phonetia del ingles

8/10/2019 PHONETIa Del Ingles

1/25

1

TEMA 7 :SISTEMA FONOLOGICO DE LA LENGUA INGLESA I : LAS VOCALES.

1. INTRODUCTION 1.1. PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY 1.2. SPEECH PRODUCTION AND THE ORGANS.

2. THE ENGLISH VOWEL SYSTEM 2.1. ENGLISH PURE VOWELS 2.2. THE ENGLISH DIPHTONGS 2.3. THE ENGLISH TRIPHTONGS

3. ENGLISH VS SPANISH AND CATALAN VOWEL SYSTEMS.3.1. DIFFICULTIES FOR SPANISH SPEAKERS 3.2. DIFFICULTIES FOR CATALAN SPEAKERS

4. CONCLUSION 5. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Once the main topics of the unit have been exposed, let's start with the INTRODUCTION: Every language is based on a finite number of sounds selected from all the possible sounds

that human beings can articulate. These sounds are called PHONEMES.

Many things have been said about phonemes, Jones, following a physical point of view,regards a phoneme as a family of sounds which are related in character and determined by

neighbouring sounds in words. On the other hand, Bloomfield, following a functional theory,

affirms that the phoneme is the minimal sound unit by which we differentiate meanings. In

any case, there are two categories of sound: the segmental, that studies the basic sound

segments, vowels and consonants; and the suprasegmental or prosodic, which are vocaleffects that take place over more than one sound segment; that is stress, rhythm, intonation.In this unit, we will deal with the segmental one, and more concretely with the vowel system.

In order to develop all these facts regarding to the study of sound, we can find two different

but at the same time related sciences : PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY.

Phonetics, is the science concerned with the study of speech processes, including the perception, transmission and reception of speech sounds, from both an acoustic and a

psychological point of view, but excluding linguistic considerations. By contrast, the main


2/25

2

aim of phonology is to discover the rules, which organise sounds into a language system. Orusing Pick's words. ' Phonetics gathers raw material, phonology cooks it.'

Once we have defined these terms, let's move on to the study of the SPEECH PRODUCTIONAND THE ORGANS that take place on it . The fact is that both, phonetics and phonology requireas their source data, a human being with an intact auditory mechanism and a functional

speech apparatus. As the most widely used description of speech sounds are articulatory, we

will study this more carefully.

I'd like to say that making a speech sound relies firstly on a mental impulse to do so and then

there are three physical stages involved in its production:

? Initiation: this is the provision of air to make the sound? Phonation: that refers to the channelling of energy to make the sound (quality of voice)? Articulation: that refers to the shaping of the sound.

These physical stages need the help of what we call SPEECH ORGANS. In fact, The key tounderstanding sounds lies in familiarity with these organs and how they function, so we will

now examine them individually. Let's start with the LUNGS. We use air from the lungs to

speak, we do it while we are breathing. In fact, most speech sounds are produce when we

breathe out.

Once the air has been expelled, we need CAVITIES OR RESONATORS in order to produce the

sounds inside and permit the articulation. These resonators are the PHARYNX, which contains

the vocal folds; the NOSE and the MOUTH. Although the mouth could be considered as one of

the most important cavities, we shouldn't forget that vowels are generally voiced and louder

than consonant sounds and they use both, the mouth and the nose for their articulation.

In order to finish with the speech production process we need some organs to give shape to

the sounds. These organs are what we call ARTICULATORS. The first articulator we find when

expelling the air from the lungs are THE VOCAL FOLDS. They are the two bands of elastictissue of coluch protected by the larynx. During speech they adopt three main positions:

? Wide open and not vibrating: to produce unvoiced sounds

? Close together and vibrating : to produce voiced sound

? Tightly shut with air locked up behind them : preparatory to glottal stop production.


3/25


4/25

4

? Open vowels: where the tongue is held as low as possible. In this group we can find/a:/ (long a) as in hard, and / ? / (turned c) as in hod.

At the same time, and according to the PART OF THE TONGUE WE RAISE, we can find a new

division into:

? Front vowels, where the front of the tongue moves towards the hard palate, as the /i:/in heed or the / I/ in hid .

? Back vowels, where the back of the tongue performs this action as the /u:/ in shoe orthe / ? :/ in saw.

? Central vowels, where the central past of the tongue is raised as in / ? :/, in bird and

/? / in the.

Finally, LIP POSITION, refers to the fact that, in some vowel production, lips can be protruded

accompanied by a rounding. In this case we find what we call rounded vowels. All the backvowels belong to this group, in fact front round vowels do not exist in English. The rest, are

what we call unrounded vowels in which the lips are spread or in neutral position.

In order to finish with this point, we could say that other facts, like Chomskian tenseness andlaxness, nasalization or length could be also observed when talking about vowelsclassification. Among them the most used would be LENGTH that divide vowels into longvowels like /a:/ in bar , and short vowels, like /e/ in pet.

