Chapter 2 Phonetics
 What is phonetics?

 Phonetics is termed as the study of speech sounds.
 Sub-branches of phonetics
 Articulatory phonetics – the production of speech sounds
 Acoustic phonetics – the physical properties of speech sounds
 Auditory phonetics – the perceptive mechanism of speech sounds

 The speech organs

 Where does the air stream come from?
 From the lung
 What is the function of vocal cords?
 Controlling the air stream
 What are the cavities?
 Oral cavity
 Pharyngeal cavity
 Nasal cavity

 Transcription of speech sounds

 Units of representation
 Segments (the individual sounds)
 Phonetic symbols
 The widely used symbols for phonetic transcription of speech sounds is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
 The IPA attempts to represent each sound of human speech with a single symbol and the symbols are enclosed in brackets [ ] to distinguish phonetic transcriptions from the spelling system of a language.
 In more detailed transcription (narrow transcription) a sound may be transcribed with a symbol to which a smaller is added in order to mark the finer distinctions.

 Description of speech sounds

 Description of English consonants
 General feature: obstruction
 Criteria of consonant description
 Places of articulation
 Manners of articulation
 Voicing of articulation
 Places of articulation
 This refers to each point at which the air stream can be modified to produce a sound.
 Bilabial: [p] [b] [m] [w]
 Labiodental: [f] [v]
 Interdental: [] []
 Alveolar: [t] [d] [s] [z] [l] [n] [r]
 Palatal: [] [] [t] [d] [j]
 Velar: [k] [g] []
 Glottal: [h]
 Manners of articulation
 This refers to how the air stream is modified, whether it is completely blocked or partially obstructed.
 Stops: [p] [b] [t] [d] [k] [g]
 Fricatives: [s] [z] [] [] [f] [v] [] [] [h]
 Affricates: [t] [d]
 Liquids: [l] [r]
 Glides: [w] [j]
 Nasals: [m] [n] []
 Voicing of articulation
 This refers to the vibrating of the vocal cords when sounds are produced.
 Voiced sounds
 Voiceless sounds
 Description of English vowels
 General feature: without obstruction
 Criteria of vowel description
 Part of the tongue that is raised
 Front
 Central
 Back
 Extent to which the tongue rises in the direction of the palate
 High
 Mid
 Low
 Kind of opening made at the lips
 Position of the soft palate
 Single vowels (monophthongs) and diphthongs

 Phonetic features and natural classes

 Classes of sounds that share a feature or features are called natural classes.
 Major class features can specify segments across the consonant-vowel boundary.
 Classification of segments by features is the basis on which variations of sounds can be analyzed.