University of Education Lahore

Department of English

Course Title: ADVANCED PHONOLOGY

Programme: BS ENGLISH SEMESTER 8TH

Course Code: ENGL4134

Instructor Name: LUBNA YASIR

 History of Phonology
• Phonetics deals with all the possible human speech sounds – it is an
inventory of possibilities, as defined by the human vocal apparatus, or
the human perceptual system.

• Phonetics deals with what kinds of sounds humans can make.

Phonology, on the other hand, deals with what languages do with those
sounds
• – how they select certain sounds, how those sounds are fitted into
their environments, and how they are constructed into larger and larger
units, such as syllables, feet, words and so on.
 History of Phonology

Architecture and the study of building materials.

Architects design buildings, using materials that they choose, but the
nature of the materials determines what kind of use they can be put to.
For example, glass is a good material for windows, since it is
transparent, but it would make a poor material for a floor, since it is
easily breakable. On the other hand, sand would make a very poor
material for a wall, since it doesn’t cohere, and doesn’t support much
weight.
 History of Phonology

• Phonetics is like the study of the nature of the materials used

in building, while phonology is the study of the way in which
those materials are actually used to construct buildings.
• In much the same way, phonetics and phonology interact,
with phonetics being the study of the raw materials used to
create language, and phonology being the design principles
that languages use to take those raw materials and build
words out of them.
 Panini

•India 1000 centuries B.C.E.

•His work on Sanskrit was
surprisingly modern and systematic
•Phonology/phonetics was
explicitly dealt with
•Discovery of Panini's grammar
helped develop today’s linguistic
science .
 History of Phonology
• The Sixteen Century.
• Some of the first writers who work was concerned with the relation
between the sound of English and those of other languages were
• 1:- john Pal grave. Lesclarissement de la langue Francoyse 1530.
• 2:- William Salesbury. Dictionary in English Welshe 1547.
• 3:- Thomas Smith. Derectaet emendate linguae anglicae scrip tone
1568}.
• 4:- John Hart. Orthogaphie,1569.
• 5:- John Wallis. Grammatical linguae Anglicae 1563.
• A work of wider scope then is of Bishop John Wilkins work who wrote
Essay toward a real character and a Philosophical Language 1668.
 History of Phonology
• Christopher cooper. His work on English Pronunciation was first published
in 1685 grammatical linguae Anicanae, with an English
edition appearing in 1687.
• The Eighteen century:
• The eighteen century writers were deeply interested in the production of
dictionaries to stabilize and standardize the language. The dictionaries of
• 1:- Samuel Johnson 1755
• 2:- Thomas Sheridan 1780
• 3:- John Walker 1791
• Were a step towards developing phonetics & phonology.
Sir William Jones
British scholar, linguist, and lawyer
•Fluent in 7 languages by age 20
•Came to India as Supreme Court
Judge
•In 1786, announced:
…Sanskrit and the
European languages "have sprung
from some common source which,
perhaps, no longer exists"
•Set a trend for studying Sanskrit
as basis for the “Indo-European
language family”
Sir William Jones
 19th century development:
• During the nineteenth century phoneticians such as
• Henry Sweet,
• 2 Paul Passy,
• Whitney,
• Sievers and others discovered
• keys to phonetic description – sounds can be completely described with the
parameters of voicing, point, and manner of articulation (for consonants) and
the tongue positions and lip setting needed for vowels.
• It was in the late 1800’s that the International Phonetic Association was
founded, and these scientists began cataloging not only the major European
languages (French, German, English) but also looked at the lesser known ones.
Jan Baudouin de Courtenay’ contribution

• The first person to discuss this fact explicitly

was a Polish linguist named Jan Baudouin de
Courtenay. What he was trying to explain
was the fact that there is a difference
between what the articulators are actually
doing when we utter some word or phrase
and what speakers perceive they are doing
(and what hearers believe they hear).

Jan Baudouin de Courtenay.

Jan Baudouin de Courtenay’ contribution

• The other fact that was noticed was that units of a language appeared
to change in form under different circumstances of use. This could
vary from fairly unconscious changes (such as the fact that [s] often
changes to [∫]3 when we say Bless you) to much more obvious
ones such as the change in German from [a~] to [fI] when we make
German Haus ‘house’ plural: Häuser ‘houses,’ or the change from [~] to
[i] when we say the plural of foot.
Jan Baudouin de Courtenay’ contribution
• Baudouin’s idea was that we perceive and store sounds in one form,
but adjust that form when we actually speak according to a set of
phonetically-defined principles that he called ‘divergences’.
• He also argued that when we hear others speak, we subconsciously
‘undo’ those divergences, hearing, in some sense, what the speaker
intended to say – that is, what the speaker stored as well.
• Baudouin called the individual sound intentions ‘phonemes’.
19th Century Development: Modern Phonology

Baudouin’s work was published in 1895, and that, in some ways, can be
considered the beginning of modern phonology.
Over the first half of the Twentieth Century linguists in a
number of European and American centers developed the
concept of the phoneme in various different directions, some
of which were more compatible with the assumptions of
Cognitive Grammar than others.
 Henry Sweet
• English philologist and phonetician

• Authority on Anglo-Saxon and the history of the English

language (Oxford, England)

• Pioneer in modern scientific phonetics

• His History of English Sounds (1874) was a landmark study.

• Thought to be the model for “Professor Higgins” in G. B.

Shaw‟s play Pygmalion Henry Sweet
“Henry Higgins”
 Daniel Jones
• Professor at University College
London
• Used the term “phoneme” in the
modern sense
• Promoted the term “cardinal
vowel”
• A father of the IPA
• Suggested a two-parameter
diagram to visualize how vowels
are produced
• Popularized experimental phonetics
• Developed new alphabets for 1881 - 1967

African and Indian languages.

Lionel Logue (1880-1953)

• Australian “elocutionist” who worked with

speech defects
• Consultant to King George VI
• Featured in 2010 movie
Abbé Rousselot

1843 – 1924
An early innovator in
experimental phonetics
Professor with the College
of France
Rousselot cylinders
• Speech sounds and
• articulatory information were
recorded for analysis
• “It will be possible hereafter to
note the pronunciation of any
language, dialect, or idiom
whatever, without relying upon
the testimony of the ear, which
distinguishes but slight
differences between the modes
of speaking of several
individuals”
 The Prague School (1896-1982)
A group of linguists centered in Prague (and consequently
known as the Prague School) argued that psychological
explanations were not the job of the linguist, who had to
develop purely linguistic explanations, leaving the psychological
interpretations to others.

Classic references include Trubetzkoy (1968) and Jakobson

(1968). Their ideas of the phoneme were based very heavily on
the work of the great nineteenth century Swiss linguist
Ferdinand de Saussure, the founder of the school of inquiry
called Structuralism.
 Ferdinand de Saussure:Structuralism
Saussure, and later the Prague school believed
that it was as meaningless to compare the
phoneme /p/ in French with the phoneme
/p/ in English as it was to compare a size 15 shoe
with a size 15 jacket (even if there were
such a thing).
This stage was crucial in establishing phonology
as different from phonetics.

