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Introduction to

Phonetics/Phonology

Wintersemester

2003-2004

Potsdam

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Course Topics

• I

Articulatory Phonetics

• II

Segments, Features, Feature Geometry

• III

The Syllable and Other Prosodic
Constituents

• IV

Segmental Alternations

• V

Phonological Theories

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General Issues

• Assignments (to be corrected two weeks later

in class)

• Final exam
• Slides are on my homepage

(http://www.ling.uni-potsdam.de/~fery/)

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Part I

Articulatory Phonetics

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Production of a Sound

!

•

Airstream Process (initiation)

• Phonation Process (vibration of the vocal

cords)

• Oral-Nasal Process: The velum either

closes off the nasal cavity or opens it.

• Articulation Process

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Components of Articulation

! •

The subglottal components (lungs and

respiratory tract), which produce the airstream.

Sounds are usually pulmonal egressive

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Components of Articulation

• The larynx, which converts the regular stream

of air into a series of periodic bursts of air
(source of acoustic energy).

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Components of Articulation

! •

The supralaryngeal vocal tract (also

(supraglottal) vocal tract) consists of the
pharynx, the oral cavity and the nasal cavity.
The pharynx runs from the larynx to the tongue
root. From the pharynx the air can escape
through either the nasal cavity or the oral cavity.
The supralaryngeal vocal tract functions as an
acoustic filter.

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English Noun Adjective Latin Noun

Glottis

glottal

glottis

Larynx

laryngeal

larynx

Pharynx

pharyngeal

pharynx

Epiglottis

epiglottal

epiglottis

Tongue back/dorsum

dorsal

dorsum

Corona

coronal

corona

Tongue tip/apex

apical

apex

Tongue blade/lamina

laminal

lamina

Alveolar ridge

alveolar

alveolae

Hard palate

palatal

palatum

Soft palate/velum

velar

velum

Uvula

uvular

uvula

Lungs

pulmonal

pulmo

Teeth

dental

dentes

Lips

labial

labia

Nasal cavity

nasal

cavum nasi

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Articulators

! •

labial

[b, p, f, m…] (cover term for bilabial and

labiodental): At least one

lip

is involved in the

articulation.

•

coronal

[t, d, l, n…] : The

tip or blade of the tongue

is

involved in the articulation.

•

dorsal

[k, g,

N, X]: The

back of the tongue

is involved

in the articulation.

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Places of Articulation

• bilabial [p, b, m]: Complete closure by both lips.

• labiodental [f, v]: Closure or constriction between

the lower lip and upper teeth.

!

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• dental [t, d] : The front part of the tongue forms

a constriction with the upper teeth.

• alveolar [t, d, l, n, s, z]: A constriction is formed

at the alveolar ridge with the tip or blade of the
tongue; the articulation is then apical (when the
tongue tip forms the constriction) or laminal
(the tongue blade is involved).

Places of Articulation

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• Retroflex: The tongue tip is bent back and up

behind the alveolar ridge.

• palatoalveolar (or postalveolar) [ ,

Z]: The tongue

blade forms a constriction behind the alveolar
ridge and/or at the hard palate.

• palatal [ç, j]: The back of the tongue forms a

constriction or a closure with the hard palate.

Places of Articulation

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• velar [k, g,

N]: The back of the tongue forms a

constriction or a closure with the soft palate
(velum).

• Uvular [

X]: The back of the tongue and the

uvula form a constriction or a closure.

Places of Articulation

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• pharyngeal [˛, ¿]: A constriction is formed in the

pharynx.

• glottal/laryngeal [h,

?]: Closure of the glottis

causes a glottal stop. An /h/ is produced with
an open glottis.

Places of Articulation

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Place of

Articulator

Sound

Articulation (movable organ) (German)
bilabial upper lip lower lip p, b, m
labiodental upper teeth lower lip f, v
alveolar alveolar tongue

t, d,

ridge

blade

s, z, l, n

palatoalveolar palate tongue blade ,

Z

palatal palate back of tongue ç, j

velar palate back of tongue k, g, x,

N

uvular

uvula back of tongue ë, X

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Manner of the narrowing or constriction

Manners of Articulation

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Manners of Articulation

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[p]: Voiceless, bilabial plosive. Very common

sound. The glottis is wide open.

[b]:

Voiced counterpart, articulated

approximately the same.

Plosive (also stop or occlusive)

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[t, d]: articulated by the tongue tip or blade. Fr.

tout doux: ‘soft’. In German d and t are
alveolar.

[k, g]:The place of articulation is the velum,

sometimes the hard palate, occasionally the
uvula, depending on the environmental
context: Kuh vs. Kühe, Kiel [k™]. In Arabic [k]
and uvular [q] form two contrastive sounds.

