Phonology In Teaching

English
Present by :
Trisna
Paul
Wiwin (20212007)
 Phonology meaning
Phonology is the study of the sound system of a language. A language's sound system is made up of a set of phonemes
which are used according to phonological rules.

Phonology describes sound contrasts which create differences in meaning within a language. Phonological systems are
made up of phonemes (we'll come back to phonemes in a bit), and each language has its own phonological system. This
means that the study of phonology is language-specific.

● Phonological awareness
Phonological awareness is the ability to be aware of, identify and manipulate phonological units (phonemes) in
elements of spoken language such as syllables and words.
Phonological awareness comes from the analysis of the following language elements:
● Phonemes
● Dialects and accents
● Phonotactics
 01
Phonemes
A phoneme is the smallest unit
of meaningful
sound. Phonemes are the basic
phonological units and form the
building blocks of speech
sounds. Phonemes are single
sounds represented by a single
written symbol.
02 03
Dialects and Accents Phonotactics
Dialects are variations of the same Phonotactics is the study of the
language spoken by people in rules governing the possible
particular areas or social phoneme sequences in a
groups.Accents have developed language.
because of regional phonological
differences.
 Phonemes
A minimal pair is when two words have different meanings but only one sound (or
phonemic) difference.
An example of minimal pairs in phonology would be:
bad /bæd/ and bed /bɛd/.
rock /rɒk/ and lock /lɒk/.
As you can see, these words are very similar, but each pair contains one phonemic
difference which creates different meanings.
The rules for identifying minimal pairs are:
-The words in the pair must have the same number of sounds.
-Two or more words in the pairs must be identical in every sound except for one.
-In each word, the sounds must be in the same position.
The words must have different meanings.
 Dialects and accents of English
For example : Scottish, Irish, Yorkshire,
Cockney, Welsh English, may all be said to be
dialects of the UK English language.
Regional dialects
may differ in their pronunciation or use
particular grammatical patterns or vocabulary.
For example, the British English dialect does not
pronounce the /r/ in words like 'car' [ka:]
whereas the American English dialect often
pronounces the /r/. This is called rhoticity.
 Phonotactics
Within phonotactics, we can look at syllables. A syllable is a
phonological unit that involves one or more phonemes. Syllables
can show us how phonemes appear in particular sequences.
Each syllable has:
a nucleus - always a vowel,
an onset and a coda - usually consonants.
 Example
In the word cat /kaet/, /k/ is the onset, /ae/ is the nucleus and /t/ is
the coda.
These are the rules concerning phoneme sequences in syllables:
- The nucleus of a syllable is essential for the word and is the
vowel in the middle of the syllable.
- The onset is not always present but you can find it before the
nucleus if it is.
- The coda is also not always present but you can find it after the
nucleus if it is.
 Phonological rules

Each language's phonological system contains rules which govern the pronunciation of
phonemes.

Phonological rules are related to the spoken or written principles which control the
changes of sounds during speech.

These describe the process of articulation (how a speaker produces speech sounds
stored in the brain). Phonological rules help us understand which sounds change, what
they change to, and where the change happens.
Examples of phonological rules can be divided into four types: assimilation,
dissimilation ,insertion, and deletion.
 Assimilation

Assimilation is the process of changing one feature of a sound to make it similar to

another.
This rule can be applied to the English plural system:
• The -s can change from voiced to voiceless depending on whether the preceding
consonant is voiced or unvoiced.
So, the English plural -s can be pronounced in different ways depending on the word it is
part of, for example:
• In the word snakes, the letter 's' is pronounced /s/.
• In the word baths, the letter 's' is pronounced /z/.
• In the word dresses, the letter 's' is pronounced /ɪz/.
 Dissimilation

Dissimilation is the process of changing one feature of a sound to make it different.

This type of rule makes two sounds more distinguishable. It can help non-native speakers to
pronounce words.
• The pronunciation of the word chimney [ˈʧɪmni] as chimley [ˈʧɪmli], with the change of [n]
to an [l].
 Insertion

Insertion is the process of adding an extra sound between two others.

For example, we usually insert a voiceless stop between a nasal and a voiceless fricative
to make it easier for English speakers to pronounce a word.
• In the word strength /strɛŋθ/, we add the sound 'k' and it becomes /strɛŋkθ/.
• In the word hamster /hæmstə/, we add the sound 'p' and it becomes /hæmpstə/.
 Deletion

Deletion is the process of not pronouncing a sound (consonant, vowel, or whole syllable)
present in a word or phrase, to make it easier to say.
For example:
In the phrase “you and me” [ju: ənd mi:] it is possible not to say the sound /d/.
• You and me [ju:ənmi:].
This also occurs in some words:
• /h/ in him [ɪm].
• /f/ in fifth [fɪθ].
 Conclusion
• Phonology is the study of the “sound system” of language. It refers to
the phonemes used in a language and how these are organised.
• A phoneme is the smallest meaningful unit of sound.
• Dialects are variations of language associated with a geographic area and social
class. Accents feature regional phonological or phonetic differences.
• Phonotactics studies the constraining rules of phoneme combinations.
• Each language has a phonological system (set of phonemes) which can be shown in
a phonemic chart.
• Phonological rules (assimilation, dissimilation, insertion and deletion) help us
understand which sounds change, what they change to, and where the change happens.