Transcript 幻灯片 1 - Yibin U

Chapter Two
Speech Sounds
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As human beings we are capable of making
all kinds of sounds, but only some of these
sounds have become units in the language
system.
We can analyze speech sounds from various
perspectives and the two major areas of
study are phonetics and phonology.

Phonetics studies how speech sounds are
produced, transmitted, and perceived.
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Articulatory Phonetics is the study of the
production of speech sounds.
Acoustic Phonetics is the study of the
physical properties of speech sounds.
Perceptual or Auditory Phonetics is
concerned with the perception of speech
sounds.

Phonology is the study of the sound patterns
and sound systems of languages.
It aims to ‘discover the principles that govern the
way sounds are organized in languages, and to
explain the variations that occur’.
 In phonology we normally begin by analyzing an
individual language, say English, in order to
determine its phonological structure, i.e. which
sound units are used and how they are put together.
 Then we compare the properties of sound systems
in different languages in order to make hypotheses
about the rules that underlie the use of sounds in
them, and ultimately we aim to discover the rules
that underlie the sound patterns of all languages.
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1. How speech
sounds are
made
1.1 Speech organs
Position of the vocal folds:
voiceless
Position of the vocal folds: voicing
(initial & the widest aperture)
Position of the vocal folds:
glottal stop
1.2 The IPA
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In 1886, the Phonetic Teachers’ Association
was inaugurated by a small group of
language teachers in France who had found
the practice of phonetics useful in their
teaching and wished to popularize their
methods.

It was changed to its present title of the
International Phonetic Association (IPA) in 1897.
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One of the first activities of the
Association was to produce a journal in
which the contents were printed entirely
in phonetic transcription.
The idea of establishing a phonetic alphabet
was first proposed by the Danish
grammarian and phonetician Otto Jespersen
(1860-1943) in 1886, and
 the first version of the International
Phonetic Alphabet (the IPA chart) was
published in August 1888.
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Its main principles were that
there should be a separate letter for each
distinctive sound, and
 that the same symbol should be used for that
sound in any language in which it appears.
 The alphabet was to consist of as many Roman
alphabet letters as possible, using new letters
and diacritics only when absolutely necessary.
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These principles continue to be followed
today.
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The International
Phonetic Alphabet
(Revised to 2005)
2. Consonants and vowels
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Consonants are produced ‘by a closure in
the vocal tract, or by a narrowing which is so
marked that air cannot escape without
producing audible friction’.
By contrast, a vowel is produced without
such ‘stricture’ so that ‘air escapes in a
relatively unimpeded way through the
mouth or nose’.
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The distinction between vowels and
consonants lies in the obstruction of
airstream.
As there is no obstruction of air in the
production of vowels, the description of the
consonants and vowels cannot be done
along the same lines.
2.1 Consonants

In the production of consonants at least two
articulators are involved.
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For example, the initial sound in bad involves
both lips and its final segment involves the blade
(or the tip) of the tongue and the alveolar ridge.
The categories of consonant, therefore, are
established on the basis of several factors.

The manner of articulation refers to ways in
which articulation can be accomplished:
the articulators may close off the oral tract for
an instant or a relatively long period;
 they may narrow the space considerably; or
 they may simply modify the shape of the tract
by approaching each other.

• Stop (or Plosive)
– Oral & Nasal
•
•
•
•
•
•
Fricative
(Median) Approximant
Lateral (Approximant)
Trill
Tap or Flap
Affricate
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The place of articulation refers to the point
where a consonant is made.
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Practically consonants may be produced at any
place between the lips and the vocal folds.
Eleven places of articulation are
distinguished on the IPA chart:
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Bilabial
Labiodental
Dental
Alveolar
Postalveolar
Retroflex
Palatal
Velar
Uvular
Pharyngeal
Glottal
2.2 Vowels
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Cardinal Vowels, as exhibited by the vowel
diagram in the IPA chart, are a set of vowel
qualities arbitrarily defined, fixed and
unchanging, intended to provide a frame of
reference for the description of the actual
vowels of existing languages.
Jones: An Outline of English Phonetics (1918)
Black: IPA
Red: English
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The problematic area is that the initial
sound in hot gives little turbulence,
depending on how forcefully it is said, and
in yet and wet the initial segments are
obviously vowels.
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To get out of this problem, the usual solution is
to say that these segments are neither vowels
nor consonants but midway between the two
categories. For this purpose, the term ‘semivowel’ is often used.
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Languages also frequently make use of a
distinction between vowels where the quality
remains constant throughout the
articulation and those where there is an
audible change of quality.
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The former are known as pure or monophthong
vowels and the latter, vowel glides.
If a single movement of the tongue is
involved, the glides are called diphthongs.
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A double movement produces a triphthong,
which is ‘a glide from one vowel to another
and then to a third, all produced rapidly and
without interruption’.
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They are really diphthongs followed by the
schwa [ə], found in English words like wire
[waɪə] and tower [taʊə].
2.3 The sounds of English

