21. Phonetics is the systematic study of speech sounds made by human beings to communicate.
It is directed toward the production of a phonology of a language.
A phonology is built to describe the spoken sounds according to standards established in the science of phonetics.
When we describe the sounds of a language, we may do so in three different ways, at three different levels of precision:
1) Articulatory phonetics: the way the sounds are produced,
2) Acoustic phonetics: the vibrations and other movements of the air that transmit language from speaker to hearer,
3) Auditory phonetics: the way the sounds are comprehended in the mind.
|
|
22. Phones
All three ways of studying the sounds of language are scientific in their methodologies and involve the use of laboratory instruments and experimentation.
Articulatory phonetics attempts to describe the sounds at the lowest level.
In this study scientists try to establish the lowest common distinction made by any and all languages in the world.
They call these sounds phones.
The results of the work of phoneticians are used in teaching foreign languages and in teaching the deaf and others with speech handicaps.
There is also much recent work in computerized speech recognition and synthesis with the development of devices for automatically converting language in its written form to an understandable spoken form.
|
|
23. Phonemes
The grammar of a language makes use of a certain small set of all the phones that it is phyisically possible to produce.
The articulatory phonetician assigns special symbols to each sound any sequence of which is indicated by placing them between square brackets.
The speaker of that language hears phones from sub-groups of this set as variants of the same sound.
It is the work of auditory phoneticians to establish these sub-groups and assigns symbols to each, any sequence of which is indicated by placing them between forward slashes.
They are the phonemes of the language.
|
|
24. Organs of Speech
When we produce speech it is by using some of our speech organs to interfere with the movement of air as it passes out of the lungs through the mouth and nose.
The different languages of the world make different uses of these organs to a greater or lesser extent.
Phoneticians characterize sounds by where the interference occurs.
|
25.
The first point of obstruction is at the top of the windpipe or trachea where the voicebox or larynx is situated.
Stretched across the voicebox are the two vocal cords — bands of tissue attached at the front but moveable at the back.
When relaxed there is a gap (glottis) between the cords, but as they move together the air passing by sets up a vibration in them.
By far the most important of the speech organs are the vocal cords.
When the vocal cords come together the air may be stopped completely so as to produce the sound of a glottal stop.
This is the sound we make in English in the middle of the utterance “uh-uh” made to make a denial, or at end of the utterance “yep,” the short expression of assent.
When we make the sound of “p” the cords are fully apart, and usually only partly separated when making the “h” sound.
They are close together and vibrating to produce voiced sounds, such as “b” and “m” and the vowel sounds.
It is possible to detect these vibrations more distinctly when we feel our Adam’s apple or cover our ears with our hands.
|
|
26.
At the other end of the vocal tract the articulators of the speech sounds are the lips and teeth.
If we put the lips together, we may produce bilabial sounds, e.g., a “p” sound.
But if we make the bottom lip touch the upper teeth, we produce a labiodental sound, e.g., an “f” sound.
Some of the vowel sounds are made by rounding the lips as in “oo,” spreading them as in “ee” or simply letting them fall apart as in “ah.”
|
|
27.
Another important articulator is the tongue as one of its parts comes close to or touches the teeth and/or the hard roof of the mouth or palate.
In English we produce the dental sounds by touching the tongue to the top front teeth.
Just behind the teeth is the alveolar ridge.
Here is where we make the “s” sound with the blade of the tongue.
The “sh” sound is formed just behind the ridge in the postalveolar area of the palate.
Behind the palate lies the soft palate or velum, which when the back of the tongue touches it, can make a “k” sound.
If the velum is lowered so as to allow air to pass through the nose, a nasal sound is made, like “m.”
The resonance that is produced with a nasal sound differs when the tongue is raised to its various positions.
|
|
28.
There are three ways in which consonants differ from vowels in English.
The first way is in articulatory and acoustic terms, i.e., phonetically.
Consonants obstruct the flow of air whereas the vowels allow the vibrations to flow more freely.
The second way is in auditory terms.
The English vowel phoneme forms the nucleus of a syllable whereas a consonant phoneme forms the on-set or tail (coda) of the syllable.
The consonant requires the sounding of a vowel with it in order to form a syllable.
The on-set and the coda may consist of phonemic clusters consisting of multiple consonants.
Sometimes what is a consonant phone serves as a single syllable and is auditorily (phonemically) a vowel + consonant.
For example, the “l” in “metal” or the “n” in “kitten” is acoustically a voiced consonant phone attached to the “t,” but is perceived as though a neutral vowel “e” phoneme appears before (or after) the consonant.
|
|
29. Morpho-phonemics
A third level of distinction between vowels and consonants is found in the morphology of English — its morpho-phonemics.
Consider the pronunciation of the words an and the, for example.
There are two pronunciations (sandhi) depending on whether the next word begins with a vowel or a consonant.
The nasal consonant of “an” is dropped off before a consonant and the vowel of “the” is formed higher in the front of the mouth before a vowel.
|
