DISTINCTIVE FEATURES

DISTINCTIVE FEATURES

• Speech sounds in spoken languages do not always act independently.

• Instead, multiple sounds often participate in the same sound patterns.
• When a group of sounds exhibits the same behavior, it is often the
case that these sounds are phonetically similar to each other.
• This type of grouping of sounds has been termed a ‘‘natural class’’,
• the observation that phonological alternations often involve groups of
sounds which share phonetic properties has led to the proposal that
phonological alternations act upon specific properties of sounds, or
‘‘distinctive features’’,
DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
A natural class of sounds in a language consists on those sounds
which share certain distinctive feature to the exclusion of all other
sounds in a language.
The features used to describe natural classes of sounds in phonology
are known as distinctive features. …because they distinguish between
otherwise identical sounds.
• These features are usually peculiar to the particular sounds in a
manner that no other sound can share them
The distinctions made by features are (almost always) denoted by a
[+] or [-] in front of the feature name.
DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
Roman Jakobson proposed that there is one universal set of distinctive
features for all languages, which define classes of sounds relevant to
phonology.
All restrictions on distribution must be stated in terms of these
features.
Are associated with speech sound
 Determine the contrast between speech sounds
 Describe the ways in which these sounds change
Define the natural classes ( set of sounds)
 DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
• They are phonological features that phonemes have that help
us identify them in a distinct manner from other sounds that
may be in their category.
• These features are usually peculiar to the particular sounds in a
manner that no other sound can share them.
• This is why they are called distinctive
• All speech sounds can be analyzed in terms of their values for
the set of distinctive features,
• the set of segments that have a particular value for some
feature (or set of feature values) is a natural class.
DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
• These elements are usually phonological in nature.
• The idea is that of identifying what contrasts one sound from the
other.
• This contrasting feature is peculiar to that sound
• Others with the same phonetic features will not share that
particular element or at least not in the same way.
DISTINCTIVE FEATURES
Example: the sounds /p/ and /b/
• They have the same manner of articulation …
• However, they are different sounds. How???

• one sound is +voice and the other is -voice It means that the
two sounds are distinct in terms of voicing.
Identifying Distinctive Features
 The sounds could be distinctly determined in terms of one feature.
 The phonological features are described in terms of their being
present or absent.
 The particular feature could be absent or present in a particular
sound.
 The are described in binary terms. It is either a plus or minus the
feature.
 The signs [+, -] are used to indicate the presence or absence of the
feature.
Major Features: Consonants
1. Stops: [p] [b] [m] [t] [d] [n] [k] [g] [ŋ] [ʧ ] [ʤ] [Ɂ]
 Produced by completely stopping the air flow in the oral
cavity for a fraction of a second.
 there is some restriction of the airflow during articulation
 All other sounds are continuants, meaning that the airflow is
continuous through the oral cavity
Major Features: Consonants

2. Fricatives: [f] [v] [θ] [ð] [s] [z] [ʃ] [ʒ] [x] [ɣ] [h]
 Produced by severely obstructing the airflow so as to
cause friction
 Major Features: Consonants
3. Affricates: [ʧ] [ʤ]
 Produced by a stop closure that is released with a lot of friction

4. Liquids: [l] [r]

 Produced by causing some obstruc0on of the airstream in the
mouth, but not enough to cause any real friction

5. Glides: [j] [w]

Produced with very little obstruction of the airstream and are
always followed by a vowel
Major Features: Consonants
Consonantal sounds can be further subdivided into:
 Labials/Bilabials: [p] [b] [m] [f] [v] [w]
 Articulated with the lips

 Coronals: [θ] [ð] [t] [d] [n] [s] [z] [ʃ ] [ʒ] [ʧ ] [ʤ] [l] [r]
 Articulated by raising the tongue blade

 Sibilants: [s] [z] ] [ʃ] [ʒ] [ʧ ] [ʤ]

Produced with a lot of friction that causes a hissing sound, which
is a mixture of high-frequency sounds
Vowels
• Vowels are classified by how high or low the tongue is,
if the tongue is in the front or back of the mouth, and
whether or not the lips are rounded.
i. High vowels: [i] [ɪ] [u] [ʊ]
ii. Mid vowels: [e] [ɛ] [o] [ə] [ʌ] [ɔ]
iii. Low vowels: [æ] [a]
Vowels
iv. Front vowels: [i] [ɪ] [e] [ɛ] [æ]
v. Central vowels: [ə] [ʌ]
vi. Back vowels: [u] [ɔ] [o] [æ] [a]