Principles of Linguistics

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Principles of Linguistics
Chapter 7 Supplement

• Phonology Pronunciation
• The Sound Patterns of English
• Understanding Some of the More Complex Patterns
  of English

Dr. Robert Schwab, 2007
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Sonorant Consonants and Obstrents Consonants

• Sonorant Consonants and Obstrents Consonants
• Sonorant consonants that are produced with little
  or no obstruction or constriction of the airflow.
  All vowels are sonorant. Sonorant consonants
  include the nasals (m,n and N), the liquids (l
  and r), and the glides (w and y).
• Obstrent consonants are sounds that are produced
  with obstruction or constriction of the airflow.
  Obstrent consonants include the 3 major classes
  of consonants the stops (pen tin kin big
  dig get), the fricatives (van fan this
  think zoo beige ship hat) and the affricates
  (joke choke ).

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What is a Syllable?

• A Syllable is a unit of connected sounds that
  contains a peak of sonorance (a vowel or
  diphthong) and any less sonorant consonant sounds
  within the same structure
• All syllables contain a peak of sonorance which
  forms the functional center or nucleus of the
  syllable
• A syllable may contain an onset consisting of one
  or more consonant sounds that occurs before the
  nucleus.
• A syllable may contain a coda consisting of one
  or more consonant sounds that occurs after the
  nucleus.
• The combination of the nucleus and coda is called
  the rhyme. The rhyme controls vowel length,
  vowel sonorance, and syllable boundary formation

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Syllable Structure

• The vowel sound and everything that follows in a
  syllable is referred to as the rhyme. The vowel
  sound itself is referred to as the nucleus, and a
  syllabic segments that follow the vowel sound is
  called the coda. Syllabic segments that come
  before the vowel sound are referred to as the
  onset
• syllable
• 
  rhyme
• Onset nucleus
  coda
• spr.i..nt

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Consonant Clusters Combinations and the Sonorance
Pyramid

• The ability of English onsets to contain 1,2 or 3
  consonants, and codas to contain 1, 2, 3, or 4
  consonants allow for literally thousands of
  potential combinations, but most of these
  possible combinations are never used.
• Consonant combinations do not occur randomly
  they reliably pattern based on sonorance, which
  is itself based on manner of articulation.
• In English, these consonants pattern in a way
  that always places members of the more sonorant
  class closer to the nucleus than less sonorant
  sounds.

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• Vowels are the most sonorant class of sounds.
  Within the class of vowels, tense vowels are more
  sonorant and lax vowels are less sonorant. On a
  full-range sonorance scale, tense vowels receive
  a sonorance level of (7) and lax vowels receive a
  sonorance level of (6)
• Consonants can be classified based on sonorance.
  Classification of consonantal sonorance is based
  on manner of articulation. The Sonorant
  consonants (glides, liquids and nasals) are the
  most sonorant group of consonants, and receive a
  sonorance level of (5). Released stops are the
  2nd most sonorant group of consonants, and
  receive a sonorance level of (4). Affricates are
  the 3rd most sonorant group of consonants, and
  receive a sonorance level of (3). Fricatives are
  4th most sonorant group of consonants, and
  receive a sonorance level of (2). Unreleased
  stops are the least sonorant group of consonants,
  and receive a sonorance level of (1). Unreleased
  stops only occur in syllable final position in
  the coda.

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Consonants and the Sonorance Scale

• (7) Tense vowels
• (6) Lax vowels
• (5) Sonorant consonants (glides, liquids,
  nasals)
• (4) Released stops
• (3) Affricates
• (2) Fricatives
• (1) Unreleased stops
• The Sonorance Pyramid
• 2 4 6 4 4 2 2 4 5 7 4 2 2 4 5
  6 5 3 2
• s k à r t s s k w k s s k r à n tS t
• (skirts) (squawks)
  (scrunched)

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Onset Adaptation Borrowed Words

• If a word does not follow our rules for consonant
  cluster formation, we will modify it so it does.
  Many Greek words begin with ps and pt
  (psychology, pterodactyl, etc). when these
  combinations are imported into English, we modify
  them by omitting the obtrusive sound.
• Each language has its own rules for controling
  this process. This is why Korean learners will
  often add a phantom vowel between segments -
  to break up the obtrusive combination, creating
  an extra vowel (/kriym/, street - /sta-riyt/).
  It is also why speakers of European languages
  will often add a phantom vowel in front of the
  obtrusive combination, creating an extra vowel
  (/Es-piyk/, student - /Es-tuwdnt/ and Spanish -
  /Es-----pQnIS/).

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Syllable Boundaries Based on Sonorance

• The syllable is based on a scale of rising and
  falling sonority (rising in the onset and falling
  in the coda). Consonant order in an onset or coda
  is dependent on maintaining the sequential order
  of the sonorance pyramid. A break or disruption
  in the ordered sequence of will result in a
  syllable break.
• There are a two relationships that mediate this
  relationship
• two consonants from the same sonorance class can
  not occur in the same onset or coda,
• two obstruents cannot occur together sequentially
  (there is one exception the initial /s/ on the
  three consonant onset as in split this is
  extrasyllabic form, a unique feature found only
  in a few Indo-European languages).
• With these two exceptions we can now predict
  syllable boundaries--the syllable begins with the
  least sonorous segment in a string.

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Consonantal Influence on Syllable Stress

• Stress is the prominence of one or more syllabic
  elements over others in a word. The structure of
  individual syllables plays controls the syllable
  that will be stressed
• Necessary terms and definitions
• Diphthong a nucleus that contains two vowel
  sounds
• Closed Syllable contains both an onset and a
  coda
• Heavy Syllable contains a closed syllable or a
  dipthong
• Penultimate Syllable the next-to-the-last
  syllable in a word

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Syllable Stress for 2 syllable words

• For this introduction, we will focus on
  multi-syllable content words in English.
• For 2 syllable words, the stress will fall on
• the 1st syllable if it is functioning as a noun
• key.board, im.plant, pr.esent, re.bate,
  part.y, hor.mone
• The 2nd syllable if it is functioning as a verb
• re.act, im.plant, pre.sent, a.dopt, cre.ate,
• Unless the second syllable is a grammatical
  morpheme
• in which the 1st syllable is stressed -
  lift.ed, end.ed,

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Syllable Stress for 3 syllable words

• For 3 or more syllable nouns, the stress falls on
• the penultimate syllable when it is heavy
• if the penultimate syllable is not heavy,
• the stress falls on the antepenultimate syllable
  that demonstrates the greatest degree of heavy
  features
• Consider a.gen.da, a.ppen.dix (penultimate
  stress) and cin.em.a, cab.in.et, A.mer.i.ca,
  in.ter.o.gate (nonpenultimate stress)
• un.re.lat.ed com.put.er aut.o.mo.bile
  Kor.e.a

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THE END Principles of LinguisticsChapter 7
SupplementPhonology PronunciationThe Sound
Patterns of LanguageUnderstanding Some of the
more Complex Patterns of EnglishDr. Robert
Schwab, 2007