U1 - The English Syllable Flashcards
What is a syllable?
It is a peak in sonority, whenever there’s a peak there is a syllable.
What suggests that speech is organized into syllables
- Syllabification
- Jeringozo
- Division into syllables when asking for repetition
Syllabification
It is the process of breaking up words into syllables. Native speakers have a good intuitive felling for the concept.
What suggests that syllables have an internal structure?
- Rhymes in poetry
- Spoonerism
Spoonerism
Unintentional errors in speech in which corresponding consonants, vowels and morphemes are switched bewteen two syllables in a word.
Nucleus
It is the most sonorous element in the syllable and it is obligatory.
Along with the coda form a unit called “the rhyme”
Generally it is occupied by vowels but syllabic consonants can also occupy this position.
Syllabic Consonants
They can act as the nuclear elements of the syllable.
In this case they are longer and more prominent.
The most common are /n, m, l/ with a symbol underneath.
Coda
It consists of a cluster of up to 4 consonants that follows the nucleus.
Along with the nucleus, it forms a unit called “the rhyme”
It is not very stable (in “fishing” It’s most likely to lose the ending “g”)
Onset
It consists of a cluster of up to 3 consonants that precedes the nucleus.
Open Syllables
It is a syllable with no coda, which means that it ends in a vowel.
It (CV) is the most common structure:
1. Children first words generally are “ma” “pa” “ba”
2. There are more variations of it.
/æ , e, ɒ/ cannot occur in stressed open syllables.
Close Syllables
It is a syllable with at least one coda, meaning it ends in one or more consonants.
Strong Syllables
They are stressed syllables
Weak Syllables
They are unstressed syllables.
The vowels of weak syllables tend to be shorter, of lower intensity, and different in quality.
When do we find weak syllables?
They can only have 4 types of peak:
1. The vowel schwa /ə/
2. Close front unrounded /i/
3. Close back rounded /u/
4. Syllabic Consonant
When does /ə/ appers in the peak of a Weak Syllable?
It is the most frequent vowel in Ensligh.
It is mid in quality, central and lax in tenseness.
They appear when in normal spelling:
1. “a” → a’ttentd
2. “ar” → par’ticular
3. “ate” → ‘animate
4. “o” → to’morrow
5. “or” → for’get
6. “e” → ‘postmen
7 “er” → ‘stronger
8. “u” → su’pport
9. “ough” → ‘thorough
10. “ous” → ‘gracious
When does the close front unrounded /i/ appers in the peak of a Weak Syllable?
- In final “y” – “ey” → happy, hurry, valley
- When such words have suffixes beginning with vowels → happier, easiest, hurring
- In prefixes “re” – “pre” – “de” if precedes a vowel and is unstressed → react, preoccupied, deactivate
- In suffixes “iate” – “ious” when they have two syllables → appreciate, hilarious
- In unstressed personal pronouns
- With “the” when it precedes a vowel.
When does the close back rounded /u/ appers in the peak of a Weak Syllable?
- In unstressed and not immediately preceding a consonant → “you” – “to” – “into” “do”
- In unstressed in all positions → “who” and “through”.
When does a Syllabic Consonant appers in the peak of a Weak Syllable?
- Syllabic l
- Syllabic n → after alveolar plosives (/d,t/) and fricatives (/z/ /ð/ /ʒ/ /s/ /θ/ /ʃ/) after bilabial consonants
- Syllabic m → After alveolar consonants.
- Syllabic r → “history, wanderer, buttering and flattery
- Two syllabic consonants together → “national, literal, visionary, veteran”
