week 5 and 7- Phonemes and stress Flashcards
Complementary Distribution
Relation between sounds of forms whose distributions do not overlap. If forms are in complementary distribution they are allophones and not phonemes.
Contrastive Distribution
Relation between sounds of forms whose distributions overlap and the overlap leads to a meaningful distinction. For instance /m/ and /k/ are in contrastive distribution in the words mat and cat.
what is a minimal pair
minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language that differ in only one phonological element, such as a phoneme, toneme or chroneme , and have distinct meanings.
eg. /pat/ and /bat/
Distinctive feature theory
Argues that a phoneme is just a category for a whole series of articulatory gestures.
- In this theory the basic unit is the feature (not the phoneme)
- features can’t be broken into smaller units.
- Features are binary; all phonemes either have [+] or don’t have [-] a particular feature.
- Features may be based on:
- Acoustic properties (e.g., strident, voice).
- Articulatory properties (e.g., high, back, lateral, coronal).
- Function in a syllable (e.g., consonantal, vocalic).
in distinctive feature theory, what does + or - stop mean
the sound is produced with full closure in the mouth
in distinctive feature theory, what does + or - nasal mean
raising or lowering of the soft palette.
Raised= minus nasal eg. p, b
Lowered= plus nasal eg. m, n
in distinctive feature theory, what does + or - labial mean
produced at the lips = plus labial
not produced at lips= minus labial
in distinctive feature theory, what does + or - apical mean
place of articulation that’s produced by the tip or blade of the tongue
produced with tip of tongue= plus apical eg. t, d , n
produced elsewhere= minus apical eg. b, p, m
in distinctive feature theory, what does + or - dorsal mean
produced by front or back of tongue
produced by back of tongue- plus dorsal eg. k, g
produced elsewhere= minus dorsal eg. t, d, n
in distinctive feature theory, what does O mean
does not apply
in distinctive feature theory, what do fortis and lenis mean?
always opposite (unless O= does not apply)
fortis= Articulated with relatively strong pressure of the airstream below the glottis, as in English (p) and (t) compared with (b) and (d).
lenis = Articulated with relatively low pressure of the airstream below the glottis, as English (b) and (d) compared with (p) and (t).
plus fortis = p, t, k
plus lenis= b, d, g
O= m, n
what is elegance
how little words you can use to say something
- You can reduce the categories as something will either be nasal OR non nasal and fortis OR non fortis.
coronal
sounds that are produced with the tip or blade of the tongue above the point of rest.
anterior
sounds that are produced at or in front of the alveolar ridge. E.g. Velars are produced at the back of the mouth so are minus anterior.
continuant
a consonant which is sounded with the vocal tract only partly closed, allowing the breath to pass through and the sound to be prolonged (as with f, l, m, n, r, s, v).
strident
the fricatives that are being produced where the air is squeezed out through a gap in the tongue.
glide
the tongue moving
In praise of the phoneme
‘Yet there is something lost if the phoneme is abandoned. It is important to know that different accents of a language have different numbers of phonemes, because it means that some people have fewer possibilities for making distinctions between words and some have more, and this is a fact of language which should not be glossed over ’ O’Connor J. D. (1973)
what is the syllable template
onset, nucleus, and coda.
onset and coda= consonants, or consonant clusters, that appear at the beginning and the end of the syllable respectively.
nucleus=the core of the syllable; it is most often a vowel, or a combination of vowels
Maximal onset principle
A phonological principle proposed by some writers which determines the placement of syllable boundaries in cases of doubt. The principle states that, unless doing so would violate universal or language-specific constraints, consonants should be assigned to the syllable onset rather than the syllable coda.
sonority scale
a list of phonetic segments showing the relative resonance of phonetic segments in relation to other segments.
9 Open Vowels (mouth as open as possible) 8 Close vowels 7 Laterals 6 Nasals 5 Approximants 4 Trills 3 Fricatives 2 Affricates 1 Plosives (mouth almost closed)
syllable timed languages
French. Each syllable should take roughly the same time to produce.
stress timed language
English
feature syllables that are stressed at regular intervals and for a longer period than vowels in unstressed syllables
stress timing
English timing is called a foot. Starts on a stress and then moves onto the next stress. Each one of the feet should take about the same time to pronounce.
what is articulatory stress
it appears to depend on speakers using more muscular effort. The intercostal muscles are more active and produce a higher subglottal pressure during the articulation of a stressed syllable
➜a more intense sound and increased vocal fold vibration
stress perception
A stressed syllable:
- feels louder than an unstressed one.
- feels longer than an unstressed one.
- feels as if it is on a higher pitch.
- contain vowels of a different quality e.g. babibababibababiba
- most salient part of speech
what is the function of stress
Lexical distinctions –
below V billow, /ˈbɪləʊ/ /bɪˈləʊ/
refer V reefer ? / ɹiˈfɛː/ ˈɹi:fə/
what do you need to be able to locate stress in nouns?
- Syntactic information - a record, to record, a present, to present
- Morphological information - root or prefix/suffix
- Phonological information – ult (final) or penult (second to last) or anti penult (third to last) or pre-anti penult (fourth to last)
what is a free vowel
A free vowel is a vowel which can occur at the end of a one syllable word.
what is the ult
final syllable
what is the penult
second to last syllable
what is the anti penult
third to last syllable
what is the pre-anti penult
fourth to last syllable
