ENG 211 - Ch 3

Question 1

Phonology

Answer 1

the study of how sounds are organized within a language and how they interact with each other

Question 2

phonetic inventories

Answer 2

the sounds that are produced as part of the language

Question 3

phonotactic constraints

Answer 3

restrictions on possible combinations of sounds; differences in the rules governing which sound sequences are possible in a language and which are not

Question 4

sound substitution

Answer 4

speakers use sounds of their native language to replace non-native sounds when pronouncing the words of a foreign language

Question 5

phoneme

Answer 5

a set of speech sounds that are perceived to be variants of the same sound

Question 6

allophone

Answer 6

each member of a particular phoneme set, which corresponds to an actual phonetic segment produced by a speaker

Question 7

phonetic environments

Answer 7

the sounds that come before and after it in a word

Question 8

contrastive distribution

Answer 8

a case in which two sounds occur in the same phonetic environment, and using one rather than the other changes the meaning of the word

Question 9

minimal pair

Answer 9

two words (with different meanings) whose pronunciations differ by exactly one sound

Question 10

free variation

Answer 10

sounds are noncontrastive and interchangeable in word-final position

Question 11

overlapping distribution

Answer 11

can occur in the same environment

Question 12

phonological rules

Answer 12

allows a speaker to “translate” phonemes into actual speech sounds; knowledge of these rules forms part of the speaker’s linguistic competence

Question 13

obstruents

Answer 13

produced with an obstruction of the airflow; sounds in this category include stops, fricatives, and affricates

Question 14

sonorants

Answer 14

segments produced with a relatively open passage for the airflow; include nasals, liquids, glides, and vowels

Question 15

Nasal Place Assimilation

Answer 15

an alveolar nasal assimilates to the place of articulation of a following consonant

Question 16

vowel harmony

Answer 16

a back vowel becomes front when preceded by a front vowel in the same word

Question 17

manner dissimilation

Answer 17

a stop becomes a fricative when followed by another stop

Question 18

insertion

Answer 18

phonological rules of insertion cause a segment not present at the phonemic level to be added to the phonetic form of a word

Question 19

voiceless stop insertion

Answer 19

between a nasal consonant and a voiceless fricative, a voiceless stop with the same place of articulation as the nasal is inserted

Question 20

deletion

Answer 20

eliminate a sound that was present at the phonemic level - such rules apply more frequently to unstressed syllables and in casual speech

Question 21

metathesis

Answer 21

rules of metathesis change the order of sounds

Question 22

strengthening

Answer 22

rules of strengthening make sounds stronger

Question 23

implicational law

Answer 23

presence of the less common sound implies that the more common sound will also be used int he language

Question 24

maximally distinct

Answer 24

consonants and vowels; consonants have very few qualities in common with the vowels, and vice versa

Question 25

restricted allophone

Answer 25

an allophone of a phoneme that appears in a mor elimited set of phonetic environments