Appunti di English 1

APPROXIMANTS

The production of air in the oral cavity can be central or lateral:

If you produce [ʃ] and breathe in, you can feel the air go over the centre of your tongue (it will feel cold) -> central sound [ʃ].

If you produce [l] and breathe in, you can feel the air go over the sides of your tongue -> lateral sound.

There is only one lateral sound in English, [l], and it can be pronounced in two ways according to the neighboring sounds:

Clear 'l' -> before vowels and /j/ -> leap, light, long.

Dark 'l' -> before consonants and pause -> help, milk, ball.

The tongue is in a more backward position compared to clear [l] and has a resonance similar to the back-central vowel [ʊ].

Some words contain both versions:

Little [lɪtɫ]

Lateral [ˈlætərəɫ]

Nasal sounds -> air flows through the nasal cavity, with the

or not in the production of sound)

● Place of articulation ('labial', 'alveolar', etc.)

● Manner of articulation ('fricative', 'plosive', etc.)

|/l/- BUT requires a fourth label: it's the ONLY voiced alveolar LATERAL APPROXIMANT.

- For nasal sounds, we use TWO LABELS : place of articulations (bilabial, alveolar, velar)(all are voiced) and NASAL

Since all the other sounds of English are CENTRAL, we do not include central in the description and only mark the only lateral sound.

Ex. /t/

Vocal cords do not vibrate, so it's voiceless 12

To produce /t/ the blade of the tongue articulates with the alveolar ridge >>The place of articulation in English is alveolar. The airstream is completely blocked >>>The manner of articulation is plosive.

TRILLS, TAPS, FLAPS:

These three manners of articulation exist in some dialects of English- TRILLS >> the active articulator is held in such a position that the airstream flowing over it

causesit to vibrate rapidly against the passive one. The vocal tract is alternately open and closed.- TAPS and FLAPS >> the active articulator makes a single fast contact with the passive one.

Consonant articulation and recognition activities SIMULAZIONE ESAME:

voiceless alveolar plosive [t]

voiced labiodental fricative [v]

alveolar nasal [n]

labiovelar approximant [w]

/p/ Voiceless bilabial plosive

/g/ Voiced velar plosive

/z/ Voiced alveolar fricative

/j/ Palatal approximant (semi-vowel)

/r/ Voiced alveolar approximant

/w/ Voiced labiovelar approximant

/f/ Voiceless bilabial fricative

/s/ Voiceless alveolar fricative

/ʃ/ Voiceless post-alveolar fricative

6°-7° lezione 03.03.23 MINIMAL PAIRS:

Phonemes: “distinctive segments […] that speakers of the language use to distinguish one word fromanother”. How do we establish the phonemic status of a sound?

Words that differ in ONE AND ONLY sound >>> called minimal pairs

Ex. fill /fɪl/ - kill /kɪl/ • kin

/kɪn/ - king /kɪŋ/ • sit /sɪt/ - seat /siːt/

The minimal pair test is based on the notion of ‘minimal contrast’ → «two or more sounds in a language contrast if they can appear in the same position in the same frame»

Ex. If we want to know which sounds contrast with /p/ in /pɪn/ → we need to identify the sounds that, substituted to /p/, give us another English word >>> What is our phonetic frame of reference? [_ɪn]

We can identify → bin /bɪn/, kin /kɪn/, chin /tʃɪn/ | MINIMAL SET >> the set of words distinguished by difference in a single sound >> we can do this process for any sound in a word, for consonants and vowels.

Ex. hot /hɒt/ → phonetic frame [h_t] hat /hæt/ hoot /huːt/ hit /hɪt/ hut /hʌt/ heat /hiːt/

These sounds are in CONTRASTIVE DISTRIBUTION: substituting one with the other will cause a change in meaning

Ex: Hate >> date – fate – gate – late – mate – rate –

wait (weight) – bait - sate

Pen >> hen – men – ten – den – zen – then - when – gen – yen – Jen – Ben – Ken

Kick >> pick – chic – chick – sick – nick – dick - tick – thick – wick – Rick- vic – lick – Mick 13

Sea >> bee – tea/tee – key – fee – wee – zee – pea / pee - knee - Lee

GENERAL AMERICAN CONSONANTS:

General American English is a RHOTIC accent: the sound /r/ is pronounced in all situations where there is a letter R in spelling

SSBE is a NON-RHOTIC accent: the sound /r/ is NOT pronounced before consonants (turn, party) and at the end of a word (car, brother)

In GA /j/ is regularly absent following /t,d,θ,ð n/ in accented syllables

Tune SSE /tjuːn/, /tʃuːn/ >> GA /tun/

News SSE /njuːz/ >> GA /nuz/

Glottal stop[ʔ] >> closure of the glottis >> allophone of [t]

British

[kʌt] and American [kʌʔ]

ALVEOLAR TAP ALLOPHONE:

US English has an alveolar tap [ɾ] instead of [t] when it occurs:

• between /t/ two vowels → BuTTer, boTTle
• between an /r/ and a vowel → parTy, turTle
• between an /n/ and a vowel sound, the sound /t/ may be elided :winter → /ˈwɪnər/Internet → /ˈɪnərˌnet/

If the /t/ is at the beginning of a word (e.g table, twist, ten) or at the beginning of a stressed syllable (e.g.potential, until), it is produced as an alveolar stop >>>> attenTION poTENtial

INTRODUCTION TO VOWELS:

5 graphemes symbols (5 graphic symbols in Italian)

20 sounds (7 sounds in Italian) in Standard British English

MONOPHTHONGS: “vowels with a single perceived auditory quality”

DIPHTHONGS: “vowels where two vowel qualities can be perceived”

VOWELS:

A vowel is a sound for which there is no closure of the throat or mouth at any point where vocalisation occurs. This can be contrasted with consonants, which are

Sounds for which there are one or more points where the airflow is reduced or stopped. The quality of a vowel is determined by the shape of the vocal tract.

- Produced with an open mouth

- No audible friction

- Vibration of the vocal chords → voicing

- Produced through

- Shape of the mouth

- Position of the tongue and lips

VOWEL QUADRILATERAL:

The International Phonetic Association uses a quadrilateral diagram to represent the vowels of every language, where each vowel sound is represented by an IPA symbol.

A quadrilateral because it represents a cross-section of the inside of a mouth:

• The top of the square is the top of the mouth.
• The part under is the lower mouth.
• Vowels in the upper part of the quadrilateral = tongue near the palate.
• Vowels in the lower part = low tongue.

VOWEL PRODUCTION:

To produce vowels, the tongue must be arched into a hump (tongue arch).

There is an upper vowel limit that the surface of the tongue cannot go beyond. If it is too close to the roof of the mouth,

up: /iː/

Downwards: /æ/

Forwards: /e/

The tongue moves:

Up and back: /uː/

Back: /ɔː/

Down: /ɑː/

1) If the upper tongue surface is close to the roof of the mouth, the sounds are called close vowels.

2) If the vowels are produced with an open mouth, with the tongue far from the roof of the mouth, they are called open vowels.

3) If the front of the tongue is the highest part, they are front vowels.

4) If the back of the tongue is the highest part, they are back vowels.

LIP SHAPE: