Lecture 13: Phonetics II

[These notes contain excerpts from the overheads used in lecture 13. As usual, there's no guarantee that these notes are complete. If you missed class -- which many people did this time -- then you should consult with a colleague about what you missed. Note: thanks are due to Prof. Caroline Heycock for all of the vocal tract diagrams here -- they are excerpted from the very useful class notes that she has provided from her LING 101 phonetics lectures. ]

Stop consonants are produced by complete blocking of the airflow through the oral cavity.

Fricatives, continuants, glides, are produced by constricting but not completely blocking the airflow.

Voiceless consonants are consonants in which the onset of vocal cord vibration follows the release of the consonantal closure.

Voiced consonants are consonants in which the onset of vocal cord vibration precedes or is simultaneous with the release of the consonantal closure.

In oral sounds most air is expelled via the oral cavity (mouth). Typically the velum is raised at the back of the mouth to block the passage of air into the nasal cavity.

In nasal sounds, on the other hand, the velum is lowered, to allow airflow through the nasal cavity. In English, nasal consonants are accompanied by the blocking of airflow through the oral cavity.

Notice that the movements of your tongue and lips are identical in the (a) and (b) examples of (1-3). The only difference is that the velum is raised in the (a) examples and lowered in the (b) examples.

Different consonants can be produced by creating the oral closure at different places; these are known as places of articulation.

(Bi-)Labial consonants are produced by creating a closure with both lips. English lacks bilabial fricatives, but these are found in Japanese ('Fuji'), and in Spanish ('deber').

Labiodental consonants are produced by raising the lower lip to the upper teeth. English has only fricative labiodentals, and no stops.

In English, the interdental consonants are also all fricatives.

English alveolar consonants are formed by raising the tip of the tongue to the alveolar ridge, which lies right behind the teeth. There are both fricatives and stops.

Note that languages differ in how related speech sounds are typically produced. For example, the stops 't' and 'd' are alveolar in English, but in languages like Spanish, Italian and French they are typically dental, i.e. they are produced with the tongue against the back of the upper teeth. This gives 't' and 'd' a different characteristic sound in these languages, and this is also one of the features that we use to identify the non-native accent in a speaker of one of these languages who is learning English.

Very few palatals in English, just two affricates and the glide [j]. Note that a variety of different palatal consonants are found in other languages. E.g. Spanish has a palatal nasal, as found in the word for 'year', 'ano'. This sound is incorrectly turned into the two sounds [nj] by English speakers: there is a good reason for this ... the English speakers are taking a single sound that is a palatal nasal, and decomposing it into the closest English equivalents, an alveolar nasal, and an oral palatal.

As with bilabials, English has a limited range of velar consonants. No fricatives, for example. But these are sometimes pronounced in words borrowed into English from languages which do have velar fricatives, e.g. from German, 'Bach'.

No uvular consonants in English whatsoever, but they are found in many languages. E.g. both French and some varieties of German have a uvular 'r' sound. Uvular stops are also common in many languages.