LECTURE 1

THE PHONETIC SYSTEM OF A LANGUAGE

1. Aspects of Sound Phenomena.
2. Methods applied in Phonetics.
3. Phonetics as a Science.
4. Branches of Phonetics.
The phonetic system of a language contains two systems (levels) segmental & suprasegmental (prosodic).
Segmental units are sounds, vowels & consonants which form the vocalic & consonantal subsystems. Prosodic
units are syllables, accentual (rhythmical) units, and intonation groups, utterances, which form the subsystems of
pitch, stress, rhythm, tempo, and pauses.
Segmental & prosodic units serve to form and differentiate units of other subsystems of language, the
lexical and grammatical units. The modifications of words and their combination into utterances (sentences) are
first of all sound phenomena. The grammatical form of a verb or a noun can be changed only by changing the
sounds which compose them. By changing the prosodic structure (int-n) of an utterance one changes the meaning
of the utterance. For example «Well done? » pr-ed w/ the rising tone, is a question, expressing the speaker's
uncertainty and desire to get further information. «Well done!", pr-ed w/ the falling tone, wide pitch range and
greater loudness, is an exclamation , expressing the speaker's evaluation.
To underline the importance of the sound medium of language H. Gleason notes that to speak any
language a person must know nearly all the 100% of its phonetics, while only 50-90% of its grammar and 1% of
the vocabulary may be sufficient.
Sound phenomena have different aspects: the articulatory aspect, the acoustic, the auditory and the
linguistic aspect.
The articulatory (sound production) aspect - Speech sounds are products of human organs of speech. They
result from the activities of the diaphragm, the lungs, the bronchi, and the trachea, the larynx w/ the vocal cords
in it, the pharynx, the mouth cavity w/ the speech organs in it and the nasal cavity.
Sound production is impossible without, respiration which consists of 2 alternating phrases - inspiration
and expiration. Speech sounds are based chiefly on expiration, though in some African languages there are
sounds produced by inspiration.
Expiration, during which speech sounds are produced, is called phonic expiration as distinct from quiet
breathing. In phonic expiration the air comes from the lungs not freely but in spurts, bec during speech the air
passage is periodically blocked by the speech organs. Therefore in speech, expiration lasts much longer than
inspiration, whereas in quite breathing inspiration and expiration each takes about the same period of time.
The lungs supply the necessary air-pressure and regulate its force, thus producing variations in the intensity of
speech sounds.
Sound production actually takes place in the larynx, the pharynx and the oral and nasal cavities. The air-stream
coming from the lungs undergoes important modifications in them.
One part of sound production is phonation, or voice-production.
When the vocal cords, situated in the larynx are tensed and brought loosely together, the air -pressure below the
vocal cords becomes very high and the air comes from the lungs in regular puffs making the vocal cords vibrate.
Their vibrations are complex, though mainly regular or periodic.
The regular vibrations of the vocal cords are transmitted to the air-stream and the acoustic effect
perceived by the human ear is that of a vocal tone. This is what we call voice.
The other part of sound-production is articulation which comprises all the movements and positions of the
speech organs necessary to pronounce a speech sound. The movements of speech organs modify the shape, size
and volume of the supralaryngeal cavities (the pharynx, the mouth and nasal cavity) thus modifying the voice
which comes from the lungs. As a result, a vowel sound of a certain quality is produced.
When in the supralaryngeal cavities there is an obstruction to the air-stream, a noise is produced. The
character of the noise (friction or plosion), depends on the type of obstruction (a constriction or a complete
closure) and determines the particular quality of a cons-t. When an obstruction is created and the vocal cords
vibrate, a voiced consonant is produced. When the vocal cords do not vibrate, the result is the voiceless
consonant
Thus there are two main sources of vibration in the production of speech sounds- the vocal cords and
various kinds of obstruction.

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 The acoustic aspect - Like any other sound of nature speech sounds exist in the form of sound waves and
have the same physical properties-frequency, intensity, duration and spectrum.
A sound wave is created by a vibration which may be periodic or non-periodic, simple or complex.
The vocal cords vibrate in such a way that they produce various kinds of waves simultaneously. The basic
vibrations of the vocal cords over their whole length produce the fundamental tone of voice. The simultaneous
vibrations of each part of the vocal cords produce partial tones (overtones or harmonies).
The number of vibrations per second is called frequency. Frequency is measured in hertz or cycles per
second. Frequency of the basic vibrations of the vocal cords is the fundamental frequency. The fundamental
frequency determines the pitch of the voice and forms an acoustic basis of speech melody.
The superposition of the fundamental and partial vibrations results in a complex tone.
The complex tone is modified in the oral and nasal resonators. Due to the particular changes in their shape, size
and volume of the oral and nasal cavities function as acoustic filter: they intensify certain frequencies contained
in the complex tone and weaken the others. Thus the specific qualities of vowel sounds are achieved.
The complex range of intensified frequencies which form the quality of a sound is called the acoustic
spectrum of the sound. The intensified frequencies in the spectrum which characterize the quality of a sound and
distinguish it from other sounds of different quality are called formants. Intensity of speech sounds depends on
the amplitude of vibration. Changes in intensity are associated w/stress. It is measured in decibels (d.B.)
Any sound has certain duration. The duration of sounds is measured in milliseconds (ms.).
The auditory (sound perception) aspect - Speech sounds may also be analyzed from the point of view
of perception. The perception of speech sounds involves the activity of our hearing mechanism, which can be
viewed in 2 ways.
On the one hand, it is a physiological mechanism which reacts to acoustic stimuli: the human ear
transforms mechanical vibrations of the air into nervous stimuli and transmits them to the brain. The listener
hears the acoustic features of fundamental frequency, formant frequency, intensity and duration in terms of 4
perceptible categories of pitch, quality, loudness and length.
On the other hand, it is also a psychological mechanism which selects from the great amount of acoustic
information only that which is linguistically significant.
The linguistic aspect - Segmental sounds and prosodic features are linguistic phenomena. Representing
language units in actual speech, they perform certain linguistic functions. They constitute the meaningful units-
morphemes, words, word-forms, utterances. All the words of a language consist of speech sounds which are
grouped and arranged in the way specific for the language and which are unified by stress. All the utterances
consist of words, and consequently, of sounds; they are characterized by certain pitch-and-stress patterns,
temporal features, rhythm.
Most of the meaningful distinctions of the language are based on distinctions in sound.
Sounds and prosodic features serve to differentiate the units they form since communication by means of
language is possible only bec. sound phenomena can be opposed to one another for purposes of differentiating
words, word-forms and utterances.
Simultaneously, the sound phenomena enable the listener to identify them as concrete words, word-forms or
utterances.
Thus, segmental sounds and prosodic features of speech perform constitutive, distinctive and recognitive
functions. The linguistic aspect of speech sounds is also called the functional or social aspect, bec. of the role
which sound matter plays in the functioning of language as a social phenomenon.

Phonetics as a Science - The study of the sound phenomena of language, in all their aspects and varieties,
constitutes the subject of the phonetic science. Phonetics as a branch of linguistics studies sounds in the broad
sense, comprising segmental sounds and prosodic phenomena (pitch, stress, tempo, rhythm, pauses). Phonetics
occupies itself w/ the study of the ways in which the sounds are organized into a system of units and the variation
of the units in all types and styles of spoken language. It also studies the acoustic properties of sounds, the
physiological basis of sound production and the sound phenomena that reveal the individual peculiarities of the
speaker.
Phonetics as a science is a branch of linguistics. Being a science in its own right, it is at the same time
closely connected w/ other linguistic sciences-grammar, lexicology, stylistics and history of the language, since
the phonetic system of a language, its vocabulary and grammar constitutes one indivisible whole. It is also
closely connected with physiology, biology, physics, pedagogy psychology, mathematics, cybernetics.

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 Branches of phonetics
Phonetics is subdivided into four main branches. Articulatory phonetics is concerned with the study of
sounds as the result of the activities of speech organs. It deals with our voice-producing mechanism and the way
we produce sounds and prosodic phenomena. It studies respiration, phonation (voice-production), articulation and
also the mental processes necessary for the mastery of phonetic system.
Methods employed in articulatory phonetics are experimental. They involve palatography, laryngoscopy,
photography, cinematography, X-ray photography, X-ray cinematography, electromyography, and various kinds
of technique to study sound-perception.
Besides these objective methods articulatory phonetics uses its oldest, subjective method - the method of
direct observation.
Perceptual (auditory) phonetics occupies itself with the study of man's perception of segmental sounds,
pitch variation, loudness and duration. It studies the ways in which sound perception is determined by the
phonetic system of a language.
The methods used in auditory phonetics are also experimental.
They include various kinds of auditory tests. Since sound production and sound perception are physiological
processes, articulatory and perceptual phonetics are generally termed physiological phonetics.
Acoustic phonetics is concerned with the acoustic aspect of speech sounds. It studies speech sounds with
the help of experimental methods. Various kinds of apparatus are applied for analyzing the acoustic structure of
segmental sounds and prosodic phenomena: e.g. a spectrograph, oscillograph and intonograph. Phonology or
functional phonetics is a purely linguistic branch of phonetics. It deals with the functional aspect of the sound
phenomena. Phonology sets out to discover those segmental and prosodic features that have differential value in a
language, and it establishes the system of phonemes and prosodemes.
The basis of phonology is the phoneme theory, created in Russia by I. Baudouin de Courtney and
developed by his pupils and followers. Phonology was founded in Prague by a group of linguists (N. Trubetzkoy,
R. Jakobson and others).
The methods employed by phonology are linguistic. N. Trubetzkoy claims that phonology should be
separated from phonetics. Phonetics and phonology are independent sciences: phonetics is a biological science
and is concerned with physical and physiological characteristics of speech sounds; phonology is a linguistic
science and is concerned with the social function of phonetic phenomena. This point of view is supported by the
Danish Linguist L. Hjelmslev. But the vast majority of the former Soviet phoneticians do not consider it logical
to separate function from form and to exclude phonetics from the linguistic sciences.
There are other branches of phonetics, such as: special, general, and historical descriptive, comparative,
applied. Special phonetics is concerned with the study of the phonetic system of a concrete language. When the
phonetic system is studied in its static form at a particular period (synchronically), we deal with descriptive
phonetics. When the system is studied in its historical development (diachronically) we speak about historical
phonetics.
General phonetics is concerned with the study of man's sound-producing possibilities and the functioning
of his speech mechanism. It establishes the types of speech sounds in various languages, the way they are
produced and the role they play when forming and expressing thoughts. It is based on the extensive material
which is provided by the special phonetics of a number of languages and on the material of other sciences.
Theoretical phonetics of a particular language applies those theories to the language it analyzes.
Comparative phonetics is concerned w/ the comparative study of the phonetic systems of 2 or more
languages, especially kindred ones.
By applied phonetics we mean all the practical applications of phonetics. Phonetics is of considerable importance
for other fields of language study, which have made use of the approaches and the linguistic methods worked out
by phonetics.
All the branches of phonetics are of great use and importance in teaching pronunciation of foreign
languages.
Phonetics is of great practical importance in teaching of diction to actors, singers, radio - announcers and
other public speakers. Phonetics is applied in logopedics i.e. in correcting speech defects and in curing
pathological phenomena of speech, such as aphasia. Phonetics is widely used in telephony, broadcasting speech
recognition.

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LECTURE 2
THE FUNCTIONAL ASPECT OF SPEECH SOUNDS

1. The Phoneme. Allophones of a Phoneme.

2. Aspects of the Phoneme and their Critical Analysis.
3. The Functions of the Phoneme.
4. The Main Problems of Phonological Analysis.

In connected speech a sound is generally modified by its phonetic environment, (i.e. by the
neighboring sounds), by the position it occupies in a word or an utterance; it is also modified by prosodic
features, such as stress, speech melody, & tempo of speech.
Compare / p / in "pill" (i.e. in initial position), in "spill" (i.e. after /s/), in "slip" (i.e. in final
position), in "slipper" (i.e. between vowels). These various / p / sounds differ in manner of articulation
or in acoustic qualities. But they don't differ phonologically, if one of the various / p / sounds are
substituted for another, the meaning of the word will not change. That’s why for the English speaking
people it is of no linguistic importance to discriminate various /p/ sounds. But it is linguistically
important for English speakers to discriminate between / p / & / b / (as in "pill" and "bill") or / p / & /
m / (as in "pill" & "mill"), though the differences in their production might not be much more notable
than the differences in the production of the various /p/ sounds.
Every language has a limited number of sound types which are shared by all the speakers of the
language & are linguistically important bec. they distinguish words in the language. In English there are
20 vowel phonemes & 24 consonant phonemes.
All the actual speech sounds are allophones (or variants) of the phonemes that exist in the
language. Those that distinguish words, when opposed to one another in the same phonetic position, are
realizations of different phonemes. E.g. /V/ & /W/ in English are realizations of 2 different phonemes
bec. they distinguish such words as "vine" & "wine", "veal" & "wheel" etc.
Those sounds that can not distinguish words in a definite language & occur only in certain
positions or in combination w/ certain sounds are realizations of one and the same phoneme, its
allophones (or variants). E.g. the "dark" / l / & the "clear" / l / are variants, or allophones of the same
phoneme.
Therefore, the phoneme may be defined as the smallest linguistically relevant unit of the sound
structure of a given language which serves to distinguish one word from another.
Allophones of a certain phoneme are speech sounds which are realizations of one and the same
phoneme & which, therefore, can not distinguish words. Their articulatory & acoustic distinctions are
conditioned by their position & their phonetic environment.
On the one hand, the phoneme is an abstraction & a generalization. It is abstracted from its
variants that exist in actual speech & is characterized by features that are common to all its variants
(e.g. / b / is an occlusive, bilabial, lenis consonant, as these features are common to all its allophones).
On the other hand, the phoneme is material, real & objective, because in speech it is represented
by concrete material sounds. In other words, the phoneme exists in speech in the material form of speech
sounds.
The phoneme can therefore be regarded as a dialectal unity of its 2 aspects: the material & the
abstracted aspects. None of these aspects of the phoneme can be neglected or disregarded. That is the
materialistic view of the phoneme.
Some linguists consider the phoneme to be but an abstraction & deny its material character. This
viewpoint is expressed by linguists of the Prague Phonological School, for whom a phoneme is but an
abstract concept. Other linguists overestimate the material, real & objective character of the phoneme.
D. Jones considers a phoneme to be a family of sounds; others consider it to be a class of sounds.
The phoneme has 3 main linguistic functions: the constitutive, the distinctive, & the

