Chapter 2

Phonetics

Phonetics:

The study of the speech sounds that occur in all human languages to represent meanings

  1.Acoustic phonetics: the study of

the physical properties of sounds.

2.Auditory phonetics: the study of the

way listeners perceive the speech

sounds.3.Articulatory phonetics: the study

of how linguistic sounds are

produced.

Fields of phonetics :

Spelling and Speech

A. The sounds in a language often

are represented by spelling

rather unsystematically.

B. The Phonetic Alphabet The discrepancy between spelling and sounds gave rise to a movement of “spelling reformers” called orthoepists. They wanted to revise the alphabet so that one letter would correspond to one sound and one sound to one letter.

C. The efforts and contribution of

George Bernard Shaw to the

phonetic alphabet.

D. In 1888 the interest in the

scientific description of speech

sounds led the International

Phonetic Association (IPA) to

develop a phonetic alphabet to

symbolize the sounds found in

all languages.

E. A phonetic alphabet should

include enough symbols to

represent “crucial” linguistic

differences. At the same time it

should not, and cannot, include

noncrucial differences.

Articulatory PhoneticsI.  Airstream Mechanisms

A. pulmonic sounds: speech

sounds are produced by

pushing the air in the lung

out of the body through the

mouth and sometimes through

the nose.

B. egressive sounds: the air is

pushed out.C. implosives sounds: the air is sucked in instead of flowing out; produced by a glottalic airstream mechanism. (occur in the languages of the American Indians and throughout Africa, India, and Pakistan.)

D.  clicks sounds: the air is sucked

in; produced by a velaric

airstream mechanism.

( occurring in the Southern

Bantu languages.)

E. ejectives sounds: the air in the

mouth is pushed out produced

by a glottalic airstream

mechanism ( occurring in

many American Indian as well

as African and Caucasian

languages.)

Three airstream mechanisms:

pulmonic airstream: plosives etc.

glottalic airstream: implosives,

ejectives

velaric airstream: clicks

II.   Voiced and Voiceless Sounds

A. voiceless: (a) the vocal cords

are apart, (b) the airstream is

not obstructed at the glottis

and it passes freely into the

supraglottal cavities.

B.  voiced: (a) the vocal cords are

together, (b)the airstream

forces its way through and

causes them to vibrate.

C.  The voiced/voiceless distinction

is a very important one in

English. It is this phonetic

feature or property that

distinguishes between word

pairs like:

rope/robe fate/fade rack/rag

voiced / voiceless

III.  Nasal and Oral Sounds

A. oral sounds: (a) the velum is

raised all the way to touch the

back of the throat the passage

through the nose is cut off; (b)

the nasal passage is blocked in

this way,(c) the air can escape

only through the mouth.

B.  nasal sounds: the velum is lowered, air escaping through the nose as well as the mouth.

C. The phonetic features or

properties permit the

classification of all speech sounds

into four classes: voiced,voiceless,

nasal, oral. One sound may

belong to more than one class.

IV.    Places of Articulation

A.   Labials

1. bilabials: [p], [b],[m] are

articulated by bringing both lips

together.

[p], [b],[m]

2. labiodental: [f],[v] are articulated

by touching the bottom lip to the

upper teeth.

B.  Interdentals: the th in the words thin and then, the tip of the tongue is inserted between the upper and lower teeth.[] []

C.   Alveolars: to articulate a [d],

[n], [t], [s],or [z], the tongue is

aised to the bony tooth ridge;

[t] and [s] are voiceless

alveolar sounds, [d] and [z]

are voiced, and only [n] is

nasal.

[t] [d]

[s] [z]

D.  Velars: produced by raising

the back of the tongue to the

soft palate or velum, as the

initial and final sounds of the

words kick, gig, and the final

sounds of the words back, bag,

and bang.

[k] [g]

E. Palatals: the front part of the

tongue is raised to a point on

the hard palate just behind the

alveolar ridge, as the voiceless

palatal sound begins the words

shoe, sure and ends the words

rush, push.

[š] [ž]

F. Coronals: the alveolar and

palatal sounds are grouped

together as coronal, sharing the

common property of being

articulated by raising the

tongue blade toward the hard

palate.

Manners of Articulation

The voiced/voiceless and oral/nasal features do not refer to the movement or position of the tongue, teeth, or lips. Rather they reflect the way the airstream is affected as it travels from the lungs up and out of the mouth and nose.

Such features or phonetic properties have traditionally been referred to as manners of articulation or simply manner features.

I.  Stops and Continuants

Sounds that are stopped completely in the oral cavity for a brief period are called stops, and the stream of air continues without complete interruption through the mouth opening are called continuants.

[p],[b],[m]--are bilabial stops, with

the airstream stopped

at the mouth by the

complete closure of the

lips.

