EL120 Week 5-Unit 5

EL120
English Phonetics & Linguistics
Week 5
(Unit 5 – Phonology + Quiz 1)
Mrs. Shahenda Bahaaeddin
Lesson Content:
 Bell-ringer/Participation
 Unit 5 – Phonology
 In-class Activity 1 – LMS

Quiz
2
Unit 4 Review:
 Vowels: Phonetic Description (Length –
Height/Position of Tongue – Lips Shape)
 Short/Long vowels – Diphthongs
 Voiced – Voiceless sounds
 IPA Chart – Phonemes
 Minimal Pairs
3
Consonants: Manner & Place of articulation:
4
Voiced/Voiceless Consonant & Vowel Sounds
5
Vowels:
There are SEVEN short vowel sounds in RP:
FRONT CENTRAL BACK

symbol example symbol example symbol Example
ɪ ship ə above ʊ foot
e head ʌ cup ɒ sock

æ hat
6
Vowels:
There are FIVE long vowel sounds in RP:
FRONT CENTRAL BACK

symbol example symbol example symbol Example
iː sheep uː cool
ɜː bird ɔː horse
ɑː farm
7
Diphthongs:
➢ There are EIGHT Diphthongs in RP:

• /ɪə/ near /nɪə/
• /ʊə/ tour /tʊə/
• /aɪ/ my /maɪ/
• /ɔɪ/ toy /tɔɪ/
• /əʊ/ snow /snəʊ/
• /eə/ hair /heə/
• /aʊ/ now /naʊ/
• /eɪ/ say /seɪ/
8
❑ IPA Chart: Video 3
9
❑ Exercise 1 (pp.47 – 48)

no. 1 – 20
Appendix II
❑ Exercises 3 – 4 – 6 (pp.
161 - 164)
10
❑ Extra Practice Exercises

Consonants (Manner & Place of Articulation)
11
UNIT 5: PHONOLOGY
1) Introduction
➢ What is Phonology?
2) Phonemic Analysis
➢ Phonemes & Allophones
➢ Phonemic vs. Phonetic Transcription
➢ Minimal Pairs
3) Assimilation and Other Phenomena
➢ Assimilation
➢ The Linking ‘r’
➢ The Intrusive ‘r’
4) Aspiration
5) Consonant Clusters & Syllable Structure
➢ Consonant Groups: Word initial, medial and final positions
➢ Syllable Structure 12
UNIT 5: PHONOLOGY
1) Introduction:
What is PHONOLOGY?
➢ Articulatory phonetics attempts to describe how
ISOLATED speech sounds are produced and classified.
➢ However, Phonology studies how these sounds are

COMBINED or MERGED into each other to produce words
and utterances.
➢ Phonology also studies the functional patterns of such
merging. This is why phonology is sometimes called
FUNCTIONAL PHONETICS. 13
UNIT 5: PHONOLOGY
1) Introduction:
What is PHONOLOGY?
➢ Phonology also deals with the rules governing how
phonemes (significant sounds) are combined in a given
language to produce words.
➢ A limited number of phonemes (44 in English) can produce

a large number of words found in dictionaries.
14
UNIT 5: PHONOLOGY
2) Phonemic Analysis:
Phonemes
➢ They are meaningful sounds, i.e. if one is used instead of
the other in a word, its meaning will change (See Units 3 &
4)
➢ The actual number of possible speech sounds is very

large, but the number of sounds which are
meaningful/significant in a certain language is
relatively small.
15
Allophones
➢ They are the VARIETIES of a phoneme.
➢ They don’t change meaning of a word if one is used
instead of the other.
➢ Let’s have a look at this example! Clear & Dark ‘L’
▪ When you hear an RP speaker say the word: little /litl/, you feel that the
/l/ sound at the beginning (Clear ‘l’) is slightly different from the /l/
sound at the end (Dark ‘l’).
▪ These two varieties of /l/ are allophones not phonemes because if
one of them is replaced by the other, there will be no change in
the meaning of the word little.
• RULE:
✓ Clear /l/ is heard before vowels, including word – initial positions.
✓ Dark /l/ is heard before consonants and in word – final position.
16
Allophones
➢ In a phonemic transcription such differences

which are not meaning changing are not
represented.
➢ In other words, the two allophones of /l/
will be represented as one sound.
➢ BUT these slightly different allophones

