REFLECTION WEEK 4

I progressed to the second chapter of the course in the fourth week, which
covers the examination of segmental and suprasegmental units in Vietnamese and
English. To help us better understand the concepts, my instructor first clarified
what segmental and suprasegmental units are. She stressed that suprasegmental
units comprise elements like stress, intonation, and rhythm, whereas segmental
units are specific sounds or phonemes. Understanding the grammatical subtleties
and pronunciation patterns of languages depends on this distinction. She provided
examples of how segmental and suprasegmental components affect meaning and
communication in different scenarios.

The most vivid memory I have of phonemes—the tiniest units of sound

required to distinguish one word from another—is this. According to my teacher,
phonemes are crucial for telling apart words in a language. For instance, the
phoneme /b/ as opposed to /k/ distinguishes "cat" from "bat." Understanding this
idea enables us to appreciate the significance of segmental units in language
production and comprehension. Additionally, I studied allophones, which are
phoneme variations that arise in speech because of various phonetic circumstances.
Allophones are pronounced differently, even though they are represented by the
same letter. For instance, the way the letter "t" is pronounced in the words "top"
and "stop" varies, although the difference may not be apparent. Nevertheless, these
variations are crucial for our ability to understand and comprehend speech. I can
comprehend the richness of language and its variety of expressions more fully now
that I am aware of these variations. Finally, I gained knowledge regarding
phonemes and allophones as well as a refresher of several concepts I had
previously studied in the previous semester, such as voicing, manner and place of
articulation, etc.