ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the accents of three towns, Milton Keynes, Reading and Hull, chosen in order to illustrate and attempt to explain the phenomenon of dialect levelling in England. A study of the vowels of the three accents reveals the similarities between the accents of the southern towns of Milton Keynes and Reading, as well as the converging direction of change. The chapter discusses these similarities. The account of Hull reveals that it has in most respects a typical northern accent, with, for example, no contrast between STRUT and FOOT and the vowel of TRAP in BATH. The chapter suggests that the accents of Milton Keynes, Reading and Hull are converging in both inventory and realisations. It explores the links between such geographical and social factors and dialect levelling. A comparison of language variation in the three towns shows that levelling is present in each, but that the underlying processes differ.
