two vowels. Regarding the second feature, all of Eastern New England is historically non-rhotic (famously pronouncing "car" like "kah"), while all of Western New England is historically rhotic (or "r-ful"). Therefore, four combinations of these two features are possible, and coincidentally all four exist among New England English speakers, largely correlated with the exact geographic quadrant in New England in which a speaker was raised. Commonalities All of New England raises the tongue in the first element of the diphthong before voiceless consonants, so writer has a raised vowel, with this often being its only distinguishing feature versus rider. Eastern New England, specifically, also raises the first element of before voiceless consonants (commonly known as Canadian raising). The local dialects of New England are also known for commonly pronouncing the unstressed sequences and (for example, found in "sitting" or "Britain" ) with a glottal . While this form of t-glottalization (especially the form) is found throughout the country (), a realization with a full schwa vowel is also a variant sometimes observed particularly among New Englanders, with reportings for instance in New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. It may, however, be a younger pronunciation variant nationwide (also reported in places as diverse as Utah, California, and New Jersey). The extent that speakers raise the tongue in the "short a" vowel, or vowel, varies in New England; however, across the board, New Englanders demonstrate a definite "nasal" short-a system, in which the vowel is always raised the absolute strongest whenever occurring before the nasal consonants and (so that, pan, for example, nearly approaches the sound of the word paean). In all of New England except Rhode Island, the short a may also be somewhat raised in many other environments, similar to the Great Lakes region. The lack of the weak vowel merger is a well-known traditional feature of New England Englishes. This makes Lenin distinct from Lennon , whereas rabbit is no longer a perfect rhyme of abbott . This feature is shared with Southern American English as well as the British Received Pronunciation. In General American English, the first two words are homophonous as , whereas the latter two words are perfect rhymes: . Certain words have a tendency to use a distinct phoneme when compared against the rest of the country: for example, aunt as , the noun route as , and syrup as . Vocabulary The following terms