what he meant after chuckling a bit!

[@greengandalf9116]

@@robinbennett3531 it isn't an intrusive w because aw or ah is just how you pronounce the A in SHA without the intrusive r. Writing the w helps people to understand the pronunciation.

[@Hwyadylaw]

@@greengandalf9116 But Shaw and Shah/Shar are pronounced differently in RP, so it doesn't really help

[@johnmiller0000]

@@greengandalf9116 Not to a Brit. To my British ears (living in the US), SHA is pronounced more like SHAH. Again, to my British ears, writing that it is pronounced like "shaw" makes no sense since "shaw" is very close to shore. And my name is John, not Jaaahhhhhn!

[@tcjacobi9275]

Interesting how further you go back in time, the more you hear the intrusive r as a one-tap r.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

The tap wasn't restricted to intrusive r -- /r/ in general was often a tap in old RP between vowels. Americans used to make fun of this by writing 'veddy British'.

[@timewave02012]

@@DrGeoffLindsey Now we mock the glottal stop.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

@@timewave02012 Mocking? I'm fighting the widespread view that RP was above using intrusive r.

[@timewave02012]

@@DrGeoffLindsey I wasn't referring to you. I'm American. When I imitate a British accent, I use glottal stops excessively. My peers do the same.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

@@timewave02012 I'm fascinated by the ongoing increase in American glottal /t/. I wrote this blog article with audio clips, and should turn it into a video: www.englishspeechservices.com/blog/american-glottal-conspiracy

[@MrClyMax]

Having Jonathan Ross as an example of an intrusive r is both genius and hilarious 😆

[@Meevious]

Got the subtitle wong though.

[@IDidactI]

I thought so too, very cheeky.

[@user-je7gf5uc3c]

Vanilla Wice, ladies and gentlemen!

[@jonstfrancis]

@@user-je7gf5uc3c Yeah, I was gonna say he - Jonathan Woss - never pronounces an R, it's always either dropped or morphed into a W.

[@SheenyPebble]

@@user-je7gf5uc3c That was alright. As long as you can't actually hear an R.

[@Mike8827]

That’s very interesting ! In my mother tongue German we have a lot of r-dropping going on as well , with „Butter“ or „Wasser“ being pronounced like „Butta“ , „Wassa“ in modern standard speech ( less so in Austria and Switzerland ) . Also similarly to English, this used to be a non-standard feature that slowly became more widespread after 1950 and now is ubiquitous at least in the North and West of Germany . Interestingly the „intrusive r“ is not a thing in our language , since words that begin in vowels always start with a „glottal stop“ that separates them from the vowel before . So, „ein Ei“ ( an egg ) is actually pronounced „ʔein ʔEi“ with a small obstruction of the airflow in the glottis ( again, this phenomenon is absent in Austrian and Swiss German speakers ) .

[@TS29er]

Ich habe wirklich genau das selbe gedacht, auch noch mit dem selben Beispiel . Witzig, dass jemand den selben Gedanken hatte :D Aber ist der Glottisschlag im Süden wirklich nicht vertreten?

[@Mike8827]

@@TS29er in meiner bairischen Heimat jedenfalls nicht so sehr , in der Schweiz dann sogar überhaupt nicht mehr. Beispielsweise wird das Wort „Theater“ im österreichischen und Schweizer Bühnendeutsch mit einem gleitenden „ea“ artikuliert , ohne beim „a“ nochmal neu anzusetzen; und „ mein Auto“ klingt aus dem Mund eines Schweizers wie „mei Nauto“. Auch das „Müesli“ ist deshalb für den Bundesdeutschen so schwer auszusprechen .

[@galliumarsenide]

​​@@TS29er Der Glottisschlag ist im Süden grundsätzlich genau gleich vorhanden, dh zb bei "ein Ei" (bzw. "es Ei"). Es ist aber möglicherweise üblicher, oder auffälliger, unbetonte Wörter zudammenzunehmen, zB "hab ich" wird zu "habich" (hobi/hani etc.). In diesem Kontext ist der Glottisschlag schwächer oder entfällt. Entscheidend ist wirklich die Betonung: "Da bin ICH aufgestanden." vs "DA binnich aufgestanden." .. imo machen das aber die deutschen Dialekte aber auch.

[@galliumarsenide]

​@@Mike8827 Stimmt, das ist mir noch nie aufgefallen. Der Hiatus - im Wortinneren - wird im Schweizerdeutschen fast immer ohne Glottis gesprochen (zB beobachten, deaktivieren). Allerdings find ich das Wort Theater kein gutes Beispiel, da es ein Lehnwort ist. Bzw. frage ich mich, wie konsequent die Trennung im Norden gemacht wird. Sagt man echt "Re'alität"?

