Phonetics Chapter 3 Phonetics: Describing Sounds
Nov 09, 2014
Phonetics
Chapter 3
Phonetics: Describing Sounds
Key concepts
Phonemes are the distinctive sounds in a language.
There are 40 distinctive phonemes in English language.
A vowel sound is produced in such a way that the air stream can pass through the vocal tract without a noticeable obstruction.
A consonant sound has some degree of air restriction.
DENHAM, Kristin. Linguistics for Everyone: An Introduction. Wadsworth: Wadsworth Cegage Congress. 2010
There are 24 consonants./p/ and /b/ are distinctive sounds, we hear
the difference between them and we know that the words bit and pit have different meanings.
Minimal pairs – two words that differ by only a single phoneme in the same position.
Bit x pit
Phonemic transcription
There is always correspondence between sounds and symbols.
We describe each consonant in terms of each of the following:
Voicing Place of articulation manner of articulation
Voicing – controlling the vibrations of the vocal cords as air passes through to make speech sounds.
Place of articulation – the places in the oral cavity where airflow is modified to make speech sounds.
Manner of articulation – the way we move and position our lips, tongue, and teeth to make speech sounds.
Voicing:
Voiceless = air flow freely without vibrating vocal cords
Voiced = air flow vibrating the vocal cords. All vowels are voiced.
Place of articulation 1- Bilabial – sounds made with both lips /p/ pink/b/ ball/m/ make/w/ wash / / which (for some speakers)
/w/ and / / are sometimes classified as velar or labiovelar because the back of the tongue is raised toward the velum during production of the consonants.
/ / - Dissapearing sound.
2- Labiodental – sounds made with the lower lip against the upper front teeth.
/t/ fast/v/ valley
3-Interdental – sounds made with the tongue between the front teeth.
/θ/ thick /ð/ though
4- Alveolar – sounds made with the tongue tip at or near the alveolar ridge.
/t/ teeth /d/ dog/s/ sea/z/ zenith (peak)/n/ nut/l/ leer (malicious eyes)/r/ red, bar
5- Palatal – sounds made with the tongue near your palate, the hard part of the roof of the mouth.
/š/ or /ʃ / shell/ž/ or /ʒ / genre, measure /č/ or /tʃ/ cheers/ǰ/ or /dʒ/ jam/y/ or /j/ yellow
6- Velar – sounds made with the tongue near the velum, the soft part of the roof of your mouth, behind the palate.
/k/ kiss/g/ gear/ŋ/ sing
7- Glottal – sounds made at the glottis.
/h/ happy
*/h/ is sometimes classified as a glottal fricative
Manner of articulation
1-Stops – the sounds in this group are made by obstructing the airstream completely in the coral cavity.
/p/ pink /b/ ball/t/ teeth /d/ dog/k/ kiss/g/ gear
2- Fricatives – the sounds in this group are made by forming a nearly complete stoppage of the airstream.
/f/ fast/v/ valley/θ/ thick /ð/ though/s/ sea/z/ zenith /š/ /ʃ / shell/ž/ /ʒ / genre, measure
3- Affricates – the sounds are made by briefly stopping the airstream completely and then releasing the articulators slightly so the friction is produced.
/č/ /tʃ/ cheers /ǰ/ /dʒ/ jam
4- Nasal – the sounds are made by lowering the velum and letting the airstream pass primarily through the nasal cavity.
/m/ make/n/ nut, bun /ŋ/ sing
5- Glides – the sound are made with oly a slight closure of the articulators – if the vocal tract were any more open, the result would be a vowel.
/y/ yellow /w/ wash / / which /h/ happy
6- Liquids – the sounds result when na obstruction is formed by the articulators but is not narrow enough to stop the airflow or to cause friction.