[t],[d],[n]—are alveolar stops; the

airstream is stopped by

the tongue making a

complete closure at the

alveolar ridge

[k],[g],[]--are velar stops with the

complete closure at the

velum.

II.   Aspirated and Unaspirated Sounds

In English when we pronounce the word pit, there is a brief period of voicelessness immediately after the [p] sound is released. That is, after the lips come apart the vocal cords remain open for a very short time.

Such sounds are called aspirated because an extra puff of air is produced. When we pronounce the [p] in spit, however, the vocal cords start vibrating as soon as the lips are opened. Such sounds are called unaspirated.

Aspirated sounds are indicated by following the phonetic symbol with a raised h as in the following examples:

pate [ph et] spate [spet]

tale [th el] stale [stel]

kale [kh el] scal [skel]

III.  Fricatives

If you put your hand in front of your mouth and produce an [s],[z],[f],[v],[],[],[š],or[ž]sound, you will feel the air coming out of your mouth.

The passage in the mouth through which the air must pass is very narrow, causing friction. Such sounds are called fricatives.

[f] [v] --labiodental fricatives

[s] [z] --alveolar fricatives

[š] [ž] --palatal fricatives

[] [] -- interdental fricatives

IV.   Affricates

Some sounds are produced by a stop closure followed immediately by a slow release of the closure characteristic of a fricative. These sounds are called affricates.

[tš] =[t]+[š] white shoes

[dž]=[d]+[ž]

[d] [t]

stage1 strage2

V.   Liquids

In the production of the sounds [l] and [r], there is some obstruction of the airstream in the mouth, but not enough to cause any real constriction or friction. These sounds are called liquids.

[l] is a lateral liquid, the tongue is raised to the alveolar ridge, but the sides of the tongue are down permitting the air to escape laterally over the sides of the tongue.

[r] is produced in a variety of ways. Many English speakers produce [r] by curling the tip of the tongue back behind the alveolar ridge. Such sounds are called retroflex sounds.

VI.  Glides

In articulating [j] or [w], the tongue moves rapidly in gliding fashion either toward or away from a neighboring vowel, hence the term glide.

[j]-- palatal glide

[w]--labio-velar glide

[h]-- glide, somtimes

classified as a voiceless

glottal fricative.

VOWELS

When we pronounce vowels our oral cavities are open without any contact points and the airstream flows out freely. As for the quality of vowels, it’s determined by our tongues raised or lowered and our lips spread or pursed.

Vowels aren’t like consonants.

--they carry pitch and loudness and can be pronounced alone. In addition, for many of the beginning students, it’s more difficult to distinguish their articulatory features from each other by many different schemes.

Because vowels are produced without any articulators touching or even coming close together.“ Only when you watch an x-ray movie of someone’s talking you’ll find why vowels have traditionally been classified.” Thus we have 3 questions:

1.   How high is the tongue?

2.   What part of the tongue is

involved; that is , what part is

fronted or backed?

3.   What is the position of the lips?

(I) Tongue positions

We can exam how vowels are produced with some parts of the relative not absolute.

front

(Height)

High

Low

Back

Rounded

/u/(boot)

//(put)

/o/(boat)

//(office)

/bah

(beet)/i/

(bit)//

(bait)/e/

(bet) //

(bat)//

(Rosa)/

(but)//

Front vowels

/i/ a high front vowel

// a lower-high front vowel

/e/ a higher-mid front vowel

// a lower-mid front vowel

// a low front vowel

Back vowels

/u/ a high back vowel

// a lower-high back vowel

/o/ a higher-mid back vowel

// a lower-mid back vowel

// a low back vowel

Schwa vowels

// a unstressed mid-central vowel

// a stressed mid-central vowel

 (II)  Lip rounding

All the back English vowels are pronounced with the lips rounded or pursed except //. On the contrary, non-back vowels are unrounded. However, it’s not true of all languages. French and Swedish languages have front- and back-rounded vowels. Mandarin, Japanese and the Cameroonian languages have high back unrounded vowels.

EX. 中文一字 [四 ]的發音含有類似英文 boot 的母音但唇形卻是 non-rounded spread lips; 而 [速 ]則是 high back-rounded lips.

 (III)  Diphthongs

They are described as a sequence of two sounds—vowel + glide.

EX: bite aj a vowel + j glide

browaw a vowel + w glide

boy j vowel + j glide

  (VI)  Nasalization Of Vowels In English, nasal vowels occur before or after nasal consonants. (eg.Hint hint, bean bin, camp kmp, bone brn ) However, the languages like Southern Min, nasalized vowels may occur when no nasal consonant is adjacent.

EX: pi “ compare ”

pĩ “ not round ”

Prosodic suprasegmental features

Such features as length, pitch, and the complex feature stress and how they are used in various languages to distinguish the meaning of words and sentences are often referred as prosodic or suprasegmental features.

1.  Long vowels in English are

produced with greater tension

of the tongue muscles than their

short counterparts and therefore

also referred to as tense vowels.