Let's move on to the study of the ENGLISH VOWEL SISTEM in detail. In order to analysethe English vowel system, we will use the standard English or RP, that stands for Received

pronunciation. This is a variety of the language that is received through the mass media, that

originally referred to the neutral accent sound at the court and in public schools. Nowadays

this accent is not as important as it was, but all sounds in the phonological system are based

on it. These are the PURE VOWELS IN ENGLISH ? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER1 /i:/ Closed front long unrounded

? ee ? free

? e ? even

? ea ? bear

? ie ? siege

? ei/ey ? receive key

? i? machine

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS: People, quay, precise, geyser

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER2 /I/ Half-closed front short unrounded? i ? miss ? y ? city ? e ? pretty


5/25

5

? ie ? ladies ? a ? village

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS Build, Sunday, Women lettuce

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER3 /e/ half open front unrounded? e ? less ? ea ? bread ? a ? many

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS Says, Bury Geoffrey Leicester

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER4 /? / Open front short unrounded? a ? sat

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS Plait, plaid

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER5 /a:/ Open back long unrounded? a ? pass

? ar ? part

? ear ? heart

? er ? clerk

? al ? calm

? au? aunt

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS vase

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER6/? / Open back short rounded? o ? dock

? a ? was

? ou? knowledge

? au? because

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER7/? :/ Half-open back long rounded? or ? horse

? aw? saw

? ou? bought

? au? cause

? a? all

? ore ? before

? oor ? door

? oar ? boar

? our ? four

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER8 /? / Half-closed back short rounded? u ? put

? o ? wolf

? oo ? good

? ou? could

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS Worcester, worsted

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER9 /u:/ Closed, back, long, rounded? oo ? food

? o ? do

? ou ? group

? u ? rude

? ew ? chew

? ue ? blue

? ui ? juice

? oe ? shoe

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER10 /? / Half open central short unrounded? u ? sun

? o ? son

? ou ? country

? oo ? blood flood

? oe ? doe

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER11 /? :/ Half-closed central long unrounded? ir ? bird

? yr ? myrtle

? er ? her

? ear ? earth

? ur ? turn

? or ? word


6/25

6

? our ? journey

ANOMALOUS SPELLINGS colonel

? ENGLISH VOWEL NUMBER12 /? / Central. This vowel can represent all the vowelsof the alphabet and many of its combinations when they occur in an unstressed position.

? a ? woman

? e ? gentlemen

? i ? possible

? o ? seldom

? u ? subside

The fact is that the schwa /? /, that is the technical name that linguists have given to thevowel 12, is very much in common to the point that follows: WEAK AND STRONGFORMS.

As I have said in the beginning of this point, vowels are studied from the RP and in a stressed

pronunciation, which is with their STRONG FORM. Nevertheless, the sound schwa confirms the

existence of a lenis representation of the same word, or what we call WEAK FORMS. Then,

weak forms do not refer so much to vowels in them but to weak form of vowels when theyare found in unstressed position. Nevertheless, weak forms go beyond vowels to name those

words that are pronounced in an unstressed manner.

Many of the most common English words, including both, content words and structuralwords, can appear in a strong or a weak form. Although it's true that nearly all are structuralsuch as conjunctions, articles, pronouns, prepositions, and the anomalous finites also called

defective verbs. Generally the strong forms of these words are used when they are being

directly quoted, when they are being contrasted or if they appear at the end of a sentence. The

pronunciation of a weak form can be so different from the strong one that is barely

recognisable as being the same word. If said in isolation, it would be all, but intelligible.

Usually it's the context that makes it understandable.

It is possible to use only strong forms in English, and some non-native speakers do exactlythis. However it sounds very unnatural to a native speaker and will also mean that a person,

who only uses strong form of English, will have trouble understanding native speakers of

English, who use the weak form all the time.

And that's all regarding to strong and weak forms. With this I have finished with pure vowelsin English. Let's move on now to the study of ENGLISH DIPHTHONGS AND


7/25

7

TRIPHTONGS. I will start with the diphthongs.

DIPHTHONGS are those sounds that consist of a movement or glide from one vowel toanother. The first part of a diphthong is always longer and stronger than the second part; as

the sound glides into the second part of the diphthong the loudness of the sound decreases.

One of the most frequent errors made by language learners is to use pure vowels instead of

diphthongs. In English we have two kinds of diphthongs: the CLOSING DIPHTHONGS that are

/a? / as in time, /e? / as in ape, /? ? / as in boy; /? ? / as in oak; and /? ? / as in house. Andreceive this name due to the tongue's movement from a more opened to a more closed

position. And in the other hand we have what we call CENTRING DIPHTHONGS, that receive

this name because the movement of the tongue is towards the centre. These diphthongs are:

/?? /as in dear, /?? / as in care and /? ? / as in poor.

Besides of this, the English vowel system also have TRIPHTHONGS, that arethose sounds that consist of a movement or glide from one vowel to another

and then onto a third. They are very similar to diphthongs, but have an extra

schwa on the end of the diphthongs. There are said to be only five

Triphthongs, but there are a number of occasions when diphthongs meet

other vowels over word edge boundaries. The five clear exa mples of

Triphthongs are as follows:

And that's all regarding to diphtongs and triphtongs, and with this I conclude the study of the

English vowel system. Now it's time to COMPARE THIS SYSTEM WITH THESPANISH AND THE VALENCIAN ONE.The first striking difference is that there are 12 pure vowels in English, 7 in Valencian and

just 5 in Sp. Castillian. In any case there is no coincidence among any of the phonemes that is

Sp. Castillian vowels and Valencian vowels do not correspond exactly to the English ones.

