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`背負う` is pronounced `せおう`, but many dictionaries also list a second
pronunciation as `しょう`.

  1. I've never heard it pronounced as `しょう` in practice. In what situations does it have this pronunciation? Is that only an archaic pronunciation, or is it still in use? Is it a regional/dialectical thing? Is one free to pronounce it with either way, unrestricted?

  2. `せおう` (or `おう`, rather) conjugates as a `五段`. Does `しょう` also conjugate as a `五段`?

>   * ます形 → しょいます
>   * ない形 → しょわない
>   * ～て･た形 → しょって・た
>   * 命令形 → しょえ
>   * 仮定形 → しょえば
>   * 可能形 → しょえる
>   * 意志形 → しょおう
>
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words usage conjugations dialects homophonic-kanji
Questions about 背負う
One can hear しょって used often when talking about rucksacks or backpacks.

> リュックサックを[背負]{しょ}って[歩]{ある}く

There isn't really much difference (しょう pronunciation is from せおう anyway),
though, and people use them quite interchangeably. Though, sometimes the
nuance of しょう can be such that it is [迷惑]{めいわく}...

However, there is one situation, when one's talking about someone being vain
or full of themselves, where one can use しょってる and not せおってる. One hears this
usage often in [落語]{らくご}...
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The only difference I perceive is that しょう sounds slightly more "intimate" as
if it's a regional dialect. But this doesn't mean せおう is less of everyday
language. Probably I feel this way because the pronunciation is a naturally
slurred version of せおう (i.e., /seo/ -> /syo/), which is most likely the result
of a natural sound shift like
[音便](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%9F%B3%E4%BE%BF).

The tricky thing is that しょう here is not a homonym of しょう as in 賞, 章, and 小.
While they look exactly the same in kana, しょう as 背負う does not have the double
mora お. It's しょ as one mora plus う as another mora, i.e., it's not the same
pronunciation as しょー.

As for its conjugation, it's 五段 as you guessed.
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2013-09-27T12:20:01.540
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answer
## Addendum: Pronunciation

The verb 背負う has two modern pronunciations: せおう, and しょう. From a modern
perspective, it's a little befuddling how these two interrelate. If we look at
the past, however, the story comes clear.

The version starting with し is sometimes analyzed by modern speakers as the し
being a slurred or otherwise shifted pronunciation of せ. However,
historically, it is worth noting that せ was itself formerly pronounced more
like //ʃe// (as in English _shed_ ). The non-fricative sibilant //se// version
appears some time after the 1603 日葡辞書 ( _Nippo Jisho_ , "Japanese-Portuguese
Dictionary"), where all of the せ sounds are spelled ⟨xe⟩ instead -- and where
that ⟨x⟩ was the Portuguese spelling at the time of the "sh" sound in modern
English (more or less -- for strict phonologists, I'm uncertain if that was
the [voiceless postalveolar
fricative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_postalveolar_fricative)
[[ʃ]], the [voiceless alveolo-palatal
fricative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_alveolo-palatal_fricative)
[[ɕ]] as in modern Tokyo Japanese, the [voiceless retroflex
fricative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_retroflex_fricative) [[ʂ]]
(unlikely, I think), or some other specific phone). Note all of the entries in
the _X antes do E_ section ("X before E") [starting from the bottom right of
this
page](https://books.google.com/books?id=TFJAAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA292-IA1#v=onepage&q&f=false),
including such otherwise-familiar terms as "Xecai. _Mundo._ " (Sekai. _World._
)

So the difference in reading between せおう and しょう is not a seemingly arbitrary
rearrangement of consonant and vowel values, but instead the unsurprising
result of a contraction, as //ʃeou// shifted to just //ʃou//.

According to the 日本国語大辞典【にほんこくごだいじてん】 entry [here at
Kotobank](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E8%83%8C%E8%B2%A0-2049668), the shorter
しょう reading appears first in 1278, well within the time period when せ was
still pronounced as a fricative //ʃe//, and thus a contraction from //ʃeou//
to //ʃou// would not have been all that exceptional.
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