New Jersey English

New Jersey English refers to the diverse regional varieties of American English spoken across the U.S. state of New Jersey. Despite popular stereotypes in the media that there is a singular New Jersey accent, there are in fact several distinct accents native to New Jersey, none being confined only to New Jersey. Therefore, the term "New Jersey English" is diverse in meaning and often misleading, and it may refer to any of the following dialects of American English—most frequently to New York City English and Philadelphia English—or even to intermediate varieties that blend the features of these multiple dialects.

African-American dialect

Working- and middle-class African Americans throughout New Jersey commonly speak African-American Vernacular English (AAVE), regardless of the area of the state in which they were raised. New Jersey AAVE commonly includes a distinction between the vowels of cot and caught as well as notable fronting of the MOUTH vowel.

New York metropolitan dialect

New York City English, including the accent of greater New York City, is spoken in northeastern New Jersey, plus Monmouth County and other New Jersey counties in North Jersey or within the New York City metropolitan area. Therefore, the short-a system of these areas of New Jersey is most similar to the New York City split-a system, albeit with some variation. East of the Hackensack River and in Newark, William Labov finds the split-a system to occur with no more variation than in New York City proper. However, west of the Hackensack River, he finds that the normal function word constraint of New York City English is lost, and the open syllable constraint becomes variable. Furthermore, most of the New York metropolitan dialect heard in New Jersey is rhotic, or "r-pronouncing", although the speech of Newark as well as Jersey City (just across the Hudson River from New York City) may, by contrast, be non-rhotic, or "r-dropping".