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 indentificatory function. Though the phonemes themselves, in isolation, have no meaning, they
are linguistically important, since, in their material form they constitute morphemes, words, all of which
are meaningful. Hence, the constitutive function of the phoneme. The phoneme performs the
distinctive function, because phonemes distinguish one word from another.
The phoneme has the recognitive function as well, because native speakers identify definite
combinations of phonemes as meaningful ling-c units (words, word combinations, or phrases). When
identifying linguistic units the use of the right phoneme is not the only significant factor, the use of the
right allophone is not much less important.
The phoneme is a linguistically relevant unit that exists in speech in the material form of its allophones.
The phoneme is, therefore, a phonological unit which is represented in speech by phonetic units (the
speech sounds). In analyzing speech we constantly carry out a phonetic & a phonological analysis. The
analysis is primarily phonetic when we describe the articulatory & acoustic characteristics of particular
sounds & their combinations; but when we determine the role of those sounds in communication, it is
mainly phonological analysis. The main problems of phonological analysis are as follows:
a) the identification of the phonemic inventories for each individual 1-ge;
b) the identification of the inventory of phonologically relevant features of a 1anguage;
c) the interrelationships among the phonemes of a 1-ge.
The 1st problem of phonological analysis is to establish the phonemes in a definite 1-ge. This can be
carried out only by phonological analysis based on phonological rules. There are 2 methods to do that:
the distributional method & the semantic method.
The distributional method is based on the phonological rule that different ph-ms can freely occur
in one and the same position, while allophones of one & the same phoneme occur in different positions
and therefore can not be opposed (phonologically) to each other. E.g, "pea"- "bee”, "cap"-"tap", (p-
b, k-t etc.) are different phonemes. But one can not find [p] aspirated & [p] non-aspirated in the same
phonetic position in English. Therefore in English they are allophones of one & the same phoneme,
whereas in Chinese the aspirated & non-aspirated stops are regarded as different phonemes, because they
occur in the same phonetic positions.
The distributional method of analysis is a purely formal method of identifying the phonemes of a
language. That's why the distributional method of identification of the phonemes in a language works
even when one does not know the language at all. The method is widely used by the American
linguistics who studies the languages of the Red Indians. But it appears to be complicated & the
investigators very often can not do without native speakers to confirm their conclusions concerning the
phonemic status of certain speech sounds.
The semantic method, in its turn, is based on the phonological rule that a phoneme can
distinguish words when opposed to another phoneme or zero in an identical phonetic position.
The opposition / z / versus / t / is called a phonological opposition. The opposition / z / versus /-/
is called a zero phonological opposition. The pairs of words which differ only in one speech sound are
called minimal pairs.
The semantic method of identification of the phonemes in a language attaches great significance to
meaning. The investigator studies the function of sounds by collecting minimal pairs of words in the
language. If 2 speech sounds distinguish words with different meanings, they form a phonological
opposition & are realizations of 2 different phonemes. If not, they are allophones of one & the same
phoneme. Thus, it is clearly evident that in English [ s ] & [ t ] are realizations of two different
phonemes (sea - tea, so - toe, while [ t ] aspirated & [ t ] non-aspirated are allophones of one & the
same phoneme as they can not distinguish words: Such analysis is referred to as "minimal pair test".
But to identify all the phonemes of a 1anguage is not always a simple thing to do. Time & again
there emerge difficulties as to the phonemic status of certain sounds. Such difficulties arise when one
deals with weakened vowels in unstressed position. It primarily concerns the schwa vowel / ə / in
English which occurs only in unstressed position.
The problem is whether there is a schwa vowel / ə / phoneme in English. Scholars are not in
agreement on this point. Though / ə / can be opposed only to weakened vowel phonemes, which are
5
partially reduced due to their position in unstressed syllables, it can form phonologica1 oppositions with
a number of other phonemes & can distinguish words.
E.g., /ə/ vs /1/ accept-except; armor-army.
/ə/ vs /ov/ temper-tempo; solar-solo.
/ə/ vs /ə:/ forward - foreword.
It is sometime considered that /ə/ is an allophone of / ^ /, because /^/ is almost exclusively used
in stressed syllables as in "comfort" / 'k^mfət /, "abundant" /ə' b^ndənt /, whereas / 0/ occurs only in
unstressed syllables.
The second problem of phonological analysis is the identification of the inventory of distinctive
features on which all the phonological oppositions in the 1anguage are based.
Every sound is characterized by a number of features, not all of which are equally important for
communication. If one compares some of the allophones of /p/, it appears that all of them have common
features & features which characterize only a few of them. The problem is to decide which of the features
of a group of common sounds in a certain 1anguage are phonologically relevant & which of them are
irrelevant.
Each phoneme is characterized by a certain number of phonologically relevant features, which
are its constant distinctive features.
Each allophones of a certain phoneme is characterized by definite phonologically relevant features
(which are common to all its allophones) plus a number of irrelevant features (which distinguish the
allophone from all the other allophones of the phoneme).
The phonological relevant features that characterize the phoneme /p/ are, therefore, bilabial, occlusive
& fortis. Aspiration, plosive ness, labialization, etc. are phonologically irrelevant features.
Phonologically irrelevant doesn't necessarily mean useless for communication. The aspiration
of/p/ helps the listener to distinguish it from /b/ (as in "pride'-'bride','' "pie-buy"). The substitution of
one irrelevant feature for another (say, aspirated for non-aspirated) results in a different allophone of
one & the same phoneme ([p] aspirated & [p] non-aspirated). Such a substitution does not affect
communication.

Different Schools in Identifying the Phonemes in "Weak" positions

Once the phonemes of a language are established and their phonologically relevant features are
determined, there arises another phonological problem: to describe the interrelationships among the
phonemes of a language. Can different phonemes have common allophones?
Can allophones of a phoneme lose any of their phonologically relevant features in certain phonetic
positions?
There are 3 views on the problem.
Scholars who support the morphonological viewpoint (A. Avanesov, P. Kuznetsov, A. Reformatsky and
others) claim that a phoneme in a "weak" position may lose one of its distinctive /phonologically
relevant/ features and therefore lose its distinctive function. For example, Russian voiced consonants
lose their voiced character & are pronounced as voiceless in final position (as in "луг" /к/, «глаз» /s/),
etc. This leads to the loss of the distinction between /k/ and /g/, or /к-г/ and /c/ and /з/, or / s & z/.
Therefore in word final position the phonological oppositions based on the phonologically relevant
features «voiced vs voiceless» are neutralized in Russian. Scholars’ term is phenomenon
neutralization of phonological oppositions.
Neutralization of phonological oppositions is the loss of a distinctive (phonologically) relevant
feature by one of the phonemes of an opposition.
Those who support this view consider that a phoneme is morphemically bound and, therefore in all
the derivatives of "луга" (лугов, луг) we deal with the allophones of one and the same phoneme /r/,
and in all the derivatives of « лука» (луком, лук) we deal with the allophones of the phoneme /k/.
Consequently, different phonemes may have common allophones and sometimes a sound may be
assigned to either of two phonemes. In the case of/k/, it may either be considered an allophone of the
phoneme /k/ (as in "лук") or an allophone of the phoneme /r/ (as in "луг).
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 But the Russian language is the only language in which the phenomenon of neutralization has been
examined more or less in depth.
The supporters of the phonological viewpoint (L. V. Scherba, D. Jones, K. Pike and others) reject the
notion of «neutralization of phonological oppositions ". They consider that an allophone cannot lose
any of its distinctive features. If it does, it becomes an allophone of the phoneme the distinctive
features of which it acquires. Thus, /k/ in "луг" is an allophone of/k/, /d/ in "addition" is an allophone of
the schwa vowel phoneme /ə/ (and is not an allophone of /аə/, as in "add"; /t/ in "walked" is an allophone
of /t/).
The third viewpoint is that of N. Trubetzkoy, R. Jacobson, and some other linguists who consider
that there are phonological units higher than a phoneme -the archiphonemes.
The archiphoneme is an abstraction which combines the distinctive features common to two
phonemes. According to this viewpoint both /k/ and /r/ in "лук" and "луг" are assigned to the
archiphoneme /K/ which is neither voiced, nor voiceless.
We assume that for teaching purposes the most suitable viewpoint is that of L. Scherba and his
followers. Accordingly, the phoneme is characterized by definite articulatory and acoustic
characteristics and can be easily described as a separate unit of the sound system of language. Whereas
the other viewpoints treat the phoneme as a phonological unit which is actually devoid of
articulatory and acoustic characteristics, because even its phonologically relevant features appear to be
unstable (they can be neutralized). Moreover, the phoneme in that sense embraces sounds that can
be assigned to other phonemes as well (the so called "common" allophones). Such an approach hinders
the practical application of phonology to teaching pronunciation.
The existence of a number of viewpoints on phonological problems can be explained by the well-
known fact that language is too complicated for all its features to be described in terms of any one theory.

Phonological schools in Russia and abroad

The phoneme theory was first formulated at the end of the 19 th century. Its founder was Prof. I.A.
Baudouin de Courtenay (Kazan, St. Petersburg). Though his theory lacks consistency and there are
some drawbacks in it. It initiated the development of the phoneme theory in Russia as well as abroad.
The various phonological schools chiefly differ in their solution of the two main problems of
phonology: (1) the definition of the inventory of the phonemes of a given language and (2) the
definition of the phonemic status of speech sounds in unstressed positions.
The phoneme theory in Russia is developing in two directions. Hence, two phonological schools are
distinguished here: the Moscow School and the St. Petersburg School.
To the Moscow School belong R.I. Avanesov, R. I. Reformatsky, P.S. Kuznetsov, N.P.
Yakovlev, V.N. Sidorov and their supporters. They have developed Baudounfs morphonological
conception of the early period. They investigate the phoneme mostly on the basis of the Russian
language.
To the St. Petersburg school belong L. Scherba and his followers (L.R. Zinder, O.I. Dikushina, M.I.
Matusevitch, V.A. Vassilyev, G.P. Torsuyev and others). They investigate the problem on the basis of
foreign languages.
Prof. L.V. Scherba has adopted and developed I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay's psychological
conception of the late period. Continuing the work of his teacher L.V. Scherba has created a truly
materialistic phoneme theory and was the first to advance the idea of the distinctive function of the
phoneme.
The representatives of the Moscow phonological school consider that the same speech sound may
belong to different phonemes. For instance, the following pairs of words are pronounced identically:
Луг- лук рос – роз
Рот - род кос – коз
Бачок - бочок вода - вод
(The voiced consonants in final position are devoiced; the vowels in unstressed position are reduced.)

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According to the Moscow School the /k/ sound of the word "лук" is an allophone of the /k/ phoneme,
whereas the /k/ sound of the word "луг" is an allophone of the /r/ phoneme. Consequently, the /^/
sound of the word "бачок" is an allophone of the /a/ phoneme, but the /^/ sound of the word "бочок" is
an allophone of the /o/ phoneme.
According to the Moscow School the neutral vowel sound in "progressive" / prə`gresiv/ belongs to
the English /ou/ phoneme, because /ou/ occurs in a stressed position in "progress" /`prougres/. The
neutral vowel sound in "activity" /ək`tiviti / belongs to the English /əe/ phoneme, because /əe/ occurs
in a stressed position in "act" / əekt /. The neutral vowel sound in "gooseberry" /guzbəri/ belongs to
the /ə/ phoneme, because /e/ occurs in a stressed position in "berry" /'beri/. Consequently, the /z/
sound in the word "gooseberry" / guzbsri / belongs to the /s/ phoneme, because /s/ is used in a strong
position in "goose" /gu:s/, but the /s/ sound in the word "newspaper" /'nju:speipə/ belongs to the /z/
phoneme, because /z/ is used in a strong position in "news" /nju:z/.
The representatives of the St. Petersburg phonological school consider that the /k/ sound of the
words "лук" and "луг" are allophones of the /k/ phoneme. The neutral sound of the words "бочок"
and "бачок" are allophones of the neutral vowel phoneme /^/
According to the St. Petersburg School the neutral vowel sound in the words "progressive" / prə'gresiv
/, "activity" /ək`tiviti/, "gooseberry" /guzbəri / ets. belong to the neutral phoneme /ə/. Consequently,
the /s/ sounds in the words "goose" /gu:s/ and "newspaper" /'nju:speipə/ belong to the /s/ phoneme,
whereas the /z/ sounds in the words "gooseberry" /guzbəri/ and "news" /nju:z/ belong to the /z/ phoneme.
The St. Petersburg School analyses and investigates sounds as real speech units, which is of great
practical value in the process of teaching a foreign language to students.
There is a third phonological school which is known as the Prague linguistic Circle. To this school
belong N. S. Trubetzkoy, R. Jakobson, A. Martinet and others. The originator of it was N. S.
Trubetzkoy. He became acquainted with Baudouin's phoneme theory when he was studying at
Moscow University. He admits that his own theory is a development of Baudouin de Courtenay and
Scherba's phoneme systems.
One of the main points of his theory is that of archiphonemes. According to N.S. Trubetzkoy the
archiphoneme is a combination of distinctive features common to two phonemes. For instance, the
speech sounds /k/ and /r/ (in the words "лук", "луг" and "кот", "год") differ only by the work of the
vocal cords but possess the following identical features: (1) plosive, (2) back lingual. These two
common features are called relevant and they constitute the archiphoneme to which both /k/ and /Г/
belong. It is neither voiced nor voiceless and is designated by the capital letter /K/. According to N.S.
Trubetzkoy a speech sound is a combination of all the features, both relevant and irrelevant, while the
archiphoneme is a combination of relevant features only.
The London phonological school is represented by Prof. D. Jones of London University. In his
monograph "The Phoneme: its Nature and Use" he says that the phoneme theory was first introduced
to him in 1911 by L.V. Scherba of St. Petersburg. D. Jones' own definition of the phoneme is as
follows: "... a phoneme is a family of sound in a given language, which are related in character and
are used in such a way that no one member ever occurs in the same phonetic context as any other
member".
In this and other definitions of the phoneme he does not mention the distinctive function of the phoneme but
he tells about it in his later works. In his work " The Phoneme: its Nature and Use " D. Jones develops the so
called "atomistic" conception of the phoneme. According to it he breaks up the phonemes into atoms which are
different features of the phonemes, such as quality, length, tone, etc. Such distinctive features exist
independently from each other. Jones' atomistic theory is criticized because one distinctive feature cannot exist
apart from all the others. For example, length by itself is an abstraction, while a long phoneme is a reality.
The American phonological school is headed by Leonard Bloomfield and Edward Sapir. Here also belong
W. F. Twaddell, Ch. F. Hockett and others.
L. Bloomfield's definition of the phoneme runs as follows: "...a minimum unit of distinctive sound —
features..."W. F. Twaddell defines it as "an abstractional fiction ".The representatives of the American
phonological school tend more and more to develop an abstractional view of the phoneme.Ch. F. Hockett says
that language may be compared to any system of codes, such as Morse code or the waving flags code.
8
LECTURE 3
MODIFICATION OF PHONEMES IN SPEECH

