Basic Concepts in Phonetics

By William Orellana
Modified by SABINO MORLA
 LANGUAGE
• Language, a system of arbitrary,
conventional spoken, manual
(signed), or written symbols by
means of which human beings, as
members of a social group and
participants in its culture, express
themselves. The functions of
language include communication,
the expression of identity, play,
imaginative expression, and
emotional release.
 LINGUISTICS
• Linguistics, the scientific study of
language. The word was first used in
the middle of the 19th century to
emphasize the difference between a
newer approach to the study of
language that was then developing
and the more traditional approach of
philology.
 What is phonetics?

• Phonetics is a branch of
linguistics that
comprises the study of
the sounds of
human speech. It
involves the physical
properties of speech
sounds: their
physiological
production, acoustic
properties, auditory
perception, and
neurophysiologic status.

PHONETICS studies everything

• PHONE- SOUND related to the production and perception
• ICS= RELATED TO/ of human speech sounds
PERTAINING TO
 Branches

Phonetics is divided into three branches:

1. Articulatory phonetics
• The study of how speech sounds are produced by the human vocal apparatus.
2. Acoustic phonetics
• The study of the sound waves made by the human vocal organs for
communication.
3. Auditory phonetics
• The study of how speech sounds are perceived by the ear, auditory nerve, and
brain.
 What is Phonology?
• Phonology is the study of how sounds are organized and used in natural
languages.
• The phonological system of a language includes
• an inventory of sounds and their features, and
• rules which specify how sounds interact with each other.
• Phonology is just one of several aspects of language. It is related to other
aspects such as phonetics, morphology, syntax, and pragmatics.
• The illustration below shows the place of phonology in an interacting
hierarchy of levels in linguistics:
• PHONO (sound) + LOGY (study of)

PHONOLOGY studies everything

related to the standards that rule possible
combinations of phonemes in a given
language.
 What is the difference between
phonology and phonetics?

• Phonetics and phonology are the two fields

dedicated to the study of human speech
sounds and sound structures. The
difference between phonetics and
phonology is that phonetics deals with the
physical production of these sounds while
phonology is the study of sound patterns
and their meanings both within and across
languages.
Comparison: Phonology and phonetics

Phonetics … Phonology …
Is the basis for further
Is the basis for work in morphology,
phonological analysis. syntax, discourse, and
orthography design.

Analyzes the sound

patterns of a particular
language by

Analyzes the production of determining which

all human speech sounds, phonetic sounds are
regardless of language. significant, and

explaining how these

sounds are interpreted
by the native speaker.
 What is a phoneme?
Definition
• A phoneme is the smallest contrastive unit in the sound system of a
language.

Discussion
•Phonologists have differing views of the phoneme. Following are the
two major views considered here:
•In the American structuralist tradition, a phoneme is defined
according to its allophones and environments.
•In the generative tradition, a phoneme is defined as a set of
distinctive features.
 What is an allophone?
• Definition
An allophone is a phonetic variant of a phoneme in a
particular language.

Examples (English)
[p] and [pH] are allophones of the phoneme /p/.
[t] and [tH] are allophones of the phoneme /t/.

CITY /sitii/sirii/ THE PHONEME REPRESENTED BY THE

GRAPHEME “T” IS AN ALLOPHONE

NEITHER / niither/ naither/

IN DR- PUERCA/ PUELCA/ PUEICA
 What is an allomorph?
• Definition
From the Greek prefix ´allo´, which means
other and ´morph´ form. Therefore, the
term allomorph refers to other forms of a
word.
For example: strong  strength
long  length
TRUE  TRUTH
For further information, click here.
LIFE LIVELY
LOVE LOVELY  LOVELESS
Here is a chart that compares phones and phonemes:

A phone is … A phoneme is …
one of many possible sounds in the A contrastive unit in the sound system
languages of the world. of a particular language.

the smallest identifiable unit found in a A minimal unit that serves to

stream of speech. distinguish between meanings of
words.

pronounced in a defined way. Pronounced in one or more ways,

depending on the number of
allophones.

represented between brakets by Represented between slashes by

convention. convention.

Example: [b], [j], [o] Example: /b/, /j/, /o/

 Minimal pair

• Examples (English): Minimal pair

• Here are examples of the phonemes /r/ and /l/ occurring in a
minimal pair:
• rip
• Lip

• HOG VS DOG

• CAR VS SCAR

• TRUCK VS TRUNK
• KNOW VS NOW

• The phones [r] and [l] contrast in identical environments and are
considered to be separate phonemes. The phonemes /r/ and /l/
serve to distinguish the word ‘rip’ from the word ‘lip’.
 HOMOPHONES
• Words sharing the same phoneme
pattern and pronunciation…

• NIGHT- KNIGHT
• BY VS BUY
• SEE VS SEA
• SELL VS SALE
• TWO VS TOO
• LIFE VS LIVE
• MAIN VS MANE
 HOMOGRAPHS

• PAIR OF WORDS THAT SPELLED

THE SAME, BUT DO NOT SHARE
THE SAME PRONUNCIATION

• LIVE VS LIVE
• RECORD VS RECORD
• LEAD VS LEAD
• OBJECT VS OBJECT
 HOMONYMS
• WORDS PRONOUNCED AND SPELLED
THE SAME; MEANING DEPENDS ON
CONTEXT!!!!
• RIGHT VS RIGHT
• FINE VS FINE
• BLUE VS BLUE
• PLEASE VS PLEASE
• CAN VS CAN
• BAT VS BAT
• FLY VS FLY
• WATCH VS WATCH
 What is a grapheme?
• Grapheme from Greek graphēma a letter. In
Linguistics, it is one of a set of orthographic
symbols (letters or combinations of letters) in a
given language that serve to distinguish one
word from another and usually correspond to or
represent phonemes, e.g.

the /f/ in fun, the ph in phantom, and the gh in laugh

[i] SIT…… SYNCHRONIC ….BUSY

[u] BOOK… SOUP… TWELVE.. SUIT… SUITE

 Sources
• BRITANNICA (2023) CLICK ON THE
PICTURE