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Intro to Linguistics
Table of Contents
Unit 2 Overview: Phonetics: Exploring Language Sounds
2.1 Articulatory phonetics and speech production
2.2 Acoustic and auditory phonetics
2.3 The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)
2.4 Classifying speech sounds

Articulatory phonetics explores how we produce speech sounds. It categorizes sounds based on how we shape our mouths and vocal tracts. This field helps us understand the mechanics behind our ability to communicate through spoken language.

Vowels and consonants are the building blocks of speech. By studying their unique characteristics and production methods, we gain insight into the intricate system of human speech and the diversity of sounds across languages.

Articulatory Phonetics

Vowels vs consonants

  • Vowels produced with open vocal tract allowing continuous airflow typically voiced (a, e, i, o, u)
  • Vowels characterized by formants visible in spectrograms as horizontal bands
  • Consonants produced with vocal tract obstruction restricting airflow (p, t, k, s, m)
  • Consonants can be voiced or voiceless appearing as noise or silence in spectrograms

Classification of consonants

  • Place of articulation refers to where in vocal tract sound is made (bilabial, labiodental, dental, alveolar, postalveolar, retroflex, palatal, velar, uvular, pharyngeal, glottal)
  • Manner of articulation describes how airflow is modified (stops, fricatives, affricates, nasals, approximants, laterals)
  • Voicing indicates whether vocal folds vibrate during production (voiced vs voiceless)

Categories of vowels

  • Tongue height affects vertical position (high, mid, low)
  • Tongue advancement describes horizontal position (front, central, back)
  • Lip rounding involves lip shape (rounded, unrounded)
  • Vowel chart visually represents vowel positions using cardinal vowels and IPA symbols

Advanced Phonetic Concepts

Types of non-pulmonic consonants

  • Clicks use ingressive airstream found in some African languages (bilabial, dental, alveolar, lateral, palatal)
  • Implosives produced with glottalic ingressive airstream lowering larynx (bilabial, alveolar, palatal)
  • Ejectives use glottalic egressive airstream raising larynx (bilabial, alveolar, velar)

Role of suprasegmental features

  • Stress gives prominence to syllables through loudness, pitch, duration (lexical stress vs sentential stress)
  • Tone uses pitch to distinguish meaning in tonal languages (Mandarin, Thai, Yoruba)
  • Intonation involves sentence-level pitch variations conveying emotion and distinguishing statements from questions

Key Terms to Review (22)

