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.