Phonetics Flashcards
phonetics
The study of linguistic speech sounds, how they are produced (articulatory phonetics), how they are perceived (auditory or perceptual phonetics), and their physical aspects (acoustic phonetics).
segment
(1) An individual sound that occurs in a language; (2) the act of dividing utterances into sounds, morphemes, words, and phrases.
acoustic phonetics
The study of the physical characteristics of speech sounds.
auditory phonetics
The study of the perception of speech sounds.
articulatory phonetics
The study of how the vocal tract produces speech sounds; the physiological characteristics of speech sounds.
orthography
The written form of a language; spelling.
phonetic alphabet
Alphabetic symbols used to represent the phonetic segments of speech in which there is a one-to-one relationship between each symbol and each speech sound.
glottis
The vocal cords themselves and/or the opening between the vocal cords.
larynx
The structure of muscles and cartilage in the throat that contains the vocal cords and glottis; often called the “voice box.”
pharynx
The tube or cavity in the vocal tract above the glottis through which the air passes during speech production.
nasal cavity
The passageways between the throat and the nose through which air passes during speech if the velum is open (lowered). See oral cavity.
oral sound
A non-nasal speech sound produced by raising the velum to close the nasal passage so that air can escape only through the mouth. See nasal sound.
oral cavity
The mouth area through which air passes during the production of speech. See nasal cavity.
vocal tract
The oral and nasal cavities, together with the vocal cords, glottis, and pharynx, all of which may be involved in the production of speech sounds.
place of articulation
The part of the vocal tract at which constriction occurs during the production of consonants. See manner of articulation.
bilabials
A sound articulated by bringing both lips together.
labiodentals
A sound produced by touching the bottom lip to the upper teeth, e.g., [v].
interdentals
A sound produced by inserting the tip of the tongue between the upper and lower teeth, e.g., the initial sounds of thought and those.
alveolars
A sound produced by raising the tongue to the alveolar ridge, e.g., [s], [t], [n].
alveolar ridge
The part of the hard palate directly behind the upper front teeth.
palatals
A sound produced by raising the front part of the tongue to the palate.
velars
A sound produced by raising the back of the tongue to the soft palate, or velum
uvulars
A sound produced by raising the back of the tongue to the uvula.
glottal/ glottal stop
A speech sound produced with constriction at the glottis; when the air is stopped completely at the glottis by tightly closed vocal cords, a glottal stop is produced.
velum
The soft palate; the part of the roof of the mouth behind the hard palate.
lateral
A sound produced with air flowing past one or both sides of the tongue, e.g., [l].
manner of articulation
The way the air stream is obstructed as it travels through the vocal tract. Stop, nasal, affricate, and fricative are some manners of articulation. See place of articulation.
voiceless
A speech sound produced with open, non-vibrating vocal cords.
voiced
A speech sound produced with vibrating vocal cords.
aspirated
Describes a voiceless stop produced with a puff of air that results when the vocal cords remain open for a brief period after the release of the stop, e.g., the [pʰ] in pit. See unaspirated.
unaspirated
Phonetically voiceless stops in which the vocal cords begin vibrating immediately upon release of the closure, e.g., [p] in spot. See aspirated.
nasal sounds
Speech sound produced with an open nasal passage (lowered velum), permitting air to pass through the nose as well as the mouth, e.g., /m/. See oral sound.
phonetic features
Phonetic properties of phonemes that account for their ability to contrast meanings of words, e.g., voice, tense. Also called distinctive features.
continuants
A speech sound in which the air stream flows continually through the mouth; all speech sounds except stops and affricates.
affricates
A sound produced by a stop closure followed immediately by a slow release characteristic of a fricative; phonetically a sequence of stop 1 fricative, e.g., the ch in chip, which is [tʃ] and like [t] 1 [ʃ].
liquids
A class of consonants including /l/ and /r/ and their variants that share vowel-like acoustic properties and may function as syllabic nuclei.
glides
A speech sound produced with little or no obstruction of the air stream that is
always preceded or followed by a vowel, e.g., [w] in we, [j] in you.
labio-velar
A sound articulated by simultaneously raising the back of the tongue toward the velum and rounding the lips. The [w] of English is a labio-velar glide.
approximants
Sounds in which the articulators have a near frictional closeness, but no actual friction occurs, e.g., [w], [j], [r], and [l] in English, where the first three are central approximants, and [l] is a lateral approximant.
trill
A speech sound in which part of the tongue vibrates against part of the roof of the mouth, e.g., the /r/ in Spanish perro (“dog”) is articulated by vibrating the tongue tip behind the alveolar ridge; the /r/ in French rouge (“red”) may be articulated by vibrations at the uvula.
flap
A speech sound in which the tongue touches the alveolar ridge and withdraws. It is often an allophone of /t/ and /d/ in words such as writer and rider. Also called tap.
click
A speech sound produced by sucking air into the mouth and forcing it between articulators to produce a sharp sound, e.g., the sound often spelled tsk.
stop
[-continuant] sounds in which the airflow is briefly but completely stopped in the oral cavity, e.g., [p,n,g].
diphthong
A sequence of two vowels run together as a single phonological unit, e.g., [aɪ, aʊ, ɔɪ] as in bite, bout, boy. See monophthong.
monophthong
Simple vowel, e.g., [ɛ] in [bɛd].
noncontinutants
A sound in which air is blocked momentarily in the oral cavity as it passes through the vocal tract. See stops, affricate.
obstruents
The class of sounds consisting of non-nasal stops, fricatives, and affricates. See sonorants.
sonorants
The class of sounds that includes vowels, glides, liquids, and nasals; non-obstruents.See obstruents.
consonantal
The phonetic feature that distinguishes the class of obstruents, liquids, and nasals, which are [+consonantal], from other sounds (vowels and glides), which are [-consonantal].
Labials
A sound articulated at the lips, e.g., [b], [f].
Coronals
The class of consonants articulated by raising the tip or blade of the tongue, including alveolars and palatals, e.g., [t], [ʃ].
Anteriors
A phonetic feature of consonants whose place of articulation is in front of the palato-alveolar area, including labials, interdentals, and alveolars.
syllabic
A phonetic feature of those sounds that may constitute the nucleus of syllables; all vowels are syllabic, and liquids and nasals may be syllabic in such words as towel, button, bottom.
