Horse-Hoarse Merger

The horse-hoarse merger is also known as the north-force merger. In this merger, only one mid back vowel occurs before /r/. This merger occurs in most varieties of English today.

Varieties of English which do not have the horse-hoarse merger are Irish, Scottish and Caribbean. In the varieties which lack the merger, hoarse is pronounced with a higher vowel. In certain speakers, the distinction is one of length rather than vowel quality. In this case, the vowel of hoarse is longer than that of horse.

Most speakers of American English have the merger. However, many speakers from New Orleans and St. Louis maintain a distinction. According to a study by William Labov in 2006, black speakers are less likely to have the merger than are whites. In the study only a little over half of the black participants had the merger.

The horse-hoarse merger is a very common merger in English. Another common merger before /r/ is the marry-merry-Mary merger. These mergers are examples of simplification.