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Vowels: Articulation and Transcription Introduction to General Linguistics Hubert Truckenbrodt Phonology 2: Vowels: Articulation and transcription 1 German vowels The German vowel system is fairly complex, but relatively systematic. The vowels are distinguished along a variety of dimensions: (a) tongue position in the mouth, (b) lip rounding (or its absence), (d) a tense/lax contrast, and (d) length. In this section, you will learn about the German vowels, with lessons that build up in a number of steps, from simple to complex. Once you have understood the German vowel system, it will be easy for you to understand any other vowel system in the future. 1.1 Tongue position: front/back, and high/mid/low The main articulatory distinctions for tongue position are front/back, and high/mid/low. These are names for the highest position of the tongue in the mouth. The top surface of the tongue has a roundish shape when a vowel is pronounced. The articulatory dimension front/back and high/mid/low refer to the highest point of this roundish shape. With a front vowel, for example, the highest point of the tongue is relatively far front in the mouth, with a back vowel relatively further back. Similarly, with high/mid/low vowels, the highest point of the tongue is, relatively speaking, high in the mouth, at a mid-height in the mouth, and low in the mouth. (1) shows three important corners of the vowel space. The high front vowel [i] is at the upper front corner of this vowel space, and the high back vowel [u] is at the upper back corner. [a] is sometimes described as 'central', as the highest point of the tongue is neither clearly front nor clearly back with [a]. However, we will see in later sections that there is evidence in the phonology of German that [a] is a back vowel, once the vowels are divided into two classes 'front' and 'back'. This is reflected in the way [a] is drawn in (1). (1) front back [i] hier [u] Huhn high here chicken [a] Hahn low rooster You can get a feeling for the tongue position of a vowel in your mouth if you use a straw (or a flat lollipop), carefully position this on the front part of your tongue, and then say two vowels alternatingly. For example, you can compare [i] and [u] in this way. Saying [uuu iii uuu iii uuu ...] you will notice how the straw is pushed out of your mouth as you go from [uuu] to [iii]. If it sticks to your tongue enough (here a lollipop may be better), it will also be pulled into the mouth as the tongue retracts from [iii] to [uuu]. You can similarly compare [i] and [a] for height, and [a] and [u]. You should be able to notice that [a] is lower than both [i] and [u]. There are languages that have only the three vowels [i, u, a]. Such a language is Warlpiri, spoken by native people in central Australia. To these three extremes in the vowel space, we can add the mid vowels [e] and [o], as in (2). [e] is front, like [i], but not as high as [i]. [o] is back like [u], but not as high as [u]. Both [e] and [o] are higher than [a]. p. 1, Intro Ling, Phonology 2: Vowels – Articulation and transcription (2) front back [i] hier [u] Huhn high here chicken [e] Heer [o] Hohn mid army scorn [a] Hahn low rooster Spanish has the five vowels distinguished in (2) and no additional vowels (apart from a long/short distinction). 1.2 Rounding and backness Of the five vowels in (2), [u] and [o] are rounded, which means that they have crucial lip rounding, while [i], [e], and [a] are not rounded. In a vowel-system like this, such as the Spanish one, it is not a coincidence that only the back vowels [u] and [o] are rounded while the front vowels are unrounded. This has to do with the acoustics of these sounds:1 There is a sense in which rounding and backness 'sound similar' (and look similar, in an acoustic computer analysis of the sound). In a sense, rounding increases the way back vowels sound like back vowels. If rounding were added to a front vowel, this front vowel would also sound a bit like a back vowel in this respect. Therefore, if the back vowels are rounded and the front vowels are unrounded as in Spanish, front and back vowels are particularly easy to distinguish in the way they sound: back vowels sound particularly 'back', and front vowels do not at all sound 'back'. Even languages with more complicated vowel systems (such as English, that we will briefly look at below) have the front vowels unrounded, and rounding reserved for back vowels. However, rounding and backness, though they sound similar, do not sound identically, and