Sentential Stress: Sentential stress refers to the emphasis placed on certain words within a sentence, which can change the meaning or focus of that sentence. It plays a crucial role in conveying information and emotion in spoken language, as different words can be stressed to highlight importance, indicate contrast, or signal a question versus a statement. This aspect of speech can significantly influence how listeners perceive and interpret the message being communicated.
Lexical stress: Lexical stress refers to the emphasis placed on certain syllables within words, which can affect the meaning or grammatical function of the words in a language. This phonetic feature is crucial for differentiating between words that are spelled the same but have different meanings, known as homographs, and can also influence the rhythm and intonation of spoken language.
Non-pulmonic consonants: Non-pulmonic consonants are speech sounds produced without the use of the airflow from the lungs, contrasting with the majority of consonants that rely on pulmonic egressive airstream mechanisms. These consonants can be classified into three primary types: clicks, implosives, and ejectives, each formed through distinct articulatory processes that do not depend on lung air pressure. Understanding these sounds is essential in classifying speech sounds across various languages and phonetic systems.
Tone: Tone refers to the variation in pitch of the voice that can convey different meanings or emotions in spoken language. It plays a crucial role in distinguishing words and phrases, especially in tonal languages, where the pitch pattern can change the meaning of a word entirely. This variation is an essential aspect of speech sounds, influencing how we interpret and understand communication.
Intonation: Intonation refers to the variation of pitch while speaking, which can signal different meanings, emotions, or grammatical structures. It plays a critical role in how sentences are interpreted, as changes in pitch can indicate whether a statement is a question, an assertion, or an expression of surprise or excitement. This pitch modulation is key for conveying nuances and emotional undertones in spoken language.
Suprasegmental Features: Suprasegmental features refer to the elements of speech that extend beyond individual phonetic segments, such as consonants and vowels, and include aspects like intonation, stress, and rhythm. These features are crucial in conveying meaning and emotion in spoken language, influencing how listeners perceive and interpret utterances. Understanding suprasegmental features helps to analyze speech patterns and recognize their impact on communication.
Lip rounding: Lip rounding refers to the articulation feature where the lips are rounded or protruded during the production of certain speech sounds. This characteristic can significantly affect the quality of vowels and some consonants, impacting how they are perceived in spoken language. Different languages use lip rounding in various ways, which contributes to their unique phonetic inventories and can also serve to distinguish meaning between similar sounds.
Tongue Advancement: Tongue advancement refers to the position of the tongue in the mouth relative to the roof of the mouth during the production of speech sounds. It is a key feature in classifying vowels, as different advancements produce different vowel qualities. This positioning can range from front to back, influencing the acoustic properties of the sounds produced.
Cardinal Vowels: Cardinal vowels are a set of reference vowels that represent distinct points in the vowel space, used to describe and classify vowel sounds across languages. They serve as a standard system for linguists to discuss vowel articulation based on specific tongue positions and lip shapes, making it easier to compare sounds from different languages.
Vowel chart: A vowel chart is a visual representation that displays the various vowel sounds used in a language, typically arranged according to their articulatory features such as height, backness, and roundedness. This chart helps linguists and language learners understand the relationships between different vowel sounds, aiding in the classification of speech sounds based on their phonetic properties.
Tongue height: Tongue height refers to the vertical position of the tongue during the articulation of vowel sounds, indicating how high or low the tongue is in the mouth. This feature is essential for classifying vowels, as it plays a crucial role in distinguishing between different vowel qualities and can affect how vowels are perceived and produced across various languages.
Articulatory phonetics: Articulatory phonetics is the branch of phonetics that studies how speech sounds are produced by the movement of the vocal tract, including the lips, tongue, and vocal cords. This area focuses on the physical aspects of sound production and classifies speech sounds based on their articulatory features. Understanding articulatory phonetics helps in analyzing how different languages produce unique sounds and the mechanics behind them.
Clicks: Clicks are a type of consonantal sound produced by creating a closure in the oral cavity and then releasing it, which creates a distinctive popping sound. These sounds are mainly found in various African languages, such as Xhosa and Zulu, and serve as important phonemes that can change the meaning of words. Understanding clicks involves looking at their unique articulatory properties and how they fit into the broader classification of speech sounds.
Stress: Stress refers to the emphasis placed on certain syllables within words or on certain words within sentences, affecting how they are perceived and understood. It plays a crucial role in speech production, influencing articulation and prosody, and is essential for differentiating meanings in various contexts. Understanding stress helps classify speech sounds and reveals phonological rules that govern pronunciation patterns.
Implosives: Implosives are a type of consonantal sound that occurs when airstream is pushed into the oral cavity while the vocal cords are closed. This unique articulation involves the downward movement of the larynx, creating a closure in the vocal tract, and is commonly found in languages such as Sindhi and Hausa. Their distinctiveness lies in the way they contrast with other stops, contributing to the phonemic inventory of various languages.
Ejectives: Ejectives are a type of consonant sound produced by creating a closure in the vocal tract, followed by a simultaneous upward movement of the larynx to increase pressure, which is then released to produce the sound. This unique manner of articulation distinguishes ejectives from other types of sounds and is found in several languages, particularly those in the Caucasus region and parts of Africa. They are characterized by their glottal closure and the burst of air that follows when the closure is released.
Vowels: Vowels are speech sounds produced without significant constriction or blockage of airflow in the vocal tract, allowing them to be voiced and creating a clear resonance. They serve as the nucleus of syllables and are crucial for distinguishing meaning in languages. Understanding vowels is essential for analyzing how speech is produced, represented in phonetic alphabets, and classified in terms of their articulatory properties.
Manner of articulation: Manner of articulation refers to how airflow is restricted or modified as it passes through the vocal tract during the production of speech sounds. This aspect plays a crucial role in distinguishing different types of consonants and vowels, impacting how they are perceived and categorized in various languages.
Consonants: Consonants are speech sounds produced when airflow is obstructed in some way by the articulators in the vocal tract. They play a crucial role in the phonetic structure of languages, forming the building blocks of syllables and impacting the rhythm and intonation of speech. Understanding consonants is essential for analyzing how sounds are articulated, represented in writing systems like the IPA, and classified based on various phonetic features.
Place of articulation: Place of articulation refers to the specific location in the vocal tract where a consonant sound is produced, determined by the interaction of the active articulator (like the tongue or lips) and the passive articulator (such as the hard palate or alveolar ridge). This concept is crucial for understanding how different speech sounds are formed, classified, and represented in writing systems, influencing both phonetic transcription and phonological analysis.
IPA: The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system of phonetic notation designed to represent the sounds of spoken language in a consistent and standardized way. By using unique symbols for each sound, it allows linguists to accurately transcribe the pronunciation of words across different languages, facilitating the study of both acoustic and auditory aspects of phonetics, as well as the classification of speech sounds and the distinction between phonemes and allophones.
Voicing: Voicing refers to the vibration of the vocal cords during the production of speech sounds. It distinguishes between sounds produced with vocal cord vibration, known as voiced sounds, and those produced without it, termed voiceless sounds. This distinction is crucial for understanding various aspects of phonetics, including how sounds are articulated, perceived acoustically, and represented in writing systems.