Southeastern phonology: vowels and diphthongs FLEECE

The London and Southeastern FLEECE variant is a diphthong. The general sociophonetic principle is again: the more central the starting-point, the more basilectal the variant. The most basilectal variant is [əi] with a full central starting-point. Suburban working-class speakers and middle-class speakers use a variant with a less central starting-point, which we transcribe as [^əi].