[@EvenRoyalsNeedToUrinate]

@@galliumarsenide re'alität hab ich schon lang nicht mehr gehört (re'al dafür öfter), bei the'ater wird hier im norden fast immer getrennt. lehnwörter kriegen durchaus auch mal nen glottalen stopp, von po'et über die A'IDA bis hin zu isra'el. zu re'al vs realität: ich meine, dass der hiatus selten aufgebrochen wird, wenn dessen erster vokal betont wird, wie bei seat oder chaos vs cha'ot & cha'otisch. kann das jmd bestätigen?

[@pegauracheii]

Thank you so much for explaining this! For years, I have been driven crazy noticing natives say "The idea'r is that..."

[@Ren-fo4lg]

It sounds too 'posh' and slow without the intrusive r!

[@jeffmorse645]

A few North American accents have an intrusive "R". I have a friend who grew up near Boston, Massachusetts. I remember after work one evening he asked me if I wanted to go get a "Pizza'r and a bee-ya"😄

[@FionaEm]

Lol! That's how we Aussies say it.

[@zweigackroyd7301]

Just ask my friends Petah and Lind-er.

[@CAPUSA]

In a linguistics course I took as an undergrad, we did a study of intrusive r in "wash," pronounced like "warsh," in Fargo, North Dakota. Zero of the participants under ~60 used it, but over 70% of participants 75+ did, which I didn't expect to be so high..

[@zweigackroyd7301]

@@CAPUSA That was a good idear in that arear. 😀

[@quintusantell2912]

@@CAPUSA you never heard of GeoRge Warshington? xD

[@dyskelia]

Ok, so that’s what that is. I started learning English at the age of 7. At age 11, I had a literature teacher from Reading. When I heard her say my name (Cecilia) with an ‘r’ at the end, it blew my mind. I was like ‘what is this language??? That’s an ‘a’ not and ‘r’!’ 😅

[@SheenyPebble]

Oo that's like an insect. Ceciliar like a Caecilian?

[@jamesmcelwain342]

You have an amazing ability to talk about complex linguistic phenomena in a way we can all understand

[@ostsan8598]

I really liked the slow progression showing how the intrusive R has been around. I seem to have picked it up along the way, though I don't know from where. It's not in the accent of where I grew up. Possible it's from listening to speakers with the intrusive R, made available through internet.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Many rhotic Scots pronounce "idea" as "idear" in all environments. They must have heard "idea/r/of" so often from Southern Brits on TV that they "mislearned" the word.

[@what-uc]

@@DrGeoffLindseyI've figured it out. There are a few factors. It's a stock word pair. It's not an easy sequence of vowels. There are few other instances of that sequence if you are rhotic, so we copy "fear of". ..... Also I mislearned "Trafalga" and "Gibralta"

[@chevchevir]

Same. The only way I listen to english speech now is by watching youtube so I find it fine to have my english thoughts with different accents, but I've never paid attention that I picked up the intrusive r as well. I kind of knew about that, but the thought has always slipped from my mind. Now I know better

[@sergeantbigmac]

I remember years ago I (an American) innocuously asked an Australian friend why he kept adding an R sound to words where there clearly was no R. And TBF it was especially prominent with him plus this was before I knew as much as I do now about accents and speech pathology, etc. He looked at me like I had 2 heads and pissed in his cereal. Thats about when I stopped asking people about their accents lol.

[@q-tuber7034]

“Pissed in his cereal,” lol. (I’m tempted to add: what a quaint, colorful, exotic expression! how did you come by it?)

[@teshn1229]

@@eiypo as another Aussie, I agree with that great explanation. Probably wouldn't go as far as equating it to the cereal metaphor but the two heads yes lol. Anyway, the original commentor learnt from the incident, so that's what counts.

[@autonomouscollective2599]

But we all have our quirks, don’t we? As for me, my quirk is pronouncing “I’m” as “Om.” I know I do it but I can’t change it. I do pronounce “time” correctly though.

[@pacadet]

@@q-tuber7034 Asking someone "who pissed in your Cheerios?" or "who pissed in your Wheaties?" is the American way of asking "what are you being such a dickhead for?"

[@SheenyPebble]

@@autonomouscollective2599 But that's quite appropriate, surely --a form of schwa?

[@RobBCactive]

I remember being very puzzled by my own intrusive /r/ as a boy, I knew it was 'correct' but not why and found it strange. There's sentences where every r in the words are silent but there's even more linking intrusive /r/ when spoken smoothly.

[@jmaz0444]

Same here, I remember asking to go to Pizza Express and saying pizza rexpress I paused for a whole minute questioning why I said it like that, then realised it's natural it just makes the sentence easier to say without having to stop between the two words.

[@RobBCactive]

@@jmaz0444 And school English never considered speech. It's like learning there are rules of adjective ordering, through helping English learners when you have never heard them broken and don't have to think what Welsh English teachers means.

