Semester Outline Introduction to English Phonology and Phonetics 1. Phonetics and phonology: basics (& introducing transcription)
2. English consonants
Dr. Nadja Nesselhauf 3. English vowels
4. Beyond the phoneme (connected speech, suprasegmentals etc.)
5. Accents of English
American vs. British English Approximant /r/
- rhoticity Pronouncing /r/ in RP: - flapped /elided t /r/ / __ V (Cara ) - more yod-dropping
- absence of / P/ (usually @9 ) /r/ / __ # V (car engine ) = linking /r/
- flat / z/ vs. broad /@9 / Ø / __ C,# (car, cart ) - often /@9 / vs. /N9 /
-/29 / vs. / U/ in some words not having /r/ in the last two contexts, RP is Purely phonetic differences:
/r/ retroflex, /l/ always dark; /e/ more open, / @9 / further non-rhotic ; GA is rhotic (r-full) back, less movement in /e H/, / ?T / vs. / nT /
1 Plosives: Allophonic Variation Plosives: Allophonic Variation
T-flapping in General American [π]: D-flapping in GA in the same contexts as t-flapping
/t/ → flap / V __ .V (better ) (cf. ladder, weirdo, saddle )
/ r __ .V (party ) -> NEUTRALISATION of the contrast /t-d/ in the
/ __ kÿÿ, qÿ, lÿ (bottle, shutter, bottom ) relevant contexts
flap → Ø / n __ .V (winter ) -> homophones such as
shutter – shudder, writing - riding etc.
Approximant /j/: English Monophthongs: Yod-Dropping Before /u:/ RP – GA Correspondences GA / U/ cut Context Example RP GA RP / U/ GA / 29 / / __ r hurry, worry / m __ mule [it9 ] [it9 ] / f __ few [it9 ] [it9 ] GA / @9 / father / p __ pure [it9 ] [it9 ] RP / @9 / / t __ Tuesday [it9 ] [it9 ] [t9t9t9 ] GA / z/ / __ e,S,r,m,l(+C) staff, bath... / d __ duke [it9 ] [it9 ] [t9t9t9 ] / n __ new [it9 ] [it9 ] [t9t9t9 ] GA / @9 / laundry / s __ assume [it9 ] [t9 ] [t9 ] RP / N9 / it9it9 GA / N9 /
2 Approximant /r/ [ ¢¢¢] American vs. British English
Some more examples of “flat a:” Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 47
advance, after, ask, aunt, banana, basket, bath, castle, class, disaster, fasten, France, glass, grass, half, last, laugh, mask, monograph, nasty, passport, past, path, plant, raspberry, rather, staff, task, vast
Approximant /r/ [ ±±±] Lateral /l/: Allophonic Variation Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 47 Allophones of resonance in RP :
clear [l] / __ V,j (land, billion, will you )
dark [ 4] / __ C,# (silk, ball )
dark [ 4] = velarized
GA: dark [ 4] only
3 English Monophthongs (RP) English Monophthongs (GA) Source: Sauer 1990, Source:1990, Sauer 16 Source:1990, Sauer 16
American vs. British English American vs. British English
Task: Please transcribe the following words in your Semi-systematic differences:
preferred variety:
anti-, adult, ate, clerk, clerk, derby, Berkely
herb, leisure, medicine, progress, either, neither, leisure Differences in individual words:
schedule, semi-, shone, tomato, advertisement, alumin(i)um, apricot, data, dynasty, falcon, khaki, lieutenant, lever, mum/mom (mummy/mommy), wrath,…
vase, vitamin, with, zebra
4 Word Stress Further Stress Differences
Suffix –ary, -ory: Task: How would you stress the following words (+ does your stress pattern correspond to RP or GA?): / !S __ /( ?)qH / (satisfactory) address inquiry advertisement laboratory <-ary,-ory> ballet magazine /( ?)qH / in RP cafe moustache / mustache / .S __ (territory, cigarette research /dqH ,N9qH / in GA temporary ) controversy translate frontier weekend → pattern !1-2-$3-4 exists in GA, but not RP garage (source: Crystal 1995)
Further Stress Differences Accents of English in the World
Semi-systematic differences: accent, variety - a number of words ending in –ate have the stress on the first syllable in GA: donate, migrate, vacate, vibrate and on the second in RP linguistic variation:
--ony like ory/ary/(ery) : secondary stress on regional second syllable from end: testimony, ceremony social - GA has secondary stress of the last element of some compounds, esp. –berry: blueberry, ethnic raspberry etc. gender - -ile endings: reduced vowel in GA but not in BrE: fertile, fragile, hostile ,… standard vs. non-standard
5 Accents of English in the World Accents of English in the World
regional and social variation:
after Trudgill 2000 social variation social
regional variation http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Anglospeak%28800px%292.png
Accents of English in the World Accents of English in the World
Kachru (1985): three circles of English users Language.theEnglish Source:Crystal,David 2003. Language spread = the increase in the number of users of a language, often in new areas
Cambridge:107. CUP, Types of language spread (Quirk 1988):
TheCambridge Encyclopedia of demographic : speaker movement, settlement in new areas imperial : language is introduced to new areas through political domination econocultural : the language gains new speakers through its economic / cultural attractiveness
6 Accents of English in the World Accents of English in the World
Dominant Type of Areas Involved Rough Timeline Types of accent variation: Spread phase Ireland, Scotland, systemic : different accents possess Imperial 11 th – 19 th century 1 Wales different phoneme inventories North America, phase Australia, New distributional : certain phonemes occur Demographic 17 th – 19 th century 2 Zealand, South Africa in different environments South Asia, South lexical : individual words or word phase East Asia, West Imperial 16 th – 20 th century 3 Africa, East Africa, groups take different phonemes Caribbean, Pacific phase All regions of the realizational : phonemes have different Econocultural 20 th + 21 st century 4 world phonetic realizations
Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 144 Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 144
/α:/ in bath /H/ as the final (instead of vowel in happy /æ/) (no happY- tensing)
7 Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 144 Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 144
/T/ instead of force and North /U/ (systemic words are variation) distinguished: e.g. [ mNqS ] vs. [enqr ]
Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 145 Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 145 light grey: rhoticity monophthongs in face and goat dark grey: diphthong shift in face , price , goat
8 Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 145 Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 145
h-dropping word-medial glottal stop
Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles
Source:Collins/Mees 2003, 143 There was one of our blokes – one of his family – like cousins or uncles – or you know – in that Listen to: range – had had an accident – and been taken to London hospital – so he spent – I think most of his weekend without any sleep at all – at this (Cockney) hospital like – until he knew – that the person was going to be OK – anyway – come Monday [41] morning – he decides to go straight to work – and – he comes to work – and say he has had no sleep at all and he‘s got a job to do in this house to provide – an extension phone – you know – and usually – it‘s – you run the cable upstairs into a bedroom – it‘s the usual place to have the phone – and – the bed – was fitted into slots in the floor – so he couldn‘t sort of – move it over .