will be represented when someone is
undertaking a phonetic transcription.
❑ So what is the difference between phonemic and phonetic

transcription?
17
Phonemic vs. Phonetic Transcription
➢ These are TWO different methods of transcribing sounds.
A) Phonemic (Broad) transcription:
▪ It is the most common type of phonetic transcription, used in many
English dictionaries.
▪ Here only the phonemes (the 44 significant sounds of English) are
considered.
▪ It represents speech using just a unique symbol for each phoneme of
the language/.
▪ It is put between two slashes / /.
▪ In other words, we say that “t” and “d” are two separate phonemes.
strewn’ /strun/
‘tenth’ /tɛnθ/
‘clean’ /klin/
18
Phonemic vs. Phonetic Transcription
B) Phonetic (Narrow) transcription:
▪ It is also known as ‘narrow’ transcription.

▪ This involves representing additional details about the contextual
variations in pronunciation that occur in normal speech.
▪ This is the transcription of actual sounds in terms of their acoustic and
articulatory properties.
▪ They are put between two brackets [ ].
▪ We might transcribe the same three words phonetically like this:
strewn’ [stru:n]
‘tenth’ [tʰɛ̃n̪θ]
‘clean’ [kl̥i:n]
19
B) Phonetic (Narrow) transcription:
▪ strewn’ has a long vowel, represented by the colon diacritic [:].
▪ ‘tenth’ has an aspirated initial [tʰ] shown by the superscript [ʰ]; the
vowel is nasalized, represented by the tilde diacritic above the vowel
[ɛ]̃ , because it immediately precedes a nasal; and the nasal is actually
articulated at the interdental place of articulation, represented by the
diacritic [n̪], because it immediately precedes an interdental fricative.
▪ ‘clean’ has a long vowel, represented by the diacritic [:]; and a

voiceless [l̥], represented by the small subscript circle diacritic,
because the normal voiced quality of [l] is suppressed by the aspiration
of the [k] before it.
20
Questions: (p. 50)

Which /l/ in the following words is clear and which is dark?
a. Enlighten
b. Layman
c. Animal
d. While
e. Ailing
f. Slave
g. milk
Answer:
❑ Clear /l/: (a, b , e, f)
❑ Dark /l/: (c, d, g) 21
Minimal Pairs
➢ The phonemes of a language are established through a process which
uses a pair of words that differ only in a single sound (See Units 3 & 4).
➢ In a minimal pair test, we take off a sound in a word and replace it by

other sounds.
➢ When the meaning changes, we conclude that the replacement is a
phoneme.
22
Minimal Pairs
Example: site /saɪt/
▪ If we replace the sound /s/ by /f/ we will have fight /faɪt/ (a different word
with a new meaning).
▪ Therefore, the two words, /saɪt/ and /faɪt/, are a minimal pair.
▪ If we continue to substitute sounds for /s/, we will see that several
phonemes can be established:
• /m/ as in might /maɪt/

• /k/ as in: kite /kaɪt/
• /h/ as in: height /haɪt/
• /w/ as in: white /waɪt/
• /b/ as in: bite /baɪt/
• /r/ as in: right or write /raɪt/
• /t/ as in: tight /taɪt/
• /n/ as in: night /naɪt/
• /l/ as in: light /laɪt/
23
Minimal Pairs
• Each change produces a different

word with a new meaning.
• With one minimal pair we
established the existence of 11
phonemes of English.
• With different pairs the remaining
phonemes (consonants, vowels
and diphthongs) can be
established.
24
Exercises 1, 2, 3: (pp. 51, 52)
25
3) Assimilation and Other Phenomena:
➢ This section deals with the EFFECT of NEIGHBORING SOUNDS on
each other.
A) Assimilation
What is Assimilation?
▪ It is a linguistic process by which a sound becomes similar to an
adjacent sound.
▪ In other words, a speech sound is being influenced by the sound that
comes before or after it (CALD Definition).
▪ All sounds, vowels, diphthongs and consonants are influenced by
surrounding sounds.
▪ This influence usually leads to sound changes.
▪ Such changes are examples of assimilation.
26
▪ Thus, assimilation happens when a sound changes as a result of being
next to another sound.
▪ In other words, assimilation is defined as the changing of sound A into
sound B under the influence of a neighbouring sound C (which may be
the same as B or different from it).
EX:
Observe how the last sound /d/ changes under the influence of the
following sound:
/d/ in good girl becomes /g/ : /goog girl/
/d/ in good boy becomes /b/ : /goob boy/
/t/ to /p/ assimilation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_ohrkQmzdQ