Every phoneme displays a vast range of variation in connected speech. Among the different types of
variation we distinguish idiolectal /'idiəlektl/- индивидуальный, diaphonic and allophonic variation.
Idiolectal variation embraces the individual peculiarities of articulating sounds, which are caused by the
shape and form of the speaker’s speech organs and by his articulatory habits. For instance, a speaker may
mumble, or lisp (шепелявить) / say “thish ish” for “this is”/, or stammer (say “a f-f-f-fine d-d-d-day”). Idiolectal
variation may cause a lot of difficulties in communication. At the same time it enables people to identify the
speech of certain individuals.
Diaphonic variation affects the quality and quantity of particular phonemes. E.g. the diaphonic variation
of /æ / involves significant changes in length, because in some dialects / æ / is much longer than the standard
sound. Its quality ranges from a front open / æ / in the southern part of England to /a/ in Northern England.
Diaphonic variants do not affect intelligibility of speech, yet they inform the listener about the speaker’s
origin (i.e. the region he comes from) and his social standing. The listener easily notices both idiolectal and
diaphonic variants, but it does not take him much time to “tune in” to the speakers manner of speech and
understand him.
The less noticeable variation of phonemes is allophonic one, which is conditioned by phonetic position
and phonetic environment.
English vowels are modified by the neighboring consonants, mainly by the following consonant, or a
consonant to a vowel, is known as accommodation.
Accommodation can be progressive, regressive or mutual. If the articulation of a sound is modified under
the influence of the preceding sound, i.e. its articulation is adapted to the articulation of the preceding sound the
accommodation is progressive (e.g. the ~ of /i:/ in “mẽ”). If the articulation of a sound is adapted to the
articulation of the following sound, the accommodation is regressive (e.g. the labialization of /t/ in “toe”).
If the articulatory movements of both the sounds are adapted to each other, the accommodation is mutual
(e.g. in /tu:/ /t/ is labialized under the influence of /u:/ and /u:/ is a little bit advanced under the influence of /t/).
Assimilation is the process of adapting the articulation of sounds that are of a similar or identical nature.
Assimilation involves changes in the central phases of the adjoining sounds (as in /nð/ or even in all their phases
(as in /sj/>/ /).
When two consonants assimilate, different phonetic phenomena may occur, such as:
1. Vocalization and devocalization, which involve the work of the vocal cords (as in / tra:nz'leit for
/……/ /tra:ns'leit/).
2. Coalescent assimilation, when under the influence of mutual assimilation there appears a new
phoneme (as in /sj/>/ /, /zj/>/ /, / />/ /, /dj/>/ /.
3. Labialization under the influence of /w/ (as in /tw/, /kw/, etc.

4. Dentalization, which is change in the articulation of alveolar sounds under the influence of dental
sounds (as in /nθ/, /zð/).
5. Loss of aspiration, when a fortis plosive is unaspirated under the influence of a neighboring sound (as
in /spi:k/).
6. Changes in the articulation of plosives, such as:
a) Nasal plosion produced by the soft palate when a plosive is followed by a nasal consonant (as in / t
n/, /d n/, /p m/);e.g. upmost=uppermost.
b) lateral plosion produced at the sides of the tongue when a plosive is followed by /1/ (as
in /t1/, /d1/); *turtle, curdle-свертывать; о крови
c) Restricted plosion, which is an incomplete plosion that occurs when a plosive is followed by a
constrictive (as in /p1/, / gr /, / kr /).
d) Loss of plosion when a plosive is followed by a plosive (as in /d t/, /t t/ /k k/, etc.).
7. Changes involving both the work of the active organs and the place of obstruction, which result in
allophonic and phonemic change (e.g. /kən'qrætjuleit/ or /kəŋ'/ where /n/>/ŋ/ under the influence of
/g/.
The mutual influence that the sounds of a similar or identical nature exert upon each other may result in
either allophonic modifications or phonemic changes. Phonological analysis shows that
9
 assimilation resulting in phonemic changes occurs mainly at the juncture between words: won’t you / />/ /
would you /dj/>/d /, of course /vk/>/fk/.
It may also occur at the juncture between the parts of a compound word: gooseberry /s b/>/z b/,
newspaper /z p/>/s p/, horseshoe /s />/ /.
Assimilation resulting in allophonic modifications may occur within a syllable (e.g. in “train” /r/ is
voiceless, or partly devoiced), at the juncture of syllables (e.g. in “anthem” /n/ is dental under the influence
of /θ/), or at the juncture of two words (e.g. “but the” where /t/ is dental).
If the assimilated sound is partially altered and acquires only some features of the assimilating sound (as
in “try”, where /t/ is post-alveolar), the assimilation is said to be partial.
If the assimilated sound is completely altered and acquired all the main features of the assimilating sound
as in “horseshoe”, “does she” /'dΛ i/, the assimilation is said to be complete.
The influence that sounds exert upon each other may vary in direction.
If a sound is influenced by the preceding sound and acquires some of its features as in “cry”, where /r/ is
partly devoiced under the influence of /k/, the assimilation is progressive.
If a sound is influenced by the following sound and acquires some of its features as in “gooseberry”,
where /s/ is voiced and replaced by /z/ under the influence of /b/, the assimilation is regressive.
If the sound influence each other equally, i.e. each sound acquires some features of the other sound as in
“twenty”, where /t/ is labialized under the influence of /w/, and /w/ is partly devoiced under the influence of /t/,
the assimilation is mutual.

Junctural assimilation may also vary in the extend of the modifications that take place. It may either be
complete as in “Is she” /'i i/,”has she” /’hæ i/, “good bye” /qub'bai/, or partial as in “in the”, “at the”,
where /n/ and /t/ are dental.
It may vary in direction as well, and we distinguish progressive junctural assimilation as in “what’s” /w
ts/, “It’s” /its/, “open the door” /'oupmðəd :/, regressive junctural assimilation as in “of course” /əf'k :s/,
“with thanks” /wiθ'θæŋks/, “in case” /iŋ'keis/, “I have to go” /ai'hæftə`gəu/ and mutual junctural assimilation
/as in “would you” /wud ə; 'wount ə/ “won’t you”.
Junctural assimilation may be either obligatory as in “in the”, “at the”, or
non-obligatory as in “let me” /'lemmi/, “give me” /'gimmi/, “How do you do” /'haud ə`du:/, “good
bye” /gub'bai/.
Reduction is the modification of the quality and length of a vowel due to a weakening of its articulation
and a shortening of its duration. Reduction of vowel occurs only in weakly stressed or unstressed positions.
Vowels can be partially reduced /so ‘leit /. Vowels can be reduced to /ə/. E.g. /ai bə'li:v/ for bi'li:v- where
/i/ is reduced to /ə/ ; /'intrəstiŋ/ for /'intristiŋ/.
Elision is the leaving out of sound as a means of simplifying the pronunciation of a word or a rhythmic
group.
In a cluster of 3 consonants within a word, the middle one is elided. E.g., in “empty”, “tempt”,
“Christmas”, “castle”, the elision of /t/ and/p/ is the norm. In “exactly”, “restless”, “handbag”, “handsome”,
“friendship” elision takes place only in rapid colloquial speech, the pronunciation of the alveolar /t/, /d/ being
characteristic of careful speech. Whenever the consonant is retained, it loses its plosion.
Such cases of elision occur rather in careful speech. E.g. pos(t)man, gran(d)father, nex(t)day, bread an(d)
butter, up an(d) down, wasn’(t) that, Doesn’(t) she know?
The elision of one of a cluster of 2 consonants at the boundary of words is considered to be vulgar and
occur in rapid careless speech only.
E.g., he went away /hi'wenə,wei/, I want to come / ai'w nə'kΛm/,
Let me see /'lemiֽsi: /, give me / 'gimi /.
The manner of linking neighbouring words is known as liaision (связывание конечного согласного с
начальным гласным следующего слова). Liaision is a phonetic phenomenon which modifies the sound
structure of an utterance.
Though liaision has not yet been fully investigated, there are 2 features which are clearly distinguished:
the “linking”/r/ and the “intrusive”/r/.
The linking /r/ is inserted after words that in their old pronunciation (the 16 th century and earlier) had a
final /r/, which still remains in the spelling of those words. E.g. here /r/ and there, for /r/ a minute, later /r/ on,
for /r/ instance.
The linking /r/ does not normally occur before words pronounced with emphasis. E.g., we were
“absolutely” sure.
10
 The linking /r/ is usually inserted at the juncture of 2 words belonging to one and the same Intonation
group. E.g. the door opened and I peeped in. But: He locked the door and put the key into his pocket.
The intrusive /r/, which has been brought about by analogy with the linking /r/, is believed to have
appeared in the 17th century. But until lately it was looked upon as a vulgarism. In the latest papers and articles on
English pronunciation it is generally noted that the intrusive /r/ is being used more widely, even by RP speakers.
E.g. Asia/r/ and Africa, the idea/r/ of it, the sofa/r/ over there, the law/r/ of the sea, papa/r/ isn’t in.
Elision of vowels is closely connected with the process of reduction. Just as reduction, it is considered by
the general tendency to produce the weakly stressed syllables with minimal articulatory effort.
Elision of a vowel is the leaving out of a vowel. In English there are certain phonetic positions in which
the elision of a weakly stressed vowel does not affect intelligibility of speech. Moreover, instances of such elision
are commonly used by RP speakers.
A.C.Gimson notes that the elision of vowels can now be observed in the following phonetic positions:
1) in post-nuclear positions in the sequence. Consonant+/ə/+/r/+weak vowel, e.g. “preferable” /'prefrəbl/,
“temperature” /'temprət ə/, “camera” /'kæmrə/, “territory” /'teritri/.
2) in post-nuclear positions in the sequence. Consonant+weak vowel+/1/+ weak vowel, e.g. “easily” /'l:zli/,
“carefully” /'kεəfli/, “novelist” /'n vlist/, “family” /'fæmli/.
3) in pre-nuclear positions /ə/ or /i/ of the weak syllable preceding the primary stress is apt to be elided in very
rapid speech, e.g. “police” /'pli:s/, “terrific” /'trifik/, “correct” /'krekt/, “believe” /'bli:v/, “phonetics” /'fnetiks/,
“suppose” /'spouz/, “perhaps” /'præps/.
Elision of vowels may occur at word boundaries as well. E.g. “after a while” /'a:ftə`wail/, “father and
son” /'fa:ðrə'sΛŋ/, “as a matter of fact” /æzə'mætrəv'fækt/.
The accentual structure of English words is generally retained in speech. But it appears that English is a
language in which a relatively high percentage of words change their accentual structure in the speech continuum
under the influence of rhythm.
Modifications of the accentual structure in English involve words that in isolation are double stressed. In
English double-stressed words may be either simple or compound, e.g. 'dis'agree 'aftern'oon
'thir'teen 'well-'known
'six'teen 'so-'called
'inc'apable 'grey-'haired

When in the speech continuum such words are preceded or followed by a strongly stressed syllable, their
accentual structure is modified e.g.

'This after`noon 'afternoon`tea

It’s 'nine ֽthirt`een 'thirteen`pence
'Notֽfull-`grown a'full-grown`man

Thus, in a speech continuum there can be observed a variety of phonetic phenomena, which affect the
sound structure, the syllabic structure and the accentual structure of words constituting the speech continuum.
The neighboring sounds, the rhythmic patter, the degree of prominence, the speed of utterance and other factors
affect the extent of the phonetic modifications, such as accommodation, reduction, elision, liaision and shifting of
stress.
Besides, the pronunciation of a word with special prominence in the utterance (the nucleus of the
utterance) is modified less than the pronunciation of the same word when weakly stressed.
Therefore, the phonetic modifications of the sound structure, the syllabic structure and the accentual
structure of a word in the speech continuum depend on:
a) the phonetic environment of the word;
b) its phonetic position in the speech continuum;
c) the prosodic features of the speech continuum the word occurs in (pitch pattern, the tempo of speech,
the rhythmic pattern, the degree of prominence).

11
LECTURE 4

THE SYLLABIC STRUCTURE OF THE ENGLISH WORDS

Theories of Syllables

1. The Expiratory Theory.

2. The Prominence Theory.
3. The Muscular Tension Theory. Peculiarities of the Syllabic structure of thy English language.
4. Functions of the Syllable.