[@HistorysRaven]

I'm an American who lived in England for three years back in the early 2000s. I had always wondered why my friends and their parents said "America/r/". It's been bothering me and I'm glad someone has finally explained it.

[@bob___]

Before General American became the norm in the Northeastern US (a relatively recent phenomenon), there used to be an intrusive R in New England and New York City speech, which was not necessarily associated with connecting to a word beginning with a vowel. One famous example of this is President Kennedy's speech during the Cuban Missile Crisis, in which he uses the pronunciation "CubeR" for the island south of Florida. Another example is the fictional Archie Bunker's New York accent, in which "teRlet" is used to refer to the well-known porcelain appliance.

[@twest344]

About 10 years ago there was a public service announcement in Massachusetts regarding wearing set belts where a state policeman said "Click it or ticket, it's the lawrrr"

[@wolliveryoutube]

Not sure how closely related to your comment this is, but in the Ozark country we call laundry “wash,” and pronounce it was “warsh.”

[@bob___]

@@wolliveryoutube It used to be that long-time residents of Washington, DC pronounced "wash" as "worsh" and the name of the city as "Worshington," and I think the old-timey Pittsburgh accent also pronounces "wash" as "worsh."

[@Urbanity_Kludge]

@@wolliveryoutube I was looking for this as I wondered how the r for into the middle of the word.

[@dogvom]

@@wolliveryoutube My partner, raised in central Illinois, used to say "warsh" till he got tired of my laughing.

[@Paul71H]

Thank you for making this video! I'm from the US, and I have always been perplexed by this "intrusive r." I could never understand why people from England or Australia add an "r" sound to the end of many words that don't end in "r", especially since they also omit many "r"s that are actually there in the word. After I watched this video, it makes more sense!

[@DonBean-ej4ou]

so far, nobody has mentioned that in the rural south west (of England) ordinary farming folk will respond to everything you say with "oo arrr" do not go there if you arrr neurotic😂

[@SheenyPebble]

@@DonBean-ej4ou But that's not annoying, the rural dialects sound like you're actually inside a storybook.

[@CrazyBunnyGuy]

Oh, so that's how it's called! I must admit it kind of drove me a little bit insane while I was listening to Robert Glenister narrate Cormoran Strike novels. He has an amazing voice and beautiful narration, but this intrusive R kept cropping up in his speech and I was convinced there was something wrong with the audio files :D

[@minorbookspodcast]

I think that's also part of Glenister's attempt to make Strike sound more Cornish.

[@TarmenAmzarian]

What an absolutely stellar choice of examples!

[@emery5483]

this is so interesting!! i'm australian and have noticed this in my own accent before but was never really sure how to describe it. i thought this stronger "r" sound was a sign of american media influence, turns out it's the opposite!

[@cheddarssalad1230]

The clearest place I’ve heard the intrusive R is in the chorus to Champagne Supernova. “In a champagne supernovaR in the sky.”

[@AnHebrewChild]

I sar a film today ol boy Like SARS-Cov2

[@pictometryofficial]

100 points out of 10 for referencing Bowie!! Blacksta(R) is one of my all time favourite songs! 😃

[@cmyk8964]

The example of the intrusive R that I’m most familiar with is spoken by an Australian Minecraft KZbinr. Minecraft comes in 2 main editions: Bedrock Edition and Java Edition (which he pronounces “Javer Edition” with an “intrusive R”).

[@FionaEm]

Yep. The intrusive r is so common in Aussie speech that most of us wouldn't even know we're doing it 😊

[@ryledra6372]

After watching this video, I said "I needed to focus quite hard to hear it in the examples" and then heard the intrusive 'r' as "hear it" became "hea r'it" (I wouldn't normally pronounce the 'r' in "hear"); I often feel, for me, the intrusive 'r' sits at the front of the second word rather than the end of the first one (like "Java r'Edition")

[@misfitr]

that’s odd! i’m australian and i kind of blend the words to say javaadition.

[@Halo_Legend]

@@ryledra6372 Either way, it's dumb and should not exist. Just like English and French, the bastard languages :)

[@OBrasilo]

I noticed the same thing with xisumavoid who is British.

[@silvenshadow]

This use of R has always perplexed me and I couldn't figure out why it was used sometimes and other time not. Thank you so much for sharing this amazing tidbit of information!

[@troobninge6064]

I'm an American non-rhotic speaker and I never have intrusive r, most of the time not having linking r either, I just have the vowels in hiatus or have a glottal stop in between

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Are you from the South? Traditional non-rhotic accents of the South have no linking r, which is also true of South African accents. I described this in my blog article on linking r, with clips of William Faulkner and Charlie Rose. www.englishspeechservices.com/blog/linking-r

[@troobninge6064]

@@DrGeoffLindsey No I'm from New York but my non rhoticity definitely comes from AAVE, not the traditional New York accent

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

@@troobninge6064 Thanks. AAVE has roots in the South as of course you know; I should revise that blog article to include some clips. It's nice that New York contains both types of non-rhoticity.