Ferdinand de Saussure
 Generative Phonology
• Although most famously known as one of the Brothers Grimm, Jacob
was also a linguist!
• He studied comparative Germanic Grammar taking into account several
old and modern languages, e.g. Gothic, Scandinavian languages,
English).
• Discovered Grimm's Law, the first law in linguistics concerning sound
change. The law identified a set of sound changes that had created
Germanic Languages from proto-Indo-European languages.
• Hypotheses strictly scientific and showed that language change is
systematic and not random.
• This Polish linguist drew a distinction between language (as a
structured system) and speech (as used by individuals).
Every language has its own ranking system:

• Proposed by Alan Prince and Paul Smolensky in opposition to

accounts like classic Generative Phonology where forms were derived
by ordered processes.
• It is a constraint based theory of phonology sharing the view with
generative phonology that every phonological structure has an input
(UR) and an output (SR), but proposes that these structures are acted
on by constraints, such as syllables must have vowels as nuclei.
• Every language has its own ranking system.
Every language has its own ranking system:

• The archiphoneme and similar constructs proposed by the European

structuralists.
• The classic American Structuralist work is Bloomfield (1933), and
arguments on many of these issues can be found in Joos (1966).
• The best-known textbook within this framework is Gleason (1961).
• It should be mentioned that there are other traditions surrounding
the phoneme, the best-known being the London school, represented
by the classic work Jones (1967).
Generative phonology

• The European and American Structuralists dominated phonological

theory until the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, when the Generative
revolution began to affect linguistic departments throughout the
world. Interestingly enough, a refugee from Nazi-occupied
• Prague, Roman Jakobson, who eventually ended up at Harvard
University, across the river from MIT, had a significant influence on
the development of the Generative version of phonology.
Generative Phonology:

• Noam Chomsky himself, with the

collaboration (without, incidentally,
the complete approval of Jakobson)
developed the branch of phonology
that could be roughly characterized
as Generative Phonology,
• the theoretical framework that
dominates most modern
phonological theory.

Noam Chomsky
 Noam Chomsky’s Contribution:
• The syntactic component of a grammar must specify, for each sentence,
a deep structure that determines its semantic interpretation and a
surface structure that determines its phonetic interpretation.
• Came into being in 1968 when Noam Chomsky and Morris Hall
published "The Sound Patterns of English", which describes how
phonemes have two forms: the UR (underlying form) and the SR
(surface form), which is the actual pronunciation.
• This was hugely influential in phonology!
• Generative grammar continues to be a major player in phonology today.
The Neogrammarians (Late 19th Century)
Ferdinand de Saussure (1854-1913)
• (Diachronic phonology is the study of language change over time, e.g
the work of The Neogrammarians, while Synchronic phonology is
focused on viewing a language at one point as a structured system).
• Government Phonology aimed to provide an account for phonological
phenomena by replacing the rule component of phonology with a
restricted set of universal principles and parameters, making a break
with classical generative approaches.
Natural Phonology: David Stampe

• David Stampe wrote his dissertation on

Natural Phonology.
• He contests the idea that the phonological
system is built on a system of rules and
instead says that phonological acquisition is a
matter of suppressing habits we are born
with.
• E.g Simplifying a cluster of consonants to
make it easier to pronounce.
• They placed the phoneme in the center of
their linguistic theory.
Today: Roman Jakobson,Nikolai Trubetzkoy

• Government phonology is still widely acknowledged in the UK,

whereas Optimality Theory has a wide following in North America.
• Jacob Grimm (1785-1865)
• Jan Baudouin de Courtenay (1845-1929)
• Optimality Theory 1991
Shift from generative phonology to Post-
Generative Phonology
• 1969-Group of linguists based at Leipzig university.
• Swiss linguist Ferdinand De Saussure widely acknowledged as the
founding father of modern linguistics.
• He championed the switch from diachronic phonology to synchronic
phonology.
• His "Course in General Linguistics" was published posthumously by
two of his students, and his ideas became more influential after he
died.
• He saw language as a formal and arbitrary system, which includes the
idea of the linguistic sign that paved the way for modern phonology.
 Post-Generative Phonology
• Post-generative theories and frameworks:
• Auto segmental Phonology
• Metrical Phonology
• Lexical Phonology
• Optimality Theory
References:

• (Cognitive Linguistics in Practice) Geoffrey S. Nathan - Phonology_ A

Cognitive Grammar Introduction-John Benjamins Publishing Company
(2008)
• Roach,Peter:English Phonetics and Ponology,4th Edition Cambridge
University Press
• Material adapted from Wikipedia.
THANKYOU!!!
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
Advanced Phonology
ENGL4134

(Phoneme and Allophones: Minimal Pairs,

complementary distribution, contrastive
distribution and free variation)
What is Phonetics

oStudy of human speech as a physical phenomenon

• Articulation
• Acoustics
• Perception
What is Phonology?

A field of linguistics that studies

• the distribution of sounds in a language
• the interaction of these sounds in language

The description of systems and patterns of sounds that occur in a language.

Concerns of Phonology

• Segmental phenomena
• Phoneme and Allophones
• Sound-change rules and ordering
• Supra-segmental phenomena
• Syllabification
• Stress
• Intonation
• Other Co articulation Features
Example Phonology
❑Syllable
• m + æ̃ : = m æ̃ : ‫میں‬
Phonetics • b+ ɑ: + t ̪ = b ɑ: t̪ ‫بات‬
• m+ ə+ t̪ = m ə t̪ ‫مت‬
• m , t̪ , b , n, f, h • ɑ: m
• ɑ: , ə, æ̃ :, æ • k ɑ: (r)----car
• h ɑ: f-------half
• b æ t------bat
• m æ b-------man
❑Stress
• p a:k ɪs t̪ɑ̃:n

❑Intonation
• p a:k ɪs t̪ɑ̃:n?
• p a:k ɪs t̪ɑ̃:n!
• p a:k ɪs t̪ɑ̃:n.
Phoneme-A unit of meaning

• A minimal unit of sound that serves to distinguish meaning between words

• Phonemes are the set of sounds we store in our lexicon

• “The smallest distinct sound unit in a given language: e.g.

• ‫ کام‬ka:m bet
• ‫ نام‬na:m set
• ‫ شام‬ʃa:m net

• The first phoneme of each word in the above mentioned examples is different and is causing a semantic
change in the words.
Phoneme-A unit of meaning
• Phonemes are defined by their function within the
language system. This function is basically one
of meaning differentiation.
• Consider the following sentence:
‫آپ کا نام کیا ہے؟‬
/a:p ka: na:m kija: hæ/
• If we change the first consonant of the word ‫نام‬, it
gives a different meaning
‫آپ کا کام کیا ہے؟‬
/a:p ka: ka:m kija: hæ/
A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that serves to distinguish
meaning between the words.
ENGLISH PHONEMES
QUADRILATERAL VOWEL CHART

FRONT CENTER BACK FRONT CENTER BACK

FRONT CENTER BACK FRONT CENTER BACK
What is Allophone

• Different phonetic realization of the same sound

Allophone (cont..)

