Classification of English Speech Sounds

Classification: vowel : a speech sound in which the air stream from the lung meets with no obstruction.
1 Classification of English consonants:
1 Manner of articulation: The manner in which obstruction is created.
Stops: [p], [b], [t], [d], [k], [g].
Fricatives: [f], [v], [s], [z], [θ], [餧, [∫] [3], [h].
Affricates: [t∫],[d3]
Liquids: [l],
Nasals:[m] ­, [n], [η]
Glides: [w], [j].------semi-vowels
2 place of articulation : The place where obstruction is created.
Bilabial: [p], [b], [m]­, [w].
Labiodental: [f], [v]
Dental: [θ], [餧
Alveolar: [t], [d], [s], [z], [n], [l],
Palatal: [∫] [3], [t∫],[d3], [j].
Velar: [k], [g], [η]
Glottal: [h].
Manner of articulation, place of articulation and voicing/ voiceless help describe a consonant.
2 Classification of English Vowels.
1 the position of the tongue:
front: [i:], [i], [e], [ε], [æ], [a]
central: [з:], [з], [/\]
back: [u:], [u], [o], [o:], [a:]
2 the openness of the mouth.
Close vowels: [i:], [i], [u:], [u],
Semi-close: [e], [з:]
Semi-open: [з], [o:]
Open vowels: [æ], [a], [/\],[o], [a:]
3 shape of the lips:
unrounded: [i:], [i], [e], [ε], [æ], [a], [з:], [з], [/\],[a:]
rounded: [u:], [u], [o], [o:].
4 length of the sound:
long vowels: [i:], [з:], [u:], [o:], [a:]
short vowels: [i], [e], [ε], [æ], [a], [з], [/\],[u], [o].
5 monophthong : the individual vowel.-----above vowels are all monophthongs.
diphthong : The vowel which consists of two individual vowels, and functions as a single one.
[ei], [ai], [oi], [iз], [au], [зu], [eз], [uз]----eight diphthongs.

Phonology

1. Phonology and Phonetics
phonetics : The study of phonic medium of language and it is concerned with all sounds in the world’s languages.
phonology : The description of sound systems of particular languages and how sounds function to distinguish meaning.
Similarity: all concerned with the same aspect of language----the speech sounds.
Differences: approach and focus.
1 Phonetics is of a general nature; it is interested in all the speech sounds used in all human languages-----how they are produced, how they differ from each other, what phonetic features they possess, how they can be classified.
2 Phonology aims to discover how speech sounds in a language from patterns and how these sounds are used to convey meaning in linguistic communication.
2. Phone, Phoneme, and Allophone
phone : The speech sound we use when speaking a language, which does not necessarily distinguish meaning in the English language.
phoneme : The smallest unit of sound in a language which can distinguish two sounds.
allophone : any different forms of the same phoneme in different phonetic environments, e.g. clear [l] and dark [l] of the same [l], aspirated [p] and unaspirated [p] of the same [p] in different phonetic environments.
3. Phonemic contrast, complementary distribution, and minimal pair
phonemic contrast : two similar sounds occur in the same environment and distinguish meaning. E.g. [b] in [bit] and [p] in [pit] form phonemic contrast.
complementary distribution : allophones of the same phoneme and they don’t distinguish meaning but complement each other in distribution. E.g. clear [l] and dark [l] respectively in the pronunciation of light and feel.
minimal pair: two different forms are identical in every way except one sound and occurs in the same position. The two sounds are said to form a minimal pair. E.g. bat and bet are a minimal pair.

4. Some Rules in Phonology

1 sequential rules: The rules to govern the combination of sounds in a particular language.
2 assimilation rule: The rule assimilates one sound to another by copying a feature of a sequential phoneme, thus making the two phones similar.
3 deletion rule: The rule that a sound is to be deleted although it is orthographically represented.

5. Suprasegmental Features----stress, tone, intonation
suprasegmental features: The phonemic features that occur above the level of the segments----syllable, word, sentence are called suprasegmental features, which include stress, tone and intonation.
1 Stress:
Classification: word stress & sentence stress.
Word Stress:
1 The location of stress in English distinguishes meaning.
A shift of stress may change the part of speech of a word from a noun to a verb although its spelling remains unchanged. E.g. ‘impott (n)----im’port (v), ‘record (n)-----re’cord (v)

‘blackbird (compound)-----‘black ‘bird (noncompound)

2 The meaning-distinctive role played by word stress is also manifested in the combinations of –ing forms and nouns. E.g. ’dining room(compound)----sleeping ’baby (noncompound)
Sentence Stress:
Sentence stress: It refers to the relative force given to the components of a sentence.
The parts of speech that are normally stressed in an English sentence are: N, V, Adj., Adv., Numerals, demonstrative pronouns. E.g. He is driving my car.------He drive, my, car.
2 Tone:
tone: Tones are pitch variations, which are caused by the differing rates of vibration of the vocal cords.
Tone (pitch variation) can distinguish meaning in such languages as Chinese, but English is not a tone language.
3 Intonation:
intonation: When pitch, stress and sound length are tied to the sentence rather than the word in isolation, they are collectively known as intonation.
Intonation plays a very important role in the conveyance of meaning in almost every language, especially in a language like English. ------four basic types of intonation, namely, the falling tone, the rising tone, the fall-rise tone, the rise-fall tone