[@DezMarivette]

Wow that was so cool how you took us through time! Thanks for this wonderful video. So much time and dedication clearly went into it 💕

[@crazyoncoffee]

Awesome video. As an American with attentive ears this R sound had always interested me, but I’d never known its name. Thanks!

[@golden_smaug]

I'm stunned by the research and editing of so many recordings in this video, awsoooome :)

[@liguy181]

Worth noting that New York also has this. Both of my parents normally drop their r's, but then add them back in when the next word starts with a vowel

[@mauriciorestrepo343]

Your videos keep blowing my mind. I am a junior student of phonetics and you are simply at another level. Hands down.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Thank you!

[@eccentriastes6273]

4:09 Gotta love how Lennon leans into that "sawr." The Beatles did that in another song, their cover of Till There Was You. "There were birds in the sky/ but I never SAWR them winging." The fact that "saw" wasn't preceding a vowel makes it clear in that case the pronunciation was just for the sake of making a pun on "soar."

[@DStecks]

A Day in the Life has got to be the most famous intrusive r ever.

[@samodelkini]

I first wrote this: The linking r in „saw them singing“ could be triggered by reduction of them to əm, which creates the context for it : [sɒːɹəm] But then listened to the song again, and he indeed says [sɒːɹðəm] and also [bɜɹd]

[@Correctrix]

@@samodelkini They're obviously doing a fake American accent.

[@ladyclovenstone]

Amazing amount of work. I get annoyed with the lack of R in English peoples speech but did not notice it includes the Southern Hemisphere too. Many thanks

[@ShinryakuIkaMusume]

I especially enjoy the speakers who TRILL the intrusive ‘r’ at the end of these words.😂

[@chri-k]

i’ve never heard anyone that. probably for the better.

[@rohitchaoji]

So far as "Dianer" is concerned

[@LifeofBrad1]

It's interesting. You very rarely hear an English person rolling their R's these days and when you do, it's usually from someone who's over the age of 60. Seems like it became less and less common after the 70's.

[@joannalink6171]

@@LifeofBrad1 It's mostly used in a theatrical context as in that example

[@bjornopitz6561]

@@LifeofBrad1 too bad, really! :-)

[@stephenharwood381]

I'm a southern English speaker and intrusive R must be so ingrained in my speech that I can't even work out how you would say these phrases without it

[@Muzer0]

Love the inclusion of Wossy's less standard r realisation in this!

[@UniversalMysteries343]

What? explain please

[@Muzer0]

@@UniversalMysteries343 TV presenter Jonathan Ross is often nicknamed "Wossy" (including by himself - it's his Twitter handle) because of his realisation of /r/ as a labiodental approximant [ʋ], which to certain ears not used to hearing it can sound like /w/. You can hear this clearly in the clips of him here.

[@FionaEm]

I never thought about the pronunciation of 'r' in terms of a global north-west/south-east divide. Fascinating - as is the fact that those of us on the south-east side have been using the intrusive r for decades. Cheers (cheeas?!) from Melbourne Australia 🇦🇺 😊

[@RobBCactive]

It dates the shift to non-rhotic r between the different colonisation periods. Cheers rhymes with here's and tears. 😆😆

[@skaldlouiscyphre2453]

It's not quite that cut and dry though; think of the many American accents that do drop their 'r's, mostly in the south but also along the east coast, and also AAVE. As a Canadian it's interesting that parts of the US continued to follow British trends towards non-rhotic accents but no cities or regions in Canada followed suit. There's 'Canadian dainty' but it wasn't a natural accent, it was a learned accent like Mid-Atlantic. Meanwhile Boston and NY/NJ and all sorts of other pockets of the east coast either did or still drop rs all over the place. It'd be interesting to see how factors like prestige, rate of immigration and mass media influence have played a role in accent development across the US, Australia and Canada. I'd been under the impression that Australia and New Zealand both had significant Scottish and Irish populations, and it's not as though Canada didn't continue to receive English immigrants and hold English culture in high regards. And now I've gotta hear what Allan Moffat's accent sounds like.

[@FionaEm]

@@skaldlouiscyphre2453 Yes, Australia had a lot of convicts from Ireland and northern England (not so much Scotland) but our accent ended up somewhere between Cockney and Standard Southern British. That's always fascinated me - as has the fact that our accent is (relatively) uniform despite the huge distances between population centres.

[@skaldlouiscyphre2453]

​@@FionaEm It might just be the Young brothers skewing my impression of Scottish immigration to Australia. Canada's accents are similar in that regard homogeneous despite huge distances between population centres), if you ignore Eastern Canada. The Maritimes have unique accents, Newfoundland sounds like Ireland but from Ontario westwards we all sound pretty similar.