• Examples from English

• Cool /k u:l/
• Tilt /t ɪlt/
• Lady / leɪdi:/

• Top [thɒp]
• Stop [s tɒp]
• Little [ lɪɾl̩ ]
• kitten[kɪtʔn̩ ]
Phoneme vs. Allophone

Phoneme is the mental representation of a sound whereas

allophone is different phonetic/physical representation of the
same sound/phoneme

Think of some examples from Urdu

Allophone

• Notice the difference between ‫ ل‬sound of the two words in the first
example and ‫ آ‬sound in the second example. Do you find some
difference in pronunciation ?
• ‫ سلب‬/s əlb/
• ‫ صلیب‬/s əli:b/

• ‫مان‬/ ma:n/
• ‫ مال‬/ ma:l/
Minimal pairs
Minimal Pairs

• A pair of distinct words differing solely in the choice of a single

segment (David Odden 2005)

• Two (or more) words that have different meanings and that differ
only by a single sound in the same position.
Examples of Minimal Pairs -English

• Sat /sæt/ • Top /tɒp/

• Bat /bæt/ • Tall /tɒl/
• Pat /pæt/ • Talk /tɒk/

• Sit /s ɪt/
• Seat /si:t/
• Sat /sæt/
Examples of Minimal Pairs-Urdu

Urdu Urdu
❑Different Initial Consonant ❑Different Final Consonant
• ‫ مان‬/ma:n/ • ‫ ساکھ‬/sa:kh /
• ‫ کان‬/ka:n/ • ‫ ساگ‬/sa:ɡ/
• ‫ پان‬/pa:n/ • ‫ ساتھ‬/sa:t̪h /
• ‫ شان‬/ʃa:n/ • ‫ سات‬/sa:t̪/
• ‫ بان‬/ba:n/ • ‫ سال‬/sa:l/
Examples of Minimal Pairs - Urdu (cont..)

❑Different Vowel Sound

• ‫ بال‬/ba:l/
• ‫ بیل‬/bel/
• ‫ بِیل‬/bi:l/
• ‫ بَیل‬/bæl/
• ‫ بول‬/bo:l/
• ‫ بُول‬/bu:l/
• ‫ بَول‬/bɔ:l/
Examples of Minimal Pairs-Punjabi

• ‫ لکھاں‬/ləkh khɑ̃:/
• ‫ لگاں‬/ləɡɡɑ̃:/
• ‫ اکھاں‬/ əkh khɑ̃:/
• ‫ سوکھا‬/ s ɔ: kh a:/
• ‫ اوکھا‬/ɔ: kh a:/
• ‫ بھیڑ‬/bʰ i:ɽ/
• ‫ پیڑ‬/pi:ɽ/
Practice
For each of the following Urdu phonemes find the minimal pairs.
‫پ‬ p ‫ڈ‬ d ‫و‬ v ‫ڑ‬ ɽ

‫پھ‬ pʰ ‫ڈھ‬ dh ‫ث‬،‫ص‬،‫س‬ s ‫ڑھ‬ ɽʰ

‫ب‬ b ‫ن‬ n ‫ض‬،‫ظ‬،‫ز‬،‫ذ‬ z ‫ی‬ j

‫بھ‬ bʰ ‫نھ‬ nʰ ‫ش‬ ʃ ‫یھ‬ jʰ

‫م‬ m ‫ک‬ k ‫ژ‬ ʒ ‫چ‬ ʧ

‫مھ‬ mʰ ‫کھ‬ kh ‫خ‬ χ ‫چھ‬ ʧh

‫ط‬،‫ت‬ t̪ ‫گ‬ ɡ ‫غ‬ ɣ ‫ج‬ ʤ

‫تھ‬ t̪h ‫گھ‬ ɡh ‫ح‬،‫ہ‬ h ‫جھ‬ ʤh

‫د‬ d̪ ‫ ن‬in ‫نگ‬, ŋ ‫ل‬ l

‫نک‬, ‫نکھ‬, ‫نگھ‬
‫دھ‬ d̪h ‫ق‬ q ‫لھ‬ lʰ

‫ٹ‬ t ‫ع‬ ʔ ‫ر‬ r

‫ٹھ‬ th ‫ف‬ f ‫رھ‬ rʰ

 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
OVERVIEW OF THE PREVIOUS TOPICS

• Phoneme
• Allophone
• Minimal Pairs
TODAY’S TOPICS

• Phonemic/Contrastive Distribution
• Free Variation
• Phonetic/Complementary Distribution
• Phonemic Inventory of Urdu and Punjabi Language
How to find phonemes?

• Consider what we find if we begin to study a language about which

we know nothing

• (phal) ‫پھل‬ ‫( پل‬pal)

• So how do we know which sounds speakers categorize as the same?

• First we can ask whether the speakers can hear the difference
between two different sounds. This is accomplished by the method of
minimal pairs. Second, we can see if the sounds are variants of a
single sound. This leads to the method of complementary
distribution and free variation.
MINIMAL PAIRS

• We know that two sounds constitute distinct sounds if native

speakers can hear the difference between them.
• We can test this by finding two different words that are exactly the
same except for the two sounds in question. Such a pair of words
would constitute a minimal pair. For example, we know that /p/ and
/b/ are distinct sounds in English because we can think of words that
differ only in that one has a /p/ in some specified place while the
other word is exactly the same, except that it has a /b/ in that place.
• Pat bat rip rib
Phonemic Distribution

• Contrastive Distribution
• Phonemically different sounds are said to be in contrast
• When different phonemes appear in the same environment and give
different meanings they are said to be in contrastive distribution (Appear in
minimal pairs)
➢ Examples from English
➢ The stops /p/ and /k/ can exactly occur in the same environment causing semantic
change
• Pan /pæn/
• Can /kæn/
• Ban /bæn/
Free Variation
• In Minimal pairs, each example must be a real, distinct word that
native speakers can recognize as being distinct from the other word
in the pair. This requirement then eliminates either of the following
cases:
1. Sometimes a particular phoneme can be pronounced slightly
differently without noticeable effect. For example, final stops in
English can be released or unreleased, and the voiceless ones can be
accompanied by simultaneous glottal closure, or that can be omitted.
All possible pronunciations count as examples of the same word:
[rIph], [rIp ̚ ], [rIʔp] = rip
This is one kind of free variation. Some free variation is just plain
free.
Free Variation (sociolinguistic implication)

• However, other kinds of free variation seem to have sociolinguistic

implications. Thus we can go to New York City and ask people to say
the word bad. We can hear at least the following

but, while they all constitute instances of the ‘same’ word bad, they
are markers of different social classes, formality levels, levels of social
solidarity and so on.
Free Variation (Phonemic)

• A second kind of free variation is much odder, and very little research
has been done on it. This is variation in which phoneme a particular
word contains? Here speakers can use either of several distinctive
sounds, but don’t seem to care very much which one they use.
Thus we can say /ε/conomic or /i/conomic, or vary between /i/ther or
/aI/ther:
You say either,
and I say either.
You say neither
and I say neither.
Either either
Neither neither
Let’s call the whole thing off.
©George and Ira Gershwin
Free Variation(summary)

❑Free Variation
• If variation is not associated with positioning, and is rather unpredictable, it is
free variation or random variation.
• Free variation does not affect the meaning
• Person dependent

➢Examples from English

• English stops may or may not have an audible release in final position.
mat [mæt] or [mæt˺]
• Neither /naɪðə/ /ni:ðə/
• Again /əgen/ /əgeɪn/
free variation and minimal pairs.

