Grammatical Aspects of Language

Phonetics: The Sounds of Language

Phonetics

• Phonetics is the study of speech sounds.

Phonetics

• Phoneme: a single sound in speech– the smallest unit of speech

• Bus is made up of three phonemes:– B + UH + S– You can divide this word into phonemes

because you know the language• A cough, clearing your throat, etc. is

not a phoneme because it isn’t combined with other phonemes to make a morpheme

Phonemes

• Not all languages have the same phonemes– Tsk is a phoneme in Zulu (a language

that includes clicking sounds), but not in English

– The ch sound in Chanukah spoken by a Hebrew speaker (or Dutch, German, etc.) is not a phoneme in English.

– Most speakers of American English don’t roll their rs, but many other languages do.

– The th sound in the is a phoneme in English, but not in French

The Alphabet

• Our alphabet doesn’t consistently reflect how letters are pronounced.– Did he believe that Caesar could see

the people seize the seas?– My father wanted many a village dame

badly.– resign, autumn, ghost, pterodactyl,

write, knot– The vs. bath (voiced / unvoiced) – Cute, side (diphthongs: one or two

letters)

The Alphabet

• George Bernard Shaw liked to spell fish as ghoti:– gh as in tough– o as in women– ti as in nation

The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)

• Symbols that represent fundamental sounds in all languages

There are many more symbols for words in different languages. This is just a basic list.

Places of articulation

Places of articulation—consonants

• Bilabials: sounds made by bringing both lips together – ball, mall, pal

• Labiodentals: bottom lip to upper teeth– ferry, very

• Interdentals: tip of tongue between teeth think, these

Places of articulation—consonants

• Alveolars: some part of the tongue raised behind teeth – tip, dip, near, sear, zeal, lean, reef– Alveolar ridge: right behind the teeth– Can be tip, sides, or back of tongue

• Palatials: front part of tongue to hard palate– Hard palate: main part of the roof of the

mouth, behind the alveolar ridge.– Tongue is raised but may or may not

touch– Mission, measure, cheap, judge, yoyo

Places of articulation—consonants

• Velars: back of tongue to back of the mouth– Soft palate / velar = back of the mouth– Kick, gig, back, bag, bang

• Glottals– Air flows through open vocal chords

(glottis)– High, here– Glottal stop: stopping the flow of air with

the vocal chords: • Uh-oh, button

Voiced and voiceless consonants

• Tip vs. dip• Teeth vs. there• Rope vs. robe• Rack vs. rag• Breathe vs. breath• Fine vs. vine