PHONOLOGY: THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGE

Phonology is the study of the ways in which speech sounds form systems and patterns in a
language. It is about the underlying design, the blueprint of each sound type, which may vary in every
physical context. Phonology refers either to the representation of the sounds and sound patterns in a
speaker’s mental grammar, or to the study of the sound patterns in a language or in human language in
general.
Phonological knowledge permits a speaker to produce sounds that form meaningful utterances, to
recognize a foreign “accent”, to make up words, to add the appropriate phonetic segments to form plurals
and past tenses, to produce aspirated and unaspirated voiceless stops in the appropriate context, and to
know what is or is not a sound in one’s language.

Phonological Concepts:
Phonemes – are the meaning-distinguishing sounds in a language. They are not physical sounds but are
abstract mental representations of the phonological units of a language, the units used to represent the
forms of words in our mental lexicons.
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is provided below to introduce to you the 44 Phonemes in
English.

Consonants
Phoneme IPA Symbol Examples

1 b bug, bubble

2 d dad, add, milled

3 f fat, cliff, phone, enough, half, often

4 g gun, egg, ghost, guest, prologue

5 h hop, who

6 dʒ jam, wage, giraffe, edge, soldier, exaggerate

7 k kit, cat, Chris, accent, folk, bouquet, queen, rack, box

8 l live, well

9 m man, summer, comb, column, palm

10 n net, funny, know, gnat, pneumonic

11 p pin, dippy

12 r run, carrot, wrench, rhyme

13 s sit, less, circle, scene, psycho, listen, pace, course

14 t tip, matter, Thomas, ripped

Phoneme IPA Symbol Examples

15 v vine, of, Steven, five

16 w wit, why, quick, choir

17 z zed, buzz, his, scissors, xylophone, craze

18 ʒ treasure, division, azure

19 tʃ chip, watch, future, action, righteous

20 ʃ sham, ocean, sure, special, pension, machine, conscience, station

21 θ thongs

22 ð leather

23 ŋ ring, pink, tongue

24 j you, onion, hallelujah

Vowels
Phoneme IPA Symbol Examples

25 æ cat, plaid, laugh

26 eɪ bay, maid, weigh, straight, pay, foyer, filet, eight, gauge, mate, break, they

27 e end, bread, bury, friend, said, many, leopard, heifer, aesthetic

28 i: be, bee, meat, lady, key, phoenix, grief, ski, deceive, people, quay

29 ɪ it, England, women, busy, guild, gym, sieve

30 aɪ spider, sky, night, pie, guy, stye, aisle, island, height, kite

31 ɒ swan, honest, maul, slaw, fought

32 oʊ open, moat, bone, toe, sow, dough, beau, brooch, sew

33 ʊ wolf, look, bush, would

34 ʌ lug, monkey, blood, double

35 u: who, loon, dew, blue, flute, shoe, through, fruit, manoeuvre, group

36 ɔɪ join, boy, buoy

37 aʊ now, shout, bough

 Phoneme IPA Symbol Examples

38 ə about, ladder, pencil, dollar, honour, augur

39 eəʳ chair, dare, pear, where, their, prayer

40 ɑ: arm

41 ɜ:ʳ bird, term, burn, pearl, word, journey, myrtle

42 ɔ: paw, ball, fork, poor, fore, board, four, taught, war, bought, sauce

43 ɪəʳ ear, steer, here, tier

44 ʊəʳ cure, tourist

(https://www.dyslexia-reading-well.com/44-phonemes-in-english.html)

Natural Classes are two sounds that share some features. Phonemes that have certain features in common
tend to behave phonologically in similar ways.

Example provided on the table below, ones marked with the plus sign (+) means that feature is present and
we use a minus sign (-) if it is not present.