• Consequently, instances of free variation do not count as minimal

pairs. That is, even though /niðәr/ is heard as sounding different from
/naIðәr/, it does not constitute a different word.

• Thus, the first test of whether two sounds are distinct phonemes in
a language is to find whether there are minimal pairs – pairs of
words with a difference in meaning attributable to a single
difference in sound.(one meaning is attributed to a single sound)
Phonetic Distribution

❑Complementary Distribution:
• Two sounds are in complementary distribution if they occur in different environments.

• The sounds that can never occur in the place of another are in complementary distribution, they
are mutually exclusive because where one occurs , the other cannot.

• If two sounds are in complementary distribution, they are allophones of the same phoneme.
• There are no minimal pairs
• The occurrence of the allophones is predictable
➢ Examples from English
• Top [thɒp]
• Stop [s tɒp]
• Little [ lɪɾl ̩ ]
• kitten[kɪtʔn̩ ]
Complementary distribution.
An Example from Korean language

look for the phonetic surroundings of the sounds

• Thus, the distribution of the two sounds is
complementary: the two sounds never occur in the same place.
• Different surroundings will result in different adjustments. The result
is that we have a small set of adjusted sounds depending on the
phonetic surroundings, and, they will be in complementary
distribution, since their existence can be attributed to their particular
surroundings. They will all be phonetically similar, since they are all
adjustments to the same basic phoneme, or mental sound. Thus
allophones are the modifications that result when a particular
phoneme occurs, say between vowels, or at the beginning of a
syllable, or when stressed or whatever.
• Within the generative tradition, the metaphor that is normally used is
that the phoneme is an underlying sound, while the allophones are
surface forms. This is borrowed from the now obsolete model of deep
and surface structure originally developed to describe syntax
• So, to sum up, phonemes are idealized mental sounds which are
stored in long-term memory. As the sounds are produced, they are
modified according to the phonetic environments that they find
themselves in, resulting in allophones
Complementary Distribution (cont..)

➢Examples from Urdu

➢Notice the sound of ‘m’ at initial and final position of ‫ موم‬and initial position of
‫مال‬
➢What difference do you find?
➢Are these sounds complementary or contrastive in distribution
• ‫قوم‬
• ‫مال‬
Complementary Distribution (cont..)

• Notice the sound t̪h in the words below:

• ‫تھالی‬
• ‫ساتھ‬
• Notice the sound of k in the words below
• ‫کام‬
• ‫وکال‬
• Notice the sounds of r in the words below
• ‫فرد‬
• ‫راستہ‬
Practice

Bring out the examples of complementary and contrastive distribution

in Urdu and Punjabi
Complementary vs. Contrastive Distribution
Allophones occur in complementary distribution
whereas
Phonemes occur in contrastive distribution
The Phonemic Inventory of Urdu
Phonemic Inventory

• The phonology of a language is the inventory of its phonemes, i.e. the

sum of all those sounds that show distinctive nature.
• The phonemic inventory of Urdu:
• 44 consonantal sounds
• 23 vocalic sounds
• (8 long oral vowels)
• 7 long nasal vowels
• 3 short oral vowels
Some Practice

• Transcribe the following Urdu Words

‫پاکستان‬
‫الہور‬
‫ملتان‬
‫ماں‬
‫آیا‬
The Phonemic Inventory of Punjabi Language

• 31 Consonants
• Ten vowels are included in the Punjabi vowel system. Three of them
are short vowels /i, u, cl, whereas seven are long out of which /i,e,e/
are front vowels and /u, o, o, a are back vowels. Complete vowel
inventory is given in Figure 1 Encircled vowels are allophonic to each
other. To determine relative position of the vowels,
PUNJABI ORAL VOWELS NASAL VOWELS
PUNJABI NASAL VOWELS
DIPHTHONGS
References

• Katamba, F. (1989). An introduction to phonology (Vol. 48). London:

Longman.
• Nathan, G. S. (2008). Phonology: A cognitive grammar
introduction (Vol. 3). John Benjamins Publishing.

• Christopher Shackle “Punjabi”

• URDU IPA published by Center for Language Engineering
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English VIII
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
Acoustic Properties of Phonemes
This lecture will cover:

• Acoustic Phonetics
• Some key concepts
• Acoustic properties of Vowels
• Acoustic properties of consonants
• Acoustic phonetics deals with the properties of sound as represented
in variations of air pressure. A sound disturbs the surrounding air
molecules at equilibrium, much as a shove by a person in a crowded
bus disturbs the standing passengers.

• The sensation of these air pressure variations as picked up by our

hearing mechanisms and decoded in the brain constitutes what we
call sound
Sound Waves

• In the above diagram the white line represents the position of the medium
when no wave is present.
• The yellow line represents the position of the medium as a wave travels
through it.
Parts of Sound Waves: What is crest and trough?

• The section of the wave that rises above the undisturbed position is
called the crest.
• That section which lies below the undisturbed position is called the
trough.
What is amplitude?

• The amplitude is the maximum positive displacement from the

undisturbed position of the medium to the top of a crest.
What is wavelength?
• The wavelength of a wave is the distance between any two adjacent
corresponding locations on the wave train. This distance is usually
measured in one of three ways: crest to next crest, or from the start
of a wave cycle to the next starting point.
What is frequency?

• Frequency refers to how many waves are made per time interval. This
is usually described as how many waves are made , or as cycles per
second.
• If ten waves are made per second, then the frequency is said to be ten cycles
per second, written as 10 cps.
• Usually, we use the unit Hertz to state frequency. A frequency of 10 cps is
noted as a frequency of 10 Hertz. So, one cycle per second is one Hertz, as in:
• 1 cps = 1 Hertz or it is abbreviated this way:
• 1 cps = 1 Hz
• 120 cps =120 Hz
• 350 cps = 350 Hz
Sound waves and the frequency

• Frequency: The number of complete repetitions (cycles) of variations

in air pressure occurring in a second. The unit of frequency
measurement is the hertz (Hz).
Vowels

• The quality of a vowel depends on its overtone structure.

• A vowel sound contains a number of different pitches
simultaneously.
• There is the pitch at which it is actually spoken, and there are the
various overtone pitches that give it its distinctive quality.
• We distinguish one vowel from another by the differences in these
overtones.
• The overtones are called formants, and the lowest three formants
distinguish vowels from each other.
Vowels(Cont.)

• The lowest formant one, which we can symbolize as F1, can be heard by
tapping on your throat. If you open your mouth, make a glottal stop, and
flick a finger against your neck just to the side and below the jaw, you will
hear a note, just as you would if you tapped on a bottle. If you tilt your
head slightly backward so that the skin of the neck is stretched while you
tap, you may be able to hear this sound somewhat better. Be careful to
maintain a vowel position and not to raise the back of the tongue against
the soft palate. If you check a complete set of vowel positions [i:, ɪ,
e, ɜ:, œ, ɑ, ɒ, ʊ, u:] with this technique, you should hear the pitch of the
first formant going up for the first four vowels and down for the second
four vowels.
Vowels(Cont.)

