CH. 3 Phonology Key Vocabulary

Question 1

Spectrogram

Answer 1

a visual representation of a sound’s frequency, amplitude, and time, which can be used to analyze the acoustic properties of speech

Question 2

Sound Waves

Answer 2

vibrations that transmit sound through matter, such as air or water

Question 3

Hearing Impression

Answer 3

how people form social impressions of speakers based on the sound of their voice, or how people use linguistic strategies to manage impressions

Question 4

Speech Sounds

Answer 4

the individual sounds that make up words in a language

Question 5

Phoneme

Answer 5

the smallest unit of sound in a language that helps distinguish one word from another

Question 6

Phone

Answer 6

a distinct speech sound or gesture that is analyzed as a unit of phonetics

Question 7

Larynx

Answer 7

a vital organ in the human body that plays a key role in speech production

Question 8

Allophones of the phoneme

Answer 8

different sounds that are variants of a phoneme, or a category of sounds that are pronounced similarly

Question 9

Narrow Transcription

Answer 9

a method of transcribing speech that records many phonetic details, including subtle distinctions between sounds

Question 10

Orthography

Answer 10

the system of writing a language, or how a language is visually represented

Question 11

Distribution

Answer 11

the range of contexts in which a linguistic unit, such as a word or phoneme, appears

Question 12

Complementary Distribution

Answer 12

describes the relationship between two elements of the same kind that are found in different environments

Question 13

Syntactic

Answer 13

the branch of linguistics that studies the structure of sentences, focusing on how words are combined to form phrases and clauses

Question 14

Morphological

Answer 14

the study of the internal structure of words and how their parts combine to change their meaning

Question 15

Minimal pairs

Answer 15

words that differ by only one sound, or phoneme, and have different meanings

Question 16

Air pressure

Answer 16

provides the energy for vocal folds to vibrate and creates acoustic signals that we perceive as sound

Question 17

Unreleased

Answer 17

a stop consonant that doesn’t have an audible release burst

Question 18

Free Variation

Answer 18

when two or more sounds or forms appear in the same environment without changing the meaning of a word or being considered incorrect

Question 19

Phonemic analysis

Answer 19

a method of analyzing a spoken language to identify its phonemes, allophones, and their distribution

Question 20

Word-final position

Answer 20

An unstressed syllable in prosodic word-final position is arguably prosodically weaker than an unstressed syllable anywhere else in the prosodic word

Question 21

Final devoicing

Answer 21

a phonological process that happens when a voiced consonant at the end of a syllable is replaced by a voiceless consonant

Question 22

Velarised

Answer 22

a secondary articulation of consonants that occurs when the tongue is raised toward the soft palate, or velum, during pronunciation

Question 23

Aspirated

Answer 23

a phonological process that involves a puff of air being released when a consonant is pronounced

Question 24

Flapping

Answer 24

a phonological process where the /t/ or /d/ sounds are pronounced as a quick, soft sound between two vowels

Question 25

Non-rhotic

Answer 25

an accent or dialect in which the /r/ sound is not pronounced in certain situations:
After a vowel and before a consonant: For example, “start” is pronounced as “/stɑːt/