1、Chapter 2,Speech Sounds,Outline,2.1 Introduction to Phonetics 2.2 Production of Speech Sounds 2.3 Transcription of Speech Sounds 2.4 Classification & Description of English Speech Sounds 2.5 Two Models of English Pronunciation 2.6 Phonology 2.7 Suprasegmental Features 2.8 Task,2.1 Introduction to Ph
2、onetics,2.1.1 Definition of Phonetics Speech sounds refer to the limited range of sounds which are produced by humans, meaningful in human communication and which linguists are only concerned. Phonetics studies how speech sounds are produced, transmitted, and perceived.,2.1.2 Branches of Phonetics,A
3、rticulatory Phonetics studies how a speaker uses his speech organs to produce the speech sounds. Acoustic Phonetics is the study of the physical properties of speech sounds. Auditory Phonetics studies how the sounds are perceived by the hearer.,2.1.3 The Importance of Phonetic Study,1) Good for the
4、correct input of language; 2) Easy to be understood by each other; 3) Be more responsible and professional;,2.2 Production of Speech Sounds,Organs of Speech Speech organs, also known as vocal organs, are those parts of the human body involved in the production of speech. When speaking, movements of
5、the tongue, lips, mouth, nose and the vocal folds, etc. are manipulated automatically, with complete unawareness of how they behave.,Speech Organs,Consolidation,Complete the chart of speech organs.,2.3 Transcription of Speech Sounds,2.3.1 Introduction about IPAInternational Phonetic AssociationFound
6、ed in France in 1886, language teachers;Published the first version of its alphabet in 1888. Its aim is to promote the scientific study of phonetics and the various practical applications of that science. Several revised, the last version of the IPA alphabet was published in 2005.,IPA Abbreviation o
7、f International Phonetic Alphabet, devised based on the phonetic alphabet proposed at the time; Undergone a number of revisions; A comprised system employing symbols of all sources, such as Roman small letters, italics, obsolete letters, Greek letters, diacritics, etc; Main principles: a separate le
8、tter for each distinctive sound, and the same symbol should be used for that sound in any language in which it appears.,2.3.2 Broad & Narrow Transcription,Broad transcription: letter- symbols only, used in dictionaries and textbooks for general purposes. Narrow transcription: letter- symbols with di
9、acritics, representing more fine details, used by phoneticians.,2.4 Classification & Description of English Speech Sounds,2.4.1 Classification of English Speech Sounds Vowels: those speech sounds that pass through the mouth without any obstruction Consonants: those sounds that are impeded, obstructe
10、d or constricted in some form or another,2.4.2 Description of Consonants,The air stream through the vocal tract must be obstructed at some place in some way in order to articulate a consonant. Consonants can be classified in accordance withthe place of articulation the manner of articulation,Place o
11、f articulation: the point where a consonant is made. Practically consonants may be produced at any place between the lips and the vocal folds.,active articulators V. S passive articulators,Bilabial: lips brought together to cause obstruction, p b m wLabiodental: the lower lip is brought into contact
12、 with the upper teeth, f vDental: between the tongue tip or blade and the upper front teeth, T D Alveolar: the tongue tip is brought into contact with the upper teeth-ridge, t d s z n l r,Postalveolar: the tongue tip and the back of the alveolar ridge, S Z tS dZ Palatal: the front of the tongue and
13、the hard palate, j Velar: back of the tongue brought into contact with the soft palate, k g N Glottal: vocal cords are brought together, h,Manner of articulation: the ways in which articulation can be accomplished: the articulators may close off the oral tract for an instant or a relatively long per
14、iod; they may narrow the space considerably; or they may simply modify the shape of the tract by approaching each other.,Stops/plosives: air stream first obstructed and then release, p b t d k gFricatives: partial obstruction and local friction, f v s z T D S Z hAffricates: first complete obstructio
15、n, then friction with partial obstruction, tS dZ,Nasals: air allowed to pass the nose, m n NLateral: the air stream is obstructed along the center of the oral tract, so that the air-stream can go through the mouth laterally, l Approximant: very narrow passage between the lips and causing slight nois
16、e from the local obstruction, j w r,English consonants can be described in the following manner: p voiceless bilabial stop b voiced bilabial stop s voiceless alveolar fricative z voiced alveolar fricative,Case Anylysis,2.4.3 Description of Vowels,In terms of the position of tongue (which part of ton