Received Pronunciation (RP)
General American (GA)
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English consonants
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The consonants of English can be described
in the following manner:
[p] voiceless bilabial stop
 [b] voiced bilabial stop
 [s] voiceless alveolar fricative
 [z] voiced alveolar fricative
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English vowels
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The description of English vowels needs to
fulfill four basic requirements:
the height of tongue raising (high, mid, low);
 the position of the highest part of the tongue
(front, central, back);
 the length or tenseness of the vowel (tense vs.
lax or long vs. short), and
 lip-rounding (rounded vs. unrounded).
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We can now describe the English vowels in
this way:
[] high front tense unrounded vowel
 [] high back lax rounded vowel
 [] mid central lax unrounded vowel
 [] low back lax rounded vowel
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3. From phonetics to phonology
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Speech is a continuous process, so the vocal
organs do not move from one sound
segment to the next in a series of separate
steps. Rather, sounds continually show the
influence of their neighbors.
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For example, map, lamb.
3.1 Coarticulation
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When such simultaneous or overlapping
articulations are involved, we call the
process coarticulation.
If the sound becomes more like the following
sound, as in the case of lamb, it is known as
anticipatory coarticulation.
 If the sound shows the influence of the
preceding sound, it is perseverative
coarticulation, as is the case of map.
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The fact that the vowel [] in lamb has
some quality of the following nasal is a
phenomenon we call nasalization.
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To indicate that a vowel has been nasalized, we
add a diacritic to the top of the symbol [], as
[].
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[p] is aspirated in peak and unaspirated in
speak.
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This aspirated voiceless bilabial stop is thus
indicated by the diacritic h, as [ph], whereas the
unaspirated counterpart is transcribed as [p].
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When we use a simple set of symbols in our
transcription, it is called a broad
transcription.
The use of more specific symbols to show
more phonetic detail is referred to as a
narrow transcription.
Both are phonetic transcriptions so we put
both forms in square brackets [ ].
3.2 Phonemes
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Phonology is not specifically concerned with
the physical properties of the speech
production system.
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Phoneticians are concerned with how sounds
differ in the way they are pronounced while
phonologists are interested in the patterning of
such sounds and the rules that underlie such
variations.
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Crystal: ‘Phonological analysis relies on the
principle that certain sounds cause changes
in the meaning of a word or phrase, whereas
other sounds do not’.
Minimal pairs test
 Phonemes
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The word ‘phoneme’ simply refers to a ‘unit
of explicit sound contrast’: the existence of
a minimal pair automatically grants
phonemic status to the sounds responsible
for the contrasts.
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By selecting one type of sound instead of
another we can distinguish one word from
another.
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Languages differ in the selection of
contrastive sounds.
In English, the distinction between aspirated
[ph] and unaspirated [p] is not phonemic.
 In Chinese, however, the distinction between
/p/ and /ph/ is phonemic.
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By convention, phonemic transcriptions are
placed between slant lines (/ /) while
phonetic transcriptions are placed between
square brackets ([ ]).
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In phonetic terms, phonemic transcriptions
represent the ‘broad’ transcriptions.
3.3 Allophones
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[p, ph] are two different phones and are
variants of the phoneme /p/. Such variants
of a phoneme are called allophones of the
same phoneme.
In this case the allophones are said to be in
complementary distribution because they
never occur in the same context:
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[p] occurs after [s] while [ph] occurs in other
places.
/p/ 
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[p] / [s] _____
[ph] elsewhere
This phenomenon of variation in the
pronunciation of phonemes in different
positions is called allophony or allophonic
variation.
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Velarization: clear l and dark l
//  [] / _____ V
[] / V _____
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Think about tell and telling!
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Phonetic similarity: the allophones of a
phoneme must bear some phonetic
resemblance.
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Free variants and free variation
4. Phonological processes, phonological
rules and distinctive features
4.1 Assimilation
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Nasalization, dentalization, and velarization
are all instances of assimilation, a process
by which one sound takes on some or all the
characteristics of a neighboring sound.
If a following sound is influencing a preceding
sound, we call it regressive assimilation.
 The converse process, in which a preceding
sound is influencing a following sound, is
known as progressive assimilation.
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English Fricative Devoicing
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/v/  [f] /z/  [s] etc.
voiced fricative  voiceless / ____ voiceless
Nasalization rule:
[-nasal]  [+nasal] / ____ [+nasal]
Dentalization rule:
[-dental]  [dental] / ____ [dental]
Velarization rule:
[-velar]  [+velar] / ____ [+velar]
4.2 Epenthesis, rule ordering and
the Elsewhere Condition
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a hotel, a boy, a use, a wagon, a big man, a
yellow rug, a white house
an apple, an honor, an orange curtain, an old
lady
Epenthesis (Insertion) Rule:
Plurals in English
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a. The [] appears after voiceless sounds.
b. The [] appears after voiced sounds.
c. The [] appears after sibilants.
//  [] / [–voice, C] _____ (Devoicing)
  [] / [+sibilant] _____ [] (Epenthesis)
Rule ordering
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The Elsewhere Condition
The more specific rule applies first.
4.3 Distinctive features

