Week 6

Question 1

Justification for ‘the syllable’ (Selkirk, 1982)

Answer 1

1. Some phonological phenomena are restricted to the syllable (word stress; stress penultimate syllable if heavy, otherwise stress on the antepenultimate).
2. The syllable is needed to establish language-specific phonotactic restrictions.
3. The syllable is needed for syllable-based generalisations (for phonological rules whose domain of application is the syllable).

Question 2

/s/ is special; is it part of the onset?

Answer 2

There are two proposals.

1. We can syllabify it as part of the onset.
2. /s/ is not part of the onset, but it can join as appendix to an initial syllable.

In exam motivate why you would detach /s/ or attach it instead.

Question 3

Monosyllabic lexical words minimally contain a branching nucleus or rhyme:

Answer 3

/sɪ/ *CV
/si/ CVV (long vowel)
/seɪ/ CVV (diphthong)
/sɪt/ CVC (lax vowel + C)

Question 4

Monosyllabic lexical words may contain a branching nucleus and rhyme:

Answer 4

/sim/ seam CVVC (long vowel + C)

Question 5

How many positions may the English rhyme have?

If the three positions are used up, then what happens to the ‘t’ in paint?

Answer 5

Maximally three positions.

You can attach it separately under ‘appendix’ and then attach it to wrd, which is above the sigma.

Question 6

Why, according to Selkirk (1982), is the syllable needed to justify the concept of the syllable?

Answer 6

1. Because it is the domain of stress.
2. To establish language-specific phonotactic restrictions (section 7.4, lecture 4).
3. For syllable-based generalisations (section 7.5).

Question 7

Syllable-based generalisations for SSBE

Answer 7

1. The /l/ is realised as an alveolar lateral approximate in onsets (clear).
2. The /l/ is realised as a voiceless lateral after a voiceless stop at the start of a stressed syllable (devoiced).
3. The /l/ is realised as a velarised lateral in rhymes (dark).

Question 8

Voicing assimilation

Answer 8

Width: /wɪtθ/
Cats: /kæts/
Bikes” /baɪks/

Question 9

Elision and voicing assimilation in weak forms

Answer 9

You can find elision in it is: /ɪt/ /ɪz/ but shortened as /ɪts/.

Then, voicing assimilation happens with the s becoming z because of the voiceless t.

Question 10

Why is the t pronounced in post office even when it occurs in a citation and elided form?

Answer 10

Because there is an empty onset position in ofice.

Question 11

How many positions in the onset and rhyme?

Answer 11

Onset: max. two
- C1 = [-son]
- C2 = [+son, -nasal], -s is special.

Rhyme: two or three (branching nucleus and/or branching rhyme.

Question 12

Which consonants can appear in the appendix?

Answer 12

Dental, alveolar or postalveolar obstruents.

Question 13

What is not possible in a syllable structure modelling non-rhoticity?

Answer 13

In non-rhotic systems, /r/ or /ɹ/ is restricted to onsets.

Question 14

Allophonic variation of English voiced stops

Answer 14

(1) English voiceless stops are aspirated in onsets of stressed syllables.
- pan, upon

(2) English voiceless stops are preglottalised and/or unreleased in codas.
- /p/ in napkin is unreleased in most varieties of English.
- /p/ -> [p˥] at the end of a syllable in coda position.

Question 15

Can two adjacent consonants occur together?

Answer 15

Yes, but then they are not part of the same syllable.

twilight zone -> [d.z]

Question 16

*nfay is not a possible onset in English. What does it violate?

Answer 16

It violates the sonority principle.

Question 17

Heavy syllable

Answer 17

Two timing positions in the rhyme.

Question 18

Role of syllable in phonology

Answer 18

1. In many languages, stress is assigned to one syllable in a word.
2. The rhyme is a unit that helps determine where stress is assigned (penultimate if heavy, otherwise antepenultimate).
3. The syllable is useful to explain the distribution of sounds (the syllable is the domain within phonotactic constrains can be stated).
4. The syllable is a unit for parsing segments.
5. Behaviour of segments (Allophonic variation) is more simply and insightfully expressed with reference to syllabic constituents (onset, rhyme, nucleus, coda).

Question 19

What are articulatory, acoustic and auditory phonetics?

Answer 19

Articulatory phonetics = the activities in the human body, in particular in the human speech organs (larynx, vocal tract, lungs), when speech sounds are produced.

Acoustic phonetics = the measurable properties of speech sounds that travel in the air, transmitted from speaker to hearer.

Auditory phonetics = the activities happening when speech sounds are perceived (the ear, brain).

Question 20

A distinctive property for English obstruents

Answer 20

Voicing

Question 21

Distinctive feature for stops

Answer 21

Air cannot escape through the mouth.

[-continuant]

Question 22

Which sound is realised in English when there is a VOT above 20 ms?

Answer 22

Voiceless oral stops /ptk/

Question 23

Two (or more) sounds are realisations of the same phoneme when:

Answer 23

1. They are in complementary distribution.
2. They are phonetically similar.

Question 24

Why is n silent in ‘hymn’?

Answer 24

/n/ cannot be parsed, so it’s deleted.

Question 25

Which words already have maximally three positions in the rhyme and thus have an appendix?

Answer 25

Paint /peɪnt/

Screamed /skɹimd/

Question 26

Derivation

Answer 26

When a distinct order between two rules is required, a derivation must be shown.

The derivation must consist of a correct application of rule ordering that proves the phonetic representation to be possible as well as a counterexamle that proves, given the opposite ordering, an incorrect phonetic representation will be generated.