Allophone
An allophone refers to variant pronunciations of a phoneme in a specific language, where the variations don’t change the meaning of a word.
Phoneme
Refers to an abstract minimal unit of speech sound that can produce a difference in meaning
Pre-fortis clipping of vowels
A vowel before a Fortis consonant (voiceless consonant) within the same syllable has a slightly shorter duration than before a lenis consonant ( voiced consonant). It is clipped. This phenomenon is called pre-fortis clipping.
Phonemic transcription
In a phonemic transcription we use slashes / / and show only the constituent phonemes of the words without any information about their allophones.
Phonetic transcription
In a phonetic transcription we use square brackets [ ] it gives useful information about some or all allophones of the phonemes.
Used to transcribe the constituent sounds of words.
Phonemic transcription vs Phonetic transcription
Phonemic is an abstract transcription, it shows only the constituent phonemes of word while the phonetic transcription is not abstract since it gives detailed information about the prononciation of words. Used to transcribe the constituent sounds of word
Levels of representation in phonology
Level of the phoneme (abstract level, i.e phonological level) abstract mental representationsvs of speech sounds in a language. Phonemes are the basic units of sound that can distinguish words from each other.Level of the allophone (concrete level, i.e phonetic level)allophones are the different concrete physical realization of a phoneme in actual speech
Phonological neutralization
Means loss of contrast btw two phonemes, it refers to the facts that in certain environments two phonemes do not oppose each other= the opposition btw them is neutralized
Neutralization btw ɪ iː takes place in the following environments:
In an unstressed syllable at the end of a word
Before another vowel in an unstressed syllable
Neutralization of opposition btwn ʊ uː
In an unstressed syllable
Before another vowel in an unstressed syllable
In word final position
Rules for the allophones of English consonants
- voiceless stops p t k have aspirated realization in syllable-initial position
-voiceless stops p t k have unaspirated realization after s (=) - ## voiced stops b d g and the voiced affricate dʒ occuring in syllable initial position tend to be partially devoiced except when they are immediately preceded by a vowel or a voiced consonan ̥
- the so-called voiced obstruents stops bd g, fricatives v z ʒ ð in utterance- final position or before voiceless sounds are voiced through only a small part of the articulation, considerably devoiced in that position
- sequence of two stops the first stop is unreleased ̚
- the approximants w r j l might be partially devoiced in certain productions when they occur after initial p t k
- nasalization ̃
- lateral consonant l after a stop or fricative or nasal in word final position is syllabic ᵊɫ
Alveolar consonant become dentalized before the interdental consonants θ ð ̪
Lateral l becomes velarised in the following position - before a consonant
-a the end of a word
The allophone ɫ is a dark l
Acoustic-perceptual features of RFs
- They have no intensity (loudness) prominence, no F0(pitch) prominence and no length prominence in an utterance
- We perceive RFs with a shorter duration to their FF counterparts. They are pronounced relatively quickly