In connected speech sounds are not pronounced by “themselves”. It is practically impossible to draw articulatory
boundaries between them. If we slow down the tempo of utterance & articulate the sounds distinctly we shall see
that the smallest unit into which the speech continuum is divided, are syllables.
The boundaries between the consonant & the vowel are not clearly marked. On the contrary, boundaries between
syllables are marked by the alternation of openings & closings in sound production &, as a result, by the
alternation of increases & decreases in articulatory tension. So the smallest pronunciation (articulatory) unit is the
syllable.
It has been proved experimentally that the syllable is also the smallest perceptible unit. A number of experiments,
carried out by Russian linguists L. Chistovitch, V. Kozhevnikov, Z. Dzhaparidze, show that the listener can
recognize the preceding sound only after he has analyzed the whole syllable.
A syllable can be considered as both a phonetic & a phonological unit. As a phonetic unit the syllable is defined
in articulatory, auditory (perceptual) & acoustic terms with universal application for all languages.
As a phonological unit the syllable can be defined only with reference to the structure of one particular language.
The very term “syllable” denotes particular ways in which phonemes are combined in a language. (CF. The
Greek syllable, “smth. Taken together”, from syn., “together” & labein, “take”).
The ancient Greek scholars noticed that the two main phonological types of sounds – vowels & consonants fulfill
different functions in speech. The function of a vowel is to occupy the central position in certain combinations of
sounds, whereas consonants serve as the margins of the sound combinations (Hence, the term “consonant”, which
means “sounding with smth.” Con+sonant).
In other words, vowels are always syllabic & consonants are incapable of forming syllables without vowels.
But in a number of languages some sonorous consonants, such as /n, l, r, m/, can also be syllabic bec. of their
strong vocalic features, e.g. in Czech – “krk” (neck), “vlk” (wolf) & in English “garden” / ga:-dn /, “needn’t” /
ni:-dnt /, “castle” / kas:-sl /, “lighten” / lai-tn /.
So, phonologically, the syllable is a structural unit, which consists of a vowel alone or of vowel (or a syllabic
sonorant) surrounded by consonants in the numbers &
arrangement permitted by a given language. Phoneticians are not always in agreement in their definition of the
syllable bec. in their analysis they proceed from either articulatory or acoustic aspects of the unit.
One of the ancient phonetic theories – the expiratory (chest pulse) theory – define the syllable as a sound or a
group of sounds that are pronounced in one chest pulse, accompanied by increases in air pressure. According to
this definition, there are as many syllables in a word as there are chest pulses (expirations) made during the
utterance of the word. Each vowels sound is pronounced with increased expiration. Consequently, vowels are
always syllabic. Boundaries between syllables are in the place where there occur changes in the air pressure. But
it is impossible to explain all cases of syllable formation on the basis of the expiratory, & therefore, to determine
boundaries between syllables. A. Gimson notes that it is doubtful whether a double chest pulse will be evident in
the pronunciation of juxtaposed vowels as, e.g. in “seeing” / si:-in /, though such words consist of two syllables.
The relative sonority theory (the prominence) created by the Danish phonetician O. Jesperson, considers that
sounds tend to group themselves according to their sonority (prominence, audibility or carrying power). The most
sonorous sounds are vowels, less sonorous are sonorants / w, j, r, m, n, n / & the least sonorous are noise
consonants. O. Jesperson classifies sounds according to the degree of sonority in the following way (beginning
with the most sonorous):
1. Open vowels / /
2. Mid-Open vowels / /
3. Close vowels / i:, i, , u: /
4. Sonants / /
5. Voiced fricatives / /
12
6. Voiced stops / b, d, g /
7. Voiceless fricatives / f, , s /
8. Voiceless stops / p, t, k /.
Sounds are grouped around the most sonorous ones, i.e. vowels (& sometimes sonants) which from the peak of
sonority in a syllable. One peak of sonority is separated from another peaks by sounds of lower sonority i.e.
consonants. This distance between the 2 points of lower sonority is a syllable, e.g. / k – to - b / “October”.
The number of syllables is determined by the number of peaks of prominence. Thus in the word / melt / “melt”
there is one peak of sonority / e / & the word is monosyllabic. In the word / metl / “metal” there are two peaks of
sonority - / e / and / l /, separated by the least sonorous / t /, & consequently, there are two peaks.
In Czech words like “vlk”, “krk” & in English “pst” the sounds / l, r, s / are sonorous peaks. But there are cases
that contradict Jesperson’s theory e.g. / sta: / “star”, / skeit / “skate”, / nekst / “next”. In these words the sound /
s / is more sonorous than / t / & / k / & forms the second peak of sonority. Yet, the words are monosyllabic. It is
evident that the relative sonority theory doesn’t explain the mechanism of syllable formation. It only makes an
attempt at explaining our perception of a syllable. Neither does it explain syllable division, as it doesn’t say to
which syllable the less sonorous sounds belong, e.g. / n aism n / “an ice-man” & / nais m n / “a nice man”, / n
eim / “an aim” & / neim/ “a name”, / s m dresiz / “some addresses” & / s m dresiz / “summer dresses”.
Nevertheless, the relative sonority theory has been accepted by D. Jones & some other phoneticians.

The widespread among Russian linguists is the muscular tension (or the articulatory effort) theory which is
known as Scherba’s theory. According to this theory a syllable is characterized by variations in muscular
tension. The energy of articulation increases at the beginning of a syllable reaches its maximum with the vowel
(or the sonant) & decreases towards the end of the syllable. So, a syllable is an arc of muscular tension. The
boundaries between syllables are determined by the occurrence of the lower articulatory energy. There are as
many syllables in a word as there are maxima of muscular tension in it. Cf. / ta: / “tar” & / ta: / “tower” (a
reduced variant of / ta /). The sound / a:/ in the second example is pronounced with two articulatory efforts, so
there are 2 arcs of muscular tension & therefore, 2 syllables. Consonants within a syllable are characterized by
different distribution of muscular tension. In accordance with this, L. Shcherba distinguishes the following 3
types of consonants.
1. Initially strong consonants, in the articulation of which the beginning is stronger while the end is weaker.
They occur at the end of a closed syllable.
E.g. / I|t /, / |s /, / pi|n /, / s |d /, / pa:|t/.
2. Finally strong consonants, in the articulation of which the beginning is weak while the end is more
energetic. They occur at the beginning of a syllable. E.g. / m|I /, / t|ai /, / p|a:t /, / s| d /.
3. Double peaked consonants, in the articulation of which both the beginning & the end are energetic
whereas the middle is weak. They produce the impression of two consonants. These consonants occur at
the junction of words or morphemes. E.g. / pe|nn|aif /, / tt|aim /, / mi|dd|ei/. The type of consonant is
therefore a cue for syllable division. If in / nais ha s/, the sound / n / is initially strong, the syllabic
boundary is after the /n / - / n ais ha s /. If the sound / n / is finally strong, the boundary is before it - /
nais ha s /. In other words, if there is a new onset of muscular tension on the sound / n /, the latter
belongs to the second syllable, & if the new onset of muscular tension is on / ai /, the sound / n / belongs
to the first syllable.
The above theories define syllables on either the production or perception level. N. Zhinkin has worked out the
so-called loudness theory, which takes into account both the levels. On the perception level the syllable is
defined as an arc of actual loudness. The experiments, carried out by Zhinkin, showed that the organ immediately
responsible for the variations in loudness of a syllable in the pharynx. The narrowing of the pharyngeal passage
& the resulting increase in muscular tension of its walls reinforce the actual loudness of the vowel thus forming
the peak of the syllable, while the loudness variations of all the speech mechanisms are involved. So on the
speech production level the correlate of “arc of loudness” is “the arc of articulatory effort” (the latter term is
suggested by V. A. Vassilyev).
The acoustic aspect of the syllable has been studied by E. Zwirner, R. Jacobson & M. Halle. According to the
results obtained, the peak of the syllable (a vowel or sonant) has a higher intensity than its consonants & in many
cases a higher fundamental frequency. Perceptually, the peak is louder & higher in pitch. These acoustic features
easily agree with physiological definition of the syllable as an arc of articulatory effort (muscular tension).
In analyzing the above theories of the syllable, we cannot but agree with the scholar who point out that each of
the existing theories is correct to a certain extent, but none

13
of them is able to explain reliably all the cases of syll. boundaries.

2. Peculiarities of the Syllabic Structure of English

The syllabic structure of English has certain peculiarities. They are as follows:
1. Syllabic structure in English is not only vowels, but also sonants / m, n, l / when they are preceded by a noise
consonant. E.g. / teibl / “table”, / ga:dn / “garden”.
2. As to the type of sounds constituting the syllable (V, C) there exist 23 syllable structures in English.
Depending on the position of vowels, which is the peak of the syllable, and that of the consonant (C), which form
margins of the syllable, we distinguish the following 4 types of syllables in English.
a) Open syllables, when there is no consonant after the vocalic peak, (CV) e.g. far, sea, tie.
b) Closed syllables, when the vocalic peak is followed by a consonant, (VC) e.g. art, sit.
c) Covered syllables, (CV(c)), when the peak is preceded by a consonant, e.g. long, shore.
d) Uncovered syllables, (VC(c)), when there is no consonant before the peak, e.g. apt, eat.
The fundamental syllable type in English is closed syll., the most frequent type in English is CVC.
3. Consonant clusters are very characteristic of the syll. structure of English, 19 structures out of 23 consonant
clusters.
4. English checked vowels (i.e. short vowels) occur only in a closed syll. Checked vowels are always followed by
initially strong consonants. E.g. bed, Sunday, put. English free vowels (long monophthongs, diphthongs &
unstressed short monophthongs) can occur both in the open & in the closed syll., bec. the end of free vowels is
weaker than the beginning. E.g. car, tie, (s n) di, / dvais /.
5. The syll. boundary never occurs after checked vowel. E.g. / twen-ti /, / kwik-li /, / let /, / big /.
If a checked vowel is separated from a succeeding stressed vowel by only one consonant sound, the syll. in which
such a vowel occurs is always open. E.g. / ai-di /, / ka: tu:n /, / i-rekt /.
7. When there is a cluster of consonants between 2 vowels the place of the syllabic boundary is conditioned by
whether this cluster occurs word-initially or not. If it does occur at the beginning of vowels, the syllabic boundary
is before it. E.g. / gri: /, / rigret/. If it doesn’t the boundary between the consonants. E.g. / dmit /, / d vais /.
When two vowels are separated by more than 2 consonants as e.g. in / ekstr / the boundary may be both before /
s / & / t /, bec. / str / & / tr / occur at the beginning of words.
8. The so-called triphthongs in English are disyllabic combinations. E.g. / sain- ns /, / fla - /.
9. The structure of the stressed syll. in English is different from the structure of the unstressed syllable. The main
difference is in the peak. The peak of the stressed syll. is always vocalic. In the unstressed syllable the peak may
be a vowel or a consonant. When the peak of the stressed syllable is checked, the syllable must be “closed” by a

consonant. The structure of the stressed syllable ((open or closed) may be presented by the following formula:
a. (C)V(C) – where V is a historically long monophthong or a diphthong & the brackets show that the consonant
may be absent;
b. (C)V(C) – where V is a historically long monophthongs.
Summing up we can say that syllabic formation & syllabic division can more usefully be described with the
reference to an individual language, since each particular language has its own syllabic structure.

3. Functions of the Syllable

Syllable performs 3 main functions: constitutive, distinctive & identificatory. The constitutive function of the
syllable manifests itself in the fact that the syllabic forms higher-level units-words, accentual or rhythmic groups,
utterances. On the one hand, the syll. is a unit in which segmental phonemes are realized. L. Bondarko has
proved experimentally that the relations between the distinctive feature of the phonemes & their acoustic
correlates can be revealed only within the syllable. On the other hand, within a syllable or a sequence of syllables
prosodic features of speech are also realized. There are distinctive variations in loudness (stress), in pitch (tone),
& in duration (tempo, length). Thus, syllable maybe stressed & unstressed, high, mid or low, rising or falling,
long or short. Al these prosodic features are significant for constituting the stress-pattern of a word & the tonal &
rhythmic structure of an utterance.
The distinctive feature of the syllable is to differentiate words & word combinations. Phonemes exist & function
within the syllable. Therefore words are actually differentiated by the syllable as one articulatory or perceptible
unit. E.g. / bi:t / “beat” & “bead” / bi:d / differ not only in their consonant phonemes / t / & / d /, but also in the
length of / i:/, which is conditioned by the neighboring fortis and lenis consonants.
14
There are some words in English where syllabicity alone is responsible for the differentiation of the words: /
laitnin / освещение (lightning) & / laitnin /молния (lightning). On this account V. Vassilyev distinguishes a
separate phonological unit – the syllabeme.
Syllable division is very important too in distinguishing words & utterances:
/ naitreit / “nitrate” - / naitreit / “night-rate”
/ neim/ “a name” - / neim / “an aim”
/ ai skri:m / “I scream” - / aiskri:m / “ice-cream”
Due to the distinctive importance of syllable division, the syllabic boundary is often regarded by the American
descriptivists as a separate phonological unit – the juncture phoneme. Open juncture (or open transition) occurs
between syllables: it is called intersyllabic juncture. Thus, in “I scream” / ai| skri:m / the open juncture is between
/ I / & / s / & in / ais|kri:m / “ice-cream” it is between / s / & / k /. Close juncture (or close transition) occurs
between sounds within one syllable. Thus in “ice-cream” / ais|kri:m / the close juncture is between / k / & / r /, /
r / & / i:/, / i:/ & / m /. This juncture is called intersyllabic juncture. The largest acoustic investigations of juncture
show that the factors determining an open or a close juncture are the

duration of the sounds, their intensity & formant transitions. Thus, according to the data obtained by I. Lehiste,
the initial / n /in “a nice man” is longer than the final / n / in “an iceman”. The pre-junctural / n / gas falling
intensity, while the post-junctural / n / has rising intensity. Formant transitions of / n / & / ai / are different in the
contrasted pairs.
Some phoneticians consider the open juncture to be a segmental phoneme; others consider it a suprasegmental
phoneme or a phoneme in its own right.

K. Pike & I. Lehiste regard the juncture to be a contrastive feature of high-level units but not a phonological unit
in its own right.
The identificatory function of the syllable is conditioned by the hearer’s perception of syllables as entire phonetic
units with their concrete allophones & syllabic boundaries.
The listener identifies two syllables in “plum pie” - сливовый пирог & “plump eye” – глаза навыкате bulging
with the corresponding boundaries before / p / & after / p /, bec. in the first example / p / is unaspirated & / m / is
shorter on account of the following fortis / p /.
Thus, shifting of the syllabic boundary causes not only a strong foreign accent, but also misunderstanding on the
part of the listener.