(https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/adam/files/phonology.ppt.pdf)

Phones and Allophones

Phones - are the different versions of sound type regularly produced in an actual speech (“in the mouth”).
Allophones - are set of phones which are versions of one phoneme.
In the table below, the phoneme t is put inside two slashes to distinguish it from the square bracketed
allophones of it.
 (file:///George%20Yule%20-%20The%20Study%20of%20Language-Cambridge%20University%20Press%20(2020).pdf)

Complementary Distribution is when two different pronunciations (allophones) of a sound type

(phoneme) are used in different places in words.
For example; tar and star. The places where /t/ occurs with aspiration, and without aspiration, never
overlap and so the different pronunciations are in complementary distribution.
Minimal Pairs and Sets
Phonemic distinctions can be tested via pairs and sets of words. Minimal pairs are two words that are
identical in form except for a contrast in one phoneme occurring in the same position. While minimal sets
are a group of words that can be differentiated, each one from the others, by changing one phoneme that is
always in the same position in the word.

(file:///George%20Yule%20-%20The%20Study%20of%20Language-Cambridge%20University%20Press%20(2020).pdf)

Phonotactics - are constraints that concern ways in which syllables can be created in a language.
Syllables – are a larger phonological unit containing a vowel or vowel-like sound including diphthongs.
The most common type of syllable also has a consonant (C) before the vowel (V) and is represented as CV.
The basic elements of the syllable are the onset (one or more consonants) followed by the rhyme. The
rhyme consists of a vowel, which is treated as the nucleus, plus any following consonant(s), described as
the coda. Syllables that have an onset and a nucleus but no coda (such as me, to or no) are known as open
syllables. When a coda is present, (as in the syllables up, cup, at or hat), they are known to be closed
syllables.

Consonant Clusters are a group or sequence of consonants that appear together in a syllable without a
vowel between them.
Notice the combination /st/ is a consonant cluster (CC) used as an onset in the word stan and as coda in the
word past. English can actually have larger onset clusters, as in the word straw and split. If we study the
phonotactics of these larger consonant clusters, they have a fairly regular pattern. The first consonant must
always be /s/ followed by a natural class of voiceless stops (/p/, /t/, /k/), plus a liquid glide (/l/, /r/, /w/).

Coarticulation Effects
Coarticulation is the process of making one sound almost at the same time as the next sound. Syllables and
words are used fast and spontaneous in a casual conversational speech which requires our articulators to
move from one sound to the next without stopping.

Assimilation is when two sound segments occur in sequence and some aspect of one segment is taken
or “copied” by the other. Think of the word have by itself, then how it is pronounced in the phrase I have to
go on an everyday speech. As we start to say the /t/ sound in to, which is voiceless, we tend to produce a
voiceless version of the preceding sound, resulting in what sounds like /f/ than /v/. So, we typically say
“hafta”, showing how the assimilation from a voiced to a voiceless sound is perceived.
Nasalization is adding a nasal quality to a sound segment preceding a nasal sound. This type of
assimilation process occurs in a variety of different contexts. By itself, the word can may be pronounced as
[kæn], but when you say I can go, the influence of the following velar [g] will make the preceding nasal
sound come out as [ŋ] (velar) rather than [n] (alveolar). The most common conversational version of the
phrase is [aɪkəŋgoʊ]. Notice the vowel in can has also changed into schwa [ə]. We may also pronounce and
as [ænd] by itself but if it is used in the common phrase you and me, we usually say [ən], as in [juənmi].
Elision is the process of leaving out a sound segment that might be present in a deliberately careful
pronunciation of a word. /t/ is a common casualty in this process, as in the pronunciation [himəsbi] for the
phrase he must be or in we asked him as the process of elision (of /k/) is likely to produce [wiæstəm].
Vowels also disappear through elision, with the result that sometimes a whole syllable may not be
pronounced, as in [ɪntrɪst] for interest, [kæbnət] for cabinet, [kæmrə] for camera, [prɪznər] for prisoner, and
[spoʊz] for suppose.

Normal Speech
These processes of assimilation, nasalization and elision occur in everyone’s normal speech and should not
be regarded as some type of sloppiness or laziness in speaking. In fact, consistently avoiding the regular
patterns of assimilation, nasalization and elision would result in extremely artificial-sounding talk. The
point of investigating these phonological processes is not to arrive at a set of rules about how a language
should be pronounced, but to try and come to an understanding of the regularities and patterns that
underlie the actual use of sounds in language.