Plosives

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[c, Ô]: Palatal articulation of the dorsal plosives.

These plosives are found in many West
African languages, e.g., Akan.

[q, G]: Uvular articulation of the dorsal

plosives. These sounds can be found in, e.g.,
Quechua.

[

?]:

Glottal stop.

Plosives

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Voice Onset Timing (VOT)

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[ƒ,]: Bilabial voiceless or voiced fricatives.

Japanese:

Fujiyama.

In

some

African

languages such as Ewe these sounds are
phonemic (éƒá ‘ he polished’ vs. éfá ‘ he
froze’).

[f, v]: Labiodental fricatives, very common.

The upper teeth form a constriction with the
lower lip.

Fricatives

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[†, d]: There are two different articulations of

this pair of sounds. In English [†] thigh and
[d] thy are two phonemes.

[s, z]: can be apical or laminal.

[ ,Ω]: an apical and a laminal (predorsal)

articulation. The lips are often somewhat
rounded, sometimes even protruding.

Fricatives

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[ç]:

Palatal fricative (ich-sound)

[‚]:

Voiced counterpart of [ç].

[x]:

Velar fricative (ach-sound).

[©]: Voiced counterpart of [x].

Fricatives

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[

X, Ë]:[X] is a fricative which is formed at the

uvula; auditorily it differs little from [x]; in
Swiss German, e.g., they are variants of the
same sound, as in Küchenkasten [

XuXiXat\].

The [Ë] is a variant of/r/.

[¿,˛]: pharyngeal fricatives.
[H, ¿]: epiglottal fricatives.

Fricatives

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[h, Ó]: A glottal fricative formed by constriction

of the vocal folds. In German the constriction
is not very narrow; the breathing position is
retained.

Fricatives

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An affricate is a plosive followed by a

homorganic, i.e., articulated with the same
articulators, fricative. Examples are [ts], [t ]
and [pf].

Affricates

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With the nasal sounds (consonants, vowels, pre- or

postnasalized sounds) the velum is lowered, and
the majority of the air flows out through the nose.

Nasals are usually voiced, but in Icelandic, for

example, there is also a voiceless n [n≤], written hn.

Nasals

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[m]: The bilabial nasal is very common.
[n]: The coronal nasal occurs in almost every

language.

[˜]:

Often a position-dependent variant of [n]

before [k, g]. In English and German [g]

has often even disappeared, so that only

[˜] remains: lang, long (cf. lungo in

Italian).

Nasals

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[ñ]: The labiodental nasal is commonly only

an articulation-dependent variant of m.

[µ]: The palatal nasal is rarer. It occurs, e.g.,

in French (agneau ‘lamb’, gagner ‘to win’)
and in Spanish (cañon).

[N]: The uvular nasal is articulated even

further back in the mouth than the velar
nasal [˜].

Nasals

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Consonants can also be partially nasalized, like the

prenasalized plosives (

m

d,

n

d,

˜

g).

Nasals

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For [l] the tip of the tongue is placed at the alveolar

ridge and impedes the airstream in the middle of
the mouth. On the sides the tongue is not placed
against the molars, as with [t], but is lower, so that
the air can escape at the sides.

Laterals

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[l]:

Clear and dark l in Russian differ in the form

of the tongue. With clear l the surface is fairly flat,

slightly concave and the contact is apical; with

dark l, in contrast, the tongue is further in front

and the blade of the tongue is raised towards the

velum. The contact is laminal. This produces an u-

color. In German and French the l is light; in

English it varies depending on the environment:

cf. little

Laterals

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[˚, ]: In Welsh there is a voiceless fricative

lateral, [˚] or also sometimes [l≤], written ll
(Lloyd). The voiced counterpart is transcribed
[].

[Ò, L]: palatal and velar lateral approximants.

Laterals

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[B]: Bilabial vibrant.

[r]:

Prototypical r-sound. It is a front trill

(tongue tip-r); in Spanish perro ‘dog’. In
German, this sound is only used in a few
dialects.

r-Sounds (Vibrants, Trills,

Rhotics)

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[®]:

Front fricative or approximant, as in

English after t and d.

[ë]:

Back trill (uvular-R), as in Dutch or in the

Scandinavian languages.

r-Sounds

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[Ë]:

Back Engelaut or approximant, as in

German and in French. The air passes around
the uvula on the sides. Very similar to [≈],
which is the voiceless variant.