Ex: day [dey]

2.  In some languages there are vowels

and /or consonants that differ

phonetically from each other only

by duration . Therefore, it is

customary to transcribe this

difference either by doubling the

symbol or by the use of a diacritic

“ colon” after the segment, as for

example [aa] or [a:]. [bb] or [b:]/

3. What are tone languages ? Give

one example. Languages that

use the pitch of individual

vowels or syllables to contrast

meanings of words are called

tone languages. Take one word

in Nupe.

(a language spoke in Nigeria)

for example

[naa] [ ] L low tone “ a nickname ”‵[naa] [ - ] M mid tone “ rice paddy ”

[naa] [′] H high tone “ young maternal

uncle or aunt ”

[naa] [ ^ ] HL falling tone “ face ”

[naa] [ ] LH rising tone “ thick ”

 4.  A contour tone VS. register tone

For instance:

Tones that “ glide “ are called contour tones; tones that do not are called level or register tones.

mā ( 媽 ) : a register tonemă ( 馬 ) : a contour tone

5.  What are downdrift languages ?

In a language, when a low tone

or high is phonetically lower than

its preceding low or high tone

(usually intervened with a high or

low tone), it is called downdrift.

6.    Let’s read the following sen

tence in Twi, we’ll find the relat

ive pitch, rather than the absolut

e pitch, important.

 “ Kofi searches for a little food

for his friend’s child. ”

h h ádu k á m

L H L H H L L H L L H L L H_________________________________________

7________________________________________

6_______h____á___________________________

5___________________k____________________

4____h__________________________á________

3____________du__________________________

2________________________________________

1___________________________________m____

DIACRITICS

Diacritic marks on vowel nasalization, prosodic features, and tone can be used to modify the basic phonetic symbols.

Phonetics is the science of speech sounds. It aims to provide the set of features or properties that can be used to describe and distinguish all the sounds used in human.

The discrepancy between spelling and sounds in English and other languages motivated the development of phonetic alphabets in which one letter corresponds to one sound The major phonetic alphabet in use is that of the International Phonetic Association (IPA).

All human speech sounds fall into classes according to their phonetic properties of features. During the production of voiced sounds the vocal cords are together and vibrating whereas in voiceless sounds the vocal cords or glottis is open and non-vibrating.

Voiceless sounds may also be aspirated or unaspirated. Classes of sounds which differ according to their manner of articulation also include oral and nasal sounds, continuants or stops. Non-sonorant continuants are fricatives; the class of sonorant continuants include, vowels, glides, and liquids.

Vowels form the nucleus of syllables and are therefore syllabic. They differ according to the position of the tongue and lips: high, mid, or low tongue; front or back of the tongue; rounded or unrounded lips.

Length pitch and loudness are prosodic or suprasegmental features which also differentiate sounds. The vowels in English may be long or short, stressed or untressed.

In many languages the pitch of the vowel or syllable is linguistically significant in distinguishing the meaning of words. Such language are called tone languages as opposed to intonation languages in which pitch is never used to contrast words.

Diacritics to specify such properties as nasalization, length, voicelessness, syllabicity, stress, tone, or rounding may be combined with the phonetic symbols for more detailed phonetic transcriptions.

Aspiration: [thi]

Unreleased: [sit]Palatalization: [ty i]

Labiolization: [twuv ]

Dentalized: [t n ]Nasalized: [t ĩ n]

Syllabified: [btl]

Devoicing: [tri]Velarized: [w d]

Q1: Are nasals stops or continuants?

Key: They are stops.

Q2: Are [][] coronals?Key: Yes, they are. Interdentals are coronals.Q3: Are affricates + or -

continuants?Key: They - continuants.

Q4: Are velars coronals?Key: NO, they are NOT.Q5: Are liquids

+consonantal?Key: Yes, they are. Liquids are +consonantals.

Q6: Are glides + or - consonantals? Are glides + or – vocalic?Key: They – conso

nantals and -vocalics.

Q7: What is the difference between [t] and [s] in terms of manners of articulation?

Key: One is a stop; the other is a continuant.

Q8: Why are [s][z][][][t][d] a natural class?Key: Because they are

all sibilants.Q9: What English consonants are +conoral and +anterior?

Key: They are [t] [d] [s] [z] [n] [l] [r]; alveolar sounds.

Q10: What is the high front rounded vowel?

Key: It is [y].

Q11: All +back vowels in English are rounded?

Key: Wrong. The +low back vowel is –rounded.Q12: The vowel [] is +tense

and -back?Key: No, it is a lax vowel.

Q13: What is the rounded counterpart of [o]?Key: It is [].

Q14: What is the difference between [] and []?

Key: They are different in roundedness.Q15: Are [] and []

different sounds?Key: They are differnet. [] is a voiceless bilabial fricative; [] is a mid front tense rounded vowel .