THE SOUND OF LANGUAGE

Introduction
Linguistic structure is conveyed to a listener by speech. (Although linguistic structure can be
conveyed to a viewer by sign or by writing, in this chapter we will consider only oral communication.)
Phonetics is the study of the physical aspects of speech events, including: speech production (how speech is
produced by the speaker, an instance of skilled motor performance), speech acoustics (the properties of the
airwaves that transmit speech from speaker to listener), and speech perception (how speech is perceived
by the listener). Phonetics is part of linguistics, but it is part of other disciplines as well, such as speech and
hearing science, psychology, and engineering. Linguistic phonetics is a term sometimes used to describe the
aspects of speech articulation, acoustics, and perception that are part of linguistics. It includes the study of
the speech sounds of a range of languages, generalizations about sounds that hold across languages, and
the study of the relation of phonetics to other areas of linguistics. In the next section we provide some
concepts and terms that let us describe the sounds of speech.

Tools for Phonetic Description Segments

A speech utterance can be described, in part, as a sequence of individual speech sounds. Speech
sounds, also called segments or phones, are sounds used in languages.
Suprasegmentals - (or Prosody) means ‘above the segment.’ These properties include variations in
loudness, duration and pitch, as well as variation in the degree of energy or effort put into the articulation
of each sound. These generally function to make some elements more prominent than others.
Phonetic Alphabets Problems with Orthography - Phonetic alphabets are sets of symbols used for
representing the speech sounds that occur in utterances. The fundamental principle of most phonetic
alphabets is that each symbol should represent only one sound, and each sound should be represented by
only one symbol.
 The IPA and other Phonetic - Over time and in different countries, many phonetic alphabets have been
devised. The one with the most widespread acceptance is the alphabet of the International Phonetic
Association (or IPA). This alphabet is called the International Phonetic Alphabet (also abbreviated IPA).
Unlike most other phonetic alphabets, the IPA attempts to provide a symbol for every sound of every
language. Another difference between the IPA and other alphabets is that the IPA was developed by an
organization whose members and Council discussed and voted on changes to it. In 1989 an international
convention met in Kiel, Germany to update the IPA, resulting in many recent revisions.
The advantage of the IP- Alphabets - The advantage of the IPA is that because it is widely studied and
used, transcriptions using it can be interpreted by many readers. Therefore we use the IPA throughout this
text. Nonetheless, it must be stressed that other systems are well-suited for other, more limited purposes.
Most linguists who work on particular languages have devised their own systems for those languages,
systems which may or may not correspond closely to the IPA.

Basic IPA symbols for American English

olemissspeechpath.blogspot.com
The IPA Chart

Articulators -The IPA articulatory definitions are provided in part by arranging some of the consonant
and vowel symbols into individual charts which are three-dimensional in content but flattened out to two
dimensions on paper. One dimension is in the horizontal arrangement, another is in the vertical
arrangement, and the third is in the order of symbols that are written in pairs. The main consonant and
vowel charts are both three-dimensional in this way, but they use different sets of dimensions.

Consonants - Let us now return to the IPA chart, beginning with the main consonant chart at the top. The
main consonant chart contains a subset of the consonants, those made with air flowing out from the lungs
(pulmonic egressive). Recall that consonants are sounds produced with a significant constriction in the
vocal tract. This constriction means that the flow of air through the oral cavity and out of the mouth is
affected: either the airstream becomes noisy, or less air is able to flow out than would without the
constriction.
 Voicing - Inside many cells (or boxes) are pairs of consonants with the same rowand-column definition.
These pairs differ in voicing, that is, in the activity of the vocal cords. Generally, if the vocal cords vibrate for
all or part of the sound, it is said to be voiced and appears as the right member of the pair; if the vocal cords
do not vibrate at all, the sound is said to be voiceless, and appears as the left member of the pair. Notice
that all the unpaired sounds (the nasals, trills, tap/flaps, and approximants) are placed to the right in their
cells to show that they are all voiced.