/d/ to /g/ assimilation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDDV01W20bo
27
Other Examples of Assimilation:
/t/ to /k/ assimilation

/d/ to /b/ assimilation
/n/ to /p/ assimilation
28
B) The Linking “r”
▪ In connected RP speech, when a word ends in the schwa /ә/ and the
next word begins with any vowel, a linking /r/ sound is commonly heard
between them.
EX:
later on /'leɪ.tər’ɒn/
dear Allen /'dɪər'a.lən/
higher up /'haɪ.ər'ʌp/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLprxwzWtc4
29
C) The Intrusive “r”
▪ Sometimes the “r” is inserted even when the previous word does not
end in [r].
EX:
idea of /aɪ.'dɪərəv /
Asia and Africa /'eɪ.ʃərənd'a.frɪkə/
/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCJrFM3hdlg
30
4) Aspiration:
➢ Let’s try this experiment together:

Bring a paper and put it in front of your mouth and then say these
words:
key – piece – tea
What did you notice?
That the tissue will move because of the puff of

air coming out of your mouth.
➢ This is called “aspiration”.
31
4) Aspiration:
➢ Aspiration are marked by the [h] symbol.

➢ The sounds /k/ - /p/ - /t/ are “aspirated”.
➢ RULE: The voiceless plosives [/k/, /p/ or /t/] are pronounced with a
following puff of air when they are used at the beginning of a
stressed syllable and before a vowel.
EX:
/p/ in peep, pronounced [phi:p];
/t/ in tie, pronounced [thai]; and
/k/ in keen, pronounced [khi:n],
Aspirated sounds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAUZqgQ8eZ0 32
4) Aspiration:
➢ No aspiration occurs when the three voiceless

plosive consonants /p/ , /t/, /k/ come after the /s/
sound as in speed, steed , skied:
/spi:d, sti:d, ski:d/
33
Exercise 4: (pp. 53)
34
5) Consonant Clusters & Syllable Structure :
A. Consonant Clusters/Groups
➢ As we mentioned earlier in this

lesson, phonology deals with how
sounds are combined together to
form words.
➢ In English words, two, three or

more consonants may be
grouped together to form
clusters or groups.
➢ Let’s look at these examples of consonant clusters:

35
a) Two Consonants: Word Initial Position:

• /s/ + /p, t, k, f, m, n, l, w, / as in: spare, steam, sky, sphere, smile, sneer,
slow, swear
• /t/ + /r, w, j/ as in: trim, twin, tune
• /k/ + /l, r, w, j/ as in: Clive, crime, queen, queue
• /b/ + /l, r, j/ as in: blame, bright, beautiful
• /d/ +/r, w, j/ as in: dry, dwell, duty
• /g/ + l, r/ as in: glare, gross
• /f/ + / l, r, j/ as in: flare, frame, few
• /θ/ + /r, w/ as in: three, thwart
• /ʃ/ + /r/ as in: shrink , shrimp
• /v, m, n, h/ + /j/ as in: view, mute, news, huge
• /p/+/l, r, j/ as in: play, pray, pew
NINE English consonants tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ŋ/, /l/,/r/, /w/, /ð/,

/z/, /j/, do not come at the start of consonant clusters.
36
b) Three Consonants: Word Initial Position
• /spr-/ as in: spray, spread, spring

• /str-/ as in straw, struggle, stress
• /skr-/ as in: scream, screen, script
• /stj-/ as in: student, steward, stew (pronounced /stu:/ in
American English)
• /skj-/ as in: skew (rare cluster)
• /spl-/ as in: splash, splendid, split
• /skw-/ as in: squad, square, squash
All the above examples begin with /s/.
37
c) Word Medial Position:
• /-st-/ as in: instant /instənt/ (two consonants)

• /-kstʃ-/ as in: exchange /ɪkstʃeɪndʒ/ (three consonants)
• /-kstr-/ as in: extract /ɪkstrækt/ (four consonants)
d) Word Final Position:
• /-sp/ as in: crisp /krɪsp/ (two consonants)