/l/ leer /r/ red
Forgotten clusters
kn= /n/Knee knight knock knife knit knot gn= /n/Gnash gnarl gnome gnaw gnat
mb= /m/Dumb climb comb
Diphthongs
The most common in American English
/ay/ or /aɪ/ - sky
/aw/ or /aʊ/ - cow
/oy/ or /oɪ/ - foil
/iy/ - beat (dialect not /bit/ but diphthong)
/uw/ - boot (dialect not /but/ but diphthong)
/ey/ or /eɪ/- bait
/ow/ or /oʊ/ - boat
Standard English diphthongs
RP(British)Australian
American
GA Canadian
low [əʊ̯G ] [əʉ̯G ] [oʊ̯G ]
loud[aʊ̯G ] [æɔ̯G ] [aʊ̯G ]
[aʊ̯G ]
lout [əʊ̯G ]
lied[aɪG ] [ɑeG ]
[aɪG ]
light [əɪG ]
lane [eɪG ] [æɪG ] [eɪG ]
loin [ɔ̯ɪG ] [oɪG ] [ɔ̯ɪG ]
loon [u:] [ʉ̯:] [ʊ̯uG ]
lean [i:] [ɪiG ] [ɪiG ]
leer [ɪəG ] [ɪəG ] [ɪɚ̯G ]
lair [ɛəG ] [e:] [ɛɚ̯G ]
lure [ʊ̯əG ] [ʊ̯əG ] [ʊ̯ɚ̯G ]
1 - Canadian English exhibits allophony of /aʊ̯G / and /aɪG / called Canadian raising. GA and RP have raising to a lesser extent in /aɪG /. General American (GA), also known as Standard American English (SAE), is a major accent of American English
2 - The erstwhile monophthongs /i:/ and /u:/ are diphthongized in many dialects. In many cases they might be better transcribed as [uuG ] and [iiG ], where the non-syllabic element is understood to be closer than the syllabic element. They are sometimes transcribed /uw/ and /ij/ or ~/iy/.
3- In rhotice dialects, words like pair, poor, and peer can be analyzed as diphthongs, although other descriptions analyze them as vowels with [ɹ] in the coda.
4- In Received Pronunciation, the vowels in lair and lure may be monophthongized to [ɛ:] and [o:] respectively (Roach (2004:240)). Australian English speakers more readily monophthongize the former.
Syllabic consonants
/rR / e /nR /runner /rənrR / ribbon /ribnR /
/ər, əl, əm, ən/ ou / rR , lR , mR , nR /
sugar /šʊgər/ or /šʊgrR / bird /bərd/ or / brR d/ button /bətən/ or /bətnR /
Vowel distinctions: Length /:/In English they are not distinctive. There is no change in meaning. Finnish: [muta] mud [mu:ta] some other [mut:a] but [tapan] I kill [tapa:n] I meet [tule] come! [tule:] comes [tu:le:] is windy
Japanese:
[to:kai] collapse [tokai] city [kokaku] a customer[ko:kaku] wide angle[ko:to:] oral, verbal [koto:] na isolated island [kotto] antique
English ( long consonants = geminate)
/bʊkɛnd/ bookend (long k)/bʊkkes/ bookcase
/ɛkssɛpt/ except (long s , two ss)
Tone
Chinese:[ma] mother - high level tone[ma] hemp - high rising tone [ma] horse - low failing rising tone [ma] scold - high failing tone
Nupe language – Nigeria:
abà placeaba penis ebá husband edú kind of fish èdù Niger river èdu kind of yam edu thigh edù deer
Nasalization
French:lot /lo/ prizelongue /lõ/ long
Navarro:a e ą (hook in the a indicates nasalization
in Navajo)a e á - tone
Vowel Shifts: The Great Vowel Shift
It began in Chaucer’s time (the Fourteen Century) and continued through the time of Shakespeare (the early Seventeenth Century) .
The Great Vowel shiftFront Central Back
High [fi:f] →[fayf] ‘five’
i: ↑
u:↑
[hu:s]→ haws] ‘house’
Mid [swe:t] → [swit] ‘sweet’ [dɛ:g]→ [de] ‘day’
e: ɛ:
o:↑ɔ:
[fo:d] → [fu:d] ‘food’ [stɔ:n] → [ston] ‘stone’
Low ay aw a: [na:me] →[nem] ‘name’
Northern Cities Chain Shift Chicago, Detroit, Rochester, Cleveland,
Buffalo
/ie/idea
/I/kid
/ɛ/Ked /ʌ/
cud/ ɔ/
cawed
/a/ or /ɒ/cod
/æ/cad
The southern vowell shift
5
4 3
7
6
2
4
4 8
1
/iy/keye
d
/uw/cooed
/ɪ/kid
/ow/code
/ ɔ r/cord
/ey/mad
e
/ ɛ/ked
/æ/cad
/ay/hide
/ar/card
Phonemes and allophones
A B
pat spell
pickle special
Peter spare
/p/ - phoneme
[pʰ [p] - allophones /p/ becomes aspirated when it occurs at the
beginning of a stresses syllable. Otherwise, it is unaspirated.