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Lecture 6 The classification of English vowel sounds
Vowels unlike consonants are produced with no obstruction to the stream of air, so on the perception level their integral characteristic is naturally tone, not noise. The most important characteristic of the quality of these vowels is that they are acoustically stable. They are known to be entirely different from one another both articulatorily and acoustically. Different vowel sounds are produced by varying the placement of the body of the tongue and shaping the lips.
a) stability of articulation;
Diphthongs consist of two elements, the first of which, the nucleus, being strong and distinct and the second, the glide, being very weak and indistinct.
Another principle of classification is the position of the tongue. The position of the tongue in the mouth cavity is characterized from two aspects that is the horizontal and vertical movement. [pen — pæn] pen — pan; [kæp — ka:p] cap — carp; [pen — pin] pen — pin; [kæp — k p] cap — cup; [bin — bi:n] bin — been; [b n — ba:n] bun — barn Another principle of classification is lip rounding. Three lip positions are distinguished: spread, neutral and rounded. For the purpose of classification, it is sufficient to distinguish between two lip positions: rounded and unrounded, or neutral. Any back vowel is produced with rounded lips, the degree of rounding is different and depends on the height of the raised part of the tongue; the higher it is raised the more rounded the lips are. So lip rounding is a phoneme constitutive indispensable feature, because no back vowel ran exist without it. Our next point is checkness. This quality depends on the character of the articulatory transition from a vowel to a consonant. As a result all English short vowels are checked when stressed. The degree of checkness may vary and depends on the following consonant. Before fortis voiceless consonant, it is more perceptible than before a lenis voiced consonant or sonorant. All long vowels are free. There is one more articulatory characteristic - tenseness. It characterizes the state of the organs of speech at the moment of production of a vowel. Historically long vowels are tense while historically short vowels are lax. Lecture 7 Intonation INTONATION AND PROSODY Phonemes, syllables and words, as lower—level linguistic units, are grouped by various prosodic means into a higher unit — the utterance. Every concrete utterance, alongside of its phonemic and syllabic structures has a certain prosodic structure, or intonation. Intonation is a complex unity of speech melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm and voice timbre, which enables the speaker to express his thoughts, emotions and attitudes towards the contents of the utterance and the hearer. Acoustically, intonation is a complex combination of varying fundamental frequency, intensity and duration. Speech melody is primarily related with fundamental frequency, tempo — with duration. On the articulatory, or production, level intonation is also a complex phenomenon. In the production of speech melody certain (subglottal, laryngeal and supraglottal) respiratory muscles regulate the subglottal air—pressure, which makes the vocal cords vibrate. An increase of subglottal pressure raises the pitch of the voice, and its decrease lowers the pitch. The definition of intonation given above is a broad definition. It reflects the actual interconnection and interaction of melody, stress, tempo, rhythm and timbre in speech. A great number of phoneticians abroad, (including D.Jones, L.Armstrong and I.Ward, K.Pike, R.Kingdon, A.Gimson, J.O'Connor and G.Arnold) define intonation as the variation of the pitch of the voice, thus reducing it to one component — speech melody. This is a narrow approach to the definition of intonation. Thus G.Arnold writes: "When we talk about English intonation we mean the pitch patterns of spoken English, the pitch tunes or melodies, the musical features of English ". Some foreign phoneticians give broader definitions of intonation. Thus L. Hultzen includes the variations of pitch, loudness and duration, F.Danes — the variations of pitch and intensity, D.Crystal — tone, pitch range, loudness, with rhythmicality and tempo closely related. Alongside of the term "intonation" the term "prosody" is widely used. "Prosody" and "prosodic" denote non—segmental phenomena, i.e. those which do not enter into the system of segmental phonemes. D. Crystal defines prosodic features as "vocal effects constituted by variations along the parameters of pitch, loudness, duration and silence". From the definition of prosody and intonation we can clearly see that both the notions include essentially the same phenomena. But the terms "intonation" and "prosody" are used differently by different linguists. Some phoneticians apply the term "prosody" and "prosodic" only to the features pertaining to the syllable and phonetic word, or rhythmic unit (which are regarded as meaningless prosodic units) and oppose prosody to intonation (which is a meaningful phenomenon). We adhere to the point of view that prosodic features pertain not only to syllables, words and rhythmic units, but to the intonation group and the utterance as well, since the latter are constituted by these units. The notion of prosody, consequently, is broader than the notion of intonation as it can be applied to the utterance, the word, the syllable, whereas prosody of the utterance and intonation are equivalent notions. Whatever the views on the linguistic nature of prosodic phenomena, the phonic substance of prosody is regarded by all phoneticians as the modifications of fundamental frequency, intensity and duration. The most complicated and unsolved problems of prosody are the interaction between its acoustic properties, their functioning in speech and their systematization. R.Jakobson says that prosody is one of the most difficult and controversial problems of modern linguistic studies. Intonation. Its functions. Much has been said about the importance of paying due attention to intonation when studying a foreign language. The process of communication cannot be performed without intonation as it has its own functions in a sentence. These functions are: 1. The constitutive 2. The distinctive (1) Intonation forms sentences. Each sentence consists of one or more intonation groups. An intonation group is a word or a group of words characterized by a certain intonation pattern and is generally complete from the point of view of meaning. E. g. You’ll come early | and stay as long as you can | won’t you || Sentences are separated from each other by pauses. The end of a sentence is always recognized by a long pause; the end of a non-final intonation group is usually characterized by a shorter pause. E. g. He’s passed his exam || He is a student now || Like most old people | he was fond of talking about old days || (2) Intonation also serves to distinguish the communicative types of sentences, the actual meaning of a sentence, the speaker’s emotions or attitudes to the contents of the sentence, to the listener or to the topic of conversation. E. g. He’s passed his exam || Low-Fall - a statement of fact High-Rise - a question Low-Rise – a question with surprise High-Fall – an exclamation One and the same sentence pronounced with different intonation can express different emotions. Intonation is also a powerful means of differentiating the functional styles.
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