[@futeramonfuturamet4830]

Or coase \ course exceptions do exist. There's American accents along the coasts of the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico in which "r" gets dropped. Conversely, there are zones in the United Kingdom with r-ishness (where most or all Rs are pronounced) mainly Scotland, Northern Ireland and parts of southwest England and Wales. Accents native to India can have r-dropping or not. Northern New Zealand has a few areas of r-ishness as well.

[@whatshisnamegain1]

I remember when I studied in Australia for a year as an exchange student (I'm a non-native in English). I was sitting there in my physics class and I always found it funny how our professor pronounced "Delta N" as "Delta-r-N" in some formulas. Now I understand better :)

[@what-uc]

On QVC UK they have a beauty thing called Alpha-H, they say Alpha-Raitch. Should I be grateful it's not Alpha-Haitch? :D

[@SheenyPebble]

Delta Wren?

[@simonalbrecht9435]

As a native German speaker I'd have been interested whether or when in the absence of the intrusive r a glottal stop is used. In German, of course, it's ubiquitous and essential, so only advanced teaching gets to the point that English (like other languages) doesn't actually require marking the “border” of two words at all in pronunciation. However, the intrusive r obviously serves this purpose, most importantly when the bowl before and after is the same.

[@Eralen00]

3:18 the fact that you chose jonathan ross to showcase the intrusive r is really funny to me lol

[@kamranahmad4592]

The intrusive W

[@kamranahmad4592]

Sorry... Intwusive W

[@deliusmyth5063]

I prefer Vanilla Rice.

[@annascarlet4450]

Wossy

[@mortachaiepstein3584]

I noticed this in Wales. Someone said "there is a spa just down the road" and I was looking for a store named Spa before walking past a Spar.

[@jamesmcinnis208]

It exists in Eastern Massachusetts/ Boston area or at least it used to. I remember as a child hearing JFK talk about Cuber and Rusher. At the time I didn't realize the next word began with a vowel sound; I just thought he always said it that way.

[@Eralen00]

sometimes you hear deep southerners also use it. "I ain't got no IDEAR about that"

[@jamesmcinnis208]

@@Eralen00 I've heard that here in Alabama.

[@louiseogden1296]

Wow. At one point, the intrusive r is even trilled -- in the 'villa-rrrrr-in' phrase. Awesome video and amazing once you have it pointed out.

[@auldfouter8661]

My mother used to shudder when Valerie Singleton always said draw-ring on Blue Peter. It does grate on Scots lugs !

[@davidharding1070]

I love your videos because they help me recognise and understand what I do when I speak as an Australian and be ok with it :)

[@mikhail_from_afar]

I always thought that there is an r in 'drawing' after w. But when I searched for it years ago, I couldn't really figure it out. I finally know the truth.

[@WeeWeeJumbo]

This topic has bothered me for years, and I didn’t even know the words to describe the phenomenon. THANK YOU.

[@WeeWeeJumbo]

I am an American so the intrusive R has always sounded like some kind of foreign speech impediment

[@fad1969]

@@WeeWeeJumbo Definitely a speech impediment.

[@Meanpeagreen]

I love this channel, wish id found it sooner. Always fascinated by subjects like language, etymology and so on. Some of THE worst intrusive Rs I've ever heard are in the Medway area of Kent where I grew up. It always stood out to me as I've always been told I speak clearly, despite my South African accent. we would've been corrected in English class if we made errors like that. I now live among the Geordies.... so thats its own language 😅

[@jackogrady3118]

I live in Medway and yeah its a pretty solid feature of estuary English. Strangely though even though I've lived here most of my life it's still a hard accent for me to pin down, and I'm often told that I don't sound like I'm from here

[@louesorg]

Very interesting. Also, the ammount of work put into this well deserves my subscription. Looking forward to see more of your videos.

[@rhydlew]

If you want more of this, check out how some people from Bristol put an intrusive L on the end of words ending in vowels. Far less common today but the BBC did a piece on it

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Yes, the original name of the place was Bristow.

[@rhydlew]

@@DrGeoffLindseyPlace of the bridge. I live in what the English call Chepstow (Place of the market)

[@kevinmahernz]

Thank you for pointing this out, I had noticed it in my own (NZ) speech and wondered about it

[@Andruspl]

I knew it! English is not my first language, and when I watched reviews of new Honda E, I kept hearing people say 'Hondaree'. When I asked native speakers about it, they said they couldn't hear a thing between 'a' and 'e', I thought I was going insane.

[@albinoorca]

English is my first language and I can't understand a lot of accents without subtitles, so I can sympathize with feeling like you're going nuts when hearing how things are pronounced. The extras Rs and the TH sounds being replaced with an F makes me take way longer to process what's being said.