The idea of Distinctive Features was first
developed by Roman Jacobson (1896-1982) in
the 1940s as a means of working out a set of
phonological contrasts or oppositions to
capture particular aspects of language
sounds.
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Since then several versions have been suggested.
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Some of the major distinctions include
[consonantal], [sonorant], [nasal] and [voiced].
The feature [consonantal] can distinguish between
consonants and vowels, so all consonants are
[+consonantal] and all vowels [–consonantal].
 [sonorant] distinguishes between what we call
obstruents (stops, fricatives and affricates) and
sonorants (all other consonants and vowels), with
obstruents being [–sonorant] and others
[+sonorant].
 [nasal] and [voiced] of course distinguish nasal
(including nasalized) sounds and voiced sounds
respectively.
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These are known as binary features because
we can group them into two categories: one
with this feature and the other without.
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Binary features have two values or specifications
denoted by ‘ + ’ and ‘ – ’ so voiced obstruents
are marked [+voiced] and voiceless obstruents
are marked [–voiced].
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The place features are not binary features –
they are divided up into four values:
[PLACE: Labial]
 [PLACE: Coronal]
 [PLACE: Dorsal]
 [PLACE: Radical]
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They are often written in shorthand forms as
[Labial]p
 [Coronal]p
 [Dorsal]p
 [Radical]p
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A useful feature for consonants not found
here is [±spread] (for ‘spread glottis’),
which distinguishes between ‘aspirated’ and
‘unaspirated’ voiceless obstruents.
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Aspirated sounds are [+spread] and unaspirated
sounds are [–spread].
Now we can represent the rule that governs
the unaspiration of /p/ after [s] in terms of
features:
-cont
-voice
 [–spread] / [s]_____
 [+spread] in other places

This is a more general rule, which also
applies to /t/ and /k/. It means that /p, t,
k/ ([–voiced, –cont]) are all unaspirated
([–spread]) after [s] and aspirated
([+spread]) in all other positions.
Past tense forms in English
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stopped, walked, coughed, kissed, leashed,
reached
stabbed, wagged, achieved, buzzed, soothed,
bridged
steamed, stunned, pulled
played, flowed, studied
wanted, located, decided, guided
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The regular past tense form in English is
pronounced as [t] when the word ends with
a voiceless consonant, [d] when it ends with
a voiced sound, and [ɪd] when it ends with [t]
or [d].
5. Suprasegmentals
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Suprasegmental features are those aspects
of speech that involve more than single
sound segments.
The principal suprasegmentals are:
5.1 The syllable structure
σ
Onset
Rime
Nucleus
k
r
æ
Coda
k
t
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Open syllable: bar, tie
Closed syllable: bard, tied
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English Syllable: (((C)C)C)V((((C)C)C)C)
Chinese syllable: (C)V(C)
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Maximal Onset Principle (MOP)
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When there is a choice as to where to place a
consonant, it is put into the onset rather than the
coda.
5.2 Stress

Stress refers to the degree of force used in
producing a syllable. In transcription, a
raised vertical line [│] is often used just
before the syllable it relates to.

A basic distinction is made between stressed
and unstressed syllables, the former being more
prominent than the latter, which means that
stress is a relative notion.
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At the word level, it only applies to words
with at least two syllables.
At the sentence level, a monosyllabic word
may be said to be stressed relative to other
words in the sentence.
Changing English Stress Pattern
Becoming norm
 inTEGral
 coMMUNal
 forMIDable
 conTROVersy
Considered conservative
 INtegral
 COMMunal
 FORmidable
 CONtroversy
RP vs. GA
RP
 laBORatory
 DEBris
 GARage
GA
 LABoratory
 deBRIS
 gaRAGE
V vs. N
Verb
 conVICT
 inSULT
 proDUCE
 reBEL
Noun
 CONvict
 INsult
 PROduce
 REbel
Compound vs. Phrase
Compound
Phrase

BLACKboard

black BOARD

BLACKbird

black BIRD
Primary vs. Secondary Stress
epiphenomenal
 unsatisfactory
 discrimination
 standardization
 communication
 industrialization
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Sentence Stress
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John bought a red car.
JOHN bought a red car.
John BOUGHT a red car.
John bought a RED car.
John bought a red CAR.
5.3 Intonation

Intonation involves the occurrence of
recurring fall-rise patterns, each of which is
used with a set of relatively consistent
meanings, either on single words or on
groups of words of varying length.

For example, the fall-rise tone in English
typically involves the meaning of a contrast
within a limited set of items stated explicitly or
implicitly.
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(Isn’t her name Mary?) No /  Jenny
The old man didn’t come / whereas the 
young man / did come and actually enjoyed
himself
 I didn’t do it
5.4 Tone
Putonghua [pa]
Chinese
Pinyin
character
Tone
symbol
Tone
number
Tone
description
Gloss
八
bā
55
High level
‘eight’
拔
bá
35
High rising
‘pull out’
‘target’
‘dam’
靶
bă
214
Low falling
rising
坝
bà
51
High falling