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Phonetics Review & Phonology

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Phonetics Review & Phonology Phonetics Review & Phonology LIN 001Y – A09 WINTER 2017 FRIDAY JANUARY 27, 2017 TA – JEFF MORAN HW 2 & Phonetics: What Do We Need to Review? - -Vowel chart -Phoneme & allophones -Minimal Pairs -Complementary & contrastive distribution 3 Minute Warmup It’s Thursday! I’m so happy I want to tell the world about it! So, work with a partner to tell the world how happy you are… in IPA! (That’s a lot of exclamation marks!) Please transcribe the following phrase into IPA: Happy Thursday hæpi θɚzde Vowels Vowel Chart & Descriptions • All voiced • No/minimal air obstruction • So we don’t use place & manner of articulation So we describe them with: Front-Central-Back High-Mid-Low Tense vs. Lax Activity Practice saying each vowel sound. Then, for each monophthong and diphthong, say one word that contains that vowel sound. Monophthongs Diphthongs 1. [ɑi] 2. [ɔɪ] 3. [aʊ] American English IPA Consonants & Vowels Transcription activity Transcribe your full name Jeffrey Chapman Moran ʤɛfɹi ʧæpmən məɹæn Phonology: 30 Second Review Phonology is the branch of linguistics that is concerned with how sounds are systematically organized within a language It is distinct from phonetics, which as we have seen, is the study of the acoustic properties of sounds However, in order to understand phonological processes, one must have a good grasp of phonetics. More Basic Concepts Phonemes are abstract mental representations of sounds. Phonemes are marked by slashes ( ex. /b/ ) They reflect speaker knowledge of sounds. Allophones are the physical “realizations” of phonemes. They are the sounds that are actually made by speakers of a language. Allophones are marked by brackets ( ex. [b] ) A phoneme can have just one allophone or more than one allophonic realization /f/ /p/ /t / | [f] [p] [ph] [t] [th] [ɾ] [ʔ] Q: “Phoneme or Allophone?” A: Ask a Minimal Pair A minimal pair is a set of two words that differ by only one unit of sound. An example of a minimal pair is CAT [khat] and BAT [bat] ◦ [kh] and [b] both appear in the environment: [#__ at] ◦ This shows that the choice of [kh] or [b] in the environment [#_at] produces a difference in meaning. ◦ When the choice between two sounds produces a difference in meaning, we say that those sounds are in contrastive distribution. They are therefore totally different phonemes. Why Minimal Pairs? Sounds in contrastive distribution are psychologically distinct for speakers of the language under investigation. [k] and [b] are psychologically distinct sounds because the choice of one sound over the other produces a change of meaning when put in the same environment [#__at] Sound that are psychologically distinct are allophones of different phonemes. /k/ /b/ | | [kh] [b] Minimal Pairs Activity pill fool sip spin look food hot thought ship lick IPA Transcriptions pill [phɪl] fool [ful] sip [sɪp] spill [spɪl] look [lʊk] food [fud] hot [hat] thought [θat] ship [ʃɪp] lick [lɪk] <sip> [sɪp] and <ship> [ʃɪp] are minimal pairs Both [s] and [ʃ] can go into the environment [_ɪp] and produce a difference in meaning. Thus, we know that [s] and [ʃ] are in contrastive distribution, so they are allophones of different phonemes. That is, these two sounds are psychologically distinct for speakers of English. /s/ / ʃ / | | [s] [ʃ] Based on the minimal pairs, what are some other distinct phonemes in English? Minimal Pairs lick [lɪk] look [lʊk] /ɪ/ vs /ʊ/ [ɪ] vs [ʊ] ship [ɪp] sip [sɪp] /ʃ/ vs /s/ [ʃ] vs [s] hot [hat] thought [θat] /h/ vs /θ/ [h] vs [θ] fool [ful] food [fud] /l/ vs /d/ [l] vs [d] Minimal Pair Brainstorm 1. Work in groups of 5 2. Come up with as many minimal pairs as you can 3. Identify and describe the phonemes that are in contrastive distribution 4. Remember, don’t think spelling, think sound! Jeff’s Examples been vs. ban /ɪ/ vs. /æ/ High front tense vowel vs. low front lax vowel cite vs. tight /s/ vs. /t/ Voiceless alveolar fricative vs. voiceless alveolar stop American English IPA Consonants & Vowels “Phoneme or Allophone?”… Without a Minimal Pair Let’s look at [p] and [ph]. Are they allophones of different phonemes or of the same phoneme? pie [phaɪ] stop [stap] spot [spat] present [phrɛsɪnt] Are there any minimal pairs with [p] and [ph]? No! But… is there a systematic pattern to where each sound can occur? Yes! [ph] only occurs at the beginning of words and [p] never occurs at the beginning of words (i.e. elsewhere). Thus [p] and [ph] are in complementary distribution. [p] and [ph] do NOT produce a contrast in meaning and thus are allophones of the SAME phoneme. /p/ [p] [ph] Natural Classes A natural class is a group of sounds that share at least one phonetic feature. Often phonological processes occur to a natural class of sounds, not just individual sounds. ◦ For example, in English, /p/, /t/, and /k/ are all aspirated at the beginning of words : [phɪn] <pin>, [thul] <tool>, [khoʊld] <cold> ◦ Therefore, /p/, /t/, and /k/ form a natural class. What is that class of sounds (i.e. what features do they share)? VOICELESS STOPS Natural Class Practice What are the shared features of the following groups of sounds? 1. [z], [ð], [v], [ʒ] VOICED FRICATIVES 2. [i], [ɪ], [e], [ɛ], [æ] FRONT VOWELS 3. [i], [u] HIGH VOWELS 4. [k], [g] VELAR STOPS 5. [n], [m], [ŋ] VOICED NASALS How to solve Phonology Problems Step 1: Identify the sounds you are investigating. Step 2: Identify any minimal pairs (If there are some, what are they? If there are none, move to Step 3). Step 3: List the environments for each sound. By the way, the list of environments for a sound is called its distribution. Step 4: Make generalizations (using natural classes) about the environments in which each sound appears. Try to find a pattern (find one unique characteristic that explains one sound’s distribution that is not present in the other sound’s distribution) Step 5: Determine which is the underlying sound (the phoneme) (that is, which has the wider distribution?). Step 6: Write a rule for the data..
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