Nevertheless this proportion is reversed with diphthongs where Valencian and Sp. Castillian

have more diphthongs than English.

Another important thing is the importance of central vowels in English, that do not exit in

Spanish and only have a little reference in Valencian with the / ? / in pare / 'p? ? ? / or mare

/ 'm? ? ? / in Barcelon . In any case it's not enough to solve this difficulty. The only


8/25

8

advantage that valencian speakers can have over Sp. Castillian ones is that they are more used

to the concept of half-open and half-closed. Remember that in valencian we have the open

and close /e/ and open and close /o/. Due to these difficulties Spanish and Valencian speakers

at their first stages of learning use to assimilate english sounds into their own. Then, i.e. they

will pronounce /i/ as in hilo , both for this /? ? ? / and these /? ?? /. Making the same

pronunciation.When Spanish speakers deal with long vowels they tend to pronounce them

with a /r/ ending /k ? ? / instead of / ?? : / for car , and so on.

In order to solve these problems, teachers should aim their pupils to practice pronunciation

with specific exercises or other activities that could improve the speakers confidence, such as

listening, songs, videos etc.

And with this I've finished the body of this topic. Now, I would like to CONCLUDE bysaying that the knowledge of the English vowel system, its pronunciation and particularities

are essential in order to acquire a good level in English language, not only for understanding

but also or producing our own speech segments. That is why we should emphasise more on it,

when learning or teaching English as a target language. In my opinion, phonetics and

phonology may be the best tools to become a real English speaker.

As far as the BIBLIOGRAPHYis concerned, I have mainly used the next sources,? Gimson An Introduction To The Pronunciation Of English Arnold 1985

? Jones An Outline Of English Phoneticcs Heffer 1960

? Mott A Course In Phonetics And Phonology For Spanish Learners Of English PPU 1991

? IPA (International Phonetics Association) : www.ipa.org


9/25

9

ADDITIONAL MATERIALS

ENGLISHVOWEL CHART

COMPARATIVE CHART SPANISH- VALENCIAN-ENGLISH


10/25

10

UNIT 8 : SISTEMA FONOLOGICO DE LA LENGUA INGLESA IILAS CONSONANTES

6. INTRODUCTION 7. THE ENGLISH CONSONANT SOUNDS. TERMINOLOGY 8. CONSONANT ARTICULATIO N

8.1. PLACE OF ARTICULATION 8.2. MANNER OF ARTICULATION

9. THE PHONETIC TABLE 10. ENGLISH VS SPANISH AND CATALAN CONSONANT SYSTEMS.11. CONCLUSION

12.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Once the main topics of the unit have been exposed, let's start with the INTRODUCTION: Every language is based on a finite number of sounds selected from all the possible sounds

that human beings can articulate. These sounds are called PHONEMES. In order to develop all

these facts regarding to the study of sound and the phonemes, we can find two different but

at the same time related sciences : PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY. Phonetics, is the scienceconcerned with the study of speech processes, including the perception, transmission and

reception of speech sounds, from both an acoustic and a psychological point of view, but

excluding linguistic considerations. By contrast, the main aim of phonology is to discoverthe rules, which organise sounds into a language system.

The fact is that both, phonetics and phonology require as their source data, a human beingwith an intact auditory mechanism and a functional speech apparatus. The SPEECH ORGANS

are: the LUNGS, to breath the air; CAVITIES OR RESONATORS to produce the sounds inside and

permit the articulation. These resonators are the PHARYNX, the NOSE and the MOUTH. And the

organs to give shape to the sounds: the ARTICULATORS. That are THE VOCAL FOLDS. , THETONGUE., PALATE and the LIPS.

Once the topic has been introduced, Let's move on now to the study of point number 2, THEENGLISH CONSONANT SYSTEM. Sound is produced by the interference of the flow ofair through the mouth (and nose). Consonants are created when that airflow is directly

restricted, or obstructed, so that air cannot escape without creating friction that can be heard.


11/25

The speech sound being obstructed can be voiced or unvoiced. It can be obstructed in a

number of different places in the vocal tract. The nature of the obstruction can take a number

of forms, or manners. And all this will define the final sound. Defining characteristics of

consonants include:

VOICED AND VOICELESS: The level of vibration of the vocal cords determines whether asound is voiced or unvoiced. If the vocal cords are apart, then air can escape unimpeded.

Sounds produced in this way are said to be voiceless . However, if the vocal cords are very

close together, the air will blow them apart as it forces its way through. This makes the cords

vibrate, producing a voiced sound.

Voiced consonants in English are:/b, d, g, v,? , z, r, ? , ?? , l, m, n,? ,j, w/Voiceless consonants in English are: /p, t, k, f,? , s, h,? , ?? /

Nevertheless we can assist to a case of devoicing. Plosive, fricative and affricate consonantsthat are voiced may become slightly devoiced when they are in final position. So that,

although sat will always be distinguished from sad a fortis -lenis oppositional classification

can aid in the study of phonetics.

FORTIS & LENISFortis sounds are those that are made with strong muscular effort, originatingin the lungs. Lenis is the opposite. Try whispering /pig/ and then /big/. You can still

differentiate the two because the intensity of the burst of air is greater for /p/ than for /b/ In

English, the fortis/lenis distinction happens to duplicate the voiced/voiceless one found in

MINIMAL PAIRS.(pairs of words that are pronounced the same less one phoneme pig/big) So

all the voiced sounds are lenis and all the voiceless sounds are fortis sounds.

