Welsh English

• The vowel of cat /æ/ is pronounced as a more central near-open front unrounded vowel [æ̈].[4] In Cardiff, bag is pronounced with a long vowel [aː].[5] In Mid-Wales, a pronunciation resembling its New Zealand and South African analogue is sometimes heard, i.e. trap is pronounced /trɛp/[6]
• The vowel of end /ɛ/ is a more open vowel and thus closer to cardinal vowel [ɛ] than RP[4]
• In Cardiff, the vowel of "kit" /ɪ/ sounds slightly closer to the schwa sound of above, an advanced close-mid central unrounded vowel [ɘ̟][4]
• The vowel of "bus" /ʌ/ is pronounced [ɜ~ə][7][8] and is encountered as a hypercorrection in northern areas for foot.[6] It is sometimes manifested in border areas of north and mid Wales as an open front unrounded vowel /a/ or as a near-close near-back rounded vowel /ʊ/ in northeast Wales, under influence of Cheshire and Merseyside accents,[6] and to a lesser extent in south Pembrokeshire.[9]
• The schwa tends to be supplanted by an /ɛ/ in final closed syllables, e.g. brightest /ˈbrəitɛst/. The uncertainty over which vowel to use often leads to 'hypercorrections' involving the schwa, e.g. programme is often pronounced /ˈproːɡrəm/[5]

Monophthongs of Welsh English as they are pronounced in Abercrave, from Coupland & Thomas (1990), pp. 135–136.

Monophthongs of Welsh English as they are pronounced in Cardiff, from Coupland & Thomas (1990), pp. 93–95. Depending on the speaker, the long /ɛː/ may be of the same height as the short /ɛ/.[10]

Diphthongs of Welsh English as they are pronounced in Abercrave, from Coupland & Thomas (1990), pp. 135–136

Diphthongs of Welsh English as they are pronounced in Cardiff, from Coupland & Thomas (1990), p. 97

• The vowel of car is often pronounced as an open central unrounded vowel [ɑ̈][11] and more often as a long open front unrounded vowel /aː/[6]
• In broader varieties, particularly in Cardiff, the vowel of bird is similar to South African and New Zealand, i.e. a mid front rounded vowel [ø̞ː][12]
• Most other long monophthongs are similar to that of Received Pronunciation, but words with the RP /əʊ/ are sometimes pronounced as [oː] and the RP /eɪ/ as [eː]. An example that illustrates this tendency is the Abercrave pronunciation of play-place [ˈpleɪˌpleːs][13]
• In northern varieties, /əʊ/ as in coat and /ɔː/ as in caught/court may be merged into /ɔː/ (phonetically [oː]).[5]

• Fronting diphthongs tend to resemble Received Pronunciation, apart from the vowel of bite that has a more centralised onset [æ̈ɪ][13]
• Backing diphthongs are more varied:[13]
  • The vowel of low in RP, other than being rendered as a monophthong, like described above, is often pronounced as [oʊ̝]
  • The word town is pronounced with a near-open central onset [ɐʊ̝]
• Welsh English is one of few dialects where the Late Middle English diphthong /iu̯/ never became /juː/, remaining as a falling diphthong [ɪʊ̯ ~ ʏʊ̯]. Thus you /juː/, yew /jɪʊ̯/, and ewe /ɪʊ̯/ are not homophones in Welsh English. As such yod-dropping never occurs: distinctions are made between choose /t͡ʃuːz/ and chews /t͡ʃɪʊ̯s/, through /θruː/ and threw /θrɪʊ̯/, which most other English varieties do not have.

• A strong tendency (shared with Scottish English, Northern English and some South African accents) towards using an alveolar tap [ɾ] (a 'tapped r') in place of an approximant [ɹ] (the r used in most accents in England) is present[14] while some accents influenced by Welsh may use an alveolar trill [r][15]
• Most Welsh accents are non-rhotic, however variable rhoticity can be found in accents influenced by Welsh, especially northern varieties, while some speakers in Port Talbot may supplant the front vowel of bird with /ɚ/, like in many varieties of North American English[16]
• H-dropping is common in many Welsh accents, especially southern varieties like Cardiff English,[17] but is absent in northern and western varieties influenced by Welsh.[18]
• Some gemination between vowels is often encountered, e.g. money is pronounced [ˈmɜn.niː][19]
• As Welsh lacks the letter Z and the voiced alveolar fricative /z/, some first-language Welsh speakers replace it with the voiceless alveolar fricative /s/ for words like cheese and thousand, while pens (/pɛnz/) and pence merge into /pɛns/, especially in north-west, west and south-west Wales.[19][20]
• In northern varieties influenced by Welsh, chin (/tʃɪn/) and gin may also merge into /dʒɪn/[19]
• In the north-east, under influence of such accents as Scouse, ng-coalescence does not take place, so sing is pronounced /sɪŋɡ/[21]
• Also in northern accents, /l/ is frequently strongly velarised [ɫː]. In much of the south-east, clear and dark L alternate much like they do in RP[16]
• The consonants are generally the same as RP but Welsh consonants like [ɬ] and [x] (phonetically [χ]) are encountered in loan words such as Llangefni and Harlech[19]

Spellings are almost identical to other dialects of British English. Minor differences occur with words descended from Welsh that are not anglicised unlike in many other dialects of English.

In Wales, cwm, valley, is always preferred over the Anglicised version coombe. As with other dialects of British English, -ise endings are preferred: realise instead of realize. However, both forms are acceptable.

Welsh code-switchers fall typically into one of three categories: the first category is people whose first language is Welsh and are not the most comfortable with English, the second is the inverse, English as a first language and a lack of confidence with Welsh, and the third consists of people whose first language could be either and display competence in both languages.[26]

Welsh and English share congruence, meaning that there is enough overlap in their structure to make them compatible for code-switching. In studies of Welsh English code-switching, Welsh frequently acts as the matrix language with English words or phrases mixed in. A typical example of this usage would look like dw i’n love-io soaps, which translates to "I love soaps".[25]

In a study conducted by Margaret Deuchar in 2005 on Welsh-English code-switching, 90% of tested sentences were found to be congruent with the Matrix Language Format, or MLF, classifying Welsh English as a classic case of code-switching.[25] This case is identifiable as the matrix language was identifiable, the majority of clauses in a sentence that uses code-switching must be identifiable and distinct, and the sentence takes the structure of the matrix language in respect to things such as subject verb order and modifiers.[24]