The Consonants of English Phonetics COMD Taylor The Consonants of English

BUT FIRST. . .

Describe the following: 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 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 Timing: N + V Timing: V + N 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

N + Fricative Move from occlusion to non-occlusion, often causes insertion of stop in between [sʌ̃mθɪŋ][sʌmpθɪŋ] [sɪ̃ns][sɪ̃nts]

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 Vowel-like [j], [w], [l], [r] 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