ASPIRATION: the plosives /p/ /t/ /k/ are strongly aspirated in accented syllables e.g. come

/? ? ? ? / take /?? ??? / put /? ? ? ? /

ASSIMILATION: Assimilation is when one sound is influenced and changed by a neighbouringsound. Generally speaking, there are three types of assimilation that can be identified;

assimilation of place, manner or voice.

? Assimi lation of place can be demonstrated by /ratbag/ or /oatmeal/ where the /t/ sound is

replaced by a /p/ sound. This is because the alveolar plosive /t/ is simplified into the /p/

sound which is closer to the bilabial plosive /b/.


12/25

? Assi milation of manner refers to when two different manners of articulation influence

each other to form a different type of manner of articulation. Examples of this are the

pronunciation of /indian/ as /inj ? n/ or the pronunciation of /soldier/. This is because the

plosive /d/ combines with the approximant /j/ to form an affricate.

? Assimilation of voice is illustrated by the pronunciation of /have to/ with an /f/ sound

rather than the /v/ as the voiced fricative is followed by a voiceless consonant.

NEUTRALISATION With some pairs of sounds, it is not always clear which of the two soundsis being articulated. It is as if it lay between the two distinct sounds. This intermediate sound

is known as neutralisation. The most common examples of neutralisation in consonants are

/b/,/d/ and /g/ with their voiceless equivalents /p/,/t/ and /k/. Also it is sometimes difficult to

hear the contrast in the sounds /s/ and /z/.

With this, I've finished point number 2, let's move on now to the study of THECONSONANT ARTICULATION in depth. I will start by the PLACE OF ARTICULATION.After the air has left the larynx, it passes into the vocal tract. Consonants are produced by

obstructing the airflow through the vocal tract. There are a number of places where these

obstructions can take place. These places are known as the ARTICULATORS. They are:

? BILABIAL: If both of the lips are used to articulate a sound, then it is said to be a bilabial sound. Examples of bilabial sounds include: /p /,/b / and /m /.

? LABIO-DENTAL: Two sounds use the lower lip together with the upper teeth and so arecalled labio-dental consonants. These sounds are:/f / and /v /.

? DENTAL: The two 'th' sounds of English are formed by forcing air through the teeth. If you

say the /? / in /thin/ and then the /? / sound in /then/, you can feel the air being forced

through the teeth. The tongue tip and rims are articulating with the upper teeth.? ALVEOLAR : An alveolar sound is when the tongue tip, or blade, touches the bony

prominence behind the top teeth. The following sounds are alveolar:/ t/,/d /,/s /,/z/,/l/,/ n/.

? POST-ALVEOLAR : the front of the tongue comes into contact with the rear part of thealveolar ridge. /r/

? PALATO-ALVEOLAR : Four sounds are said to be palato-alveolar. This is partly because the blade of the tongue straddles both the alveolar ridge and the front of the hard palate as air


13/25

is forced through to make The following sounds: The / ? /in sheep. The / ? /in genre. The

/?? / in cheap. And the / ? ? /in jeep.

? PALATAL: This is the hard bit of the arched bony structure that forms the roof of themouth. The /j / sound in yes is the clearest example of a palatal sound in RP.

? VELAR : The soft palate is toward the back of the mouth. It is where the roof of the mouthgives way to the soft area behind it. The velar sounds are usually made when the back of

the tongue is pressed against the soft palate. They include the /k/ in cat, the /g/ in girl and

the / ? / in hang.

? GLOTTAL: Glottal sounds are those sounds that are made in the larynx through the closureor narrowing of the glottis. /h/ as in Helen is an example of a glottal sound. It is physically

impossible to feel the process using your tongue. It is as far back as you can get in your

mouth. The glottal stop /?/ is becoming a more widespread part of British English, but isstill uncommon in R.P.

As you can see, depending on the place of articulation we will have one phoneme or another.

Nevertheless, sometimes, we can find ALTERATIONS IN THE PLACE OF ARTICULATION of a

phoneme depending on the adjacent sounds. These variations are called ALLOPHONES.

Allophones are just for phonemic transcription and are represented into brackets [] for

instance, phoneme /t/ has among others the following allophones[ ?? ] aspirated as in tea; [?? ]

with nasal release as in curtain [?? ] dental as in eighth .

As well as indicating the place of articulation, it is also necessary to determine the nature and

extent of the obstruction involved. The type of obstruction is known as the MANNER OF

ARTICULATION. An example of this can be found by looking at the following words: ninedine l ine. They all begin with voiced, alveolar consonants. Yet, they are all clearly different

in both sound and meaning. The kinds of constriction made by the articulators are what make

up this further dimension of classification. :

? PLOSIVE: Plosive sounds are made by forming a complete obstruction to the flow of airthrough the mouth and nose. The first stage is that a closure occurs. Then the flow of air

builds up and finally the closure is released, making an explosion of air that causes a sharp

noise. Note that a plosive cannot be prolonged or maintained. Once the air has been

released, the sound has escaped. The plosive sounds in RP are: /p/ /b/ /t/ /d/ /k/ /g/


14/25

? FRICATIVE: A fricative is the type of consonant that is formed by forcing air through anarrow gap so that a hissing sound is created. Typically air is forced between the tongue

and the place of articulation for the particular sound. Try it yourself. Say the /f / in fin, the

/? / in thin and the / ? / in shin. You should be able to feel the turbulence created by the

sounds. It is possible to maintain a fricative sound for as long as your breath holds out.

