Session 1

 Branch of linguistics that studies the characteristics

of human sound making, especially those sounds
made in natural speech. It provides methods for the
description, classification, production, combination
and representation by written symbols.

 The phonetic level is concrete (the phonological level

will be abstract) and it’s not a proper linguistic
science but a physical science.

 The unit of phonetics is the phone which is a speech

segment which possesses distinct physical or
perceptual properties, which are not meaningful.
Every time a speech sound is produced it is slightly
different from other utterances, so we have a new
phone, but they do not represent different meanings.
 Branch of linguistics that deals with the way speech
sounds behave in particular languages.

 Of the wide range of sounds that the human vocal

apparatus can produce and which are studied by
phonetics, only a relative small number are used distinctly
in a language. These sounds are organized into a system
of contrasts which are analyzed by phonology.

 The unit of phonology is the phoneme, the minimal

contrastive unit of speech which produces a change in
meaning.

 Allophone: distinct production of the same phoneme

provoked by its position in the word, that does not change
the meaning when they it is interchanged.
 Phonemic transcription:
- Phonemes
- Slant brackets / /

 Phonetic transcription:
- Allophones
- Square brackets [ ]

“pit”: / pɪt / vs. [ p ǐt ]

h
 Before the glottis:
- Diaphragm
- Lungs
- Trachea or Windpipe

 The glottis

 Resonating cavities
Vocal Folds
a) The pharynx

b) The soft palate (or velum)

c) The mouth
 Fixed organs:
- Teeth
- Palate: - Alveolar ridge
- Hard palate
- Soft palate
- Uvula
 Movable organs:
◦ - Lips
◦ - Tongue: Tip, blade, front, centre, back, root, rims
◦ - Lower jaw
 Nature of the air stream:
Pulmonic / Non-pulmonic
Egressive / Ingressive

 Action of the vocal folds:

Voiced / Voiceless

 Position of the soft palate:

Nasal / Oral
 Stricture in the resonating cavities
Vocalic / Consonantal

a) Vowel: - Position of the tongue

- Opening of the mouth
- Shape of the lips
- Length of the sound

b) Consonant: - Point of stricture

- Type of stricture
 According to this, the articulation of vowels is
not restricted. Vowels are sounds in which
there is no obstruction to the flow of air as it
passes from the larynx to the lips.

 On the contrary, consonants are sounds in

which the air finds a difficulty or even it’s
impossible to pass through the mouth.
 In the middle, there will be semi-vowels or semi-
consonants which won’t allow the air to pass
without obstruction, but whose stricture is as
slightly as to behave the same to perform the
action of a vowel.

 So, phonologically, they behave like consonants

in that they do not appear at the centre of
syllables (a feature shared by all vowels), but at
the edges. This ambiguity – vowel-like by nature,
consonant-like in behaviour - is also reflected in
their traditional name of semi-vowels
(sometimes also semi-consonants).
 Tongue height: - Close
- Open
- Close-mid or open-mid

 Frontness vs. backness of the tongue: - Front

- Back
- Central

 Lip rounding: - Rounded

- Spread
- Neutral

 Length: - Long
- Short
 Phonation or voicing: - Voiced
- Voiceless

 Place of articulation: - Bilabial - Palato-alveolar

-Labiodental - (Retroflex)
- Dental - Palatal
- Alveolar - Velar
- Glottal

 Mode of articulation: - Plosive - Nasal

- Fricative - Lateral
- Affricate - Trill
- Approximant (Semi-vowels)