9 Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles
I mean – he could only get two legs out of the hole and she‘s taken her clothes off like – you know – in the floor and he couldn‘t – he needed two and gone into the bedroom to get her housecoat people to actually lift it and move it – so he laid – she was going to have a bath – and there‘s a across the bed – to – finish the cabling – and strange man laying on the bed – snoring his head screw the – terminal box on the wall – and – not off – needless to say – our bloke spent about six having had any sleep – he just sort of drifted off hours in the nick – trying to explain what had – and the thing is – the gentleman who let him in happened – yes – spent six hours in the police – but said he was going to work – and his wife station would be in shortly – and she‘s come in – and not knowing the telephone man was there – I mean – to see a van outside – but she didn‘t – you know – sort of put two and two together – she‘s come in – she‘s gone upstairs – into the bathroom –
Accents of English: British Isles Accents of English: British Isles
A closer look at Scotland Task: Listen to the following excerpt from “Saving Grace”, with the Scottish actors Craig Ferguson and Valerie Edmond [Kapitel 5, 31:07]: The languages of Scotland: 1) In what ways is the pronunciation of the phoneme /r/ different from Standard British English? Scottish Gaelic (today almost extinct) 2) How is what would be Standard BrE / ?T / pronounced? 3) How is what would be Standard BrE / dH / pronounced? Scots (might be considered a distinct 4) How is what would be Standard BrE / `T / pronounced? language, an earlier split from English)
Scottish English (the Scottish standard of English)
10 Accents of English: North America Accents of English: North America
North American accents (USA and Canada) are relatively uniform. Canada : • house is Special features are to be found in: New England, [?T ] and South, Canada price is [?H ] before fortis Two important ethnic accents: consonants = “Canadian the accent of African Americans (~ African- raising” American Vernacular English = AAVE ) • otherwise, the accent of Hispanic Americans (~ Chicano ) like GA
Accents of English: Accents of English: The Southern Hemisphere The Southern Hemisphere The three major Southern Hemisphere Some shared features of Southern varieties of English are: Hemisphere accents:
Australian English non-rhotic New Zealand English /e/ and /æ/ are very close South African English palm is very front: [a 9] (only AusE and They share: NZE) a similar history (British settlement in the 18th-19th centuries)
similar accents!
11 Accents of English: The Southern Hemisphere Accents of English in the World
Listen to New Zealand English [55]: Systematizing the major differences between - Close /e/: went, bed, very, everybody, let native-speaker accents of English: - Close / z/: bad, flatmate - Long / @9 / very front: car , guitar
Listen to South African English [56]: - Close /e/: went, special, together, vegetable
Source: Trudgill/Hannah
Accents of English in the World Accents of English in the World
Key to the previous figure: Numbers of 1 /a:/ rather than /æ/ in path English native 2 absence of non-prevocalic /r/ speakers in 3 close realizations for /æ/ and /e/ different 4 front [a:] for / @9 / countries 5 absence of contrast between cot and caught 6 /æ/ rathern than /a:/ in can’t 7 absence of contrast between bother and father 8 voicing of intervocalic /r/ 9 unrounded vowel in pot 10 syllabic /r/ in bird
11 absence of contrast between pull and pool Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:English_dialects1997.png
12 Accents of English: Accents of English: Second-Language Varieties Second-Language Varieties
apart from native-speaker varieties, new Criteria for an institutionalised New English:
varieties have also developed in post- function : the variety must be used for a colonial settings broad range of functions
these institutionalised varieties have their form : the variety must have its own own accent, lexicon and syntax distinctive features
some New Englishes : Indian English, attitude : the speakers must recognize Singaporean English, West African English, their own variety as the standard Jamaican English → the status of many varieties is still debated (e.g. Fiji, Philippines, Bahamas)
Accents of English: Accents of English: Second-Language Varieties Second-Language Varieties Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Africa-m
West African English accent: Listen to: smaller set of monophthong West Africa phonemes: / h,d,`,N,t/ [60] no / ?/; e.g.: perpetrate / o`o`sqds /
syllable timing
tendency for spelling pronunciation ap.jpg
13 The Chaos The Chaos (The Joy of English Pronunciation) (The Joy of English Pronunciation)
(by Gerard Nolst Trenité) (About 65 stanzas on): Pronunciation – think of Psyche!- Dearest creature in creation Is a paling, stout and spiky. Studying English pronunciation, […] I will teach you in my verse Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse. It’s a dark abyss or tunnel Strewn with stones like rowlock, gunwale, I will keep you Susy, busy, Islington, and Isle of Wight, Make your head with heat grow dizzy; Housewife, verdict and indict. Tear in eye, your dress you‘ll tear; Don’t you think so, reader, rather, Queer, fair seer, hear my prayer. Saying lather, bather, father?
The Chaos (The Joy of English Pronunciation)
Finally, which rhymes with enough , Though, through, bough, cough , hough, sough, tough ?? Hiccough has the sound of sup ... My advice is: GIVE IT UP! http://www.spellingsociety.org/journals/j17/caos.php
MY ADVICE IS: DON‘T GIVE UP!!!
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