This is very different from a plosive sound. Other fricatives include the /v / in van, the /s /

in sin, the /h / in hat, the / ? / in that, the /z / in zoo and the / ? ? / sound in genre.

? AFFRICATES: An affricate is a plosive immediately followed by a fricative in the same

place of articulation. The / ?? / in chap and the / ? ? / in jeep are the two clear affricates in

English. If you think about it, the / ?? / sound is made up from the plosive /t / and the

fricative / ? / sounds.

? NASAL: A nasal consonant is a consonant in which air escapes only through the nose. Forthis to happen, the soft palate is lowered to allow air to pass it, whilst a closure is made in

the oral cavity to stop air escaping through the mouth. You can feel if a sound is a nasal

sound or not by placing your hand in front of your mouth and feeling if any air is escaping

or not. There are three nasal sounds in English. The /m / in mat, the/n / in nasal and the

/? / in sing.

? LATERAL: To produce a lateral, air is obstructed by the tongue at a point along the centreof the mouth but the sides of the tongue are left low so that air can escape over its sides. /l/

is the clearest example of a lateral sound in English. Both the clear and dark allophones of

/l/ are lateral sounds. When an alveolar plosive is followed by the lateral /l/, then what

happens is that we simply lower the sides of the tongue to release the compressed air,

rather than raising and lowering the blade of the tongue. If you say /bottle/ to yourself you

can feel the sides of the tongue lower to let out the air.

? APPROXIMANTS: these may be called frictionless continuants. The organs of speech arenot brought close enough together to cause turbulence and audible friction. There are 4

approximants in English: /l/, which is also lateral. /r/, and the semivowels /w/ and /j/. We

have three different phenomena Regarding to the /r/, in English:

Silent r: in RP, before consonants or in final position it is not pronounced, but servesto make the previous vowel long

Pronounced r : in RP it's pronounced in final position when the next word begins

with a vowel. E.g. near /? ?? / ? near enough /??? ? ?? ?? ? /. This is also called

linking r.


15/25

Intrusive r: this sound does not represent a letter, but it's inserted into a sequence, e.g. I saw it, /? ? '? ? ???? /

And that's all regarding to point number three. In order to facilitate the comprehension of the

explained above please observe the following PHONETIC TABLE according to Mott'stheories:

PLOSIVE FRICATIVE AFFRICATE NASAL APPROXIMANT VOICELESS/VOICED VCLS VCD VCLS VCD VCLS VCD VCLS VCD VCLS VCD BILABIAL ? ? ? ? LABIO-DENTAL ? ? DENTAL ? ? ALVEOLAR ? ? ? ? ? ? POST-ALVEOLAR ? PALATO -ALVEOLAR ? ? ?? ? ? PALATAL ? VELAR ? ? ? ? GLOTTAL ? ?

Once we know how the English consonant system works it's time to study the

COMPARISON AMONG THE ENGLISH CONSONANT SYSTEM, THE SPANISHAND THE VALENCIAN ONE. If sounds in a target language are physically similar to

those in the source language, and they combine and are distributed similarly, the learner won'thave any problem. Problems arise when there are no similar phonemes or that these phonemes

are found in different combinations. That is why in order to develop this point I am going to

analyse the consonant systems of the three languages: English, Spanish and Catalan.

The English consonant system has 24 phonemes; the Spanish 20 and the Valencian has 23.

Unfortunately not every phoneme as an identical correspondence in the other two languages,

and this fact can create some difficulties to students. Besides of this the consonant clusters,groups of consonants together in the speech are no t always the same. In this point I will try to

clarify these difficulties.

If we have a look to the PLOSIVES, we will see that the three languages have identical phonemes. The difference between them is that Spanish and Valencian do not have /b/ /d/or

/g/ in word final position. And /p/ /t/ /k/ are not aspirated before a stress vowel as it occurs in

English. /t/ and /d/ are alveolar in English, but Dental in Spanish and Valencian.


16/25

The FRICATIVES AND AFFRICATES are better understandable for Valencians than for Spanish

Castillian.. Valencian recognises phoneme / v/ as in canviar or veure . Also the / z/ in rosa or

the affricates /? / /? / / ?? / / ? ? /: xocolata , joc, jordi, potser dotze... Main problems Spanish

speakers have with these consonants are in the realisation of the /? / /? /, as this phoneme does

not exist in Spanish, students tend to do it as an /s/, or in general words, SpC. Speakers

pronounce the unvoiced equivalent of the English affricates.

The phonemes /h/ and / ? / are also problematic for these languages inter-comprehension.

Spanish and Valencian do hot have the aspirated h, (unvoiced glottal fricative) and they use to

pronounce it with the most similar phoneme they have that is the unvoiced velar fricative / ? /.