LECTURE 5
15
ACCENTUAL STRUCTURE OF ENGLISH WORDS

1. Types of Word Stress.

2. Degrees of Word Stress. Fixed and Free Word Stress
3. The main Accentuation Tendencies (the Recessive, Rhythmic and Retentive).

A word as a meaningful unit has a definite phonetic structure. The phonetic structure of a
word comprises not only sounds that the word is composed of and not only the syllabic structure
that these sound form; it also has a definite stress pattern. The auditory impression of stress is
that of prominence. And if a wood contains more than a syll., the relative prominence of those
syllables differs. There may be one prominent syll in a word as compared to the rest of syllables
of the same word (as in “im'portant”). There may be 2 equally prominent syllables (as in
“'misbe'have”), 2 unequally prominent syllables (as in “e,xami'nation”) or more prominent
syllables (as in “'unre,lia'bility”). And this correlation of degrees of prominence of the syllables
in a word forms the stress pattern of the word, which is often called the accentual structure of a
word.
The stress patterns of different words may coincide with “mother”, “table”, __ __. The
stress pattern of these words differs from that of “prominent”, “analyze”, “syllable” __ __ __.
The stress pattern of words is generally perceived without difficulty. We easily distinguish
between “'subject” and “sub'ject”.
The stress pattern of a word is altered in connected speech. Cf. 'un'happy. She was 'so
un`happy. He re'membered those 'unhappy `days. Word stress belongs to the word when said in
isolation, whereas utterance stress belongs to the utterance.
As stated above, the auditory impression of stress is that of prominence. So a stressed syll.
on the auditory level is a syll. that has special prominence. The effect of prominence may be
produced by a greater degree of loudness, greater length of the stressed syll., some modifications
in its pitch and quality.
Acoustic analysis shows that the perception of prominence may be due to definite
variations of the following acoustic parameters: intensity, duration, frequency, formant structure.
All these parameters generally interact to produce the effect of prominence.
In different languages stress may be achieved by various combinations of these
parameters. Depending upon which parameter is the principal one on producing the effect of
stress, word stress in languages may be of different types.
There are languages with dynamic word stress. Stress on such languages is mainly
achieved by a greater force of articulation which results in greater loudness, on the auditory level
and greater intensity on the acoustic level. The stressed syllables are louder than the unstressed
ones. All the other parameters play a less important role in producing the effect of stress in such
languages.
In languages with musical word stress prominence is mainly achieved by variations in
pitch level, the main acoustic parameter being fundamental frequency. Chinese, Japanese,
Vietnamese are languages with musical word stress (or tonic word stress). The meaning of the
words in those languages depends on the pitch levels of their syllables.
Swedish word stress is characterized as dynamic and musical, because both loudness and
pitch variations are relevant factors in producing prominence.
In languages with quantitative word stress the effect of stress is mainly based on the
quantity of the sound. i.e. length. In such languages vowels in the stressed syll-es are always
longer than vowels in unstressed ones.

16
 Russian word stress is considered to be mainly quantitative though it has been proved that
duration is not the only parameter that produces the effect of stress in Russian.
Besides those types of word stress, linguists distinguish qualitative word stress, as in many
languages the quality of vowels on stressed syllables is unobscured and consequently differs
greatly from the quality of vowels in unstressed syllables. Until recently, English word stress was
considered to be dynamic, as stress was generally correlated with loudness. But numerous
investigations of the acoustic nature of English word stress have made it clear that stress in
English does not depend on intensity alone and that English w-s is of a complex nature.
Thus, D. Fry synthesized pairs of words ('object – ob'ject) on monotones and varied the
relative durations and intensities of the two vowels. His experiment showed that as long as
duration and intensity were increased together, reinforcing each other, there was agreement on
which of the syllables was the most prominent one but, when increased separately, duration
appeared to be more important than intensity.
D. Bolinger’s experiments have shown that pitch movement in English is also one of the
most important cues for prominence. But it is not the pitch direction that is significant in English,
it is the pitch contrast.
A. Gimson notes that if a synthesized nonsense word / i l l e l / is presented to English
listeners, with no pitch, intensity or length variations but with vowels of different quality, the
vowels which are the most sonorous (i.e. the most open vowels) will be judged most prominent.
In this word / / & / / are usually judged as the points of the greatest prominence. This shows
what an important role the inherent quality of a vowel plays in producing the effect of
prominence.
We consider that English word stress is created by an interaction of 4 parameters:
intensity, fundamental frequency, duration and format structure.
As for Russian word-stress it is considered to be primary quantitative and, secondly it is
qualitative and dynamic.

Degrees of word-stress
Instrumental investigations show that a polysyllabic word has as many degrees of
prominence as there are syllables in it. D. Jones indicated the degrees of prominence in the word
“Opportunity”. But not all these degrees of prom are linguistically relevant. The problem is to
determine which of these degrees are linguistically relevant. There are 2 views of the matter.
Some (e.g. D. Jones, R. Kingdon, V. Vassilyev consider that there are 3 degrees or W-s in
English: primary, secondary (partial stress) and weak (unstressed). Secondary stress is chiefly
needed to define the stress pattern of words. E.g. “e,xami'nation”, “,qualifi'cation”,
“'hair-,dresser”.

All these degrees stress are linguistically relevant as there are words in English the meanings of
which depend on the occurrence of either of the 3 degrees in their stress patterns. E.g. 'import -
im'port, ,certifi'cation - cer,tifi'cation =certificate.
Some American linguists (G. Trager, A. Hill) distinguish 4 degrees of W-s:
- Primary (as in “cupboard”) /  /
- Secondary (as in “discrimination) / ^ /
- Tertiary (as in “analyze”)
Weak stress (as in “cupboard”), but very often the weakly stressed syllable is left
unmarked. /v/

17
 American phoneticians consider that secondary stress generally occurs before the primary
stress (as in examination), while tertiary stress occurs the primary stress (as in handbook,
specialize).
Linguistically, tertiary word-stress can be taken for a variant of secondary w-s, as there are
no words in English the meanings of which depend on whether their stress patterns is
characterized by either secondary of tertiary stress.

The stress Patterns of English words

There are languages in which stress is always falls on the first syllable (as in Czech and
Finish), or on the last syllable (as in French and Turkish). Word stress is in such languages is
said to be fixed. English words is said to be free because stress is not fixed to any particular
syllable, in all the words of the language.
G. Torsuyev, who has made a special analyses of English stress patterns, distinguishes
more than 100 stress patterns, which he groups into 11 main types. The most common among
them are:
 (Words w/I primary stress as in “'after”)
  (Words w/2 primary stresses, as in “'week'end”)
_&_  (words w/one primary and one secondary stress, as in 'hair-, dresser, maga'zine).
Though w-s in English is called free, there are certain tendencies in English which regulate
the accentuation of words. There are 2 main accentuation tendencies: the recessive and the
rhythmic tendency.
According to the recessive tendency, stress falls on the 1 st syllable (e.g. “'mother”,
“'father”, “'sister”, “'brother”) or on the 2 nd syllable (e.g. be'come, in'deed, for'give etc.)
According to the rhythmic tendency stress is on the 3 rd syllable from the end (in'tensity,
possi'bility).
It has also been noticed that the stress of the parent word is often retained in the
derivatives. 'Personal-,perso'nality, 'nation-,natio'nality.
This regularity is sometimes called the retentive tendency in English.
There is one more tendency in English: the tendency to stress the most important elements
in words. Such negative prefixes as “-un, -in, -mis, -ex, -vice, -sub, -under, semantically
important elements in compound words: well-'known, red-'hot, bad-'tempered.

The functions of word-stress

Word-stress has a constitutive function, as it moulds syllables into a word forming its
stress pattern.
Word-stress has a distinctive function in English, because exists there different words in
English with analogous sound structure which are differentiated in speech only by their stress
pattern. E.g.
Noun / adjective verb
'Insult in'sult
'Subject sub'ject
Word-stress has an identificatory factory function, because stress patterns of words enable
people to identify definite combinations of sounds as meaningful linguistic units. A distortion of
the stress pattern may hamper understanding or produce a strange accent.

18
LECTURE 6
INTONATION AND PROSODY

Phonemes, syllables & words, as lower-level linguistic units, constitute a higher phonetic unit
–the utterance. Every concrete utterance, alongside of its phonemic & syllabic structures, has a
certain intonation.
Most CIS countries phoneticians define it as a complex unity of speech melody, sentence
stress, tempo, rhythm & voice tamber (timbre), which enables the speaker to express his
thoughts, emotions & attitudes towards the contents of the utterance & the hearer. Speech
melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm and tamber are all components of intonation. These are
perceptible qualities of intonation.
Acoustically, intonation is a complex unity of varying fundamental frequency, intensity &
duration. Speech melody is primarily related with fundamental frequency, tempo- with duration.
On the articulatory level intonation is a complex phenomenon. In the production of speech
melody the subglottal –подгортанный, laryngeal –ларингальный & supraglottal-
надгортанный respirotory - дыхательный muscles regulate the subglottal air pressure, which
makes the vocal cords vibrate. An increase of subglottal pressure raises the pitch of the voice, &
its decreases lower the pitch.
There is no single mechanism to which the production of stress can be attributed.
Physiological correlates of different degrees of utterance stress haven’t as yet been established.
Further investigations are necessary to discover the articulatory mechanism of the components of
intonation.
The definition of intonation given above is a broad definition. It reflects the actual
interconnection & interaction of melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm & tamber in speech.
A great number of phoneticians abroad, D. Jones, L. Armstrong & I. Ward,
K. Pike, R. Kingdon, A. Gimson, J.O’Connor & G. Arnold define intonation as the variation of
the pitch of the voice, thus, reducing it to just one component –speech melody. This is a narrow
definition of intonation. Thus D. Jones writes: “Intonation may be defined as the variations
which take place in the pitch of the voice in connected speech.”
In spite of the fact that many scholars do not include sentence stress, rhythm & tempo in the
definition of intonation they regard these prosodic phenomena as closely connected with one
another.
According to R. Kingdon: “When we talk about English intonation we mean the pitch patterns
of spoken English, the pitch tunes or melodies, the musical features of English.”
Some foreign phoneticians give broader definitions of intonation. Thus, L Hultzen
includes the variations of pitch, loudness & duration, F. Danes –the variations of pitch &
intensity, E. Haugen a combination of tone, stress & juncture.
Alongside of the term “intonation” the term “prosody” is widely used. “Prosody” &
“Prosodic” denote non –segmental phenomena, i.e. those which do not enter into the system of
segmental phonemes. The British phonetician D. Cristal defines prosodic features as “vocal
effects constituted by variations along the parameters of pitch, loudness, duration & silence.”
From the very definition of prosody and intonation we can clearly see that both the notions

include essentially the same phenomena, but the terms-“intonation and prosody” are used

differently by different linguists. Some phoneticians apply the term “prosody” and “prosodic”

19
only to the features pertaining to the syllable and phonetic word, or rhythmic unit which are

regarded as meaningless prosodic units & oppose prosody to intonation (which is a meaningful

phenomenon).

We adhere to the point of view that prosodic features pertain not only to syllables, words &
rhythmic groups, but to the intonation group & the utterance as well, since the latter are
constituted by these units.
The notion of prosody, consequently, is broader than the notion of intonation, as it can be
applied to the utterance, the word, the syllable, whereas prosody of the utterance and intonation
are equivalent notions.
Whatever the views of the linguistic nature of prosodic phenomena, the phonic substance of
prosody is regarded by all phoneticians as the modifications of fundamental frequency, intensity,
and duration. The most complicated and unsolved problems of prosody are the interaction
between its acoustic properties, their functioning in speech and their systematization. R.
Jakobson says that prosody is one the most difficult and controversial problems of modern
linguistic studies.
Concrete realizations of speech prosody & its systematic nature can be described adequately in
terms of the syllabic, the rhythmic (or accent) group & the utterance.
The syllable is the smallest prosodic unit. It has no meaning of its own, but it is significant for
constituting higher prosodic units. Prosodic features of the syllable (tone, stress, duration)
depend on its position and function in the rhythmic unit and in the utterance.
A rhythmic group (or accentual unit, or group) is either one stressed syllable or a stressed
syllable with a number of unstressed ones grouped around it the stressed syllable is the nucleus
of the rhythmic group. There are as many rhythmic units in an utterance as there are stressed
syllables in it. The unstressed syllables are clitics. Those preceding the stressed syllables are
called proclitics & those following it – enclitics.
Depending on the position of the stressed syllable and the number of proclitics and enclitics in
the rhythmic group there exist various accentual-and-rhythmic patterns of it. E.g. /
/, / /, / /, etc. Besides a definite accentual-and-rhythmic pattern, the rhythmic group is
characterized by a pitch pattern (or tonal contour) and duration pattern (temporal structure).
These prosodic characteristics make it possible to perceive the rhythmic unit as an actual discrete
unit of prosody. The rhythmic unit may be singled out of an utterance also due to the meanings
expressed by its prosodic features.
According to D. Bolinger these may be the meanings of assertiveness, separateness, newness:
But nobody knew about it.; the meaning of connectedness & incompleteness: The brighter they
are the better. The rhythmic unit should, therefore, be considered a meaningful unit, though this
viewpoint is not unanimously accepted.
The intonation group is higher than the rhythmic unit. It has also been termed “syntagm”, “sense-
group”, “breath group”, “intonation contour”, “and divisible accentual unit ”,“ tone group ”,“
tune ”,“ tone unit”.
The term “syntagm”, has a drawback: it is often used with different meanings which have
nothing to do with the prosodic unit.
The term “sense group” calls attention to the fact that it is a group of words that make sense
when put together. But it does not indicate its intonational character.