17、gue maintained the highest)Hight high/ mid/ lowFrontness/ backness front/ central/ back In terms of the lip shape rounded/ unrounded In terms of the duration (tension)Tense vowel: long vowelLax vowel: short vowel e.g. i: high front tense unrounded vowel,Classification of Pure Vowels,Principles for c
18、lassification: The position of the highest part of the tongue (front, central, back) Front vowels: i: I e Central vowels: 3: Back vowels: O: u: U A: V, The height of tongue raising (open, open-mid, close-mid, close) Open vowels: A: Open-mid vowels: e VClose-mid vowels: I 3: O: U Close vowels: i: u:,
19、 The length or tenseness of the vowel (tense vs. lax or long vs. short)Tense (or long) vowels: i: 3: A: O: u: Lax (or short) vowels: I e V U, The shapes of the lips (rounded vs. unrounded) Rounded vowels: O: u: U Unrounded vowels: i: I e A: V 3: ,Vowel Chart,open,front,central,back,open-mid,close-mi
20、d,close,I ,u: ,U , V, O:, ,e , ,A:,a, 3:, i:,2.5 Models of English Pronunciation,IPA has many models, and recently two models are more and more popular. They are RP & GA.RP：Received Pronunciation GA：General American,RP (Received Pronunciation) It is the pronunciation described by Doctor Daniel Jones
21、 as the “Public School Pronunciation”, which is a pronunciation mostly heard in the everyday speech of Southern Englishmen, who have been educated at the great public boarding-schools. This pronunciation began to be called RP in 1926.,GA (General American) It is commonly called American English, whi
22、ch is the general accent of most American regions except several states in East and South of the USA.,Differences between RP and GA,The main differences between RP phonetic transcription and GA phonetic transcription lie in vowel transcription.,Listen and study the differences between RP and GA.,* T
23、he same transcriptions in GA & RP,President and Colleagues, The UN must come of age. It must become the visible and credible expression of the globalization of politics. The modern world insists we are dependent on each other. We work with each other or we suffer in isolation. The principles of the
24、UN have always had a moral force. Today they receive the sharper impulse of self-interest. The terrorist attacks in Britain on 7 July have their origins in an ideology born thousands of miles from our shores. The proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons will never be halted outside
25、of an international consensus to do so.,2.6 From Phonetics to Phonology,2.6.1 Phonetics and Phonology Distinction Phonetics: of a general nature, studies all speech sounds in all human languages Phonology: how speech sounds in a language form patterns and how these sounds are used to convey meaning.
26、 e.g. clear l and dark , same entity, but phoneticians are only interested in the difference, phonology functions as distinguishing between words and meanings,2.6.2 Phone, Phoneme and Allophone,Phone: phonetic unit or segment, e.g. p in “spit” and p in “pit” Phoneme: a phonological unit, it is an ab
27、stract unit, put in slashes, /p/ Allophone: different phones which can represent a phoneme in different phonetic environments are called the allophones of the phoneme, e.g. clear l and dark are the allophones of the phoneme /l/,/phoneme/phone phone phone allophone, Complementary distribution Phoneti
28、c similarity,2.6.3 Phonemic Contrast, Complementary Distribution, and Minimal Pair,Phonemic contrast: contrast of two distinctive phonemes, /p/ and /b/ in pit and bit Complementary distribution: allophones of the same phoneme occurring in different phonetic environments, e.g. clear l and dark Minima
29、l pair: Two different forms are identical in every way except for one sound segment which occurs in the same place in the strings, pill and bill, till and kill, kill and dill,2.6.4 Coarticulation,When simultaneous or overlapping articulations are involved, the process is called coarticulation. If th
30、e sound becomes more like the following sound, as in the case of lamb, it is known as anticipatory coarticulation. If the sound shows the influence of the preceding sound, it is perseverative coarticulation, as is the case of map.,The fact that the vowel in lamb has some quality of the following nas
31、al is a phenomenon we call nasalization. To indicate that a vowel has been nasalized, we add a diacritic to the top of the symbol , as .,p is aspirated in peak and unaspirated in speak. This aspirated voiceless bilabial stop is thus indicated by the diacritic h, as ph, whereas the unaspirated counte
32、rpart is transcribed as p.,2.6.5. Phonological Processes, Phonological Rules & Distinctive Features,2.6.5.1 Assimilation,Nasalization, dentalization, and velarization are all instances of assimilation, a process by which one sound takes on some or all the characteristics of a neighboring sound. If a