• The second formant, F2, goes down in pitch in the series of vowels [i:,
ɪ, e, ɜ:, œ, ], as can be heard more easily when these vowels are
whispered.
• F1 primarily reflects vowel height in inverse fashion: greater F1
reflects lower vowel
• F2 reflects vowel backness as well as lip rounding: lower F2 reflects
greater backing or rounding
Spectrogram

• There are computer programs that can analyze sounds and show their
components. The display produced is called a spectrogram.

• In spectrograms, time runs from left to right, the frequency of the

components is shown on the vertical scale, and the intensity
of each component is shown by the degree of darkness. It is thus a
display that shows, roughly speaking, dark bands for concentrations
of energy at particular frequencies.
• Figure 8.4 is a set of spectrograms of an American English speaker
saying the words heed, hid, head, had, hod, hawed, hood, who’d.
ACOUSTIC ANALYSIS

• Phonetic scientists like to describe vowels in terms of numbers. It is

possible to analyze sounds so that we can measure the actual
frequencies of the formants. We can then represent them graphically,
as in Figure 8.3. This figure gives the average values of the
frequencies of the first three formants in eight American English
vowels.
CONSONANTS

• STOPS
• FRICATIVES
• AFFRICATES
• LIQUIDS
• NASALS
 Stops
b t
Fricatives
f v
 Nasals
n m
 Affricates
tʃ ʤ
 Liquids
r l
Reference Book

• Ladefoged, P., & Johnson, K. (2014). A course in phonetics. Nelson

Education.
• https://web.ntpu.edu.tw/~language/workshop/chapter%208.pdf

• Video Link (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLfQpv2ZRPU)

 Thank You

Contact Details:
afiamahmood@ue.edu.pk
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
Distinctive Features

• History
• Trubetzkoy
• Jackobson
• Chomsky and Halle
• Why Distinctive Features are useful
Introduction

• Distinctive features are the universal set of cognitive properties

associated with the speech sounds that are used in language.
• They determine the contrasts which may exist between speech
sounds, account for the ways in which these sounds may change, or
alternate, and define the sets of sounds.
• A small set of features is able to differentiate between the phonemes
of any single language
Distinctive Features

• The units below the level of the phoneme.

• We call this type of unit a feature.
• A phoneme can be described in terms of a matrix of features. If we
start with a single phoneme and substitute one of its features for
another we might end up with a different phoneme.
• Traditionally, phonological and phonetic features are quite distinct.
• Phonological features are more abstract and phonetic features are
concrete and often measurable (eg. acoustically or physiologically).

• We will particularly focus on a model of phonological features known

as distinctive features. This was developed by Jakobson and his
colleagues and further elaborated by Chomsky and Halle in their very
influential book the Sound Pattern of English (Chomsky and Halle,
1968)
Historical Overview
Historical Overview

• Distinctive Oppositions
• Acoustic Features
• The SPE Approach
Nikolai Trubetzkoy (1939)

• His most influential work was published posthumously in 1939

• Nikolai Trubetzkoy was a core member of the Prague school of
linguistics which was highly influential in developing some areas of
linguistic theory (including phonology), particularly in the 1930s
• One aspect of Trubetzkoy's work examines the idea of different types
of "oppositions" in phonology.
• These oppositions are based on phonetic (or phonological) features.
Distinctive Oppositions

• Bilateral Oppositions: A bilateral opposition refers to a pair of sounds

that share a set of features which no other sound shares fully. For
example, voiceless labial obstruents = /p,f/.
• Multilateral Oppositions: A group of more than 2 sounds which share
common features. For example, labial obstruents,/p,b,f,v/, are both
labial and obstruents, so they share two features.
Distinctive Oppositions

• Binary Features: Features which a sound either possesses or lacks.

Voicing is such a feature. A sound is voiced or NOT voiced. The sound
which possesses that feature is said to be marked (eg [+voice]) whilst
the sound lacking the feature is unmarked (eg. [-voice]).

• Gradual Oppositions: The members of a class of sounds possess

different degrees or gradations of a feature or property. For example,
the three short front unrounded vowels in English /ɪ, e, æ/ which are
distinguished only by their height. In this system height would be a
single feature with two or more degrees of height.
Roman Jakobson et al. (1941-1956)
(Acoustic Features)

Briefly, Jakobson's original formulation of distinctive feature theory was

based on the following ideas:
1. All features are privative (ie. binary). This means that a phoneme
either has the feature eg. [+VOICE] or it doesn't have the feature eg. [-
VOICE]
Roman Jakobson et al. (1941-1956)
(Acoustic Features)

2-There is a difference between PHONETIC and PHONOLOGICAL

FEATURES
• Phonological Features are Distinctive Features
• Phonetics Features are surface realisations of underlying Phonological
Features.
• A phonological feature may be realised by more than one phonetic feature,
eg. [FLAT] might be realised by labialisation, velarisation and
pharyngealisation
Roman Jakobson et al. (1941-1956)
(Acoustic Features)

3-A small set of features is able to differentiate between the phonemes

of any single language

4-Distinctive features may be defined in terms of articulatory or

acoustic features, but Jakobson's features are primarily based on
acoustic descriptions
Chomsky & Halle's (1968) The Sound Pattern
of English.
• Chomsky and Halle (1968-1983)
• Distinctive feature theory was first formalised by Roman Jakobson in
1941.
• There have been numerous refinements to Jakobson's (1941) set of
features, most notably with the publication of Chomsky & Halle's
(1968) Sound Pattern of English.
ADVANTAGES OF DISTINCTIVE
FEATURES
a) Features Establish Natural Classes
• Using distinctive features, phonemes are broken down into smaller components.
• For example, a nasal phoneme /m/ might be represented as a feature matrix [+
sonorant, -continuant, +voice, +nasal, +labial]
• By representing /m/ in this way, we are saying both something about its phonetic
characteristics (it's a sonorant because, like vowels, its acoustic waveform has low
frequency periodic energy; it's a non-continuant because the airflow is totally
interrupted in the oral cavity etc.), but also importantly, the aim is to choose
distinctive features that establish natural classes of phonemes.
• For example, since all the other nasal consonants and nasalised vowels (if a
language has them) have feature matrices that are defined as [+nasal], we can
refer to all these segments in a single simple phonological feature by making the
rule apply to [+nasal] segments.
• Similarly, if we want our rules to refer to all the approximants and high vowels,
we might define this natural class by [+sonorant, +high].
Features…Classes

• If the features are well chosen, it should be possible to refer to

natural classes of phonemes with a small number of features. For
example, [p t k] form a natural class of voiceless stops in most
languages: we can often refer to these and no others with just two
features, [-continuant, -voiced].
• On the other hand, [m] and [d] are a much less natural class (ie. few
sound changes and few, if any, phonological rules, apply to them both
and appropriately it is impossible in most feature systems to refer to
these sounds and no others in a single feature matrix).
PHONOLOTACTIC STATEMENTS
Phonotactic Statements

Phonology - Distinctive Features II, Jürgen Handke, 2013 Copyright: The Virtual Linguistics Campus,
www.linguistics-online.com
Phonological Rules
Phonological Rules

• Cats • Buses
• Bags • Roses
• Cups • Churches
• Labs • Judges
Phonological Rules.