20
The term “breath group” emphasizes the physiological aspect of the unit, which is uttered with a
single breath. A breath group usually coincides with a sense-group because “pauses for breath are
normally made at points where pauses are necessary or allowable from the point of view of
meaning”. But a pause for breath may be made after two or more sense-groups are uttered, so a
breath –group may not coincide with a sense-group.
The term “divisible unit” emphasizes the role of utterance stress in constituting the unit. The
divisible accentual unit may consist of several indivisible units (rhythmic units).
The terms “tone -group”, “tune”, “tone unit” also emphasize the role of just one (pitch)
component of prosody for the formation of the unit. In our opinion, the term “intonation group”
better reflects the essence of this unit. It shows that the intonation group is the result of the
division in which not only stresses, but pitch & duration play a role. Structurally the intonation
group has some obligatory formal characteristics. These are the nuclear stress & the terminal
tone. The boundaries between intonation groups are marked by tonal junctures and pauses. All
these features shape the intonation group, delimit one intonation group from another and show its
relative semantic importance. Intonation group is a meaningful unit. The most general meanings
expressed by the intonation group are: completeness, finality versus incompleteness, non finality.
It may be coextensive with a sentence or part of a sentence. E.g. Yesterday they passed the
exam. They passed the exam yesterday.
The structure of the intonation group varies depending on the number of syllables and rhythmic
units in it. Minimally, intonation group consists of one (stressed) syllable – the nucleus.
Maximally, it contains the prehead, the head, the nucleus and the tail.
The stressed & unstressed syllables of an intonation group perform different functions. H. Palmer
was the first to single out the consecutive structural elements of the intonation group (“tone-
group”) which differ in their functions. These elements of intonation groups are “pre-head”,
“head”, “nucleus” and “tail”.
The number of functional elements distinguished by different phoneticians is not the same. Thus,
J. O’Connor & G. Arnold distinguish two elements in the pre-nuclear part of the utterance
–the pre-head & the head. The notion of “head” in this sense coincides with the notion of
“scale”, used by Russian phoneticians, e.g. G. Torsuyev, A. Trakhterov, V. Vassilyev, A.
Antipova & others.
R.Kingdon uses the term “head” to mean only the first stressed syllable, which he considers to
be an independent functional element. The stressed & unstressed syllables following the head
form another functional element – the body.
The “pre-head”, “head” & “tail” is non-obligatory elements of an intonation group, whereas the
nucleus is an obligatory & the most important functional element.
A higher prosodic unit is the utterance. The utterance is the main communicative unit. It is
characterized by semantic entity which is expressed by all the language means: lexical,
grammatical and prosodic. The prosodic structure of an utterance is a meaningful unit that
contributes to the total meaning of the utterance. Each utterance has a definite prosodic structure.
The utterance may contain one intonation group, two or more. E.g. 'Listening is an im'portant
'process in 'learning a language. Be'sides the auditory ·process | there are speaking |
reading | and `writing of the language. Irrespective of its structural complexity, the prosodic
structure of the utterance is viewed as a single semantic entity.
The utterance is not the ultimate unit of prosodic analysis. In speech single utterances are not
very frequent. On the contrary, they are connected and grouped into still larger units – hyper
utterances, phonetic paragraphs and texts. The prosodic features of these higher units indicate the
relations between their constituents, the degree of their connectedness and interdependence, thus

21
forming the prosodic structures of the hyperutterances, the phonetic paragraphs and texts. The
study of these units in modern linguistics is in the forefront of scholars’ interest.
To summarize, it is necessary to note, that the syllable, the rhythmical unit, the intonation group,
the utterance and the hyperutterance are taxonomical prosodic units. Whereas the elements of the
intonation group, considered above, i.e. prehead, head, nucleus and tail, are autonomous units,
they are not related taxonomically.
The prosody of the utterance performs 3 basic functions: constitutive, distinctive &
identificatory.
1. The constitutive function of prosody is to form utterances as communicative units. Prosody
unifies words into utterances. A succession of words arranged syntactically is not a
communicative unit until a certain prosodic pattern is attached to it. It forms all communicative
types of utterances (statements, questions, imperatives, exclamations and modal types) e.g.
categoric statements, non categoric, perfunctory statements, quizzical statements, certainty &
uncertainty questions, insistent questions, etc. Prosody at the same time performs the
segmentative & delimitative function. It segments connected discourse into utterances and
intonation groups and simultaneously delimits them one from another, showing relations between
them: Cf. “We can if we want to and “we can if we want to”. It also signals the semantic nucleus
and other semantically important words of an utterance (or an intonation group). Prosody also
constitutes phonetic styles of speech.

2. The distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in several particular functions, depending
on the meanings which are differentiated. These are communicative -distinctive, modal –
distinctive, culminative (“theme -rheme”) distinctive, syntactical –distinctive & stylistic –
distinctive function.
The communicative –distinctive function is to differentiate the communicative types of
utterances, i.e. statements, questions, etc. and communicative subtypes: e.g. within statements,
statements proper (It was a 'very hot •after`noon, answers (It was a very hot •after`noon),
informing statements, announcements, etc. within questions – first instance questions ('where did
he `find it?), repeated questions (''where did he ``find it?), echo questions (•where did he find
it?); within imperatives – commands ('Don’t be late), requests ('Don’t be late) an so on.
The modal –distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in differentiating modal meanings of
utterances, i.e. the speaker’s attitudes & emotions, e.g. antagonistic versus friendly attitude and
so on.
This function is often defined as expressive or emotional, attitudinal.
Various modal meanings can also be expressed and differentiated by lexical and grammatical
means, e.g. such modal words as “sure”, “undoubtful”, “definitely”, “perhaps”, “may be”,
“probably” and modal verbs “may”, “might” and so on. Usually, the speaker’s attitude
corresponds to the contents of the words he chooses. But utterance prosody may disagree with
word content and is, then, the crucial factor in determining the modal meaning of the utterance.
Cf. “He definitely promised” and “He definitely promised”. In the first case the melodic contour
agrees with the word content and the grammatical structure, whereas in the second case it does
not. So the first utterance sounds definite and categoric. The second utterance sounds indefinite
and non-categoric. In “`Thank you” the high falling tone is in harmony with the word content and
expresses genuine gratitude. In “^Thank you” the rising-falling tone adds an antagonistic note to
the utterance. That is why in actual speech the listener is more interested in the speaker’s “tone”
than in his words.

22
The culminative-distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in differentiating the location of
the semantic nuclei /nju:kliai/ pl. of utterances & other semantically important words. This
function is often called logical (Artymov), predicative (Vinigradov), accentual (Gimson).
Some scholars claim that prosody indicates the “theme – rheme” organization of an utterance, i.e.
it shows the thing already known & the new thing said about it e.g.
Theme – rheme
The' teacher has` come.
Rheme – Theme
The` teacher has come.

The syntactical - distinctive function of prosody is to differentiate syntactical types of sentences

& syntactical relations in sentences.

E.g. Her, sister, said •Mary, | was a ' well –known` actress ( a compound sentence.)
Her' sister, said |' Mary was a 'well – known `actress (a complex sentence with an object
subordinate clause)
'Smiling, Tom | 'entered the` hall.(“smiling” is an attribute)
, Smiling |'Tom 'entered the` hall. (“Smiling” is an adverbial modifier)
Stylistic – distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in that prosody differentiates
pronunciation (phonetic) styles, determined by extra linguistic factors.
3. The identificatory function of prosody is to provide a basis for the hearer’s identification of the
communicative & modal type of an utterance, its semantic & syntactical structure in accordance
with the situation of the discourse.
All the functions of prosody are fulfilled simultaneously & cannot be separated one from another.
They show that utterance prosody is linguistically significant & meaningful.
Each language has a certain limited number of such meaningful units, capable of distinguishing
utterances. They are defined as intonemes. or utterance prosodemes.
The prosodic system is characteristic of each language. The prosodic systems of one language are

not the same in form as those of other languages. Nor do they necessarily express the same

meanings, though there may be resemblances here & there.

Emphasizing the role of intonation in speech, R.Kingdon says: “Intonation is the soul of a

language while the pronunciation of its sounds is its body…

Thus, the linguistic character of prosody can be summarized in the following way:

1. Prosody of speech is significant & meaningful.

2. Prosody is systematic. It is not invented in speaking but produced according to the system of
prosodic structures of a given language.
3. Prosody is a characteristic feature of each concrete language & cannot be used in speaking
another language.

23
LECTURE 7
VARIETIES OF ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION
THE ORTHOEPIC NORM
There exist numerous varieties of pronunciation in any language, the English language as well.
The pronunciation of almost of every locality in the British Isles has peculiar features that distinguish it
from the pronunciation of other localities. Besides, pr-n is socially influenced. It reflects class
distinctions, education and upbringing. The varieties that are spoken by a socially limited number of
people and used only in certain localities are called dialects. There are therefore local dialects & social
dialects. All these varieties have much more in common. They are varieties of one & the same language,
the English language.
Dialects have some peculiarities in pr-n, vocabulary and grammatical structure. Due to mass
media (radio, TV, cinema), the increased mobility of the population, concentration of the population in
the cities, the dialectal differences are becoming less marked. That, of course, does not mean the pr-n of
a
Manchester dialect speaker does not differ from the pr-n of a London dialect speaker. Among the most
well-known dialects one should mention Cockney (spoken by the less educated part of the Londoners),
Cornish dialect (in Cornwall) & others.
Dialect speakers are, as a rule, the less educated part of the population. With the more educated
people pr-n generally tends to conform to a particular standard. Dialects enrich the language & make it
more lively & fresh.
In present – day English the number of local dialects is being reduced to fewer, more or less
general, regional types. Every regional type of pr-n is characterized by features that are common to all
the dialects used in the region. The regional types of pr-n, in their turn, are marked one from another by
a number of peculiarities specific to each of them. British English phoneticians generally distinguish 3
main regional types of pr-n: Southern, Northern & Scottish regional types of English pr-n.
One of the types of pr-n, generally the one that is spoken by the educated people in the capital, is
recognized as the orthoepic norm. The orthoepic norm of a language is the standard pr-n adopted by
native speakers as the right & proper way of speaking. It is used by the most educated part of the
population.
The orthoepic norm is based on the variants of pr-n that are widely used in actual speech, that
reflect the main phonetic tendencies, & that are considered to be acceptable by the educated.
Since the orthoepic norm is ever changing & developing, from time to time the pronouncing
dictionaries have to be revised & reset. E.g. in the (1937) edition of Everyman’s English Pronouncing
Dictionary by D.Jones the pr-ns of the following words were indicated in such an order: “again” / ә'gein
- ә' gen /, “national” - /næ әnәl, nәl, nl /. In the (1956) edition the order is reversed: “again” / ә'gen -
ә' gein /, “national” - /næ әnl, nәl, nl, nl, әnәl /.
In connected speech the sound structures of words are modified under the influence of rhythm,
tempo &utterance stress. But the pronouncing dictionaries do not and cannot reflect all these variants.

Pronunciation Varieties of British English

It is generally considered that the orthoepic norm of British English is “Received Pronunciation”
(RP), though as many scholars state, it is not the only variety of British English pr-n that is recognized as
the orthoepic norm in present-day Britain.
RP was accepted as the phonetic norm of English about a century ago. It is mainly based on the
Southern English regional type of pr-n, but it has developed its own features. Though RP is carefully
24
preserved by the public schools & the privileged class in England, the RP of today differs in some
respects from the former refined RP used half a century ago. A.Gimson claims that the exclusive purity
of the classic RP has been diluted, as some features of regional types of speech are “received” now,
though some 50 years ago those features were considered to be regional, non-RP.
The main changes that have recently taken place in RP are as follows:
1. The diphthongization of the RP /i:/ & /u:/ which in final position are often
pronounced with a glide (e.g. “see” - /sij /, “who” – /h u / ).
2. Monophthongization of /ai / & /a / when followed by /ә/ (e.g.”tower”-
/ta ә/ >/taә/, “fire”-/ ' faiә / > / ' faә /).
3. The centering of former /o / to / /. E.g. the word “November” had three possible pr-ns the
recommended /o / (/no ' vembэ /), shortened monophthongal form /o / (/no' vembә/), or, in rapid
speech /ә / (/nә'vembә/). Now, there is a tendency to pronounce / / in careful speech (/n
'vembэ/),
& /ә/ in rapid speech (/nә'vembә/).
4. A greater weakening of vowels in weakly stressed syllables, which results in
the use of the neutral /ә/. E.g. /bә'li:v/ for /bi'li:v/; /intrәstin / for /intristin/.
But RP does not accept a loss of the / ә /-/i / distinction in final open syllables (e.g. between “better-
Betty”, “dollar-Dolly”).
5. The assimilation of the following sounds: /sj/ > / /, /zj / > / /, /tj > /t /, /dj / > /d / (E.g.
“issue”, “crozier”, “situation”, “education”).
6. The final /b, d, g / are now partially devoiced, But the distinctions between /b-p, d-t, g-k / are just
clearly marked, because /p, t, k / are fortis, while /b, d, g / are lenis (cf. “cab-cap”, “had-hat”, “bag-
back”).
7. The use of the intrusive / r /, which some 20-30 years ago was carefully avoided by RP speakers.
Nowadays RP tolerates the intrusive /r / in such phrases as “the idea /r / of it”, “Asia /r/ & Africa” & so
on.
A.Gimson distinguishes 3 varieties of RP today:
(1) The conservative RP used mainly by the older RP speakers;
(2) The general RP heard on radio & TV that is less conservative;
(3) The advanced RP mainly used by the younger RP speakers.
RP has accepted so many features of the Southern English regional accents that many linguists
use the terms “Southern English” for RP.
RP has been investigated & described more thoroughly than any other type of English pr-n. It was
excellently described in the works of D.Jones & his Everyman’s English Pronouncing Dictionary is still
the most reliable reference book on RP.
But there are many educated people in Britain who do not speak RP, though their English is good
& correct.

The Northern English Type of English Pronunciation

The main distinctions of the Northern type of English pr-n, as opposed to RP, are as follows:
(a) /æ/ is more open & more retracted back, as in /a/ (e.g. “back”, “bad”)
25
(b) /a:/ is fronted compared with RP /a:/ & it approximates to /æ/ in words
“Glass”, “laugh”, “after”.
(c) / / is used instead of /  / (e.g. “cup”, “love”, “much”).
(d) /o / is pronounced as a monophthongal /o:/ (e.g. “go”, “home”).
(e) /e/ or / : / are pronounced instead of /ei/ (e.g. “may”, “say”, “Take”).

