The Vocalic Phonemes in English

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The Vocalic Phonemes in English

• A new perspective

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Introduction

• The Big Picture of Phonology based on analysis
  and segmentation

• Extended view based on morphology and contextual
  phonemes
• Unstressed vowels ? schwa /?/ or /?/
• Stressed closed syllables ? short vowels
  
• Stressed open syllables ? long vowels, diphthongs

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Overview Vowels

• Description in R.P. phonological system
• Distinctive features
• Quality
• Tongue position
• Mouth opening
• Secondary Features
• Roundness, Tenseness
• Quantity
• Length (D. Jones, 1917, 1991)

Pete boot pit pert put
pet Peter port pat putt pot
part
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Diphthongs Semivowels

• Diphthongs
• Lengthening into a central glide
• Classification
• Closing diphthongs
• Lengthening of original vowels
• Centring diphthongs
• Towards neutralization
• Other feature
• Rising diphthongs
• Semivowels (/j/, /w/)
• Frictionless Approximants,
• near vowel realization,
• but not syllabic nucleus, falling on vowel
• Examples yes, wet, tabulation

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Stress

• Influence of Stress and Morphology
• Phrase stress
• (Phrase as the basic information unit, Brown
  Yule, 1983)
• Structural words (unstressed tendency to schwa)
• Lexical words (stressed unstressed syllables)
• 40 sounds are vowels, 20 are /?/, /I/ (Fry,
  1947) ? 50
• 65 vowels are unstressed, 90 ? /?/, /I/.
  (Brooks,1994)
• Tendency ? Centralization of unstressed vowels

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Historical background

• The Great Vowel Shift
• Stressed short vowels in closed syllables
  remained short CVC
• Stressed long vowels in open syllables suffered a
  lengthening and raising, which broke most of them
  up into diphthongs CVCV
• (B. Strang, 1970)

i a?, e? ??, a? u e ? ? ?
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The Regular Pattern of the Pronunciation of
English Vowels

• Neutralization of unstressed vowels
• V ? (/?/, /?/) ? some disappear (Ø)
• Stressed Syllable Patterns
• CVC CV ? Short vowels
• CV CV ? Long vowel
• Diphthongs
• Variations
• Neighbouring consonants
• Late affixation
• 
  (Sánchez-Villalón, 1994)
• 84 regular pattern spelling
  (Brookes, 1997)

cat pet sit pot put,cut
-aC- /?/ -eC- /e/ -iC - /?/ -oC- /?/ -uC-
/?/, /?/
name evening site nose student
-a- /e?/ -e- /i/ -i - /a?/ -o- /??/ -u-
/j?/, /u/
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Phonotactic Variations
Influencing Consonants r, l, m, n. -ar /?/ -or /?/ dark, cork -er, -ir, -ur /3/ merge,girl,church -om, -on /?/ son, tongue -um, -un /?/ sun, summer mel-, col-, (partially)melon, colour Influencing Clusters ld, mb, nd, ght, st -ild, -old, child, cold -ind, -imb, -omb mind, comb -ight, light -alC, -olC talk, folk -ast, -ance /?/ chance, past -aste, -ange /e?/paste, change
Influencing semivowel w- wa- /w?/ watch Other consonants -th-, -v- -oth, -ath, brother, path -iv, -ev-, -ov- live, seven, love
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Morphophonological variations

• Influence of affixation Word stress
• Weak (No effect)
• a-, -ness, -less /?/ about, careless, happiness
• -y /I/ happy, rainy
• -able (comfortable) -ance (appliance)
• Strong
• Stressed, -ese (Chinese), -eer (engineer)
• Unstressed, -ic, -al, -ion shifting stress to the
  preceding syllable (history ? historical, maniac
  ?maniacal)
• False affixation
• Fam?ily, fam?ine,
• Technical terms
• Syllabic spelling for clarity hydroxide,
  photoelectric, tabulation

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Influence on Spelling

• Closed Syllables match Pronunciation Spelling
• Ending e stripe (cf. strip)
• Doubling consonants in inflections
• ed, ing, er, est begin ? beginning, but open ?
  opening
• Doubling consonants in affixation
• -ish, -y reddish, sunny, robbery, flippancy
• Others cottage, pattern, middle

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Application to teaching

• In Reading
• Whole language vs phonics
• phonics /?f?Un?Iks/ noun U, a method of
  teaching people to read based on the sounds that
  letters represent (OALD definition).
• Mix of both approaches
• In Listening
• Listening comprehension -- for meaning (stressed
  words)
• Repeating listened utterances (isolated
  connected speech). Group repetition

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Activity 1 Listening comprehension An
economical conversation

• Stressed/Unstressed Words in connected speech
• (Listening comprehension Basic Level. Students
  try to copy most prominent, meaningful words
  down. Then, they read and fill with structural
  words)
• morning, Dad.
• morning Tom.
• mind doing favour ?
• What Tom?
• wondering lend fiver ?
• seems lot. What for?
• Janets birthday Saturday.
• giving diamond ring ? When pay back ?
• soon can Dad . Thank much Dad.

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Activity 2 MultiskillInferring pronunciation
from spelling

• Advanced level. Reading a text with new words for
  advanced students (technical, literary or from
  the newspaper)
• Reading asking for meaning or Reading aloud
• Sample text The wrought iron rivets that
  fastened the hull plates to the Titanic's main
  structure also failed because of brittle fracture
  during the collision with the iceberg. Low water
  temperatures contributed to this failure
• Student What is the meaning of the second
  word? The one with iron?
• Teacher /r?t/ iron?
• Yes. /r?t/
• Wrought iron is Hierro forjado
• And is it /r?v?t/ or /ra?v?t/?
• Short I influenced by v-. /r?v?t/
• And /br?t?l/ as it is a closed syllable. Notice
  tt-

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Activity 3 Music (listening)

• Identify the final rhyming vowel phonemes
• (Listening for specific sounds)
• (A rap song)
• Always have fun
• Always on the run
• Cant rap now
• Till I see the sun
• You see 20 dollars
• Laying in the ground
• Try to pick it up
• But it moved across town
• from The English Language by David Crystal
  (1988)

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Listening and Note-taking

• Sometimes I just feel
• like my father,
• I hate to be bothered
• with all of this nonsense
• it's constant
• And, "Oh, it's his lyrical content
• -- the song 'Guilty Conscience'
• has gotten such rotten responsesAnd all of this
  controversy circles me
• and it seems like the media immediately
• points a finger at me (finger at me)..
• EMINEM, The Way I Am, Marshall Mathers, 2000

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References

• Brookes, M, (1997) Pronounce English, Barcelona
  Larousse
• Brown, G. Yule, G. (1983) Discourse Analysis,
  CambridgeC.U.P
• Finch, D.F. Ortiz Lira, D., (1982), A Course in
  English Phonetics for Spanish Speakers, London
  Heinemann
• Jones, D., (1917) English Pronouncing Dictionary,
  14th ed. 1991, Cambridge C.U.P
• Sánchez-Villalón, P.P., The Pronunciation Rule
  of English, in Estudios Filológicos
  Angloamericanos, (1994) Ed. L. Mora, Cuenca
  UCLM
• Strang, B. M.H. (1970) A History of English,
  London Methuen

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