/æ/ raising

In the sociolinguistics of the English language, /æ/ raising, or short-a raising, is a phenomenon by which the "short a" vowel /æ/ ^ⓘ, the TRAP/BATH vowel (found in such words as lack and laugh), is pronounced with a raising of the tongue. In most American and many Canadian English accents, /æ/ raising is specifically /æ/ tensing: a combination of greater raising, fronting, lengthening, and gliding that occurs only in certain phonological environments or certain words. The most common context for tensing /æ/ throughout North American English, regardless of dialect, is when this vowel appears before a nasal consonant (thus, for example, commonly in pan^ⓘ, but rarely in pat^ⓘ).

The realization of this "tense" (as opposed to "lax") /æ/ includes variants such as [ɛə], [eə], [ɛː], etc., which can depend on the particular dialect or even speaker. One common realization is [ɛə], a transcription that will be used throughout this article as a generalized representation of the tensed pronunciation.

Variable raising of /æ/ (and /æɔ/, the MOUTH vowel transcribed with ⟨aʊ⟩ in General American) before nasal consonants also occurs in Australian English.