Lovian English

Lovian English is a variety of North American English used in Lovia. In many ways, it resembles American English, and especially the Californian dialect. In fact it's a mixture of Californian American English and European influences. Many of the grammatical constructions are derived from Dutch, Libertan or French grammar. Lovian English is, spoken, mostly the same as American, and written as well. Characteristics of American English, such as an 'o' instead of 'ou' (eg. 'color'), are also typical for Lovian.

According to the Constitution, English is the official language of Lovia. In fact, the Constitution says that American English is preferred. Many consider Lovian English as a variety of American English. Boundaries between these varietes are unclear, and so, Lovian English is frequently seen as the official language of Lovia.

General North-American phonology
In many ways, compared to British English, North American English (including American, Canadian, and Lovian English) is conservative in its phonology. Most North American speech is rhotic, as English was in most places in the 17th century. Rhoticity was further supported by Hiberno-English and Scottish English as well as the fact most regions of England at this time also had rhotic accents. In most varieties of North American English, the sound corresponding to the letter r is a retroflex [ɻ] or alveolar approximant [ɹ] rather than a trill or a tap.

In England, the lost r was often changed into [ə] (schwa), giving rise to a new class of falling diphthongs. Furthermore, the er sound of fur or butter, is realized in Lovian and American English as a monophthongal r-colored vowel (stressed [ɝ] or unstressed [ɚ] as represented in the IPA). This does not happen in the non-rhotic varieties of North American speech.

Some other British English changes in which most North American dialects do not participate:
 * The shift of /æ/ to /ɑ/ (the so-called "broad A") before /f/, /s/, /θ/, /ð/, /z/, /v/ alone or preceded by a homorganic nasal. This is the difference between the British Received Pronunciation and American pronunciation of bath and dance.
 * The realization of intervocalic /t/ as a glottal stop [ʔ] (as in [bɒʔəl] for bottle). This change is not universal for British English and is not considered a feature of Received Pronunciation. This is not a property of most North American dialects, especially Western variations including Lovian English.

On the other hand, North American English has undergone some sound changes not found in Britain, especially not in its standard varieties. Many of these are instances of phonemic differentiation and include:
 * The merger of /ɑ/ and /ɒ/, making father and bother rhyme. This change is nearly universal in the United States and in Lovia.
 * The merger of /ɒ/ and /ɔ/. This is the so-called cot-caught merger, where cot and caught are homophones. This change has occured in several parts of the USA, especially to the West. Exceptions are the San Francisco region, and as a result of that: most parts of the Lovia Archipelago.

For speakers who do not merge caught and cot: The replacement of the cot vowel with the caught vowel before voiceless fricatives (as in cloth, off [which is found in some old-fashioned varieties of RP]), as well as before /ŋ/ (as in strong, long), usually in gone, often in on, and irregularly before /g/ (log, hog, dog, fog.

The replacement of the lot vowel with the strut vowel in most utterances of the words was, of, from, what and in many utterances of the words everybody, nobody, somebody, anybody; the word because has either /ʌ/ or /ɔ/; want has normally /ɔ/ or /ɑ/, sometimes /ʌ/.

Vowel merger before intervocalic /ɹ/. Which vowels are affected varies between dialects. One such change is the laxing of /e/, /i/ and /u/ to /ɛ/, /ɪ/ and /ʊ/ before /ɹ/, causing pronunciations like [pɛɹ], [pɪɹ] and [pjʊɹ] for pair, peer and pure. The resulting sound [ʊɹ] is often further reduced to [ɝ], especially after palatals, so that cure, pure, mature and sure rhyme with fir.

The flapping of intervocalic /t/ and /d/ to alveolar tap [ɾ] before unstressed vowels (as in butter, party) and syllabic /l/ (bottle), as well as at the end of a word or morpheme before any vowel (what else, whatever). Thus, for most speakers, pairs such as ladder/latter, metal/medal, and coating/coding are pronounced the same. For many speakers, this merger is incomplete and does not occur after /aɪ/; these speakers tend to pronounce writer with [əɪ] and rider with [aɪ]. Both intervocalic /nt/ and /n/ may be realized as [n] or [ɾ̃], making winter and winner homophones. This does not occur when the second syllable is stressed, as in entail.

The pin-pen merger, by which [ɛ] is raised to [ɪ] before nasal consonants, making pairs like pen/pin homophonous. This merger originated in Southern American English but is now found in parts of the Midwest, West, and in Lovia since the 1920s as well.

Some mergers found in most varieties of both American and British English include:
 * The merger of the vowels /ɔ/ and /o/ before 'r', making pairs like horse/hoarse, corps/core, for/four, morning/mourning, etc. homophones.
 * The wine-whine merger making pairs like wine/whine, wet/whet, Wales/whales, wear/where, etc. homophones, in most cases eliminating /ʍ/, the voiceless labiovelar fricative.

Specific Lovian phonology
The differents between American and Lovian English are rather small, especially not between Lovian and California English. Specific characteristics of both Lovian/Californian English, that are different for most American varieties:
 * Front vowels are raised before velar nasal /ŋ/, so that the near-open front unrounded vowel /æ/ and the near-close near-front unrounded vowel /ɪ/ are raised to a close-mid front unrounded vowel [e] and a close front unrounded vowel [i] before /ŋ/. This change makes for minimal pairs such as king and keen, both having the same vowel [i], differing from king [kɪŋ] in other varieties of English. Similarly, a word like rang will often have the same vowel as rain in Lovia English, not the same vowel as ran as in other varieties.
 * The vowels in words such as Mary, marry, merry are merged to the open-mid front unrounded vowel [ɛ]
 * Most speakers in Lovia do distinguish between the open-mid back rounded vowel /ɔ/ and open back unrounded vowel /ɑ/, characteristic of the cot-caught merger, which is a result of the migration from San Francisco where the East Coast language tradition was kept alive.
 * According to phoneticians studying Lovian English, traditionally diphthongal vowels such as /oʊ/ as in boat and /eɪ/, as in bait, have acquired qualities much closer to monophthongs in some speakers of Lovian English. However, the continuing presence of slight offglides (if less salient than those of, say, British Received Pronunciation) and convention in IPA transcription for English account for continuing use of /oʊ/ and /eɪ/.
 * The pin-pen merger is complete in Lovia.

Vocabulary
Though the vocabulary differs from town to town some words are found almost everywhere in Lovia, for example:
 * diffi: difficult, hard
 * actrice: actress
 * this list is incomplete

Expressions and proverbs

 * naranja
 * Meaning: congratulations, let's do it!, great!
 * to be a crumble compared to the cake
 * Meaning: to be less good/famous/... compared to somebody great

Local varieties
These dialects, variations, or language/dialect mixtures are (partly) based on Lovian English:


 * Hurbanovan English, a variety spoken in and around Hurbanova with lots of Slovak, Polish and Dutch influences.
 * Modern Trainish, an almost extinct variety with very specific characteristics.
 * Oceana, a local Slovak and Polish based dialect with few Lovian English influences, spoken in Hurbanova.
 * † Train Village Dutch, an extinct mixture of Lovian English and Dutch.