Other consonants- The Basic English consonants that are not on this main consonant chart are the
affricates and the approximant [w]. For [w], it is not on the chart because it is a combination of two
articulations, bilabial and velar. Sometimes on phonetic consonant charts you will see [w] in the bilabial
column, sometimes in the velar column, sometimes in both, sometimes in a special column labelled, labial-
velar or labiovelar.

Vowels - Like the consonant chart, the vowel chart encodes three dimensions, but the vowel dimensions
are different from the consonant ones. The primary active articulator of vowel sounds is always some part
of the tongue (almost always the tongue body), the passive articulator is some part of the midline of the
outer surface of the vocal tract, but the active articulator never comes very close to the passive. The vowel
chart represents a kind of grid of the vocal tract in which the top of the chart is the roof of the mouth, and
the left side of the chart is the front of the oral cavity, viewed on the speaker’s left side, just as for the main
consonant chart
Diphthongs -Some vowels are represented as sequences of vowel symbols because the tongue and/or lips
move from one position to another. Such vowels are called diphthongs. We can distinguish large
diphthongal movements, which cross a large part of the vowel space, from small diphthongal movements,
which involve only adjacent areas of the chart.

Different pronunciations mean different symbols - The IPA charts make a big distinction between
consonants and vowels, giving them separate charts and descriptive terminology. This puts the glides in an
odd position, since they are like both consonants and vowels. Glides are sometimes also called semi-vowels
because they are vowel-like. Their position on the consonant chart (as central approximants) obscures
their similarity to vowels.

Other IPA symbols: consonants and vowels -The IPA provides many more symbols than we have used so
far. This is in part because other languages use sounds that English does not use. The IPA is meant to
provide a symbol for every basic sound of every language. It is beyond the scope of an introductory course
to present and discuss all of the symbols of the IPA, but if you understand the conceptual framework you
should be able to cope with many of these symbols when you encounter them.

DIACRITICS
We noted before that the cells of the charts cover ranges of articulations. Diacritics serve to narrow down
those ranges, and transcriptions using them are often called Narrow. As stated above, a narrow
transcription is used to represent small differences between speakers or languages, to show how a basic
sound’s exact value can change depending on the surrounding sounds, and to show differences between
speech that is more or less careful, etc. However, in many cases diacritics are needed even for the basic
sounds of a language. For example, a language that has nasalized (with air coming out the nose) as well as
oral vowels will necessarily use the nasalization diacritic. The lower right part of the IPA chart contains a
chart of diacritics, of which a few have already been presented.

SUMMARY
Phonetics is concerned with the physical properties of speech. Speech utterances are analysed as
sequences of (partially overlapping) speech segments, plus suprasegmentals. A phonetic transcription
represents a speech utterance as a string of phonetic symbols for the segments, accompanied by diacritics
for the suprasegmentals.
Languages’ orthographies are not always consistent in their letter-to sound relations. Phonetic alphabets
aim to provide one symbol per sound and one sound per symbol. The IPA is an international standard
alphabet which aims to provide symbols for the sounds of all the world’s languages. Consonant and vowel
symbols are defined in terms of speech articulations: consonants in terms of their voicing, place of
articulation, and manner of articulation; vowels in terms of their tongue position and lip rounding. These
descriptive dimensions also serve to organize the symbols into phonetic charts.
A phonetic transcription can be broad or narrow. This chapter provides a list of 40 symbols for broad
transcription of the basic sounds of American English. Narrow transcriptions use additional phonetic
symbols and diacritics. Diacritics make symbols more specific. These additional symbols and diacritics are
also used for basic sounds of other languages.
Just as native speakers of a language have unconscious knowledge about other aspects of linguistic
structure, they have phonetic knowledge. They know the sounds of their language, and exactly how those
sounds are pronounced in different combinations. No phonetic transcription conveys every such detail of
pronunciation.

PHONETICS vs. PHONOLOGY

Phonetics and phonology are two important intra-disciplinary branches of linguistics. Though closely
interlinked and serving the same purpose, i.e. dedicated to the study of human speech sounds and sound
structures, phonetics and phonology differ from each other to an extent that each has been given a separate
disciplinary status. Some of the most prominent differences between phonetics and phonology can be
elaborated as follows:

Descriptive vs. Theoretical:

Phonetics is a subfield of descriptive linguistics while phonology is an area of theoretical linguistics.