[@liv97497]

Such an interesting video! But the "Vanilla Rice" is what got me😂😂😂

[@89ji76]

It’s understandable that a short video like this would work with generalizations, but it’s worth considering how southeastern US accents can either drop the R (Apalachia), keep the R (Louisiana) or even add R’s that didn’t otherwise exist! (Piney woods belt, Florida panhandle)

[@mellinghedd267]

Great video! Interestingly enough I've noticed this among certain American accents too, particularly with the word "idea."

[@mozu517]

THANK YOU! I thought I was imagining things when I heard that R on the end of words that didn't really have one. 😉

[@vincentstartuplarbin2786]

And now, these Rs usually going unnoticed are giving me headlights calls. The Clash are singing "Quit holding out, and draw R another breath". Thanks a lot for this video (and a lot of others) 😊

[@Paul71H]

You know how people make little sounds in between words, to fill space when they need a second to think of the right word? In US English, we might write these sounds as "uh" or "um". I have noticed that in British literature, these sounds might be written (in dialogue) as "er" or "erm". I used to think that this meant that people from England say "er" or "erm" (with the "r" sound) while we Americans say "uh" or "um" (without the "r" sound). But recently I read something that said that actually "er" and "erm" are meant to sound exactly like "uh" and "um", it's just that an English author would write it that way because he knows that the "r"s are silent. I'm not certain if this is actually correct, but this video reminded me of that.

[@elkins4406]

I was in my forties before I realized this! And then when it did, it totally blew my mind. I shared my amazing revelation with my husband, and he looked at me as if I'd gone mad. "You really thought British people hemmed and hawed by saying 'errrrr?' But you've LIVED in the UK. Didn't it occur to you that you'd never actually heard them do that?" Oddly enough, it hadn't.

[@Paul71H]

@@elkins4406 My experience was very similar to yours. When I read that "er" and "uh" were basically the same sound, it was quite an "a-ha" moment! I have been reading British literature since I was a teenager, and I've heard plenty of actual British speech (British TV, KZbin, travel to England, etc.), but like you, I was in my 40s when I had this revelation. 🙂

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Exactly right. The British NURSE vowel is identical to the hesitation vowel [əː]. This is often written 'er' as in 'term', 'prefer', 'alert', 'Kermit', 'perfect', 'merge', 'nerd', 'version', 'jerk', 'herd', 'Serbia' etc.

[@zhuofanzhang9974]

I thought I have known all the easily-accessible trivia of A Day In The Life, and then this video popped up. Now I can't unhear this.

[@vladimirzeleny8816]

Vanilla Ice must have been confused when being addressed as "Vanilla Rice" in Britain

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

He might have already heard it in NYC etc.!

[@ABetney]

*in England. I'm in NE Scotland and I think it probably comes out more like Vanillice with just a hint of the A

[@ek-nz]

These examples used here make me feel like this is just the YT channel for me. Black Star was a surprise. I loved “Vanilla wIce” too. Fantastic integration of nerdiness and pop culture.

[@Efreeti]

Dude I've been telling English, Australian, and Kiwi friends out on this for years and they all deny it exists. I feel vindicated. I first remember noticing this about 20 years ago in the Lord of the Rings special edition appendicies, hearing Peter Jackson pronounce australian actress Miranda Otto's name as "Miranduh Rotto"

[@djdissi]

Same experience lol. Not one of them were aware of it and all denied its existence. All said I was hearing things. Okay so maybe It's one thing to be unconsciously aware of one's own speech sounds and tongue placement when it's you, but how does one not hear it in others when it's so clear?

[@hifromneptune]

@@djdissi I'm a Kiwi and even listening to the examples in the vid with the words right beneath, I have to really try to hear it. My brain just doesn't code the sound as an R when it's used like that!

[@gchecosse]

​@djdissi we can't hear it, I could barely hear it in the examples.

[@fugithegreat]

Being an American, the first time I noticed this phenomenon was listening to the Beatles. "I never sawr them winging, no I never sawr them at all, till there was you." I was thinking, Paul, there is no R in saw! Thanks for this explanation, now I understand what the heck is going on.

[@c.h.benwan3793]

Another fantastic video, Geoff. Can I use /z/ for 'is' in 'Russia is making'? In that case, an intrusive r won't be triggered, right?

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Exactly. So, if you treat contraction as a rule, it happens before r-insertion.

[@c.h.benwan3793]

@@DrGeoffLindsey Thanks!

[@2fortsmostwanted]

3:55 I've never heard someone pronounce an intrusive R like that, it's always been so subtle. Interesting. As an American I don't do much R-dropping but as a New Englander it comes out from time to time. I have friends and neighbors with really strong accents who do drop their Rs a lot, I'll keep an ear out for this R next time I talk to them. Because I've heard people follow up my name with an intrusive R. Like, "Sarah(r) is at the door (doah)." Sometimes I find myself doing it because it's easier. Never really noticed it!

