Transcript Phonetics: Topic 4 - Chris Taylor, PhD

Phonetics COMD
Taylor
The Consonants of English
BUT FIRST. . .
Describe the following:
• /b/
• voiced bilabial stop
• /p/
• voiceless bilabial stop
• /d/
• voiced alveolar stop
• /t/
• voiceless alveolar stop
• /k/
• voiceless velar stop
• /ŋ/
• (voiced) velar nasal (stop)
• /r/
• (voiced) alveolar (central) approximant
• /l/
• (voiced) alveolar lateral (approximant)
• /f/
• voiceless labiodental fricative
• /z/
• voiced alveolar fricative
• /ʃ/
• voiceless alveopalatal fricative
• /dʒ/
• voiced alveopalatal affricate
Give the IPA for the following:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
voiceless labiodental fricative
[f]
voiced alveolar fricative
[z]
voiced alveolar nasal
[n]
voiced velar nasal
[ŋ]
voiceless alveopalatal fricative
[ʃ]
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
voiced alveolar (central) approximant
[r]
voiced alveopalatal fricative
[ʒ]
voiceless alveopalatal affricate
[tʃ]
voiced velar stop/plosive
[g]
(voiceless) glottal stop
[ʔ]
What’s wrong with these?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
‘shut’ [shut]
[ʃʌt]
‘swift’ [swift]
[swɪft]
‘follow’ [falo]
[faloʊ]
‘frog’ [frog]
[frag]
What’s wrong with these?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
‘left’ [left]
[lɛft]
‘child’ [tʃild]
[tʃaɪld]
‘theme’ [ðim]
[θim]
‘voice’ [vois]
[vɔɪs]
‘rang’ [raŋ]
[reŋ]
‘health’ [helθ]
[hɛlθ]
Postvocalic Cs
• How can we tell whether final C is voiced?
• Often no final release
• Duration is often too short to tell whether
cords are vibrating during
• Length of preceding vowel is key
– bead vs beat, bid vs bit, fade vs fate, said vs set, sad vs sat, bug vs
buck, lewd vs loot, code vs coat, (hog vs hawk)
– Example
Homorganic Cs
• Two sounds with the same place of
articulation
– e.g., [d] and [n]
Nasal plosion
• Stop followed by a homorganic nasal
– ‘sudden’ [sʌdn̩]
– ‘kitten’ Q: [kɪtn] but not [kɪʔn]
• Occurs only if there is no glottal stop or if
the glottal stop is released after the
alveolar closure has been made and
before the velum is lowered
Lateral plosion
• Alveolar stop before the lateral [l]
– air pressure built up during the stop can be
released by lowering the sides of the tongue
‘middle’ [mɪdl̩]
Tap/flap
• In American English, the alveolar C
between Vs is not really a stop, but a quick
tap of the tongue blade against the
alveolar ridge
• Q: how can we tell what the speaker has
said?
– ‘latter’ vs ‘ladder’
Fricatives
• Partial obstruction of airflow
• Fricatives + Stops form a natural class
called ‘obstruents’
Post-vocalic
• +/- voice info carried on preceding vowel
– long vowel = voiced post-vocalic fricative
– short vowel = voiceless post-vocalic fricative
– Point: voicing info carried on the longest, most
salient segments
• Fortis (-voice) held longer than lenis
• Lenis (+voice) are not actually voiced
throughout
Fricatives: articulatory gestures
• Primary gestures: close approximation of
articulators
• Secondary: lip rounding (labialization), if
applicable, e.g., ‘same’ vs ‘shame’
– changes shape, length of the chamber,
creates room in front of the teeth–dramatic
acoustic effect
– ‘strong’: [stɹɔŋ] or [ʃtɹɔŋ]
• rounding due to anticipation of upcoming [ɹ]
Affricates
• More than just a stop + a homorganic
fricative
• Issue of timing between the stop and
succeeding vowel
– different kind of (gradual) release
Other (non-affricate) combos
• [ps] and [ks]: why aren’t they affricates?
– not homorganic
• [tθ] and [ts]
– cannot occur everywhere
• [tʃ] and [dʒ] are the only two that can occur
anywhere and are homorganic (very
close), so they get special phonological
status in English
Nasals
• Velar opening is key
– allows air into the nasal cavity
• Timing: N + V
– velum lowered
– occlusion
– vocal cord vibration
• Timing: V + N
–
–
–
–
[ãn] (Engl.) occlusion vs [ã] (French) no occlusion
voicing for vowel
velum lowered
occlusion
N + Fricative
• Move from occlusion to non-occlusion,
often causes insertion of stop in between
– [sʌm
̃ θɪŋ][sʌmpθɪŋ]
– [sɪn
̃ s][sɪn
̃ ts]
Final N can be syllabic
• Like [r, l]
• Marked with vertical line under the N
– [sʌdn̩]
• Syllabicity can be in phrase:
– ‘milk and cookies’ [mɪlkŋ̩kʊkiz]
The velar nasal
• Cannot occur word-initially
• Usually not syllabic
• Can only be preceded by [ɪ,ɛ,æ,ʌ,ɑ]
Approximants
• Glides, lateral and rhotic
– [j], [w], [l], [r]
• Vowel-like
–
–
–
–
no occlusion,
active articulator approaches passive articulator
approach changes the shape of the chamber
can occur in consonant clusters with stops
Rhotic [r]
• Hardest category to define
• Number of different types of sounds are
included
Lateral [l]
• [l] and [r]
– can be curled or bunched
– light or dark
• light: pre-vocalic: ‘light’, ‘right’
• dark: post-vocalic: ‘pull’ ‘for’
– no contact with alveolar ridge
– patterns like a diphthong: ‘feel’–velarized
– voiceless when they follow a voiceless stop
• ‘clear’ and ‘creep’ [kl̥iɚ] and [kɹ̥i:p]
Glides: [j] and [w]
• [j]: place of articulation?
– hard palate: voiced palatal glide
• [w]: place of articulation?
– lips and velum: voiced labio-velar glide
• Shortened versions of vowels
– [j] corresponds to [i]
– [w] corresponds to [u]
Voiceless glottal fricative: [h]
• Open vocal tract
• Set up for the vowel that follows
– compare ‘has’ ‘hut’ and ‘heat’
• Has the same status in all languages
– Should it be categorized as a glide?
• No, because it’s voiceless (can’t be a semi-V)
– L: voiceless counterpart of surrounding sounds
• Turbulence comes from entire vocal tract, with
most turbulence coming from point of articulation
of following vowel
More on [h]
• Usually occurs at the beginning of words in English
– seldom between Vs within a word (mostly with prefixed
words)
– never at the end of words
– never in clusters
• If [h] occurs between vowels in an utterance, articulatory
movement is continuous
– [h] is realized as a weakening (not necessarily complete
devoicing): ‘the head’ vs ‘at home’
• Some dialects distinguish between ‘witch’ [wɪtʃ] and
‘which’ [hwɪtʃ], but that distinction appears to be
disappearing
Overlapping gestures
• Anticipatory coarticulation
– stops are slightly rounded when they occur in
clusters with [w] and [ɹ]
• ‘kick’ ‘quick’; ‘tea’ ‘tree’
• [s] can become [ʃ] when followed by [tɹ]: why?
• Movement towards a target
– series of movements towards targets
• Certain aspects of active articulator
movement or placement are crucial
(‘specified’)
Allophones and articulatory gestures
• No simple relationship between a
languages phonemes and description of
articulatory gestures
• Allophones arise from coarticulation
effects
– can result in completely different places or
manners of articulation
– almost all neighboring sounds overlap