So English students of Spanish in caja would pronounce / kaha/ instead of /ka ? a/. And the

other way round, SpC. And Vlc, would pronounce / ? i/ instead of /h I/ when pronouncing the

personal pronoun he.

NASALS, LATERALS AND APPROXIMANTS do not represent very big problems, because BothSpanish Castillian and Valencian are very similar to English. The most problematic features

would be the / ? ? / in rosa or carro has more friction that the /r/ in rose .

Let's go now to analyse the CONSONANT CLUSTERS. In order to do this we will differentiate

among INITIAL CLUSTERS, if they are at the beginning of a word, MEDIAL CLUSTERS, if they

appear in the middle and FINAL CLUSTERS, when they are produced in the end of a word.

INITIAL CLUSTERS of two consonants are similar among the three languages, except in thecase op /s/ + consonant; which is not present in Spanish nor Valencian and causes an

epenthetic /e/ to be inserted in e.g. speak /es'pik/, instead of /'sp Ik/. This epenthetic /e/ alsoappears in the combination of /? , ? , ? , ? / + /r/ . The first two sounds do not exist in Spanish

and /t/ and /d/ are dental instead of alveolar, then is quite difficult for them to produce theses

sounds correctly. Epenthetic /e/ also appears in initial three-consonant clusters, because

Neither Spanish nor Valencian have this combination: spray /es'pre I/.

Concerning MEDIAL CLUSTERS, we have to say that although the English and the Valenciansystem are very similar, there are several differences wit the Castillian Spanish clusters..


17/25

Spanish tends to assimilate the final consonant of a syllable with the first consonant o the

following syllable, this is the case of submarino, examen, Israel etc.

FINAL CLUSTERS of consonants are common in English and Valencian. Valencian has severalfinal clusters of 3 and even 4 syllables, e.g. Alps, llests triomfs, texsts. Nevertheless Spanish

do not have that kind of combination, then Spanish speakers will find many problems to

pronounce e.g. sprinkled. Surely they will drop final d and would pronounce something

simmilar to /es'prinkel/.

After developing all these facts it seems that Valencian speakers, due to the particularities of

their language would have less difficulty than Spanish speakers to pronounce English

correctly. Nevertheless, we as teachers must help our students teaching them how to

pronounce correctly helping them with pronunciation techniques, listening, speech etc.

Finally I would like to CONCLUDE by saying that the knowledge of the English consonantsystem, its pronunciation and particularities are essential in order to acquire a good level in

English language, not only for understanding but also or producing our own speech segments.

That is why we should emphasise more on it, when learning or teaching English as a target

language. In my opinion, phonetics and phonology may be the best tools to become a real

English speaker.



? Mott A Course In Phonetics And Phonology For Spanish Learners Of English PPU 1991

? IPA (International Phonetics Association) : www.ipa.org

? Guia De Fonemes I Al.lofons Del Valenci www.geocities.com/soho/caf/9308/afi.htm

UNIT 9 SISTEMA FONOLGICO DE LA LENGUA INGLESA III.

ACENTO, RITMO Y ENTONACIN

1. INTRODUCTION.


18/25

2. SUPRASEGMENTALFEATURES. STRESSR HYTHM ANDINTONATION 3. STRESS

3.1. Word Stress in English3.2. Sentence Stress or Accent

4. R HYTHM

4.1. Weak Forms5. INTONATION 5.1. The Functions of Intonation5.2. The Meanings of the Tunes

6. ENGLISHVS SPANISH& CATALANSUPRASEGMENTALSYSTEM.7. CONCLUSION 8. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Once the main topics of the unit have been exposed, let's start with the INTRODUCTION: there are two categories devoted to the study of sound: the segmental, that studies the basicsound segments of the spoken language, vowels and consonants. And the suprasegmental orprosodic, which are vocal effects that take place over more than one sound segment; that isstress, rhythm, intonation. In this unit, we will deal with the suprasegmental one. Regardingto the suprasegmental features of sound, we have to say that stress, rhythm and intonation are

not separate ideas, but facets of connected speech.

Let's go now to analyse the SUPRASEGMENTAL FEATURES: STRESS RYTHM AND

INTONATION. At the same time we pronounce the segments of spoken language, ourspeech is altered in some other ways. The voice force may change producing a whole range of

effects. The basic psychoacustic properties of sound are the source of the main linguistic

effects: pitch and loudness.

These effects combine with those arising out of the distinctive use of speed and rhythm and

are called prosodic or suprasegmental features. When we speak we give more prominence to

some parts of an utterance than to other. Stress, rhythm and intonation have to do with the perception of this emphasis.

Physiologically speaking, STRESS is increased air pressure from the lungs. In general we can

see it as a linked with emphasis. Some syllables are more prominent than others e.g. father is

stressed on the first syllable and in I like it the word like is stressed. Stress is very important in

English. In fact, English is considered a stress-timed language, because stress marks the step

of its sentences. This differentiates English from Spanish, which is a syllable-timed language,as we will see onwards.


19/25

R HYTHM is the regularity of the prominent syllables in speech. Or using more technicalwords the pattern formed by peaks of prominence as they are distributed in an utterance. The

basis of rhythm in English speech is the loudness.

Finally, INTONATION is the association of the relative prominence to a series of factors suchas pitch movement, loudness and tempo. Thus stress rhythm and intonation are closely

connected.

