1. Introduction to Language Phonetics 1

2. Explore the relationship between sound and spelling Become familiar with International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA ) Understand the nature of consonants and vowels Learn where particular sounds occur (physical aspects of the human vocal tract) How sounds change when different sounds surround them Yule: Chapter 3, The Sounds of Language 2

3. SEAGH 3 CHEF? sure dead laugh Imagine a word spelled as But pronounced as How would one come to this spelling?

4. The sounds of spoken English often do not match up with the letters of written English. phonetic alphabet One solution to describe the sounds of a language is to produce a separate alphabet with symbols that represent sound  phonetic alphabet These symbols represent both the consonant and vowel sounds of language 4

5. Acoustic phonetics – the physical properties of speech as sound waves in the air (sound waves) Auditory phonetics – the study of the perception of speech sounds, via the ear (perception) Articulatory phonetics – the study of how speech sounds are made, or ‘articulated’ (production) 5

6. The English alphabet has 26 letters but there are over 40 different speech sounds: 5 vowel and 21 consonant letters of the alphabet About 20 vowel sounds and 24 consonant sounds (depending on dialect) 6

7. Same sound spelled using different letters: sea, see, scene, receive, thief, amoeba, machine Same letters can stand for different sounds: - sign, pleasure, resign - dough, through, rough, cough, fought, drought 7

8. Single sound spelled by a combination of letters: lock, that, book Single letter represents a combination of sounds: exit, use Sometimes letters stand for no sound at all: know, doubt, though 8

9. the conversion of spoken words into written words the process of matching the sounds of human speech to special written symbols using a set of exact rules, so that these sounds can be reproduced later. 9

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11. 11 All English words are made from combinations of consonants and vowels Every English segment can be uniquely described in three or four words [p] is the voiceless (bi-)labial (oral) stop [e] is the upper-mid front vowel [n] is the alveolar nasal (stop)

12. Inside the larynx are the vocal cords One position: voiceless Vocal cords are open, the air from the lungs passes between them unimpeded. e.g. /s/ Another position: voiced When the vocal cords are drawn together, the air from the lungs repeatedly pushes them apart as it passes through, creating a vibration effect. e.g. /z/ 12

13. Consonants are generally produced with greater constriction within the vocal tract. Description of consonants – Voicing: describes the state of the larynx – Place of Articulation: describes the location of the obstruction or constriction – Manner of Articulation: describes the type of constriction and the passage of airflow – e.g. /s/ voiceless alveolar fricative 13

14. Place  Bilabial  Labiodental  Dental  Alveolar  Palatals  Velar  Glottal (Yule pgs. 28-31) 14 Manner  Stop  Fricative  Affricate  Nasals  Liquids  Glides  Glottal stops and flaps (Yule pgs. 31-33)

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16. 16 English Consonants Yule, pg. 30

17. 17 Exercise: Hold your jaw lightly, now say he, who, and ha. Did your jaw move for ha? Vowels don’t have a consonant-like point of articulation or manner of articulation. The three standard descriptors for consonants (place, manner, voicing) aren’t helpful when we want to describe vowels.

18. 18 There are 4 main ways in which speakers can change the shape of the vocal tract and thus change vowel quality.  Raising of lowering the body of the tongue  Advancing or retracting the body of the tongue  Rounding or not rounding the lips  A tense or lax gesture of the tongue body Manner: all vowels are articulated in the same way, with the tongue raising or lowering to the target position All vowels (in English) are voiced

19. 19 seat setset satsat You will find that you open your mouth a little wider as you change from [i] to [ Ɛ ] to [æ] These varying degrees of openness correspond to different degrees of tongue height

20. 20 Made with the front of the mouth less open because the tongue body is raised, or high Produced with an intermediate tongue height Pronounced with the front of the mouth open and the tongue lowered.

21. 21 beat boot Beat: the body of the tongue is raised and pushed forward so it’s just under the hard palate. Boot: made by raising the body of the tongue in the back of the mouth, toward the velum

22. 22 Front: tongue is moved forward or advanced for all front monophthongs Back: tongue is retracted or pulled back for the back monophthongs

23. Vowel quality also depends on lip position [u] in two  lips are rounded [i] in tea  lips are unrounded 23

24. 24 Diphthongs: Complex vowel sounds because they are two-part vowel sounds, consisting of a transition from one vowel to the other in the same syllable Try saying eye very slowly. How do you make this vowel sound? 1.Your tongue starts out in the low back position for [α] 2.Then your tongue moves toward the front position for [I] Diphthongs of English

25. 25 Examples: buy bay bow oh Diphthongs of English

26. Do Study Questions Chapter 3; Read Chapter 4. 26

27. Yule, 2010 Fromkin, et. al., 2009 27

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