Phonetics & Phonology

Question 1

manner of articulation

Answer 1

what the articulators involved do

Question 2

place of articulation

Answer 2

where the articulatory gesture happens, the point where the airflow in the vocal tract is constricted

Question 3

voicing

Answer 3

in voiced sounds, the vocal cords are pulled together and vibrate

Question 4

plosives

Answer 4

complete closure somewhere in vocal tract, then air released

Question 5

fricatives

Answer 5

articulators move quite close together, with audible friction in the air, hissing sound

Question 6

affricates

Answer 6

plosive + fricative combination, pronounced as a single sound in the time it takes to pronounce a single consonant; a plosive released as a fricative

Question 7

nasals

Answer 7

• velum loweres so air exits via nose, also complete closure somewhere in the mouth.
• produce a resonant sound, but are also like plosives in that there is a full closure in the mouth,
• generally voiced

Question 8

approximants

Answer 8

articulators approach each other, but not close enough for friction, hence a more resonant, vowel-like sound

Question 9

glides

Answer 9

behave phonologically like consonants, because unlike other vowels, they only occur directly before vowels and at start/end of a syllable and select the a-form of the indefinite article

Question 10

laterals

Answer 10

partial closure made with tongue at the alveolar ridge; one or both sides of the tongue are lowered and air escapes through the resulting passageway

Question 11

rhotics

Answer 11

r-sounds

Question 12

bilabial

Answer 12

both lips are active articulators

p,b,m

Question 13

labiodental

Answer 13

upper lip, lower teeth

f,v

Question 14

(inter)dental

Answer 14

dental = tongue touches back of teeth; interdental = tongue between teeth

th-sounds

Question 15

alveolar

Answer 15

passive articulator is the alveolar ridge (= gum ridge)

t,d,s,z,r

Question 16

postalveolar

Answer 16

= alveo-palatal, palato-alveolar

passive articulator between alveolar ridge and hard palate; s/sh sounds

Question 17

palatal

Answer 17

hard palate is passive articulator

j in yes

Question 18

velar

Answer 18

back of tongue approaches soft palate

k,g,n

Question 19

glottal

Answer 19

made in glottis, space between vocal folds

Question 20

Pure Vowels

Answer 20

don’t change while being pronounced

Question 21

diphtongs

Answer 21

a vowel in which the tongue glides from the position of one vowel to the position of another. This takes about the same time to pronounce a single (long) vowel.

Question 22

tongue height

Answer 22

describes the highest point of the tongue in pronouncing the vowel

high > high-mid > low-mid > low

Question 23

backness

Answer 23

which part of the tongue is the highest (or how far back is the passive articulator)

front/central/back

Question 24

tenseness

Answer 24

tense (long) vowels are articulated with more muscular effort & higher air pressure than lax (short) vowels

Question 25

roundedness

Answer 25

rounded vowels: lips rounded & pushed forward

unrounded: lips are spread

Question 26

phone

Answer 26

the actual sound of a word/letter you can hear

it is represented in phonology with square brackets surrounding it

Question 27

phoneme

Answer 27

the smallest unit that discerns meaning between sounds in any given language

written in slashes; the mental representation of a specific word; the mental image we store in our brain of the specific word

Question 28

allophones

Answer 28

a phone which is one of the set of phones which can realize a particular phoneme

different ways you can say a word or basically another way to pronounce a phoneme

Question 29

clear & dark l

Answer 29

dark l: back of the tongue is raised towards the velum

clear l: back of tongue is in its normal low position

Question 30

free variation

Answer 30

variants of the same sound which appear within one environment, because of dialect or emphasis, e.g. rhotic and non-rhotic r sounds

Question 31

complementary distribution

Answer 31

variants of the same sounds which appear in different environments; e.g. aspiration of a voiceless plosive at the start of a stressed syllable

Question 32

assimilation

Answer 32

a sound becomes more similar to a sound near it

Question 33

regressive assimilation

Answer 33

a sound influences another sound before it, e.g. five past (the voiced fricative v becomes voiceless because of the following voiceless consonant)

Question 34

progressive assimilation

Answer 34

a sound influences a sound after it, e.g. the plural s in dogs is voiced because of the voiced g before it

Question 35

deletion

Answer 35

the non-pronunciation of a sound in fast speech,e.g. [ɹaspbərɪ] > [ɹɑzbɹi] (schwa deletion)

Question 36

epenthesis/insertion

Answer 36

adding a sound to facilitate pronunciation of neighbouring sounds, e.g. quizzes [khwɪzəz] (Obligatory epenthetic schwa,

Question 37

vowel reduction

Answer 37

the pronunciation of a vowel as a lax vowel (most often schwa) in unstressed syllable

Question 38

syllable organisation

Answer 38

nucleus contains the vowel; onset and coda contain respectively the consonants before and after the nucleus. The nucleus and coda form a unit called the rhyme

Question 39

syllabic consonants

Answer 39

some consonants can be a syllable nucleus, in fast speech we find syllabic [n,m,l,r] when schwa is deleted in front of them in unstresses syllables

e.g. button [bʌtn̩ ], subtle [sʌtɫ̩ ]

Question 40

heavy and light syllables

Answer 40

• light syllables have a short vowel and no coda
• heavy syllables have either a coda or no coda but a long vowel in the nucleus
• light syllables have one timing unit in the rhyme, heavy ones have more than one
• only heavy syllables can be stressed

Question 41

Sonority Sequencing Generalisation

Answer 41

The nucleus of the syllable is the most sonorous (» vowel-like, loudest) element. The onset and coda are organised such that the most sonorous elements are closer to the nucleus.

Question 42

Sonority scale or sonority hierarchy

Answer 42

(< = ‘is less sonorous than’):
obstruents < nasals < liquids < glides < vowels

Question 43

Maximal Onset Principle

Answer 43

If a segment is not a
nucleus, assume that it is an onset rather than a coda unless the resulting
syllabification produces an unpronounceable syllable. In other words, try to make
onsets as big as possible.