|
owner
 "Linguistics web-based assignment " tagboard Credits
| What Is Phonology???
What is Phonology?
Definitions
•5th Ed- George Yule
•Description of the systems and patterns of speech sounds in a language.
•Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries
•The system of contrastive relationships among the speech
sounds that constitute the fundamental components of a language.
•Longman Dictionaries
•The study of pattern of speech sounds used in particular language.
Phonology
is the description of the
system
and patterns of speech sounds in a language.Phonology is concerned with the
abstract and mental aspect
of the sounds in
language rather than the actual physical articulation of speech sounds.The blueprint of
the sound type: as the basis of all the variations in physical articulations.
· Branch of
linguistics which studies the sounds system of languages.
· The sound system
involves the actual pronounciation of words, that can be broken up into smaller
units of pronounciation( phonemes ).
[t] : tar, star , writer , eighth
In
phonology: they would be represented in the same way (abstract).
In
actual speech: these [t] sounds are all different.
[t],
[k], [f], [b]
The
above sounds are meaningful distinct sounds regardless of how you produce them.
tar,
car, far, bar : meaningfully distinct
Phonology
is concerned with the abstract set of sounds which allows us to distinguish
meaning in the actual physical sounds we say or hear.
Phonemes
The
smallest unit of speech that can be used to make one word different from
another word.
• Each of the meaning
distinguishing sounds
• /t/: slash mark-to indicate
a phoneme
• [t]:square brackets-to
indicate phonetic physically produced segments
v e.g : the sound represent
by /p/, /c/ and /f/
/p/ : ‘pat’
/c/ : ‘chat’
/f/ : ‘fat’
Natural
Class - set of sounds that have
certain phonetic features in common.
Phones and Allophones
Phoneme: abstract unit or sound
type(in the mind)
Phones: different versions of that
sound-type regularly produced in actual speech.
A
set of phones: all of which are versions of ONE phoneme, refer to them as Allophones.
tar [t] :aspiration
(puff of air)
star [t] : no aspiration
eighth [t] :dental
articulation
From a set of phones,
referred to as allophones of the phoneme /t/.
Minimal pairs and sets
Phonemic
distinction can be tested via pairs and sets of words.
pat
and bat
: minimal pairs-identical in the form except for a contrast in one phoneme, at
the same position.
Change
in one phoneme, changes the meaning.
v fan-van, bet-bat,
site-side
Minimal pairs – two words
that differ only one sound.
v
e.g :
fan-van , bet-bat , site-side
Minimal
sets – when a group of words can be differentiated each one from the others by
changing one phoneme.
Phonotactics
There are indeed definite patterns to the types of
sound combinations permitted in a language.The previous minimal set does not
include forms such as lig or vig, are they possible English
words?
· Acceptable if, at some
future time, came into use.
· ‘accidental’ gaps in the
vocabulary of English
· However, no accidental gaps such as [fsIg] or
[rnIg]
Syllables and clusters
A syllable must contain a
vowel or a vowel like sound.The basic elements of the syllable are the onset (one or
more consonants) and the rime/rhyme.
Rime/rhyme consists of a nucleus
(the vowel) and coda (the following consonants) Both onset and coda can consist of more than one consonant, known
as consonant clusters.
 
st : a consonant cluster (CC), as onset in the word ‘stop’ and as coda in the word ‘post’
CC onset combinations in English: black, bread, trick, twin, flat, throw with approximants (/w/,
/r/, /l/) frequently appearing in second position.
Larger onset clusters, as in stress
and splat consisting of three consonants (CCC).
Phonotactics of CCC consonant clusters:
– First consonant: must always be /s/
– Followed by: voiceless
stops
– ( /p/,/t/,/k/)
– Then by: approximants ( /r/,/l/,/w/)
Splash, spring,
strong, scream,
CO-ARTICULATION EFFECTS
SPEECH: our talk is fast and spontaneous, and it requires our
articulators to move from one sound to the next without stopping. The process
of making one sound almost at the same time as the next is called
‘co-articulation’.
 
Both assimilation and elision occur in everyone speech
and should not be treated as a form of sloppiness or laziness in speaking.
If we avoid them
(assimilation and elision): artificial-sounding talk.
Phonetic vs Phonology
¢ Phonology
( about patterns of sounds,
especially different patterns of sounds in different languages, or within each
language, different patterns of sounds in different positions in words.)
¢ Phonetics
( deals with the
production of speech sounds by humans, often without prior knowledge of the
language being spoken.)
Quizzes
1) what is Assimiliation?
2) what is the difference between an open syllable
& closed syllable.
3) Beat /bi:t/ and meet /mi:t/ are minimal pairs in English? True or False? Why?
4) If you exchange one sound for
another in a word and the meaning does NOT change, then the two sounds are Allophones of the same phoneme. True or False?
5) which segments in the pronunciation of the
following words are most likely to be affected by elision?
- government
- postman
- pumpkin
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
0 Comments:
Post a Comment