English Phonetics and Phonology

<A Practical Course> by Peter Roach [SUMMARY]

(including some extra material taken from ‘A Course in English Phonetics for
Spanish Speakers’ by Diana Finch and Héctor Ortiz)

1. INTRODUCTION

The theoretical context in which material about speech sounds and how they are
used in language is presented is called phonetics and phonology.

Sounds representing vowels and consonants are called phonemes. It is important

to learn to think of English pronunciation in terms of phonemes rather than letters
of the alphabet because of the confusing nature of English spelling.

Stress could be roughly described as the relative strength of a syllable, and

intonation as the use of the pitch of the voice to convey meaning.

Differences of accent refer to pronunciation differences only.

2. THE PRODUCTION OF SPEECH SOUNDS

2.1 Articulators above the larynx.

Muscles in the larynx produce many different modifications in the flow of air from
the chest to the mouth. After passing through the larynx, the air goes through what
we call the vocal tract, which ends at the mouth and nostrils. Here the air from the
lungs escapes into the atmosphere.

The different parts of the vocal tract are called articulators, and the study of them is
called articulatory phonetics.
i) The pharynx is a tube which begins just above the larynx. At its top end it
is divided into two, one part being the back of the mouth and the other
being the beginning of the way through the nasal cavity.

ii) The velum or soft palate is often raised so that air cannot escape
through the nose. The velum is one of the articulators that can be
touched by the tongue.

iii) The hard palate is often called the roof of the mouth. Its surface is
smooth and curved.

iv) The alveolar ridge is between the top front teeth and the hard palate. Its
surface is covered with little ridges.

v) The tongue is, of course, a very important articulator and it can be

moved into many different places and different shapes.
 vi) The teeth (upper and lower) are in contact with the tongue to make
dental sounds.

vii) The lips can be pressed together, brought into contact with the teeth, or
rounded to produce different sounds.

The seven articulators described above are the main ones used in speech.

2.2 Vowel and consonant.

Although these two words are very familiar, they are not easy to define exactly:

The most common view is that vowels are sounds in which there is no obstruction
to the flow of air as it passes from the larynx to the lips.

However, some English sounds that we think of as consonants, such as /h/ in ‘hall’
and /w/ in ‘wall’, do not obstruct the flow of air more than some vowels do.

Furthermore, different languages have different ways of dividing their sounds into
vowel and consonant using different criteria.

On the other hand, it is possible to establish the difference between vowels and
consonants in another way. This is by looking at the different contexts and
positions in which these particular sounds can occur. This study is called the
distribution of sounds.

Even though there are many interesting theoretical problems connected with the
vowel-consonant distinction, for the rest of this course it will be assumed that the
sounds are clearly divided into vowels and consonants.
Difference between close and open vowels & front and back vowels:

We begin the study of English sounds by looking at the vowels. We need to know
in what ways vowels differ from each other. The first matter to consider is the
shape and position of the tongue. In the first place, the vertical distance between
the upper surface of the tongue and the palate. And in second place, the part of the
tongue, between front and back, which is raised highest.

i) When we make a vowel like the /i:/ in the English word ‘see’, the tongue is held

up close to the roof of the mouth. Now, if we make an /æ/ vowel (as in the word

‘cat’), the distance between the surface of the tongue and the roof of the mouth

is now much greater. The difference between these two vowels is a difference

of tongue height, and we will describe /i:/ as a relatively close vowel and /æ/ as

a relatively open vowel.

ii) In making the two vowels described above, it is the front part of the tongue that

is raised. We could therefore describe /i:/ and /æ/ as comparatively front

vowels. By changing the shape of the tongue we can produce vowels in which a

different part of the tongue is the highest point. A vowel in which the back of the

tongue is the highest point is called a back vowel. If you make the vowel in the

word ‘calm’, which we write phonetically as /ɑ:/, you can see that the back of

the tongue is raised. Compare this with /æ/ in front of a mirror; /æ/ is a front

vowel and /ɑ:/ is a back vowel. The vowel in ‘too’ /u:/ is also a comparatively

back vowel, but compared with /ɑ:/ it is close.

Phoneticians need a very accurate way of classifying vowels, and have developed

a set of vowels, arranged in a close-open, front-back diagram, which are not the

vowels of any particular language. These cardinal vowels are a standard reference

system. By learning these vowels you are learning about the range of vowels that

the human vocal apparatus can make, and also learning a useful way of

describing, classifying and comparing vowels.

It is useful to think of the cardinal vowel framework like a map of an area of country

where vowels represent the ‘extremes’ of vowel quality. Therefore, it is important to

know where the edges of the map are drawn.

We have now looked at how we can classify vowels according to their tongue
height and their frontness and backness. There is another important variable of
vowel quality and that is lip-rounding.

i) Rounded, where the corners of the lips are brought towards each other and
the lips pushed forwards.

ii) Spread, with the corners of the lips moved away from each other as for a
smile.

iii) Neutral, where the lips are not noticeably rounded or spread. The noise
most English people make when they are hesitating (written ‘er’) has neutral
lip position.

2.3 English short vowels

The symbols for these short vowels are: ɪ, e, æ, ɒ, ʊ, ʌ, ə. Short vowels are only
relatively short; since vowels can have quite different lengths in different contexts.