• The advantage of this approach is readily apparent in writing

phonological rules. For example, we might want a rule which makes
approximants voiceless when they follow aspirated stops in English. If
we could not define phonemes in terms of distinctive features, we
would have to have separate rules, such as [l] becomes voiceless after
/k/ ('claim'), /r/ becomes voiceless after /k/ ('cry'), /w/ becomes
voiceless after /k/ ('quite'), /j/ becomes voiceless after /k/ ('cute'),
and then the same again for all the approximants that can follow /p/
and /t/. If we define phonemes as bundles of features, we can state
the rule more succinctly as e.g. [+sonorant, -syllabic, +continuant]
sounds (i.e. all approximants) become [+spread glottis] (aspirated)
after sounds which are [+spread glottis] (aspirated).
Clinical Application

• If we look at features rather than phonemes errors that look unique

at the phoneme level may actually have a common basis.
• What looks like several errors may actually be a common problem
of not having learned a single feature.
• E.g., child’s errors may all be on [+] strident sounds or on [+]
continuant sounds
Economy

• In phonology, and particularly in Generative Phonology, we are often

concerned to eliminate redundancy from the sound pattern of a
language or to explain it by rule. Distinctive features allow the
possibility of writing rules using a considerably smaller number of
units than the phonemes of a language. Consider for example, a
hypothetical language that has 12 consonant and 3 vowel phonemes:
We could refer to all these phonemes with perhaps just 6 distinctive features - a
reduction of over half the number of phoneme units which also allows natural classes
to be established amongst them:
At the same time, each phoneme is uniquely represented, as shown by
the distinctive feature matrix:
Distinctive Features Classification

Distinctive features are grouped into categories according to

the natural classes of segments they describe
• Major class features
• Manner features
• Place /Point of Articulation features/Cavity Features
• Basic Vowel Features
• Laryngeal features
THANK YOU
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English VIII
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
Distinctive Features Classification
This lecture will cover the following topics:

• Major class features

• Manner features
• Place /Point of Articulation features/Cavity Features
• Basic Vowel Features
• Laryngeal features
Major Class Features

Major class features classify sounds according to

their most basic characteristics:
• consonants, vowels, obstruents, liquids, glides and
so on.

• The features that are used for this purpose are

[sonorant], [consonantal], and [approximant].
Sonorant

• Sonorant sounds are those that are produced with the vocal tract
open enough that air can flow freely without obstruction at any
point.
• Thus, vowels, glides, laterals (except for lateral fricatives), rhotics and
nasals are sonorants,
• since in each case, there is a clear, uninterrupted path for the air to
follow. As a result, sonorants have a formant structure, and you can
sing a sonorant – singing a nasal is called ‘humming’.
Sonorant (cont.)

• Distinctive features are designed to ‘crosscut’ traditional categories,

so note that both vowels and some consonants are sonorants.
• The remaining consonants are [–son].
• There is a traditional name for [–son] consonants, which are the
stops, affricates and fricatives: they are called obstruents, but
obstruent is not a feature in most standard works. Instead it is simply
a label for the class of [–son] sounds
Consonantal

Consonantal sounds are, in a sense, almost the

opposite of sonorants, in that they are defined as
sounds having a significant obstruction somewhere,
even if some other part of the vocal tract is open.
Consonantal

• The only sounds that are not consonantal are vowels and glides.
• Laterals have an obstruction in the center of the mouth, rhotics have
obstructions either at the alveolar ridge or at the uvula.
• Nasals have the entire mouth closed (even though the nasal passages
are open), and of course, stops, fricatives and affricates are all, by
definition, obstructive sounds, and therefore [+consonantal].
Approximant

• Approximants are sounds that involve insufficient obstruction to

create noise. Thus, vowels, glides and liquids (rhotics and laterals) are
approximants, while nasals and obstruents are non-approximants.
Together with [sonorant] and [consonantal] these three features
define the major classes of sounds:
• Activity(1)
Stops Vowels Liquids Glides Nasals
Son
Cons
appr
Answers
Manner Features

• The remaining manner features define kinds of consonants

in greater detail, and all involve

• details of the kind of constriction or obstruction taking

place in the vocal tract,

• or the location of that constriction when it defines a kind

rather than a point of articulation.
Continuant

• Continuant sounds involve a continuous airflow, while [–cnt] sounds

have the airflow cut off somewhere.
• In its simplest incarnation, [–cnt] sounds are stops, and [+cnt] sounds
are fricatives.
• In addition, nasals (which are frequently considered stops in any case)
are [–cnt]. Affricates, since they begin with complete closure of the
vocal tract are, of course noncontinuants, and vowels and glides are
[+continuant].
Continuant

• The liquids are somewhat trickier. It seems clear that all kinds of r-
sounds are continuants, but
• laterals are a puzzle. In some languages they appear to act as if they
were stops, while in other languages they behave as continuants.
Since laterals involve complete closure at the center of the mouth,
but an opening on the side of the tongue, this dual nature should not
be surprising.
Nasal

• This feature is relatively self-evident: sounds made with a lowered

velum are [+nasal], those made with the velum raised are [–nas].
Nasal consonants are the most obvious examples, but nasalized
vowels are also [+nasal], and a few languages have nasalized glides.
Strident

• Strident sounds are relatively ‘noisy’, as you might guess from the
name.
• This feature has limited applicability – it only applies to sounds that
involve friction, which is to say, to fricatives and affricates.
• All fricatives involve a constriction of the vocal tract sufficiently
tight to produce a noisy stream of air. The turbulence caused by
forcing air through a narrow opening constitutes the ‘hissing’ sound
that we associate with fricatives (and with the final portions of
affricates).
Strident (cont…)
• However, the jet of air can be either simple or complex.
When we make a [ϕ/β] or a [θ/ð] the air goes straight out
from our lips.
• But when we make an [f/v] the jet of air is directed against
the lower lip. You can test this for yourself by pulling your
lower lip down out of the way. If you make an [f] or [v] with
the lip pulled down and then permit it to return, you will
hear a radical difference in the sound, but this does not
happen with [ϕ/β],
• Compare this with an [s] or a [z] and [θ/ð].
Strident (cont…)

• The sounds made with the additional surface for the

airstream to contact are strident sounds, the
remaining sounds are non-strident. Thus [f, v, s, z, ∫,
Š, pf, ts, dz, t∫, dŠ] are all strident, and all other
sounds are non-strident.
• Play sounds
Lateral

• Sounds made with the side of the tongue lowered,

while the tip remains in contact with the roof of the
mouth (dental, alveolar, palatal or retroflex regions)
are [+lateral]. All other sounds are [–lateral]. Thus any
sound represented in the IPA with some variant of the
letter 〈l〉 is a lateral.
 Activity: Write the English phonemes in the
appropriate columns
Continuant Nasal Strident Lateral

Phonemes
Point of articulation features

• The next set of features divides up the upper articulators, but in a

different way from the traditional list running from labial to uvular.
Labial

• Labial sounds are made at the lips.

• Labial sounds include labials (stops, fricatives etc.), labiodentals (only

fricatives exist in this category) and rounded sounds, including
labiovelars such as [w], and doubly-articulated sounds such as [kp ͜ ].

