PHONOTACTICS AND SYLLABLE

1. PHONOTACTICS AND SYLLABLE

2. THE PHONEME • Speech – continuous stream of sounds • Study of speech – dividing the stream into segments • The total number of sounds actually produced – infinite; yet, what is important is whether their interchange brings about the change in meaning • If yes, the sound is called the phoneme

3. A phoneme- the smallest ‘distinctive soundunit ’ of a language • It distinguishes one word from another in a given language. • changing a phoneme in a word produces another word, that has a different meaning. In the pair of words (minimal pairs) 'cat' and 'bat', the distinguishing sounds /k/ and /b/ are both phonemes. • The phoneme is an abstract term (a speech sound as it exists in the mind of the speaker) and it is specific to a particular language.

4. A phoneme may have several allophones, related sounds that are distinct but do not change the meaning of a word when they are interchanged. • The sounds corresponding to the letter ´t´ in the English words 'tea' and 'trip' are not in fact quite the same. The position of the tongue is slightly different, which causes a difference in sound detectable by an instrument such as a speech spectrograph. Thus the [t] in 'tea' and the [t] in 'trip' are allophones of the phoneme /t/.

5. ALLOPHONES • If there is a strict separation of places where particular realizations of a phoneme (i.e. allophones of a phoneme) can occur, they are said to be in complementary distribution (e.g. the aspirated and unaspirated realizations of ´t´, like in ´tin´ and ´trip´)

6. SYLLABLE • Just like sounds, syllables can be defined both phonetically and phonologically • Phonetically: they consist of a centre with minor or no obstruction to the airflow, and the beginning and end with greater obstruction to the airflow • Phonologically: vowels and consonants having different distribution

7. SYLLABLE • Minimum syllable: a single vowel in isolation: /a:/, /כּ:/, /∫/, /m/ • Some syllables have an onset (more than silence before the central vowel): ´bar´ • Some syllables have a coda more than silence after the central vowel): ´ease´ • Some syllables have onset and coda: ´run´

8. PHONOTACTICS • is the study of thepossible phoneme combinations of a language: what can occur at a word beginning or end • In English, a word can begin with a vowel, 1, 2, or 3 consonants • In English, a word can end in a vowel, 1, 2, 3 or 4 consonants

9. SYLLABLE INITIAL SOUNDS • Syllable onsets: • A vowel (any vowel but /υ/) = zero onset • A consonant (any cons. but /ŋ/,/ζ/ is rare) • Two or more cons. = consonant cluster • pre-initial /s/ + initial /p/,/t/,/k/,/f/,/m/,/n/,/l/,/w/,/r/,/j/ (´sphere´) • a set of some 15 cons. as initial + one of cons. /l/,/r/,/w/,/j/ as post-initial (´clear´) • Three-cons. initial cluster: pre-initial /s/ + initial /p/,/t/,/k/ + post-initial /l/,/r/,/w/ (´split´)

10. SYLLABLE FINAL SOUNDS • Zero coda = no final cons. • Final cons.=any cons. except /h/,/r/,/w/,/j/ • Two-cons. clusters: - pre-final /m/n/ŋ/l/s/ + final (´bank´) - final + post-final /s/z/t/d/θ/ (may be separate morphemes) (´beds´) • Three-cons. clusters: • pre-final+final+post-final (twelfth) • final+post-final 1 +post-final 2 (fifths) • pre-final+final+post-final 1+ post-final 2 (twelfths) • final+ post-final 1+post-final 2+ post-final 3 (sixths)

11. BORDER CASES? • Syllabic consonants at the centre of the syllable instead of a vowel • Q: How many syllables are there in ´students´ /´stju:dnts/? • A: One or two!!!

12. RECENT PHONOLOGICAL TIPS Syllable rhyme onsetpeakcoda (centre/ nucleus)

13. SYLLABLE DIVISION • Alternative analyses possible in many cases: e.g. ambisyllabic cons. in ´carry´ • The ´extra´ case – much discussed • The ´standing´ case – much discussed • The ´boundary´ case – much discussed • No obvious way of deciding whether to follow the phonetic (CVC) or grammatical instinct (base form + extension)