Phonetics Flashcards
For Quiz 1
Acoustic Signal
sound wave traveling through the air
Speech Comprehension
- perception
- listener has to decode continuous acoustic signal as a sequence of discrete consonants and vowels
- sequence of sounds needs to be further associated with the meaning, activating an internal mental representation for the object
Phonetics
-how speech sounds (phones) are produced by speakers (articulatory phonetics), realized acoustically (acoustic phonetics), and perceived by listeners (auditory phonetics)
International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)
one-to-one correspondence between a sound (segment or phone) and a symbol
-[ ]: phonetic transcription
Segment
[u]
individual speech sound
Vocal organs
- lungs: the source of air;
- larynx (and vocal folds): the sound source
- vocal tract: filtering
Glottal States
- configurations of the vocal folds
- voiceless/voiced
- murmur/breathy voiced: vocal folds loosely+slowly vibrating; glottis not fully closed;
- whisper: front portions of folds are pulled close together
Voiced/Voiceless
Voiceless: vocal folds widely pulled apart
Voiced: folds pulled close together and open repeatedly (vibration) regularly due to air passing between the folds
Vocal Tract
- air passages above the vocal folds
- the pharynx, oral cavity, nasal cavity
- Modifications of airflow creates different sounds.
Articulators
- parts of the vocal tract, can be used to form speech sounds.
- lower articulator articulates against an upper articulator.
Upper/Passive articulators
- The upper lip, teeth, surface of the mouth:
- alveolar ridge
- hard palate
- soft palate/velum
- uvula
- pharyngeal wall
Alveolar Ridge
-small protuberance just behind the upper teeth
Hard Palate
-bony structure of the front part of the roof of the mouth
Soft Palate/Velum
-muscular flap at the back of the mouth
Uvula
-small appendage hanging down at the lower end of the velum
Lower/Active articulators
- The lower lip, the lower teeth, the tongue
- Nasal cavity: velum is lowered adding nasal resonances to the speech
Tongue
large muscular organ: the tip, blade, body, back (dorsum), root
Consonants
- made with major obstruction in the vocal tract
- less sonorous
- can be syllabic
Vowels + Glides
- made with relatively little obstruction
- more sonorous, air is moving more freely
- vowels form nucleus of syllable
Consonant Articulation
1) voicing (glottal state),
2) place of articulation
3) manner of articulation
Place of articulation
- where in the vocal tract + what articulators make the constriction
- labial, dental, alveolar, alveopalatal/palatal, velar, labio-velar, uvular, pharyngeal, glottal
labial: bilabial/labiodental
- 2 lips together/lips to teeth
- pie, by, my, five, vibe
Dental/Interdental
- tongue to teeth/between
- thigh, that
Alveolar
- tongue right behind teeth
- die, tie, sigh, lie, rye
Alveopalatal/Palatal
- front tongue raised
- shy, child, jive
- palatal: yikes
Velar
- bunched up and back
- kite, guy
Labio-Velar
- round lips and tongue raised to velum
- wide, why
Glottal
- produced in the larynx
- howl
Manner of articulation
- way the constriction is made or its degree
- Oral, nasal, stops, fricatives, affricates, liquids, glides
Stridents/Sibilants
-sounds that produce, hissing/hushing
Continuants
-fricatives, vowels, glides
Syllabic Liquids/Nasals
-can function as syllabic nuclei
Oral vs. Nasal
- velum raised (closed) or lowered (open)
- oral: bye, sigh, lie
- nasal: my, nigh
Stops
- complete closure, no air passing through vocal tract
- pie, bye, tie, die, kite, guy
- At the end of the word, stops in English are usually unreleased.
- [p
Fricatives
- constriction narrow enough to cause friction
- five, vibe, beige
Affricates
- complete closure with a fricative release
- chime, jibe
Nasals
-complete closure in the oral cavity, lowered velum and air passing through the nasal cavity
Liquids
- relatively little obstruction
- laterals: lie
- rhotics: retroflex + flap, rye, atom
Glides
-rapidly articulated, vowel-like sounds
Flap
atom: the tongue hits the alveolar ridge in a ballistic motion; the closure cannot be maintained long.