• We can distinguish between the subdivisions of LABIAL for the

fricatives with the use of the feature [strident] – labiodentals are
strident, bilabials are nonstrident.
Coronal
• Coronal sounds are made with the tip or blade of the
tongue. This is probably the most diverse region of the
mouth, probably because the blade of the tongue is capable
of very precise and quick movements. The tongue can touch
the teeth, the alveolar ridge and behind it, both with the tip
and with the blade.

• Phonologists generally define CORONAL as normally

involving the tongue-tip touching the alveolar ridge.
Coronal

• If the tongue tip touches the teeth an additional feature is

needed, and if either tip or blade touches behind the
alveolar ridge a different additional feature is used.

• Thus within CORONAL there are additional features:

• Distributed
• Anterior
• Strident
Distributed

• To express the difference between alveolar and dental the feature

[distributed] has been proposed, although it is rarely used.
• Roughly, [+distributed] sounds are laminal (made with the tongue
blade) while [–distributed] sounds are made with the tongue tip
(apical).
• Since almost no languages distinguish between dental and alveolar
stops, the feature is rarely needed, – [strident] is used to distinguish
fricatives in these regions.
Anterior

• The feature [anterior] was introduced in the Sound Pattern of English,

and originally divided the entire vocal tract into a front and back
half, with the dividing line just behind the alveolar ridge.

• [anterior] has been downgraded to a subdivision of CORONAL, with

sounds made at the alveolar ridge or teeth being [+anterior], and
those made behind it (retroflexes and palatoalveolars) being [–
anterior].

• Thus [θ] and [s] are [+anterior], while [∫] and [--] are [–anterior].
Strident

• Although strident counted as a manner feature, it also has application

as a place feature, as mentioned above.
Dorsal

• The feature DORSAL denotes sounds made by the back of

the tongue touching the palate, the velum and the uvula.

• The vast majority of languages have only one sound in this

region, but some languages do have palatal stops and/or
uvular sounds.
GUTTURAL

• GUTTURAL sounds include pharyngeals and glottals. Some languages

(particularly in the Semitic [Afro-Asiatic] family) treat this group as a
class, which has led some phonologists to believe they share a point
of articulation.
• Play sounds
Basic Vowel features

• In addition to a set of features for the primary points of

articulation, there is a set of features that are used for vowel
characteristics.

• These features refer to the placement of the body of the

tongue, and are based on the assumption that there is a
neutral position for the tongue, and that therefore each
positive specification for one of these features is a
deviation away from that neutral position.
Basic Vowel features-(Cont… neutral position explained)

• The assumption (which stems from SPE) is that [ε] is the least marked
vowel (in the specific technical sense of being specified as minus for
all vowel features).
• If the tongue body is raised above [ε], the vowel is [+high], so that
would include [i, u] If the tongue body is lowered below [ε], the vowel
is [+low], which would consist of [a, ɑ, ɒ,(perhaps)].

• All remaining vowels are [–high, –low]. Note that this essentially
allows only three levels of height
HIGH - N O N H I G H [± high]

• High sounds are made with the tongue raised from neutral
position while nonhigh sounds are made without such
raising of the body of the tongue.

• High sounds include vowels like [i u], the glides [w j], alveo-
palatal, palatalized, palatal and velar consonants.

• All other sounds are nonhigh.

L O W - N O N L O W [± low]

• Low sounds are produced with the tongue depressed and lying at a
level below that which it occupies when at rest in neutral position;
non low sounds are produced without depressing the level of the
tongue in this manner.

• Open vowels like [a ɑ ɔ] are low and so are the pharyngeal

consonants [h] and [?].

• All other sounds are nonlow. (MID vowels are both NONHIGH and
NONLOW.)
BACK - NONBACK [± back]
• Sounds produced with the body of the tongue
retracted from neutral position are back.

• Sounds produced with the body of the tongue either

in neutral position or pushed forward are nonback.

• This feature distinguishes between back vowels like [u

o a] and front vowels like [i e ε].
Tongue root features

• The vocal tract is a long tube with holes at both the lip end and the throat
end.
• The shape of this tube can be modified by rounding the lips and making
them protrude - and thus elongating the tube.
• Alternatively, the tongue root position can be adjusted by pushing it
forward or retracting it so that the vocal tract is either lengthened or
shortened.
• Either of these actions has the effect of modifying the shape of the
resonating chamber in the vocal tract in much the same way as differences
in size and shape of wind instruments affect the notes which they produce
ADVANCEDTONGUEROOT-NONAD-
V A N C E D T O N G U E R O O T [± ATR]
• The tongue root is pushed forward in the production of advanced
tongue root sounds, thus expanding the resonating chamber of the
pharynx and possibly pushing the tongue body upward; if the tongue
root is not advanced, it remains in a neutral position. Vowels like [i e
o] in many West African languages are made with the tongue root
pushed forward while [i c o] are made with the tongue root in neutral
position.
TENSE - LAX [± tense]

• 'Tense vowels are produced with a tongue body or tongue

root configuration involving a greater degree of constriction
than that found in their lax counterparts; this greater degree
of constriction is usually accompanied by greater length.
(Tense vowels vs. lax vowels.) Halle and Clements (1983:7)

• The English 'long' vowels and diphthongs are tense while

the 'short' vowels are lax.
Laryngeal features

• The original view of laryngeal features was that the only feature
needed was the obvious one, [voice], and for most languages this is
still true.
• However, a number of other laryngeal settings need features to
describe them, and two basic ones have been proposed and have
gained wide currency in addition to [voice]
SPREAD GLOTTIS - NONSPREAD GLOTTIS
[± spread]
• Pushing the vocal cords wide apart increases the airflow
through the glottis and inhibits voicing. This gesture, which is
associated with voicelessness and aspiration, is absent in
nonspread sounds.

• Spread sounds include aspirated stops ( pʰ, tʰ, kʰ);

murmured and breathy voice sounds, voiceless vowels and
voiceless glides. All other sounds are nonspread.
CONSTRICTED GLOTTIS -
NONCONSTRICTED GLOTTIS [± constr]
• Constricted sounds are GLOTTALISED. They are produced with a
severe obstruction of the glottis which is made using the vocal cords.
• This inhibits or prevents the free vibration of the vocal cords. No such
gesture occurs in the production of nonconstricted sounds.

• Constricted sounds include implosives, ejectives, glottalised and

laryngealised consonants as well as creaky voice and glottalised
vowels and glides. All other sounds are nonconstricted.
USEFUL LINK TO LISTEN ALL TYPES OF
SOUNDS
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPA_pulmonic_consonant_chart_with_
audio
• http://www.phonetics.ucla.edu/index/sounds.html
URDU IPA
Reference Book

• Katamba, F. (1989). An introduction to phonology (Vol. 48). London:

Longman.
• Nathan, G. S. (2008). Phonology: A cognitive grammar
introduction (Vol. 3). John Benjamins Publishing.
 Thank You

Contact Details:
afiamahmood@ue.edu.pk
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English VIII
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
Distinctive Features
This lecture will cover:

• Introduction
• Need of Distinctive Features
• What is the minimal unit of speech sound?

