Diphthongs

NEAR

In most rhotic accents of the British Isles, those of Scotland, Ireland, and the South-west of England, the realization of NEAR is typically as a high front monophthong, invariably of a tensed variety. Diphthongization elsewhere is usually to [iə], with varying degrees of tenseness for the onset: a relaxed onset at [ɪ] is found in RP and one of the variants for British Creole (which also has available [ie(r)/iε(r)] in rhotic variants), while [eə/εə] also occur in the West Midlands. East Anglia has [e:/ε:], creating a NEAR/SQUARE merger.