Let's move now to pint number 3 in which I'm going to analyse the STRESS in depth.According to Jones, Str ess is the force with which a sound or syll able is uttered ; then it isessential in order to create a rhythm and even the correct comprehension of a word or

sentence. In English then, we differentiate among stressed syllables, unstressed syllablesand even a secondary stress.

Mott observed that In English, STRESSEDSYLLABLES are longer than unstressed ones. Thevowels are more voiced and even short vowels are pronounced with more weight, as if they

were longer. Although stress is not marked in the English spelling system, it can be

transcribed phonetically with an upper mark placed before the stressed syllable e.g. syllable

/'sIl? bl/. In long words there may be a less emphatic stress, called SECONDARY STRESS. It istranscribed by a lower case mark before the syllable affected.

UNSTRESSED SYLLABLES suffer the other way round, that is a weakening effect that provokes

a little shortening and neutrality in vowels as in gentleman /' ?? ?????? ? / and a devoicing in

consonants.

Note that Incorrect stress on syllables is an obstacle to communication. For example in

Spanish if a foreign learner mis-stresses cenicero placing the stress on the second syllable the

listener may mis-hear and mentally substitute by plumifero or centimetro or any other word

with the same stress pattern. In English we have the same thing, if we as students of English

as target language pronounced effort stressing the second syllable instead of the first one, it

could be confused with afford or any other word with the same pattern.


20/25

Let's study now the WORD STRESS IN ENGLISH. In words of more than one syllable, oneat least of those syllables wont be stressed, and one of them will receive primary stress. In

Spanish and Valencian, the rules are simple, and exceptions are marked in orthography. In

English the rules are complex because this syllable is not marked and not constant; e.g. not all

three syllable words are stressed on the same syllable : foll ower, dis co ver, after noon. In anycase I am going to provide a generic rule to facilitate the comprehension of English Stress,

depending on the number of syllables, the effect of the affixes, functional variations, and the

compound words.

? TWO-SYLLABLE WORDS: In general, a short vowel or light syllable (a short vowelfollowed by one consonant) is not stressed. So, if a word has a long vowel or a heavysyllable (a short vowel followed by two consonants), then this will receive primarystress. E.g. mo ther, pa nic, fa mous, elect , can oe , par ade . Exceptions are found to thisgeneral rule in some nouns and adjectives: e.g. ye llow, fe male, ho nest

? THREE-SYLLABLE WORDS: as above, the final syllable with a long vowel or heavy, willget the stress (and secondary stress often falls on the first syllable). E.g. perse vere,

compre hend . Again nouns and adjectives provide exceptions: at ten tion. If the final

syllable is not heavy, the antepenultimate one is stressed, e.g . com munist, in dustry.

? POLYSYLLABIC WORDS: stress on the final syllable is uncommon in these words. As

above, penultimate syllable stress is normal if it's heavy and antepenultimate if it is not.

E.g. combi na tion, A me rica. Polysyllabic words are often composed of a root and one or

more affixes, so that is more useful to classify them according to these rather than as

separate groups.

? THE EFFECT OF THE AFFIXES: PREFIXES do not generally affect the word they areattached to, although they may take a secondary stress if the primary one isn't adjacent e.g.

'legal / 'ilegal (no secondary stress ) ; em'ployed/'unem,ployed (secondary stress). Prefixes,which have primary stress on them, are: re- pre- post- pro- anti- ex- and those that havea clear meaning. Talking about SUFFIXES we have to say that some of them do not affect

the stress of the root, this is the case of -(e)s -(e)d -ing -er -able -lessor -ly among others.Other suffixes move the primary stress onto themselves; this is the case of -ee -eer -ette, -oon -ain (verbs) among others. Finally there are suffixes that move the primary stresstowards them. This is the case of -ic, -al or -ion; e.g. eco nomy/eco nom ic;

po litics/po l i tical; i l lustrate/illus tr a tion .


21/25


22/25

the concept of the rhythmic group is based on stress in connected speech, so that any given

group may consist of an alternation of weak and strong syllables. E.g. What 's the date to day ?.

Rhythm and the alternation of stressed and unstressed words links with the strong and WEAK

FORMS. Except in cases where a form word is emphasised or contrasted for semantic purposes, it is not stressed and often even weakened. This weak form is the regular

pronunciation and the strong form is not often used. Generally the strong forms of these

words are used when they are being directly quoted, when they are being contrasted or if they

appear at the end of a sentence. Weak forms are a manifestation of stress & rhythm in English

and must not be avoided in teaching or the learner will sound unnatural in connected speech.

Having finished with rhythm, it's time to analyse the INTONATION. The messages that weconvey to one another depends just as much on how we say something as on what it is that we

actually say. Phonetics and phonology study the mechanics of articulating sounds. However,

it is possible to use the same words to convey a huge variety of meanings, moods or

intentions. The way we do this is by using intonation.

In the study of intonation, pitch, loudness and length are the most important factors. They

work together to give certain syllables prominence over the others. The concepts of intonation

are very closely related to those in stress, the difference being that stress is concerned with

individual words, whereas intonation extends over a phrase or utterance.

Pitch is an auditory sensation that places sounds on a scale from high to low. Every syllablehas pitch, however, any syllable that is articulated with a noticeably different pitch will be

deemed to carry stress. This can go either way: if all the syllables are said in a low pitch

except one, then that higher pitch syllable will be deemed to carry the stress of the word.