[@donaldbaker5061]

I am struck by the “intrusive R” in the pronunciation of NorthEastern American Accents where the word ends in a vowel “a” - While I am not sure about Boston, which famously drops its “r”s at the ends of words, in my own New York City accent, we regularly say things like “ideer” and “Peetser” for Idea and pizza. Even when they are not followed by a vowel.

[@yessumyecrad]

New Englanders do this as well. I grew up calling it the "pizzer for suppah" phenomenon. Somehow, I managed to escape it along with many in my generation...I think heavy media exposure has that effect.

[@12thAllie]

Please include eastern Massachusetts if not all of the northeastern United States (?) in the intrusive R group. We say rawr egg for raw egg, sawr it for saw it, etc.; pretty sure the younger people still do as well.

[@WreckItRolfe]

The trilled version is very odd. The "regular" version is just the morphing of one vowel into another, but the trill requires extra effort

[@Correctrix]

That's not at all true. It just seems so because you've heard it a lot. I know of no other language that breaks hiatus with [ɹ].

[@WreckItRolfe]

@@Correctrix What do you think the intrusive-r not existing in other languages proves exactly? That English isn't often casual and lazy?

[@jazeenharal6013]

Oh my god, I had always wanted to hear more about this. It kinda drove me a bit crazy. haha

[@hi_im_envy]

not what i expected for leia on leia

[@superwassou]

As a French I can't hear these R without your subtitles.

[@YaShoom]

Thank you for the video, but I would like to write a review of how I took it all (perhaps it will be useful to you to improve the content for other viewers, to improve their perception). The examples are extremely difficult to understand because there is a lot of text and speech: I literally can't hear them because my attention is lost in this flow of speech and text. It would be much better if you shortened the extra words and repeated the right moment several times (which would be shortened with each repetition). It would also be possible to make a running line, as in karaoke (but this, of course, is much more difficult). Thanks =)

[@SEB1991SEB]

Two more examples of intrusive sounds are the intrusive 'w' and the intrusive 'y', and these exist in all accents. When a word ends in an 'o' sound, and the next word begins with a vowel sound, then you may notice yourself linking the two words with a 'w'. For example, "We watched a video in school" can sound like "We watched a video win school". Also when the previous word ends in an 'ee' sound, and the next word begins with a vowel sound, then you may notice yourself linking the two words with a 'y'. For example, "We are going away" can sound like "We yarr going away".

[@djdissi]

Totally. That's me

[@aarondenney3740]

Those "intrusions" (glides) are almost always there -- they're just easier to notice in certain cases.

[@RaunienTheFirst]

I can't hear it on many of these clips, I think for many people the "intrusive r" is so soft as to be non-existent. Merely a transition between vowels. But it's hilarious to hear it from people that roll their r! Going to all that effort to pronounce a letter that isn't really there!

[@fiat2.583]

As someone who grew up in California, every single one of the "intrusive R's" sounds incredibly out of place to me. It blows my mind that so many people pronounce it without even thinking about it, but that's just how accents work.

[@djdissi]

And it's so true... It's a lot of effort. And it's for that reason that it blows my mind that so many don't even know they're doing it! How?

[@melonie_peppers]

This channel makes me question my own speech. I can't even remember what I actually sound like anymore.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Welcome to phonetics 😵‍💫

[@szyszkienty]

Vanilla Rice :D

[@TerezatheTeacher]

Sound like a good pudding!

[@WalrusPlatypus]

I just realized Mrs. Crocombe from English Heritage does this a LOT! I still love her though 💖

[@littlesnowflakepunk855]

This is something that I've had trouble understanding in audiobooks voiced by British actors about American characters - They often forget to *remove* this intrusive rhotic, to the point of saying the name of the country as "Americerr." Granted there are accents in the US where rhotics are added in certain contexts - lookin' at you, the northeast - but almost never in the same way as the intrusive R.

[@carly5]

Why should they remove it though, it's part of their accent?

[@fad1969]

@@carly5 Because it sounds awful. They should work on correcting their speech impediment.

[@matarey-u8k]

3:03 What I heard is "My memoriesa roar ..." followed by a prolonged pause before "happy".

[@LauraAgustinNA]

Wonderful time-line of Rs, the posher the more hilarious.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Thanks Laura. Fascinating channel.

[@gsarngad]

The best example I can think of is "Champagne Supernova, Champagne Supernova r-in the sky"

[@zweigackroyd7301]

What about the intrusive "f" in lieutenant? 😀On a more serious note, I also know several people from England who don't pronounce the r after a consonant, roughly using the bwain on the twain.

[@mitlanderson]

F in lieutenant? Not in my accent at least.

[@zweigackroyd7301]

@@mitlanderson Maybe this KZbin video helps kzbin.info/www/bejne/g2iVpKigpbqom5I

[@formbi]

​@@mitlanderson some people pronounce it like «levtenant»

[@djdissi]

@@formbi yes agreed, a lot of english brits do

[@ulexite-tv]

That was tons of fun! Than you ... from an American, who has always wondered about this.