Major Field vs. Sub-discipline:

Linguists often consider phonology a major field of linguistics. While, on the other hand, phonetics is
regarded as a subfield placed under phonology.

Phonological Analysis vs. Further Studies:

Phonetics is the basis for phonological analysis. On the other hand, phonology is the basis for further work
in morphology, syntax, discourse, and orthography design.
General Speech Sounds vs. Particular Sound Pattern analysis:
Phonetics the study of the physical aspects of sounds analyzes the production of all human speech sounds,
regardless of any language it is dealing with. While, phonology analyses the sound patterns of a particular
language by determining which phonetic sounds are significant, and explaining how these sounds are
interpreted by the native speaker.

Concrete vs. Abstract:

Phonetics discusses the physical characteristics of speech sounds or signs, especially, their physiological
production, acoustic properties, auditory perception and neurophysiological status. Phonology is primarily
concerned with the abstract, grammatical characterization of systems of sounds or signs.

Audible Sounds vs. Their Meanings:

Phonetics is strictly about audible sound and the things that happen in our mouth, throat, nasal and sinus
cavities, and the lungs to make these sounds. It has nothing to do with meaning. It is only description.
Phonology, on the other hand, is both physical as well as meaningful. It explores the differences between
the sounds in a language that change the meaning of an utterance.

Limited vs. Wide Scope:

Phonetics only asks, "Does this sound go here or not?"
Phonology asks, "Does the meaning change if this sound is put here instead of that one?"

Form vs. Function:

Phonetics is concerned with the form, i.e. the physical properties of sounds. Phonology, on the other hand,
is concerned with the function, i.e. The differences and similarities of sounds.

Parole vs. Langue:

The linguistic term 'parole' is the concern of phoneticians while 'langue' is studied by phonologists.

Universal vs. Language Specific:

Phonetics deals with the universal phenomenon of human speech sounds. Phonology, on the other hand, is
language specific.

Phone vs. Phoneme:

In phonetics, the smallest structural unit is a phone. In phonology, on the other hand, the minimal
meaningful unit is called a phoneme.

Phone vs. Allophone:

Every language consists of speech sounds called phones. Phonetics is concerned with phones in general.
Phonology, on the other hand, describes phones as allophones of phonemes.
Phonetic vs. Phonetic Transcription:
Phonetics deals with the phonetic transcription of speech sounds. Phonology, on the other hand, deals with
the phonemic transcription of speech sounds.

Square brackets vs. Slanted brackets:

In phonetic transcription, square brackets are used to enclose transcribed symbols. In phonemic
transcription, on the other hand, slashes are used for the same purpose.

Speech act vs. language System:

Phonetics is concerned with the speech act. Phonology, on the other hand, is concerned with the language
system.

Continuous vs. Discrete entity:

Phonetics is the domain of the continuous, while phonology is the domain of discrete entity.

Gradient vs. Categorical:

Phonetics is gradient while phonology is categorical.

Phonetics in Phonology vs. Phonology in Phonetics:

During their interaction, when phonetics affects phonology, the phonetics effects and constraints are
reflected in the phonology. This is referred to as naturalness. On the other hand, when phonology affects
phonetics, it results in the mapping between the units of phonology and their physical realization.

Individuality vs. interrelationship of Sounds:

Phonetic transcription depends simply on the pronunciation of each individual sound regardless of its
function in the sound system of the given language, whereas phonemic transcription depends upon the
interrelationship of sounds in each particular language.

Identification vs. interpretation of Sounds:

Phonetics studies' which sounds are present in a language'. Phonology, on the other hand, studies how
these sounds combine and how they change in combination, as well as which sounds can contrast to
produce differences in meaning.

Phonetic vs. Phonetic Features:

Phonetic features whose presence or absence can alter meaning are called phonemic features. On the other
hand, adding or subtracting a phonemic feature normally results in a change of meaning as well as in a
change in pronunciation.