The Scottish Type of English Pronunciation

The main distinctions of this type of pr-n, as compared to RP, are as follows:
(a) / : / is not used in the Scottish type of pr-n, instead of RP / : / they use the
sequences /ir/, /er/ or / r/ (e.g. “bird” -/bird/, “heard”- /herd/, “word”- /w rd/, “beard”, “there”,
“pure”, “poor”, “ sure”, etc).
(b) /u / is used instead of /a / (e.g. “down”- /dun /).
(с) The Scottish pr-n does not distinguish between /æ/ & /a:/ words like “bad”, “path”, ”grass”,
“dance”, ”half”, “part” are pronounced with /æ/ & /a:/ or /ә/.
(d)All vowels are short. There is no distinction in the length of the vowels in words like “pull”,
“pool”, “cot” & “caught”.
(e) /r / is not between or before vowels, as in “hurry ” & “brown”, but also after vowels as in
“word”, “born”.
(f) A voiceless fricative / / is used to distinguish between “which” & “witch”, “whine” &
“wine”.
(g) A backlingual fricative /x/ is used (e.g. “loch”).
One should distinguish between RP & “educated” regional type of pr-n (such as Southern,
Northern & Scottish types of English pr-n), on the one hand, & local dialects, on the other.
One of the best examples of a local dialect is Cockney. It is used by the less educated in the
region of London. Cockney has not been fully investigated, but there are certain striking peculiarities:
(a) In Cockney the nucleus of the diphthong /ei/ is an almost open vowel, so that it reminds of /ai/
(e.g. “take”, “lake ”).
(b) / æ / sounds like / / (e.g. “bag”)
(c) /o / is / / (e.g. “potatoes” - / p ә'tai æ z / ).
(d) A nasalised /ai/ is used for /ai/ (e.g. “Buy potatoes & cabbages”- /bai p ә'tait æ z n' k b
әd iz/).
(d) /p, t, k/ are heavily aspirated.
(e) /h/ does not occur; it may appear only in stressed position (“his”, “her’, “happened’).
(f) The final /n/ sounds like /n/ (e.g. “something”, “evening”).
(g) / / & / / do not occur, /f/, /v/ or /d/ are used instead (e.g. «thin»
/fin/, «father» -/fa:vә/, “this” -/dis/).
/fin/, “father”- /fa:v ә/, “this” -/dis/).
(i) The glottal stop is often heard instead of /p/, /t/, /k/ & between vowels (e.g. “I hope so”- /aiæ
? s /, “back door” - /b ?doә/, “thirty” -/fә:?i).

26
 American English Pronunciation

English is spoken not only in Britain. It is the national language in the USA, Australia, New
Zealand, & of a great part of the population in Canada. Each of those nations has its own orthoepic norm
which exists alongside of regional types & numerous dialects.
Though the national languages have peculiar features of their own, which differentiate them from
British English (BE) & from each other, they have much more in common. That is why they are
considered to be variants of the same language, the English language.
American English (AE), which is the variant of the English language, has developed its own
peculiarities in vocabulary, grammatical structure and pr-n. The most widely used regional types of AE
pr-n are the Eastern, the Southern & the General American Types, the letter is spoken mainly in the
Middle Atlantic States Region.
The GA pr-n is usually referred to as the standard pr-n of AE.
The peculiarities of GA lie in:
1) The pr-n of sounds & sound combinations;
2) Differences in the stress patterns of words;
3) Differences in intonation.

1. Peculiarities of pr-n of GA sounds & sound combinations as compared to those of RP:

a) /r/ in GA is retroflexive, i.e. the tip of the tongue is curled back;
b) /t/ is voiced between a vowel & a sonorant (as in “battle”,
“twenty”, or between two vowels the second of which is unstressed (as in “pity”, “better”). But the
distinction between /t/ & /d/ is not neutralized, because the voiced /t/ is extremely short & resembles a
one tap alveolar /r/. Americans easily distinguish between “writer” & “rider”, “latter” & “ladder”;
c) /l/ is always dark, even before vowels (e.g. “film, “look”);
d) / / is voiced in words like “excursion” - / n/, “version” -/ n/,
“Asia” -/ /, “Persia” -/ /;
e) /h/ is often dropped in weak syllables , but it is retained when the syllable is stressed
(e.g. ‘an historical novel” - / әnis 'torikl
'n vl/, “I saw him” - /ai 's :im/, but “history” -/histri/, “him” -/him/);
f) /j / is omitted before /u/ )e.g. “duty’ -/du:ti/, “student” - /’studnt/,
“new” -/nu:/);
g) /d/ is omitted after /l/ & /n/ )e.g. “cold”, “old”, “individual”);
h) /k/ is omitted before /t/ )e.g. ”asked” -/æst /);
i) The glottal stop /?/ is used instead of /t/ before /m, n, l, r, j, w/ (e.g. “certainly” - /sә:?
nli /, “that one” - / æ?w n/, etc);
j) GA vowels are not differentiated by their length. D. Jones notes
that all American vowels are long;
k) /æ/ is used instead of /a:/ in words which do not contain “r” in spelling “path”,
“glass”, “laugh”, “can’t”, “last”, “grass”, etc. Exceptions: “father”, “palm”, “balm”,
“alms”);

1) / æ / in GA is wider & longer than RP / æ /;

27
 m) /o / is much less diphthongal than in RP. It may be represented as /o:/;
n) / ә/ tends to be monophthongized (e.g. “usually” - /ju әli/, “rural”
/rurәl/).
2.Peculiarities in the stress patterns in words in GA as compared to RP. American speakers make much
greater use of secondary stress in polysyllabic words than British speakers do. In words which end in “-
ary”, “-ory”, “-ery”, “-mony”, “-ative” the first syllable in the suffix bears tertiary stress (i.e. stress
which is somewhat weaker than secondary stress). E.g. dictio nary, terri tory, milli nery, cere mony,
com muni, cative.

3. Peculiarities of GA intonation.
The most frequent intonation contour for statements & requests in GA is the tune, beginning low, rising
to a high level, & then steadily falling.
E.g. He asked me to do it. Or He asked me to do it.

You better do it. or You better do it.

The same type of falling intonation contour may characterize the so-called General questions in GA.
E.g. did he ask you to do it?

“Rising” tunes that rise from a low pitch level & end on a high pitch level occur with some General
questions, especially in situations where a very polite form is desirable.
E.g. do you know him?

Though the so – called Special Questions are pronounced with a falling tone in both RP & GA, the
difference lies in the pr-n of the Scale. If in RP it is usually the Descending Scale, in GA the whole
utterance is generally pronounced on a level tone.
E.g. RP ‘Why haven’t you told me about it?

GA Why haven’t you told me about it?

Why haven’t you told me about it?

Another frequent intonational characteristic in GA is to end a sentence with a high-pitch fall-rise.

E.g. We certainly can.

28
LECTURE 8

PHONOSTYLISTICS- A NEW BRANCH OF PHONETICS

PHONETIC STYLES & THEIR CLASSIFICATION

Language functions in two main forms: the spoken language & the written language.
Though the main concern of phonetics is to investigate the varieties of the spoken language, the
written lan-ge can not be dismissed altogether, as it is very often read aloud, or recited, or it
guides the speaker when his speech is prepared & written down in advance.
Scholars distinguish a number of functional styles of the written lan-ge, such as belles-
lettres style, publistic style, newspaper style, the style of official documents & that of scientific
prose, which have clearly distinguishable lexical & syntactical peculiarities. Apart from a few
scattered studies of oratorical & conversational styles, the styles of the spoken lan-ge are not as
yet unanimously defined, though we are well aware of the phonetic differences between, say, a
casual conversation & an official exchange of views.
A close examination of the speech characteristics of one & the same person easily reveals
that each native speaker uses several varieties of the lan-ge. He uses one at home, another with
his colleagues, a third when addressing an audience & so on.
At home he usually speaks rather carelessly, with colleagues his speech, though rapid at
times, is less careless, & when addressing an audience his speech is more careful.
Each of these varieties may differ in the usage of items of vocabulary & in grammatical
structures, but by far the most striking distinctions are phonetical. At times these varieties differ
only phonetically, nevertheless they are easily identified by all the native speakers. E.g. “Do you
know her?”, when pronounced as [d `n ә], or again “come here”, when pronounced [k'miә] are
easily identified as belonging to informal conversation.
The main circumstances of reality that cause phonetic modifications in speech are as
follows:
a) the aim of speech (which may be to instruct, to inform, to persuade, to narrate, to chat
etc.;
b) the extent of spontaneity of speech (unprepared speech, prepared speech, etc.);
c) the nature of interchange, i.e. the use of a form of speech which may either suggest
only listening, or both listening & an exchange of remarks (a lecture, a discussion, a
conversation, etc.).
d) social & psychological factors, which determine the extent of formality of speech & the
attitudes expressed (a friendly conversation with close friends, a quarrel, an official
conversation, etc.).
These circumstances, or factors, are termed extra linguistic factors.

29
 Different ways of pronunciation, caused by extra linguistic factors & characterized by
definite phonetic features, are called phonetic styles, or styles of pronunciation.
The notion of styles of pronunciation was introduced by M. Lomonosov in the 18 th
century. Since then it has attracted many linguists. Though the difference in the styles of
pronunciation are recognized by all, there is no generally accepted classification of styles of
pronunciation as yet L. Scherba, one of the first linguists to make a study of the styles of
pronunciation, distinguishes two styles: the full style & the colloquial style.
The full styles is the pronunciation used in deliberately careful speech, while the
colloquial style of pronunciation, as he defines it, is the pronunciation used in ordinary
conversation. Cf. “Александр Александрович” & “Альсан Саныч” or “Сан Саныч”.
L.Scherba notes that the colloquial style embraces different varieties of pronunciation which, as
he says, are not easily differentiated one from another.
Most of the phoneticians who deal with Russian pron-n (R. Avanesov, L. Bulanin)
distinguish 3 styles of pronunciation:
a) the full style or elevated style (used when speaking officially, reciting & reading aloud
to a large audience)
b) the neutral style (used when lecturing, broadcasting)
c) colloquial style (used in rapid & careless speech)
English phoneticians distinguish a greater number of styles of pronunciation, although
among them there is no generally accepted classification of pronunciation styles either. Thus,
D.Jones distinguishes 5 styles of pronunciation:
a) The rapid familiar style,
b) The slower colloquial style,
c) The natural style used in addressing an audience,
d) The acquired style of the stage,
e) The acquired style used in singing.
J.Kenyon distinguishes 4 principal styles of “Good Spoken English”:
a) Familiar colloquial,
b) Formal colloquial,
c) public-speaking style,
d) public-reading style.
D.Crystal & D.Davy consider that the term “the English Lan-ge” is not a “single
homogeneous phenomenon at all, but rather a complex of many different ‘varieties’ of lan-ge in
use in all kinds of situation”. They consider that the differences between these varieties are due to
the kind of social situation the speaker is in, including the social position of the speaker & the
person spoken to. Their main concern is to establish the general phonetic distinctions of the
varieties of current En-sh, such as conversational En-sh (which in its turn includes “discussion»,»
talking”, etc.), television advertising (which is written En-sh being recited often by professional
actors), etc.
All the classifications mentioned above differ not only in the number of styles which they
are singled out. The main distinction between them is that they are based on different principles:
the degree of carefulness (L.Scherba’s & R.Avanesov’s classification of styles of pronunciation),
the extent of formality (J.Kenyon’s classification), and the rate of speech (D.Jone’s
classification), the social situations (D.Crystal & D.Davy).

There is evidently a correlation between phonetic & the ‘speech styles’. ‘Speech styles’,
just as phonetic styles, are conditioned by the circumstances of reality in which lan-ge functions,
30
by the kind of situation the speaker happens to be in & by the aims of the speech situations. They
may be a great variety of situations, aims & circumstances (the situation may be private or
public, the speaker may be informing, entertaining, persuading, advertising, he may be excited,
friendly etc.).
The question remains open whether there are just as many phonetic styles as there are
speech styles.
Phonetic investigations of some of the speech styles have shown that there also exists
definite phonetic distinction between lecturing, reading aloud, responding in an interview, casual
conversation, official talk & other speech styles.
Some attempts have been made to classify all the numerous varieties of speech forms on
account of their phonetic features & other linguistic characteristics. Thus, D.Abercrombie classes
them into:
a) Reading aloud (which includes most radio speech & recitation by heart,
b) Monologue (it includes lectures, radio commentaries, etc),
c) Conversation.
But this classification is not consistent, as both “monologue” & “conversation” are
spontaneous speech, they differ in the extent of spontaneity & the nature of interchange, whereas
“reading aloud” is a different type of speech activity.
Some scholars distinguish between:
a) Phonetic styles of spontaneous speech (conversation, spontaneous monologue, etc), b)
phonetic styles of prepared speech (lectures, speeches, etc),
c) Phonetic styles of reading aloud.
In their turn, the phonetic styles of spontaneous speech should be classified into: a)
official style,
b) Informal style or the style of everyday-life discourse,
c) Familiar (careless) style.
Each of these subgroups includes numerous varieties which are modified by extra
linguistic factors. This classification of phonetic styles was worked out by S.Gaiduchik.
The investigation of phonetic styles have originated a new branch of phonetics-
phonostylistics, which is concerned with the identification of the style – forming means, i.e. the
phonetic features that enable the native speaker to distinguish intuitively between different styles
of pronunciation.

The Phonetic Style – Forming Means

The speaker is to a definite extent governed by his audience in choice of vocabulary units,
grammatical structures, tempo of speech, distinctiveness of articulation, & so on. He has to make
sure he is understood. That is why he speaks more carefully when addressing a large audience, or
people whom he is not on familiar terms with. Whereas he is less particular about the
distinctiveness of his pronunciation when talking to those who know him well enough to “tune in
“very easily to his individual manner of speaking. E.g. [‘lemi`si:] for “let me see”, [dn’nou] for
“don’t know”, [freidnot] for “afraid not”, [smpm] for “smth”. In a free chat are ‘acceptable’
(though non-obligatory) assimilation & elision, but in other more official situations they are
‘unacceptable’ with those who speak the orthoepic norm. It appears that the use of one phoneme
for another as often as not a style-forming means. It may have a stylistic coloring & produce a
striking effect.