In order to talk about Intonation there are some terms used in describing the melodies or tunes

of intonation:

? FALL/RISE: these describe where the pitch change goes to: fall ? ; rise ? ? HIGH /LOW: these describe where the tune starts, thus a high-rise tune will start high and

go higher.

? THE INTONATION UNIT: In brief we should consider the following divisions:PRE-HEAD: this is the unstressed syllables before the head. These are often low in pitch.


23/25

? Clauses: when we arrived it was snowing.

? Subject & predicate: my teacher is British.

? Relative non-defining clauses: the mirror, which was antique, was broken.

HEAD: this is all stressed syllables before the nucleus. They often move down in steps

until the nucleus.

NUCLEUS: this is the accented syllable.

TAIL: this is the unstressed syllables after the nucleus. In a falling tune, they stay low, and

in a rising one they continue to rise.

Let's analyse now THE FUNCTIONS OF INTONATION. The importance of intonation in

communication of meaning is basic and unquestionable. It can convey not only a difference

between question and statement, purely by a change in pitch but it's used to communicate the

type and strength of an emotion using melody and range.

? ATTITUDINAL FUNCTION: this function reflects the attitude or emotional state of a personalong with speed of talking, loudness, paralinguistic gestures etc. If we consider the range

of responses possible to the statement " she's going to have a baby " a short answer such as

is she? Can convey a lack of interest with low fall; polite interest with a low rise;

surprising with a high rise, and disbelief or fascination with a high fall.

? GRAMMATICAL FUNCTION: Here intonation is used as a type of oral punctuation that mayor may not coincide with the actual graphemes. Pauses and rises mean that the utterance is

not completed, and thus we can divide up:

? ACCENTUAL FUNCTION: highlights the most important words in an utterance, with thehelp of stress and the nucleus or accented syllable. The nucleus comes with a change of

pitch: e.g. Jhn likes fish... (although his wife doesn't); John l kes fish.. (so why didn't heeat)

? DISCOURSE FUNCTION: this function tells us about what's new on information and what'snot, and again it's tied to stress. Brazil (1980) states that a rise indicates new information

while a fall refers back. E.g. this is my sister . She is a friendly person . ( Person refers to

sister so is an old information and it is de-stressed; the stress in now in friendly that is a

new information about my sister.)


24/25

That's all regarding to the functions of intonation. Now and in order to finish with this point

we will analyse THE MEANINGS OF THE TUNES:

? THE FALL: this tune is the most neutral tone. It's used for

a) Statements : he's English b) Wh-questions: What's the time? c) Commands: come here! d) Exclamations: What an idiot!e) Question tags: you don't like him, do you?

? THE RISE: the high rise is commonly used to elicit repetition, e.g. when did I go, orwhere ?. The low rise is used for:a) Yes/no questions:are you Spanish?

b) Wh-quest to show politeness: Where's your mummy? c) Expressing reassurance: he won't bite you.d) Dissagreeing: no, it isn't.

? THE FALL-RISE: this is extremely common in English, indicating pauses, reservation,hesitation etc. It is also used for:

a) Apologising: I'm sorryb) Expressing dif of opinion: I like whisky, Well, I don't.c) Irony : do you like her? I like him.

? THE RISE-FALL: this is very rare in English, but may be used to show complacency orcriticism

With this I've finished the development of stress rhythm and

intonation. Now it's time to COMPARE THE ENGLISHSYSTEM WITH THE CASTILLIAN SPANISH AND THE VALENCIAN SYSTEM.Regarding to stress & rhythm, the first striking consideration is that Spanish and Valencian, as

most Romance languages, are Syllable-timed languages, and English is a stress-timed one.

Spanish learners of English make every syllable count, and thus cannot find the typical

English rhythm, whereas English students of Spanish suffer the other way round.

Spanish word stress is not regular, that means that not all words of three syllables, for

example, will always have the stress on the same syllable. However, Spanish and Valencianhave three types of word stress: aguda llana/plana and esdrujula/esdruixola depending if the

FALL

RISE

FALL- RISE

RISE-FALL


25/25

stressed syllable is the final, the penultimate or the antepenultimate. And both Spanish and

Valencian have rules for graphic stress or tilde. English language lacks both, a ruled

classification and the graphic accent. The most difficult for Spanish students of English are

trying to accommodate the stress English pattern into the Spanish one.

In order to finish with this point, I would like to clarify that by means of Intonation, I would

like to say that in general, Spanish uses the rising tune mush more than English does in

questions. In addition, the fall rise pattern is rarely used both in Spanish and Valencian.

I'd like to CONCLUDEsaying that although it is important to know and produce correctly the

segments of speech, it is useless if we are not able of giving sense and feeling to our

utterances. This can be reached by means of the stress the rhythm and the intonation. Because

language, is not just a union of phonemes to form words and sentences. A language is also

feeling and expression.



? Mott A Course In Phonetics And Phonology For Spanish Learners Of English PPU 1991? IPA (International Phonetics Association) : www.ipa.org

? Guia De Fonemes I Al.lofons Del Valenci www.geocities.com/soho/caf/9308/afi.htm

phonetia del ingles

Documents