Lecture 2 Allophony in Phonetics

Second Year LMD______Phonetics

Lecture 2:

Section of English

DETAILED STUDY OF ENGLISH CONSONANTS: ALLOPHONY

What is a phoneme? A class of speech sounds that are identified by a native speaker as the minimal sound unit of speech, they are defined by their different features. E.g.: the voiceless bilabial plosives /p/. Phoneme: “The smallest distinct sound unit in a given language’’

What is an allophone? It is one of the phonetically distinct variants of a phoneme. The occurrence of allophones is determined by its position (initial, final) or the context in which they occur (stressed syllable). Allophone: refers to the phonetic variants of the same phoneme.

Thus, allophone is a different realisation of the same phoneme. I- Aspiration: The aspiration is the audible breath (burst of air) represented in transcription with the diacritic [ʰ] aspiration occurs in the post-release phase and accompanies the Fortis plosives [ pʰ, tʰ, kʰ ]. E.g.: [pʰ] and [p] are the allophones of the same phoneme in English. Like: Partake [ˈpʰa:teɪk]. Aspiration Rule in English: Aspiration occurs on the Fortis plosives /p, t, k/ occurring as the first sound in a stressed syllable. a. The voiceless bilabial plosive /p/: aspirated when it occurs in initial position of the stressed syllable but it is unaspirated in the final position. E.g.: Paper [ˈpʰeɪpə], Lip [lɪp].

b. The voiceless alveolar plosive /t/: we can notice that this phoneme is aspirated in the initial position of the stressed syllable but when it is final, /t/ is always unaspirated. For instance: Taste [tʰeɪst], Task [tʰæsk], Take [

], Tart [

], Torn [

], Team [

].

c. The voiceless velar plosive /k/: it is aspirated at the beginning of the stressed syllable; on the other hand, when /k/ occurs at final position it is unaspirated. E.g.: Kake [kʰeɪk], Car Remember: • The aspiration rule does not apply when the Fortis plosives preceded by /s/ E.g.: Span /spa:n/, Standard /ˈstændəd/, Skate /ˈskeɪt/, Speak /

/, Start /

(in the same syllable). /, Sky /

/. Page | 1

Second Year LMD______Phonetics

Section of English

II- Laterals: There are many varieties in the pronunciation of the phoneme / l /. The quality of the sound is affected by the position of the tongue, which may be moved from the front (alveolar) towards the back of the mouth (velar). The English consonants [ l ], [ l ] and [ ł ] are allophones of the same phoneme /l/. For instance: Pill [pʰɪł] vs

spill [spɪł]; till

[tʰɪł] vs still [stɪł]; kill [kʰɪł] vs skill [skɪł], clear [klɪə]

*The English phoneme / l /: The alveolar lateral phoneme / l / have three allophones as follows: 1. Clear / l /: we can find the clear / l / as an alveolar lateral approximant phoneme / l / before vowels, diphthongs and / j / in initial position. The lateral phoneme is realized as clear consonant. E.g.: Live / lɪv /, lead /

/, let /

/bɪˈləʊ/; yellow /ˈjeləʊ/, collar /

/, lucky /

/, sailor /

/, late /

/, silly /

/, island /

/, believe /bɪˈli:v/, below

/, million, select, ugly, especially.

Intervocalic in context (between two vowels or /j/): Examples: Feel it /

2. Voiceless

/, All over /

:

/, Will you /

/, Feeling / ˈfi:lɪŋ /.

is a voiceless alveolar lateral occurs after the voiceless sounds / p, k /

The / l / becomes devoiced alveolar lateral approximant [

] when preceded by a voiceless

sound . E.g.: Plate [ p eɪt ] , clap[ k æp ] , please [ p i:z ] , clay [k eɪ], play

, clean

3. Dark [ł]: when it comes after a vowel or consonant cluster at final position we can find a dark [ ł ] which is a velarized lateral approximant. After consonants (except / j /) & pure vowels or diphthongs, on final position of an utterance or ends with ( le), this allophone is a dark [ł]. –Final preceded by a vowel: feel [fi:ł]; well [weł]; Fall [

]; Real [

]; Cruel [

]; Canal [

–Final preceded by a vowel and followed by a consonant: field [fi:łd] yield [ji:łd]; bulb [

[

]; cold [

]; solve [

]; milk [

]; film [

]; health [

]; elbow [

].

]; salt

]; help [

].

–As syllabic consonant: Pixel [ˈpɪksł]; possible [ˈpɒsɪbł]; quarrel, apple, table, middle, eagle, final.

Two different representations in transcription: The allophones are represented using the IPA diacritic [ʰ] for aspiration [pʰ], [tʰ], [kʰ] and [~] for dark [ł] and voiceless [l]. They are transcribed using Allophonic/Phonetic or (Narrow) transcription using square brackets […]. On the other hand, the unaspirated plosives or the clear lateral approximant are transcribed using the Phonemic (Broad) transcription as: /p/, /t/, /k/ and /l/. Page | 2

Second Year LMD______Phonetics

Section of English

Exercise 1: Transcribe the following words phonetically (narrow transcription) 1. Difficult 2. Tie

, Also

, Tough

, Although

, Potato

, Paper

, Target

, Pause

, Couple

, Pipe

, Cattles

Exercise 2: Convert the following transcribed passage into English spelling (Adapted from English Phonetic Transcription Course)

Exercise 3: Transcribe the following sentences phonetically (narrow transcription) 1- There

is

no

alternative

to

the

government

proposal

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………….

2- We

ought

to

make

a

collection

to

cover

the

expenses

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………….

3- Finally,

they

arrived

at

a

harbor

at

the

edge

of

the

mountains

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………………………..………………….

4- I

want

her

to

park

that

car

over

there

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………….

PHONETIC FACTS: • There is a burst or puff of air after the /p/ in pill, till, and kill called aspiration, which is absent in spill, still, and skill that means they became unaspirated when preceded by the phoneme /s/. • In English, the /t/ sound in the words “tip,” and “little” “hit,” are allophones; phonemically they are considered to be the same sound although they are different phonetically in terms of aspiration, but the same in voicing, and point of articulation or manner of articulation; as follows respectively : [tʰɪp], [lɪtł], [hɪt]. • Although aspirated plosives and unaspirated ones are physically different; however, we consider the aspiration feature does not affect the meaning of the utterance. Page | 3