[@Sandalwoodrk]

Im fascinated by the linking R used by those who have a tapped or trilled R cause like the usual intrusive R makes sense to me, the vowel is in the same area of the mouth as R, and so the sound arises naturally So I wonder if by hearing that, they've just internalized the intrusive R as part of the word and then producing it that way intentionally

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

I was going to provide footnotes on the different articulations, but decided to keep it simpler. I may make another more detailed video on the topic. Linking r is a real /r/, although speakers who use it mostly don't realize they're doing it, so it certainly isn't intentional. Some phonologists think the /r/ is there underlyingly, and dropped when not linked to a following vowel, i.e. recapitulating what happened historically. But note that such an analysis requires "saw", "spa", "Leia" etc. to have underlying /r/. As for being "natural", obviously rhotic speakers get by without it. But it does avoid adjacent vowels, which languages often try to avoid.

[@Sandalwoodrk]

@@DrGeoffLindsey ye that makes sense, didnt mean to imply one was more natural than the other. I suppose that "ar" is just sort of how that vowel is internalized regardless of how it's spelled So you would just kind of automatically add it there Maybe in a similar way that "E" and "I" are intrusively followed by a "Y" which is also used to distinguish adjacent vowels. So rather than an intrusive R in pronunciation, it's more of an absent R in spelling

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

@@Sandalwoodrk Yes, vowels are kept apart in my kind of English by r, j or w. But, if you have a look at my long video on why vowel symbols are "wrong", you'll see that I don't consider linking j and w to be inserted: they are simply the glides on the end of the preceding vowel. So key may buy toy are, basically, kij mej baj toj.

[@rooney0423]

@3:56 I find it very interesting that not only is the R inserted at the end of villa, but it's also trilled! Surely no one, even a native non-rhotic English speaker, could miss that!

[@adhamsmart92]

Interesting how in the clip from To Australia and Back in Six Minutes the speaker doesn't use intrusive r in 'empire air routes', even though 'empire' actually has an r!

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Yes, smilar thing in the Gaumont wartime clip, with even closer hiatus.

[@Correctrix]

It's for two reasons: 🌟 With linking, it sounds like “rare”. 🌟 “Rare routes” has a tongue-twisting repetition of R sounds. Breaking the hiatus with the glottal stop sounds clearer and nicer.

[@NerlenDept]

Great video! By the way, I was amused when read 'the present general tendency among GB speakers is to use /r/ links, even - unconsciously - among those who object most strongly' in 'Gimson's Pronunciation of English'. :) Still, myself, I haven't adopted the 'intrusive R' for my speech and often make a conscious effort to insert the 'linking R' between vowels; in my native language, it is very natural to link vowels, even the glottal stop is not needed.

[@DrGeoffLindsey]

Thank you! I assume from "GB" that you mean Cruttenden's revision of Gimson. He's expressing a typical view in RP/GB texts, namely that classic RP/GB didn't have intrusive r, but that there's a "tendency" to use it more. My video is trying to counteract this: I believe it's been around since "spar" merged with "spa", although many RP speakers self-consciously suppressed it. No doubt there are some complications/qualifications, I admit. Intrusive r before a suffix, e.g. Theresa May's withdraw/r/ing, seems to have been more stigmatized until quite recently. I never tell non-natives that they "should" do it, but I do point out that those non-natives who to my ear have achieved the highest degree of nativeness in SSB *do* use it. What I do teach speakers of Spanish, Russian etc. is to avoid letting adjacent vowels merge, so that "the EU" sounds like "thee you". English mostly avoids this, maintaning the syllable count: thiyEU, theʔEU, etc. www.englishspeechservices.com/pronunciation/thee-you/

[@AlphaNumeric123]

Impressive set of examples. I hear this most common in idea pronounced as “ideer”

[@rohitchaoji]

Funnily enough, I've heard lots of Australians and English people pronounce "Saw" like "Sore", "No" like "Nore", etc and I've always wondered where it came from. Now I know.

[@NPipiniko]

2:54 - I will never unhear Obamer in my head ever again

[@chaotickreg7024]

As an American who never has to deal with this, every single example made me go "Where is Russiar? Haha." "How do I withdrawr? Lol." "Never heard of Nokiar..."

[@bruhbbawallace]

finally, i know why leigh diffey pronounces honda as "hondur" on the indycar broadcasts but only sometimes

[@Orenotter]

To be perfectly and brutally frank, as an American with a midwestern accent, I have always found the the intrusive R to sound stupid. The moment that pushed it over the edge for me was when Dr. Who pronounced Martha as "Mawthur". It made my want to slap him and shout JUST PUT THE R WHERE IT BELONGS!