there are also many languages that show additional combinations of rounding and backness. German is one of these languages, in that it has front rounded vowels. These are orthographic 'ü' and 'ö', transcribed as [y] and [ø] (as well as their 'lax' counterparts that we will see below). (3) high front rounded: [y], orthographically 'ü', as in: Hügel, [hyl], 'hill' mid front rounded: [ø], orthographically 'ö', as in: Höhle, [høl], 'cave' The following table integrates these vowels, and integrates the distinction of rounding. (4) front back unrounded rounded unrounded rounded [i] hier [y] Hügel [u] Huhn high here hill chicken [e] Heer [ø] Höhle [o] Hohn mid army cave scorn [a] Hahn low rooster The table shows that [y] ('ü') is similar to [i] in tongue position (high and front), but distinct from it in lip rounding, and that [ø] is similar to [e] in tongue position (mid and front), but distinct from it in lip rounding. It may help you remember how [y] and [ø] are pronounced if you consider the orthography (writing): Going from 'u' to 'ü' and going from 'o' to 'ö' in both cases means 'becoming front, but 1 The script of last year speaks of Japanese here. This is not correct. Japanese has no high back rounded vowel. The Japanese high back vowel is the unrounded , which is found in Polish,Russian, and many other languages. p. 2, Intro Ling, Phonology 2: Vowels – Articulation and transcription leaving everything else the same'. Thus, 'ü' is like 'u' in that it is high and round, but 'ü' is front, unlike the back vowel [u]. Also, 'ö' is like 'o' in that it is mid and round, but 'ö' is front, unlike the back vowel 'o'. Thus, you can think of the 'umlaut' dots (written on top of 'o' and 'u' in 'ü' and 'ö') as turning a vowel into a corresponding front vowel. 1.3 Tense and lax vowels The next important distinction is more subtle. This is the distinction between tense and lax vowels. With the exception of [a], all vowels in (4) are tense, and have a lax counterpart. In German, the distinction between tense and lax vowels is to some extent connected to the distinction between long and short vowels (more on this below). (5) shows examples of minimal contrasts between tense (long) vowels with lax (short) vowels. (5) tense lax [i] - [] ihn - in him, in [e] - [] Heer - Herr army, mister [u] - [] Mus - muss mush, must [o] - [] wohne - Wonne live (1.sg), bliss [y] - [] Hüte - Hütte hats, cottage [ø] - [œ] Höhle - Hölle cave, hell In addition to the length distinction, there is, in all these pairs, a distinction in how 'strong' the articulation is executed. The tense vowels have their articulation more strongly executed, while the lax vowels have it less strongly executed (as though the tongue was more relaxed). [i] and [] for example, are both high front vowels. However, lax [] is not quite as high up and not quite as far front as tense [i]. Similarly, lax [] is not as high up as the mid [e], and not quite as far front. The distinction also applies to the amount of lip rounding: Lax [], for example, is not only lower than tense [o] in tongue position, but the lips are also less rounded with [] than with [o]. This is a difference in degree: both [] and [o] are rounded vowels nevertheless. The German vowel [a] is usually classified as lax, and as having no tense counterpart. The table in (6) adds the lax vowels to the table in (4), as well as the distinction between tense and lax. (6) front back unrounded rounded unrounded rounded tense [i] hier [y] Hügel [u] Huhn high here hill chicken lax [] Hilfe [] Hülse [] Hund help husk dog tense [e] Heer [ø] Höhle [o] Hohn mid army cave scorn lax [] Hemd [œ] Hölle [] Holz shirt hell wood (lax) [a] Hahn low rooster Notice also that lax vowels are often followed by double consonants in the orthography, as in many of the examples in (5). Importantly, the double consonant of the orthography is not pronounced longer than the single consonant of the orthography. Thus, the single and double consonants in Mus and muss, in wohne and Wonne etc. are both pronounced short. The double consonant of the p. 3, Intro Ling, Phonology 2: Vowels – Articulation and transcription orthography is only a 'sign' that the preceding vowel is pronounced lax. Altogether, the pronunciation is: Mus [mus], muss [ms], wohne [von], and Wonne [vn]. Notice also, that there is not always such an orthographic sign for a lax vowel. Thus, the vowels of in, Bär, Hals, Holz and many other words are lax, with no following double consonant serving as a sign for this.
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