In Arabic [r] and [Ë] are two different phonemes.
Rhotacism is the conversion of [z] into [r]:

Etrusci/Etruria, was/were.

r-Sounds

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Flaps (sudden short closure plus glide) or Taps

(sudden short closure) are plosives of very short
duration produced with a single muscle
contraction.

English: marry or very, in
American: instead of an intervocalic [t] matter, pity.

Flaps and Taps

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[w]: The approximants are always voiced. [w]

or [˘] is a bilabial sound.

[j]:

In German the palatal glide is sometimes

articulated as a fricative [‚] (voiced
counterpart of [ç]).

Approximants (Glides)

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[¥]: The sound which is realized, e.g., in the

French words huit ‘eight’ and puis
‘

afterwards’.

[º]: Velar vibrant.

Approximants (Glides)

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[ˇ, Î, ¯, ö, Í, ¸, Æ], also sometimes transcribed with

dots under the letters.

These sounds are special forms of many of the

consonants which are articulated at the alveolar
ridge or at the adjoining part of the hard palate.

Retroflexes

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The tongue tip is bent back so that the closure (or

constriction) is formed with the underside of the
tongue blade.

Common in Sanskrit, in Arabic, in the Dravidian

languages of India (Malayalam), in Swedish and in
Norwegian. The English r is retroflex.

Retroflexes

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Labialization: a consonant is articulated with rounded

lips. This can also occur with labial sounds, as
when both articulations are realized with the lips.
Examples from Kwakw’ala (Ladefoged &
Maddieson 1996:356-7) and from Arrernte:

Secondary Articulation

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Labialization

in Kwakw’ala

kasa ‘beat soft’

k

w

esa

‘

splashing’

gisgas ‘incest’

g

w

esu

‘

pig’

Labialization in Arrernte

p

w

ape

‘

whirlwind’

Secondary Articulation

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Palatalization

: Raising of the front part of the tongue

in the direction of an i-articulation. Russian
contrasts palatalized vs. nonpalatalized
articulation in many consonants, e.g.: p

j

otr ‘Peter’

with pjot ‘drinks’ and pot ‘sweat’.

Secondary Articulation

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Velarization

: Raising of the back part of the tongue.

According to Ladefoged & Maddieson (1996), the
English l in little, for example, is velarized.

Secondary Articulation

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Pharyngealization

: A constriction is formed in the

pharynx. Some dialects of Arabic contrast
emphatic vs. normal coronals: s

¿

vs. s.

Secondary Articulation

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1) Height or

vertical

tongue movement

2) Front-back-dimension or

horizontal

tongue

movement

3)

Lip rounding

Vowels

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Cardinal Vowels

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IPA

Lips

Example

1

[i]

unrounded

Fr. si, Eng. beat

2

[e]

unrounded

Ger. See, Fr. chez

3

[´]

unrounded

Ger. Bett, Eng. bet

[æ]

unrounded

Eng. cat

4

[a]

unrounded

Ger. kann, Fr. la

5

[å]

unrounded

Dt. dam

Vowels

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IPA

Lips

Examples

6

[ø]

rounded

Fr. sotte, Eng. hawk

7

[o]

rounded

Ger. Stroh, Fr. beau

8

[u]

rounded

Ger. gut, Fr. cou

9

[y]

rounded

Ger. Tür, Fr. bu

10

[ø]

rounded

Ger. Goethe, Fr. eux

11

[œ]

rounded

Ger. Götter, Fr. beurre

Vowels

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IPA

Lips

Examples

12

[Œ]

rounded

Ger. Hölle

13

[Å]

rounded

Eng. hock, Dt. dom

14

[ ]

unrounded

Eng. but, luck

15

[{]

unrounded

Vietnamese ó

16

[}]

unrounded

Japanese u

Vowels

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IPA

Lips

Example

[\]

unrounded

Ger.: be-,Fr. le

[á]

unrounded

Ger.: ver-

(from Clark & Yallop 1990:67)

Vowels

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i

u

i

u

e

o

´ ø

e

o

a

a

Italian

Spanish

Vokale

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i

u high

ˆ

y

u

Á

e

\

o

mid

´

ø

ø

œ

á

a å

low

front central back

German Vowels

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Nasal vowels in French

[%´~] as in bain ‘bath’
[õ] as in monde ‘world’
[ã] as in enfant ‘child’
[œ~] as in un ‘one’

Vowels

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Long, tense vowels:

Miete, Huhn, wohnen, Düne, Höhle

Short, lax vowels:

Mitte, Hunne, Wonne, dünne, Hölle

German v owels

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Three German Diphthongs

/aiª/ (Hai)

‘shark’

/auª/ (Bau)

‘building’

/øyª/ (neu) ‘new’

Diphthongs