31
 Elision, reduction & assimilation may, therefore, signal stylistic differences. Take the
sentence “We can trust him to do it well” said in 2 different ways:
1. [wi kn'trst im tә 'du it wel]
2. ['wi: 'k n 'trst 'him tu 'du: it wel]
O’Connor states that they belong to different styles: the 1 st to colloquial conversation, the
2nd to a political speech delivered to a large audience.
On account of all that, the degree of assimilation, reduction & elision may serve to
distinguish phonetic styles.
Besides these segmental features, there are prosodic features which enable people to
distinguish between different phonetic styles.
Each speaker has a norm of loudness which may depart from in different circumstances.
His speech is generally characterized by a more or less regular usage of certain tones. But there
are circumstances when he introduces into his speech tonal variations, variations of pitch levels
& ranges specific for definite styles of pronunciation (either to awaken enthusiasm & interest in
his audience, or to acquire an authoritative tone, or, v.v., to sound informal, etc).
Each speaker has a norm of speech tempo as well. And he may depart from it in different
circumstances. E.g., when reading aloud the tempo is more or less even, when chatting freely the
variations in the tempo appear to be considerable. Pauses also help to distinguish different
varieties of speech. E,g. the character of pauses shows striking differences between written En-sh
read aloud & informal conversation. In the former the pauses are closely related to the
grammatical structures, but in conversation they may & do appear in between words in close
grammatical connection. Some of the pauses are often replaced by the so called ‘silence-fillers’
such as “I mean”,”sort of”, “kind of”, “well”, “Shall I say” & others. E.g.”It ‘was a… ‘sort of…
conversation & it, went like, this…”

Some speakers, when they are greatly involved in what they say & are very emphatic,
introduce no pauses until they run out of breath. Their speech sounds abnormal & careless: “He
'said he was 'going but he didn’t do 'anything to get ‘under `way & he came to the ‘door. He
‘stood there like a `dunce. He just `watched ‘other people ‘pack their ‘things. He 'didn’t 'help at
`all”.
Experimental investigations show that duration of pauses & tempo of speech depend
largely on the extent of creative activity that takes place during speech production. When a native
speaker uses a great deal of automatized & well learned sequences, commonplace utterances,
professional jargon & clichés, the tempo of his speech is higher than when he has to take serious
decisions concerning the content of his speech & its form (the vocabulary, the grammatical
structures, the conciseness of expressions). The tempo of speech also depends on whether the
audience is large or not. The speaker usually slows down his tempo of speech when addressing a
large audience. Thus, each phonetic style is characterized by a specific combination of segmental
& prosodic features.
The En-sh phonetic styles have been left unexplored as yet. Most of the research work
concentrated mainly on distinctions between different types of speech activities: reading aloud as
contrasted to spontaneous conversation. E.g. D.Crystal & D.Davy have noted that informal
conversational En-sh as opposed to written En-sh read aloud is characterized by:

32
a) a high proportion of hesitation features of all kinds, e.g. [m’m], [әm], [ә];
b) a substantional amount of overlapping & simultaneous speech;
c) a great amount of non-obligatory assimilation;
d) a very high frequency of simple falling tones, a high frequency of ‘stepping down’ head &
almost complete absence of ‘stepping up’ head; a high frequency of compound tunes,
especially the fall-rise; a frequent use of low rising tones on statements; the occasional use
of very emphatic tones such as : rise-fall & fall-rise; a common use of high unstressed
syllables especially in the prehead; a tendency to make frequent use of a small number
basic prosodic configurations;
e) a strong tendency to use short intonation groups & to break up lengthy intonation groups;
f) A frequent use of pauses which occur in places where they are not regular in formal
conversation.
D.Davy, when opposing different intonation patterns for conversation & reading aloud, has
found that the rising tones are used much oftener in reading.

33
2 лекция

Principles of Classification of Speech Sounds

The Articulatory Classification of English Speech Sounds. In all languages Speech sounds
are traditionally divided into two main types – vowels and consonants.
From the articulatory point of view the main principles of the division are as follows: the
presence or absence of obstruction; the distribution of muscular tension; the force of the air
stream coming from the lungs.
Vowels are speech sounds based on voice which is modified in the supralaryngeal cavities.
There is no obstruction in their articulation. The muscular tension is spread evenly throughout the
speech organs. The force of the air stream is rather weak.
Consonants are speech sounds in the articulation of which there is an obstruction, the removal
(перемещение) of which causes noise – plosive or friction. The muscular tension is
concentrated at the place of obstruction. The air stream is strong.
The articulatory boundary between vowels and consonants is not well marked. There exist
speech sounds that occupy an intermediate position between vowels and consonants and have
common feature with both the vowels and consonants. There are sonorants /m,n,ᵑ,j,l,w,r/. There
is an obstruction in their articulation and the muscular tension is concentrated at the place of
obstruction as in the production of consonants. Like vowels they are largely based on voice. The
air passage their production is rather wide and the force of the air is weak as in the case of
vowels. The wide passage for the air stream in the articulation of sonorants means that the oral
and nasal cavities are active. It results in greater audibility (sonority or perceptibility) of the
sounds a feature characteristic of vowels.
Because of their strong vocalic characteristics sonorants /w,j,r/ are often referred to as
semivowels.
From the acoustic point of view vowels are complex periodic vibrations-tones. They are
combinations of the main tone and overtones intensified by the supralaryngeal cavities.
Consonants are non-periodic vibrations – noises. Voiceless consonants are pure noises.Voiced
consonants are actually a combination of noise and tone. And sonants are predominantly sounds
of tone with an admixture (примесь) of noice.
Thus, the acoustic boundary between vowels and consonants is not well marked either.

The Articulatory Classification of English Sounds.

A. Vowels

The varies qualities (timbres) of English vowels are determined by the oral resonator – its
size, volume and shape. The resonator is modified by the most movable speech organs the
tongue and the lips. Moreover , the quality of a vowel depends on whether the speech organs
are tense or lax and whether the force of articulation weakens or is stable.
Thus, vowels are classified:
1. According to the horizontal movement of the tongue;
2. According to the vertical movement of the tongue;

34
3. According to the position of the lips;
4. According to the degree of the muscular tension of the articulatory organs;
5. According to the force of articulation at the end of a vowel;
6. According to the stability of articulation;
7. According to the length of a vowel;

1. According to the horizontal movement of the tongue , English vowels are classified into

front : /ni:i:, n3:e,n4:æ/ and the nuclei of the diphthongs /i: ei: 7: ἐᵊ:,ᴈ/ , front –
retracted : /2: I/ and the nucleus of the diphthong /6: Iᵊ/,mixed: /11: ᵊ:12:ᵊ/, back-
advanced: /8: v,10: ^,5:a:/, and the nuclei of the diphthongs /2: ov, 9: vᵊ/ and back : /9: u:,
7: ᴐ:,6:ᴐ/.
2. According to the vertical movement of the tongue ,English vowels have been
traditionally subdivided into close /high/, mid and open /low/. It is insufficient ,
however, to define the articulatory features of vowels in terms of these 3 degrees of
opening of the mouth cavity, since functionally different vowels /1: i:-2: I/,/9: u:-8:
v/,/7:ᴐ:-6:ᴐ/ are not described from the point of view of their articulation .
Russian phoneticians G. Torsuyev /I/, A.Trakhterov /2/,V.Vassilyew/3/ classify
these sounds in a more precise manner subdividing each class (close,mid,open) into a
narrow and a broad variation. Thus, according to the height of the tongue , vowels can
be classified as high-narrow /1:i:,9:u:/, high broad /2:I, 8: v/, mid- narrow
/3:e,11:ᵊ,2:o/v /,mid-broad /12:ᵊ,7:ἐ(ᵊ)l/, low-narrow /10: ^,7:ᴐ:/,low – broad
/4:æ,3,4:a(I,v)5:a:,6:ᴐ/.
Their Classification reflects the distinctive differences in the quality of the
historically long and short vowels./Show the table of English vowels:/
3. According to the position of the lips, i.e. whether they are rounded ,spread or
neutral ,English vowels are classed into rounded /ᴐ:,ᴐ, u: v/ and unrounded
/i:I,e,ᵊ,æ^a:ᵊ:ᵊ/.The subdivision of vowels into lipspread and lip neutral is unnecessary
for a phonological analysis, but may be useful in describing concrete realizations of the
phonemes.
4. According to the degree of muscular tension, English vowels are classified into tense
and lax.Thus, for instance, English /i: /and /u:/ are characterized as tense, because the
speech organs that participate in their formation /the tongue and the lips/ are
considerably tensed .In the articulation of short /I/and/v/ these organs are relatively
relaxed, so these vowels are characterized as lax. All the long vowels are believed to be
tense ,while short vowels are lax /Torsuyev G. p.4/ This is due to the long period of
time for which the speech organs are kept in a certain position and this ,in its turn,
requires greater muscular tension of the speech organs. Not all phoneticians share this
opinion. According to D. Jones /5/, only the long /I:/and /u:/ may be considered as
tense. D. Jones applies the terms `tense` and `lax` only to close vowels , because in the
case of open vowels in to difficult to define whether there is any tenseness or not.

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 5. According to the force of articulation at the end of the vowel (the character of the end),
English vowels are subdivided into free and checked. Free vowels are pronounced in an
open syllable with a weakening in the force of articulation towards their end, i.e. they
have a fading character .These are all the English long monophthongs and diphthongs
and unstressed short vowels.
Checked vowels are those in the articulation of which there is no weakening of the
force of articulation. They are pronounced abruptly at the end, immediately followed by
a consonant that checks them. These are historically short vowels under stress.
6. According to the stability of articulation English vowels into monophthongs /i:I,e,
æ ,a:, ᴐ :, ᴐ ,u:,v/, diphthongs /ei,ai, ᴐi,av,ov,ia,ia,oa,va, /and diphthongoids, or
diphthongized vowels /i:,u:/.
The stability of articulation as in the care of monophthongs or its instability as in the
case of diphthongs and diphthongoids is, actually , the stability (or instability) of the
shape of the oral resonator.When the position of the tongue and the lips during the
pronunciation of a vowel is altered to some extent, a new vowel quality is produced.In
diphthongs
vowel elements are distinguished the nucleus and the glide.The nucleus is stronger,
more definite in timbre , more prominent and syllabic.
In different languages the nucleus of a diphthongs may be either the 1 st or 2 nd
element. Diphthongs that consist of a nucleus followed by a glide are falling diphthongs
,because the total amount of articulation energy falls towards the 2nd element .Those
consisting of a glide followed by a nucleus are rising diphthongs , since the articulatory
energy rises towards the second element. English diphthongs are falling. Rising
diphthongs are common in Italian.

Are some phonetic contexts English diphthongs /ia, va/ may be pronounced with the nd
element stronger and more prominent than the 1st , and are, consequently , rising. When the
diph /ov/ is pronounced as an exclamation with the high rising tone, the /v/ element in it is as
strong and prominent as /o/. So /ov/ can be called a level diphthong.
7. Closely connected with the quality of vowels is their quantity , or length. Any speech
sound must have certain duration to display its quality, to be perceived as such.

According to their length, English vowels are divided into long /i:,a:, ᴐ:,u:a:/ and short /I,
ᴐ,e,v, ᵊ, æ /. This length is historically short ones and even shorter /b1 :t/-/bId/, /s1:t/-/sIt/.
B. The Articulatory Classification of English Consonants.

An indispensable constituent of a cons in noise is an obstruction .There are the following

types of obstruction in the production of consonants:1. complete occlusion
/closure/,/преграда/ 2. constriction /norrowing/- щель- constrictive –щелевый 3.occlusion-
constriction –смычка-щель (clause immediately followed by a constriction).
The noise produced by the removed of closure is that of a plosion , the noise resulting
from the movement of the air stream in the narrowing is that of friction (шум,трения,
фрикация). The two effects are combined when closure is followed by a narrowing.

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 1. According to the type of obstruction and the manner of the production of noise, English
Consonants are classified in the following way:

a) Occlusives - (cмычные) : stops (plosives) /p,b,t,d,k,g,/ and nasal sonants / m,n,n,/

b) Constrictives –(щелевые ) fricatives and oral sonants : Fricatives : unicentral and

bicentral. Unicentral: /f,v,Ө,s,z/ and bicentral /3, Ϩ/. Oral sonants: medial and laterial.
Medial /j,r,w/ and Larerial /1/.

c) Occlusive –Constrictive /Affricates/ ,/tϨ, d3 /

Obstructions may be formed either by 2 active speech organs or by one active speech organ
(articulator) and passive organ of speech (point or place of articulation).
2. According to the active speech organ which forms an obstruction , English consonants
are classed into:

a) Labial : bilabial and labio-dental, . Bilabial: /p,b,m,w/ and Labio-dental:/v,f/

b) Lingual: forelingual,medio-lingual and backlingual. Forelingual: apical and cacuminal.
Apical:/t,d,n,s,z, Ө / and Cocuminal /r/. Medio-lingual /j/. Backlingual /k,g,n/.
c) Phatyngeal /h/ фаринкс – жуткыншакта пайда болатын дыбыс
3. According to the place of obstruction , consonants are classified into dental / Ө ,Ϡ/ alveolar
/t,d,n,1,s,z/, post—alveolar /r/ , palatal /j/, palato- alveolar /3,Ϩ, tϨ, d3 / velar /n,k,g/
4.According to the presence or absence of voice ,English Consonants are subdivided into
voiced /b,d,g,v,z,3, d3 / and voiceless /p,t,k,f,s, tϨ, Ө/.
5. According to the force of articulation English Consonants are classified as lenis and fortis . In
the articulation of English voiced consonants the muscular tension is weak-lenis articulation. In
the articulation of English voiceless consonants the muscular tension is strong-fortis articulation.
6.According to the position of the soft palate ,English Consonants are subdivided into oral
/p,b,t,d,k,g,f,v,s,z, Ө ,Ϡ, tϨ, d3,w,l,r,j / and nasal /n,n,m / .

References:
1 Г.П.Торсуев .Фонетика английского языка. м 1950
2. А.Л. Трахтеров. Лекции по теоретическому курсу фонетики английского языка м. 1955
3. V.A.Vassiliyev. English Phonetics. Moscow ,1970
4. Г.П.Торсуев. Указ.раб.
5.D.Jones. An Outline of English Phonetics. Cambridge/1960

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