Phoneme
/p/

/b/

/t/
Symmetry in Phonological Systems

Phonological systems tend to be symmetrical and

a limited number of phonetic parameters, taken
from a fairly small universal set recur in a variety
of combinations in different languages.
Phonological ingredients

• We look beyond the phoneme and focus on those basic

phonological ingredients, called DISTINCTIVE FEATURES,
which phonemes are made of.

• There is a relatively small inventory of phonetic features

from which languages select different combinations to
construct their individual phoneme systems.
Biological endowment.

• As all members of the human race are endowed with

very similar articulatory and auditory capabilities, it is
only to be expected that they will only be able to
produce and utilise speech sounds built up from the
set which is pre-determined by their biological
endowment.
How do we describe speech sounds in
general?
Traditionally in phonetics, phones are broadly classified
according to their place and manner of articulation, and
phonation type, as they are in the International Phonetic
Alphabet (IPA).
• When we specify one of these descriptions, we are defining
the articulatory features of the particular sound
Feature Specifications

• Features may be based on acoustic properties for example strident,

voice, articulatory properties for example high, back, lateral, coronal
and function in a syllable for example consonantal.
What are Distinctive Features

• Distinctive features represent a finer grained, abstract

representation of phones in that
• A phone can be described as a bundle of features and each
feature’s corresponding value.
• These features and their corresponding values are hypothesized as
the mental representation of our phone inventory.
 Cont..

• In this theory the basic unit is the feature (not the phoneme)
• features can't be broken into smaller units.
• Distinctive features are the smallest indivisible sound properties that
establish phonemes, binary (+/-) system is used to indicate presence
vs absence of a specific feature /t/ and/d/ differ by one feature --
voice

• A small set of features is able to differentiate between the phonemes

of any single language
Binary system

• a feature that signals the difference in meaning by changing its plus

(+) or minus (-) value. Example: tip [-voice] dip [+voice]
• Binary system: a feature is either present or absent. pluses and
minuses: instead of two separate labels, such as voiced and voiceless,
we apply only one: [voice] [+voice] voiced sounds [-voice] voiceless
sounds
Distinctive features..

• Every speech sound shares some articulatory and acoustic properties

with other speech sounds. For example, the consonant [n] shares
nasality with [m], complete oral closure with the set [pbmtdkg], and
an elevated tongue-tip with the set [tdsz].
The hypothesis of distinctive feature theory

• The hypothesis of distinctive feature theory is that there is a small set,

of phonetically based properties which phonological analysis uses.
• These properties (the distinctive features) not only define the
possible phonemes of human languages, but also define phonological
rules.
Three principal arguments of Distinctive Feature theory:

1. The union of the sound systems of all spoken languages is a smaller

set than the physical capabilities of the human vocal and auditory
systems would lead one to expect.
Cont..

2. Distinctive features help to explain the structure of sound systems.

For example, many languages have no sounds from the set [bdg], but if
a language has one of them, it is likely to have all of them. These
sounds are all [+voice] (referring to the presence of vocal fold vibration)
Cont..

3. PHONOLOGICAL RULES AND PROCESSES depend on the

classes of sounds defined by distinctive feature values, and
so the notion "possible phonological process" is, in part,
determined by the universal feature theory.
Example of the English plural suffix

• caps, chiefs, cats, tacks

versus
• labs, shelves, beds, bags.

• passes, roses, lashes, garages.

Example of the English plural suffix

• Rule A: The English plural suffix is a typical example. This suffix agrees
in the value of [voice] with the sound at the end of the noun: [ -
voice] in caps, chiefs, cats, tacks versus [+voice]
in labs, shelves, beds, bags.
Example of the English plural suffix

• Rule B: This suffix is pronounced with a vowel if the noun ends in a

[+strident] consonant, characterized by turbulent airflow and
consequent [s]-like hissing noise: passes, roses, lashes, garages.
Classes like these -- [+voice], [ - voice], and [+strident] -- are
frequently encountered in the phonological processes of the world's
languages.
Phonological processes:
Examine the data below
 The signal to start voicing is delayed until well
after the beginning of the / r / due to imprecise
adjustment of the articulatory apparatus in the
transition from one sound to the next. Looking at
sounds in terms of the individual parameters
which they consist of allows an insightful
expression of ASSIMILATION PROCESSES,
Examine this data from American English
You will have discovered that if you treat
phonemes as unanalysable entities, you have no
straightforward way of showing that the vowel
only assimilates the property of nasality from the
following consonant if that consonant is nasal as
in 3.2 B
Phonological Segments Have Internal Structure.
• Whereas [p] is wholly oral and [n] is wholly nasal, the
vowel [ae] occurring between them is oral to begin
with but subsequently becomes nasalised in
anticipation of the following nasal consonant. The
properties NASAL and NON-NASAL occur together in
sequence in the same phoneme.
Chomsky & Halle (1968) on Distinctive Features

• The total set of features is identical with the set of phonetic

properties that can in principle be controlled in speech; they
represent the phonetic capabilities of man, and we would assume,
are therefore the same for all languages.
(Chomsky & Halle 1968:294-95)
• The significant linguistic universals are those that must be assumed to
be available to the child learning a language as a priori, innate
endowment.
(Chomsky & Halle 1968:4)
The Sound Pattern of English (SPE)
• Chomsky and Halle (1968) in their book The Sound Pattern of
English (SPE) proposed a major revision of the theory of
distinctive features. They replaced acoustically-defined
phonological features with a set of features that have, in
most cases, articulatory correlates.
• They have only two coefficients or values, plus (+) indicating
the presence of a feature and minus (—) its absence, so that,
for example, among other things, a sound like [p] is said to be
[—voice] and [ — nasal] while [m] is [ + voice] and [ + nasal].
• The list of distinctive features given below is based on SPE in
the main.
Distinctive Features Classification

Distinctive features are grouped into categories according to

the natural classes of segments they describe
• Major class features
• Manner features
• Place /Point of Articulation features/Cavity Features
• Basic Vowel Features
• Laryngeal features
Check Your Understanding

• What are distinctive features?

• Phonological rules and processes depend on the classes of sounds
defined by distinctive feature values, Can you think of any other
examples not given during this lecture?
• Before you move on, You should have good understanding of the
traditional classification of sounds according to place and manner of
articulation!
 Fill this Chart of Consonants before you move
on
Bilabial Labio- Dental Alveolar Post Palatal Velar Glottal
dental Alveolar
Stops
Fricatives
Affricates
Nasals
Laterals
Approximants
REFERENCE BOOK

• Katamba, F. (1989). An introduction to phonology (Vol. 48). London:

Longman.
• THANK YOU
 University of Education Lahore
Department of English

Course Title: Advanced Phonology

Programme: BS English
Course Code: ENGL4134
Instructor Name: Afia Mahmood
SOME PRACTICE
DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
Distinctive Features discussed in Previous
Lecture
• Major Class features:
• sonorant, consonantal, approximant
• Manner features:
• continuant, nasal, strident, lateral
• Place of articulation features:
• coronal, anterior, strident, distributed, dorsal, guttural
• Basic Vowel features
Laryngeal features: spread glottis, constricted glottis
EXERCISE
REFERENCE

• Katamba, F. (1989). An introduction to phonology (Vol. 48). London:

Longman.
• Nathan, G. S. (2008). Phonology: A cognitive grammar
introduction (Vol. 3). John Benjamins Publishing.