Predictability vs. Unpredictability of Features:

The occurrence of certain phonetic features is entirely predictable in phonetic environment, called
redundant phonetic features, as is the case in English with voicing or sonorants, nasality of vowels, or
length in vowels. On the other hand, the presence of a phonemic feature is not predictable according to
phonetic context.
Phonetic Symbols vs. Phonetic Symbols:
The symbols of phonetic alphabet are universal. On the other hand, phonemic symbols are a type of
phonetic shorthand with specific value for a particular sound in a language.

Marking vs. ignoring Phonetic Detail:

Phonetic transcription, enclosed in square brackets, attempts to express as much phonetic detail as
possible, redundant or otherwise phonemic transcription does not mark redundant features, but rather is
intended to represent only those phonetic details of a given language that are distinctive.

"One for one" vs. "One for several"

In phonetics, a phonetic symbol stands for one and the same sound regardless of language, but a phonemic
symbol often stands for any one of the several actual sounds.
Example:
Let us take an example of the word "bed" Phonetics is concerned with its physical production, acoustic
properties, and its physiological status. On the other hand, phonologists take the word "bed" differently.
They say the word "bet" is very similar to the word "bed" in terms of the physical manifestation of sounds.
The only difference is that at the end of "bet" the vocal chords stop vibrating so that sound is a result only
of the placement of the tongue behind the teeth and the flow of air. However, the meanings of the two
words are not related in the least. What a vast difference a muscle makes! This is the biggest distinction
between phonetics and phonology, although phonologists analyze a lot more than just the obvious
differences.

APPLICATION TO LANGUAGE TEACHING

Applications:
 Foreign language teaching/learning
 Pronunciation dictionaries
 Speech pathologies
 Forensic phonetics
 Speech technology

What is Pronunciation?
 The production of significant sound.
Significant because:
• It is used as part of a code of a particular language
• It is used to achieve meaning in contexts of use.
 Auditory Phonetics – the perception of the sound.
 Articulatory Phonetics – the production of the sound.

What is pronunciation teaching?

 Pronunciation teaching not only makes students aware of different sounds and sounds
features
  Can also improve their speaking immeasurably
 Showing where they are made in the mouth, making students aware of where words
should be stressed.

Why teach pronunciation?

 English is not pronounced as it is written: vowels and consonants can be pronounced in different
ways and there are no accents to help you with stress
 Incorrect pronunciation is one of the main reasons for breakdown in communication
 The more help students are given with their pronunciation, the more confident they feel when
speaking
 There’s no point in teaching students new words or phrases if they can’t pronounce them
comprehensibly
 Despite many irregularities, there are also many rules which can help pronunciation. About 70% of
words in English follow a regular pronunciation pattern
 If students are taught to recognize phonemic script, this will enable them to check pronunciation
for themselves

Teach Pronunciation to build on...

 Functional intelligibility: spoken English in which an accent is not distracting to the listener.

 Functional communicability: learner’s ability to function successfully within the specific

communicative situations.

 Self-confidence: dependent on the ones mentioned above.

 Speech monitoring abilities: good learners listen to the input and try to imitate it.

Pronunciation Issues
1. Perfection versus intelligibility
2. What students can hear versus what students can say
3. To use or not to use phonemic symbols
4. When to teach pronunciation

Actually, Pronunciation Teaching

 Makes students aware of different sounds and their features
 Improves their speaking immeasurably
 Allows students to get over serious intelligibility problems
 Concentrates on sounds, showing where they are made in the mouth, making students aware of
where words should be stressed

What to teach?
Individual sounds (perhaps using the IPA)
Sound linking
Connected speech
Weak forms (schwa)
 Voice – get them to imitate English speakers mispronouncing their L1 – gives them a feel for
sounds/rhythm
Syllable stress – highlight length, pitch loudness, & vowel clarity
Intonation
Minimal pairs
Chunking
Pausing
Rhythm
Awareness of varieties of English
Awareness and recognition

So...
 Recognizing all these things give them extra information about spoken English and help them
achieve the goal of improved comprehension and intelligibility
 Being made aware of pronunciation issues will be immense benefit not only to their own
production but also to their own understanding of spoken English.