- voiced, unlike the voiceless [t]
Aspiration
- delay of voicing after voiceless stops
- vocal folds start to vibrate some time after the oral closure has been released
- ‘puff’ of air after p, t, k in English
- pill, tall, cool
- [h] subscript
- After [s], English voiceless stops are unaspirated
Description of consonants – three parameters
(1) laryngeal settings (voiceless or voiced),
(2) place of articulation,
(3) manner of articulation
Vowels
- relatively little obstruction in the vocal tract
- sonorous (high acoustic intensity)
- always function as nucleus of syllable
- described in terms of height, backness, rounding, tenseness
Height
- relative raising or lowering of the tongue
- high, mid, or low, (pit – pet – pat)
Backness
- relative fronting or backing of the tongue
- front, central, or back (pit – put, pat – pot, bet)
Lip Rounding
- rounded or unrounded
- only high and mid back vowels rounded in English -(boot – beat)
Tenseness
- greater/lesser vocal tract constriction
- tense or lax (beat – bit, boot – put)
Simple vowels
- show no noticeable change in quality over time
- bit, bet, bat, but, bought
Diphthongs
- consist of a sequence of a simple vowel and a glide
- bait, bite, boat, boy
- diphthongs are considered to be single units, one segment
Lax Vowels
- Lax vowels (except the schwa, [ǝ]) never occur at the end of a word
- are always followed by consonants
- [bɪd], [bɛd], [bæd], but *[bɪ], *[bɛ], *[bæ], etc.
Tense Vowels
- can freely occur at the end of a word and before consonants
- [bid], [bejd], [bud], [bi], [bej], [bu], etc.
Mid central vowels
- Schwa, [ǝ], is a mid, central, unrounded vowel that occurs in unstressed syllables and before
- When unstressed, schwa is reduced (short in duration and less loud).
- Caret, [ʌ], is also a mid, central, unrounded vowel occurring in stressed syllables. The two vowels sound very similar.
Suprasegmentals (Prosody)
- properties of speech that do not relate to specific vocal folds adjustments or place/manner of articulation
- Pitch, Loudness. Length
Pitch
- perception of relative frequency of vocal fold vibration.
- controlled by the tension of the vocal folds and amount of air going through the glottis.
- pitch movements are used in differentiating:
- Word meanings; ‘tone’.
- Sentence meanings; ‘intonation’.
Tone
- lexical items can be distinguished solely on the basis of their pitch
- Types of tones
- Flat pitch in a syllable: register tone
- Moving pitch in a syllable: contour tone
- can express a grammatical function
Intonation
- refers to pitch movements over utterances.
- concerned with general meaning of the utterance
Length
- distinguish between short or long consonants or vowels.
- length is said to be contrastive
Stress
- refers to auditory prominence of some syllables compared to others
- can be realized in various ways
- English: stressed syllables are higher in pitch, louder, and longer
Coarticulation
- sequence of movements of articulators that overlap in time.
- Articulation of one sound inevitably influences that of another
Assimilation
- One segment becomes more like another, taking on some or all phonetic properties of that segment
- Regressive assimilation: following segment affects the preceding segment, right-to-left.
- Progressive assimilation: preceding segment affects the following segment, left-to-right.
Dissimilation
- Two sounds become less alike in terms of articulation or acoustics. It is less common than assimilation
- fifths [fɪfθs]-[fɪfts]
Epenthesis/insertion
- segment get inserted next to other segments
- [pɹɪns], [woɹmθ], [tɛnθ]-[pɹɪnts], [woɹmpθ], [tɛntθ]
Deletion
- segment gets deleted next to other segments
- [səpówz] [pətéjɾow][spowz] [ptéjɾow]
Metathesis
- Two segments get re-arranged
- [pɹɪskɹájb] [pɹɪskɹɪṕ ʃn̩]-[pəɹskɹájb][pəɹskɹɪṕ]
Vowel reduction
- vowel becomes shorter, less loud, and less peripheral (more central)
- Canada [khǽnədə], Canadian [kənéjdiən]