/ɪ/ Advanced, half-close. The lips are slightly spread. Example words: ‘bit’, ‘pin’,

‘fish’.

/e/ Front, mid. The lips are slightly spread. Example words: ‘bet’, ‘men’, ‘yes’.

/æ/ Front, between half-open and open. The lips are slightly spread. Example

words: ‘bat’, ‘map’, ‘cat’.

/ɒ/ Back, open, slightly rounded. Example words: ‘pot’, ‘gone’, ‘cross’.

/ʊ/ Retracted, half-close. Slight lip-rounding. Example words: ‘put’, ‘pull’, ‘push’.

Front Central Back

Advanced Retracted
Close

Half-close

Mid

Half-open

Open

Classification of the English vowels

/ʌ/ Central, between half-open and open. The lip position is neutral. Example

words: ‘but’, ‘some’, ‘rush’.

/ə/ Central, mid. Lips unrounded. Example words: ‘sister’, ‘ago’, ‘sanity’.

3. LONG VOWELS, DIPHTHONGS AND TRIPHTHONGS.

3.1 Long vowels.

The first to be introduced here are the five long vowels; these are the vowels that
tend to be longer than the short vowels in similar contexts, considering that the
length of all English vowel sounds varies very much according to context and the
presence or absence of stress. To remind you that these vowels tend to be long,
you will find the vowel symbol plus a length- mark made of two dots ː. Thus, we
have: iː, ɑː, ɔː, uː, ɜː.

/iː/ Front, between close and half-close. The lips are slightly spread. Example

words: ‘beat’, ‘mean’, ‘peace’.

/ɑː/ Back, open, unrounded. Example words: ‘card’, ‘half’, ‘pass’.

/ɔː/ Back, mid, rounded. Example words: ‘board’, ‘torn’, ‘horse’.

/uː/ Back, between close and half-close. Lips rounded. Example words: ‘food’,

‘soon’, ‘Luke’.

/ɜː/ Mid, central. Lips unrounded. (The lip position is neutral!). Example words.

‘bird’, ‘fern’, ‘purse’.

It is important to remember that the length mark is used not because it is essential
but because it helps learners to remember the length difference between long and
short vowels. However, you can see that all these vowel symbols would still be
different from each other even if we omitted the length mark. Additionally, long and
short vowels have differences in quality (resulting from differences in tongue shape
and position, and lip position) as well as in length.

3.2 Diphthongs

There are eight diphthongs in RP (received pronunciation). They consist of a

movement or glide from one vowel to another. In terms of length, diphthongs are
like the long vowels. It is important to remember that in all diphthongs the first part
is much longer and stronger than the second part. That is to say, as the glide from
the first letter to the second one happens, the loudness of the sound decreases.
Therefore, the last part of English diphthongs must not be made too strongly.
However, you must remember that a vowel which remains constant and does not
glide is called a pure vowel.
The easiest way to remember all eight diphthongs is in terms of three groups
divided as in this diagram:
The centring diphthongs glide towards the ə (schwa) vowel.

The closing diphthongs have the characteristic that they all end with a glide

towards a closer vowel. Three of the diphthongs glide towards ɪ and two glide

towards ʊ.

English closing diphthongs English centring diphthongs. ‘F’ shows

usual finishing area in final position.

Classification of the English diphthongs

Diphthongs can be classified into wide or narrow & closing or centring:

i) According to the distance the tongue travels they can be articulatorily
labeled ‘wide’ –when the glide is long- and ‘narrow’ –when the glide is
short.
 ii) Depending on the direction of the movement the tongue makes in
producing diphthongs, they can be articulatory classified into ‘closing’
and ‘centring’.

The following is a list of brief articulatory labels:

/eɪ/ Narrow, front-closing. Glide starting at RP /e/, moving in the direction of RP

/ɪ/.

/əʊ/ Narrow, back-closing. Glide starting at RP /ə/, moving in the direction of RP

/ʊ/.

/aɪ/ Wide, front-closing. Glide starting from open retracted position, moving in

the direction of RP /ɪ/.

/aʊ/ Wide, back-closing. Glide starting approximately at RP /ɑ/, moving in the

direction of RP /ʊ/.

/ɔɪ/ Wide, front-closing. Glide starting between half-open and open, moving in

the direction of RP /ɪ/.

/ɪə/ Centring. Glide starting approximately at RP /ɪ/, moving to mid-central in

non-final position, and to the more open variety of RP /ə/ in final position.

/eə/ Centring. Glide starting from half-open, moving to mid-central in non-final

position, and to the more open variety of RP /ə/ in final position.

/ʊə/ Centring. Glide starting approximately at RP /ʊ/, moving to mid-central in

non-final position, and to the more open variety of RP /ə/ in final position.

3.3 Triphthongs

A triphthong is a glide from one vowel to another and then to a third, all produced
rapidly and without interruption.
The triphthongs can be looked on as being composed of the five closing
diphthongs described above, with ə added on the end. Thus we get:

eɪ + ə = eɪə (layer, player) əʊ + ə = əʊə (lower, mower)

aɪ + ə = aɪə (liar, fire) aʊ + ə = aʊə (power, hour)
ɔɪ + ə = ɔɪə (loyal, royal)