• /-ldz/ as in: fields /fi:ldz/ (three consonants)
Four or more consecutive consonants are heard across

word boundaries.
EX:
long street /lɒŋ.stri:t/ , twelfth strike /twelfθ.straɪk/
(the dot [.] marks a new syllable.)
38
B. Syllable Structure
What is a Syllable?
➢ It is a single unit of speech that contains a vowel with consonants
or consonant clusters after or before.
➢ English words are made up of one or more syllables.
➢ Each syllable consists of one or more sounds (consonants & vowels).
➢ As a rule, the English syllable commonly contains a vowel or a
diphthong regardless of the number of consonants used in it.
➢ Minimum syllable:
One vowel sound or diphthong can be a

whole syllable.
EX: or /ɔ:/
eye /ai/
39
B. Syllable Structure
➢ Syllabic Consonants:
It is a consonant that forms a syllable on its own.
EX: mutton /mʌtn/ cattle /kætl
Although there is one vowel in these words, the number of syllables is two:
➢ the final /n/ in the first and the /l/ in the second are called syllabic,
meaning that each one stands for a syllable, i.e. they stand out as
stronger and louder than consonants.
RULE: when an alveolar stop [t, d] is followed by an alveolar liquid [l] or an
alveolar nasal[n] and occurs at the end of a word they make up a syllabic
consonant.
EX: bottles
40
Question : (p. 55)

Which of the following words end in a syllabic consonant?
1. Team
2. lone
3. rotten
4. fine
5. fiddle
6. hill
7. sole
8. shuttle
Answer: 3 – 5 – 8 41
❑Exercise 5: (pp. 55 – 56)
❑Activity : (pp.55 - 56)
42
Appendix II (p.165)
43
So let’s BREAK…
PLEASE
For 10 minutes ONLY
44
44
GOOD LUCK!
45
46

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EL120

English Phonetics & Linguistics

 In-class Activity 1 – LMS

Consonants: Manner & Place of articulation:

Voiced/Voiceless Consonant & Vowel Sounds

There are SEVEN short vowel sounds in RP:

FRONT CENTRAL BACK

ɪ ship ə above ʊ foot

e head ʌ cup ɒ sock

There are FIVE long vowel sounds in RP:

FRONT CENTRAL BACK

➢ There are EIGHT Diphthongs in RP:

❑ IPA Chart: Video 3

❑ Exercise 1 (pp.47 – 48)

❑ Extra Practice Exercises

➢ However, Phonology studies how these sounds are

➢ A limited number of phonemes (44 in English) can produce

➢ The actual number of possible speech sounds is very

➢ In a phonemic transcription such differences

➢ BUT these slightly different allophones

❑ So what is the difference between phonemic and phonetic

▪ It is also known as ‘narrow’ transcription.

▪ We might transcribe the same three words phonetically like this:

▪ strewn’ has a long vowel, represented by the colon diacritic [:].

▪ ‘clean’ has a long vowel, represented by the diacritic [:]; and a

Questions: (p. 50)

➢ In a minimal pair test, we take off a sound in a word and replace it by

• /m/ as in might /maɪt/

• Each change produces a different

Exercises 1, 2, 3: (pp. 51, 52)

/t/ to /p/ assimilation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_ohrkQmzdQ

Other Examples of Assimilation:

/t/ to /k/ assimilation

B) The Linking “r”

dear Allen /'dɪər'a.lən/

C) The Intrusive “r”

Asia and Africa /'eɪ.ʃərənd'a.frɪkə/

➢ Let’s try this experiment together:

What did you notice?

That the tissue will move because of the puff of

➢ This is called “aspiration”.

➢ Aspiration are marked by the [h] symbol.

➢ No aspiration occurs when the three voiceless

Exercise 4: (pp. 53)

➢ As we mentioned earlier in this

➢ In English words, two, three or

➢ Let’s look at these examples of consonant clusters:

a) Two Consonants: Word Initial Position:

NINE English consonants tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ŋ/, /l/,/r/, /w/, /ð/,

b) Three Consonants: Word Initial Position

• /spr-/ as in: spray, spread, spring

All the above examples begin with /s/.

c) Word Medial Position:

• /-st-/ as in: instant /instənt/ (two consonants)

• /-sp/ as in: crisp /krɪsp/ (two consonants)

Four or more consecutive consonants are heard across

One vowel sound or diphthong can be a

EX: mutton /mʌtn/ cattle /kætl

Question : (p. 55)

❑Exercise 5: (pp. 55 – 56)

❑Activity : (pp.55 - 56)

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