33、 following sound is influencing a preceding sound, we call it regressive assimilation. The converse process, in which a preceding sound is influencing a following sound, is known as progressive assimilation.,English Fricative Devoicing,/v/ f /z/ s etc. voiced fricative voiceless / _ voiceless Nasali
34、zation rule:-nasal +nasal / _ +nasal Dentalization rule:-dental dental / _ dental Velarization rule:-velar +velar / _ +velar,2.6.5.2 Epenthesis, Rule Ordering and Elsewhere Condition,a hotel, a boy, a use, a wagon, a big man, a yellow rug, a white house an apple, an honor, an orange curtain, an old
35、lady Epenthesis (Insertion) Rule:,Plurals in English,a. The appears after voiceless sounds. b. The appears after voiced sounds. c. The appears after sibilants./ / voice, C _ (Devoicing) / +sibilant _ (Epenthesis),Rule Ordering,The Elsewhere ConditionThe more specific rule applies first.,2.7. Suprase
36、gmentals,Suprasegmental features are those aspects of speech that involve more than single sound segments.,2.7.1 The Syllable Structure,Onset RimeNucleus Codak r k t,Open syllable: bar, tie Closed syllable: bard, tiedEnglish Syllable: (C)C)C)V(C)C)C)C) Chinese syllable: (C)V(C)Maximal Onset Principl
37、e (MOP) When there is a choice as to where to place a consonant, it is put into the onset rather than the coda.,2.7.2 Stress,Stress refers to the degree of force used in producing a syllable. In transcription, a raised vertical line is often used just before the syllable it relates to. A basic disti
38、nction is made between stressed and unstressed syllables, the former being more prominent than the latter, which means that stress is a relative notion.,1. da d da d da d,2. d da d da d da,3. da d d da da d,4. d da dada da dda da d,5. d da da d d da,6. da d da da d da d da da,7. d da da da d da da d
39、a d,8. d dad da dada da d,Word stress is concerned with the stress of individual words of two or more syllables when they are pronounced in isolation. Phrase and sentence stress refer to the stress that falls on certain word or words semantically important in a phrase or sentence.,RP laBORatory DEBr
40、is GARage,GA LABoratory deBRIS gaRAGE,RP vs. GA,Verb conVICT inSULT proDUCE reBEL,Noun CONvict INsult PROduce REbel,V vs. N,BLACKboardWHITEhouse,black BOARDwhite HOUSE,Compound vs. Phrase,Primary vs. Secondary Stress,unsatisfactory discrimination standardization communication industrialization,Sente
41、nce Stress,In general situations, content words are normally stressed while structural words are unstressed. In principle, stress may fall on any word or any syllable.,John bought a red car. JOHN bought a red car. John BOUGHT a red car. John bought A red car. John bought a RED car. John bought a red
42、 CAR.,2.7.3 Pitch, Tone and Intonation,Pitch is defined as the frequency of vibration of vocal cords. Tone refers to pitch variations which can distinguish meanings like phonemes. Chinese is a typical tone language. Change of tone can certainly change the meaning.,Intonation: the “melody” of speech,
43、 the changing pitch of the voice, or the rise and fall of the voice.,Intonation,the falling tonethe rising tonethe fall-rise tonethe rise-fall tone,Dialogue: Mr. Clark Hello, Lily. Waitress Hello, Mr. Clark. Youre early for lunch. Its only eleven oclock. Mr. Clark When I come later, theres usually n
44、othing left. Waitress What would you like today? Mr. Clark Ill have the leg of lamb. Waitress And would you like salad? The salad plate today is lettuce, tomatoes, and black olives. Mr. Clark Marvelous！I love olives. Waitress And what would you like to drink? Mr. Clark A glass of lemonade, please. A
45、nd a slice of melon for dessert. Waitress Would you like the lemonade now? Mr. Clark Later, thanks, Lilywith the lamb.,2.8 Task,Discuss the following questions in groups : Explain with examples how broad transcription and narrow transcription differ? How are English consonants classified? What crite
46、rias are used to classify the English vowels? How do phonetics and phonology differ in their focus of study? Who do you think will be more interested in the difference between, say, l and , p and p, a phonetician or a phonologist? Why? What is a phone? How is it different from a phoneme? How are all
47、ophones related to phoneme? What are suprasegmental features? How do the major suprasegmental features of English function in conveying meaning?,Mommy told me something A little kid should know Its all about the devil And I learned to hate him so She said he causes trouble When you let him in your r
48、oom Hell never ever leave you If your heart is filled with gloom So let the sunshine in Face it with a grin Smilers never lose And frowners never win So let the sunshine in Face it with a grin Open up your heart and let the sunshine in When you are unhappy The devil wears a grin But oh he starts to run in When the light comes prowling in,
