PHONOLOGY: THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGE See also “Phonetics,” “Spelling,” and Writing Systems”

1. PHONOLOGY:THE SOUND PATTERNS OF LANGUAGESee also “Phonetics,” “Spelling,” and Writing Systems” by Don L. F. Nilsen and Alleen Pace Nilsen 18

2. MINIMAL PAIRS CONTRASTIVE DISTRIBUTION: Pronounce the following minimal pairs: “bit,” “beat,” “bet,” “bat,” “bite,” “bought,” “but,” and “bout” In these words, the vowel sounds are in exactly the same phonetic environment, preceded by a /b/ and followed by a /t/. Since only the vowel is changing, then the changing of the vowel must be making the difference in distinguishing these different words. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 268) 18

3. COMPLEMENTARY DISTRIBUTION Now consider these minimal pairs in English: “then-den,” “lather-ladder,” and “breathe-breed.” In English /ð/ and /d/ are in contrastive distribution. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 275-278) But in Spanish, /ð/ and /d/ are in complementary distribution. /ð/ always occurs between vowels and /d/ never occurs between vowels. In the Spanish word “duda” for example, the first <d> is pronounced /d/ and the second is pronounced /ð/. 18

4. In Spanish, these two sounds never occur in the same phonetic environment, never allow there to be contrasting minimal pairs, and never make a real difference. In Spanish, therefore, the difference between /ð/ and /d/ is said to be “phonetic,” but not “phonemic.” Notice that in Spanish these two sounds are spelled with the same letter of the alphabet, <d>. 18

5. NATURAL CLASSES OF SOUNDS:NASALS /m/ /n/ and /η/ are in a natural class called nasals. Natural classes are important so that linguists can make generalizations, like “In English, vowels become nasal in the environment of nasal consonants. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 282-284) 18

6. ASPIRATION: /p/ /t/ and /k/ form the natural class of voicless stops. In English, voiceless stops are aspirated if they are followed by a stressed vowel and not preceded by /s/. This makes sense because aspiration is a puff of air. This puff would occur after a stop. It would occur into a stressed syllable. If the consonant were voiced or if some of the air had leaked out because of a preceding /s/, the aspiration would be less pronounced. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 239-240, 281) 18

7. VOICING When Verbs add -ed to become past tense this ending becomes voiced if the preceding sound is voiced as in “planned” or voiceless if the preceding sound is voiceless as in “jumped.” Since /t/ is not voiced and vowels are voiced, a /t/ between vowels often becomes voiced so that “latter” and “writer” are pronounced like “ladder” and “rider.” (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 238-241) 18

8. PALATALIZATION When a word that ends with a /t/ is followed by a –ual, -ial, or -ion ending, the palatal vowel <y-> changes the /t/ sound into a /č/ sound. addict  addiction act  actual or action part  partial predict  prediction (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 236-238) 18

9. STOPS BECOMES CONTINUANTS Because /k/ is a stop, and vowels are continuants, an affix beginning with a vowel often changes /k/ to /s/. critic  criticize or criticism fanatic  fanaticism romantic  romanticism This ability of the <c> to have two different pronunciations allows us to spell these words the same way even though they are pronounced diffently. The benefit of this is that it helps us to see that these words are in the same word-family even though the <c> part is pronounced differently. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 284-288) 18

10. CONSONANT ASSIMILATIONFOR EASE AND SPEED VERB 3rd sing pres ind: sings, hits VERB past: buzzed, jumped VERB past part: popped, killed NOUN plurals: cats, dogs NOUN possessives: Mike's, Fred's ADJ substantive: its, ours PREFIX: (NOTE: im- assimilates as follows): illegal, immature, impotent, indelicate, irreligious (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 284-288) 18

11. CONSONANT DISSIMILATION: FOR CLARITY VERB 3rd person singular present inddicative: buzzes VERB past tense: heated VERB past participle: spotted NOUN plural: horses NOUN possessive: Max’s NOUN: belfry ADJ: ignoble (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 288-289) 18

12. MORE CONSONANT ASSIMILATIONS MODAL PLUS "HAVE" ASSIMILATION: coulda, mighta, shoulda, woulda MODAL PLUS "TO" ASSIMILATION: gonna, hafta, hasta, supposta, useta CONTRACTIONS: *ain’t, can’t, couldn’t, won’t, wouldn’t, shan’t, shouldn’t, *mayn’t, (mightn’t, mustn’t) (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 284-288) 18

13. DISSIMILATION AGAIN “-al” is a suffix that changes a Noun into an Adjective, but when the Noun ends in /l/, dissimilation occurs: “anecdotal” but “angular” “penal” but “perpendicular” “spiritual” but “similar” “venal” but “velar” (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 288-289) 18

14. VOWEL REDUCTION AND ASSIMILATION BRITISH VOWEL REDUCTION: aluminum, laboratory, secretary LONG AND SHORT GRADES: do-done, go-gone, nation-national, obscene-obscenity, punitive-punish, sign-signature, soup-supper (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2011] 257) 18

15. vowel reduction and word stress When a suffix changes a word from one Part of Speech to another, this suffix affects which syllables are stressed, and which are unstressed and can change to different vowel grades like schwa or short grade: 18

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17. HISTORIC PHONOLOGY REFLECTED IN SPELLINGS TRACES: ic-ich-I, knight, hostel-hôtel- hotel, scribere-écrire-scribe DOUBLETS: chief-chef, dish-discus, hotel-hostel, ship-skiff, shirt-skirt GRIMM'S LAW: courage-hearty, corn-horn, decade-ten, dozen-twelve, dent-tooth, pedestal-footnote, padre-father, plate-flat, pyre-fire 18

18. !MORE HISTORIC PHONOLOGY REFLECTED IN SPELLINGS GERMANIC UMLAUT: child, goose, man, mouse, woman (cf. book-beech) GREEK RHOTOCISM: genus-generic; opus-opera ENGLISH: schwa and silent e ACRONYMS AS WORDS: AID, AIDS, BIRP, CREEP, GASP, MANURE, MASH, NOW, NUT, SAG, VISTA, ZIP 18

19. !!FOREIGN INFLUENCES ON PHONOLOGY & SPELLING BORROWINGS: chaise longue, cole slaw, frankfurter, hamburger, lingerie, rouge, schnitzel, wiener BILINGUAL COGNATES: actual, embarazada, grocería, libraria, molestar, principio, (cf. blanket [white], porpoise [pig fish], puny [puis né], walrus [whale horse]) INDO-EUROPEAN ABLAUT: sing-sang-song MODAL PAST-SUBJUNCTIVE: can-could, may-might, shall-should, will-would 18

20. !!!FINAL THOUGHTS FROM OGDEN NASH The one-l lama, He’s a priest. The two-l llama, He’s a beast. And I will bet A silk pajama There isn’t any Three-l lllama. (Fromkin Rodman Hyams [2007] 290) In response to this poem one wit remarked, “A three-alarmer (three-l lllama) is a really big fire.” 18

21. References: Clark, Virginia P., Paul A. Eschholz, and Alfred F. Rosa, ed. Language: Readings in Language and Culture, Sixth Edition. Boston, MA: Bedford, St. Martins, 1998. Eschholz, Paul, Alfred Rosa, and Virginia Clark. Language Awareness. Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2009. Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman, and Nina Hyams. “Phonology: The Sound Patterns of Language.” An Introduction to Language, 9th Edition. Boston, MA: Thomson Wadsworth, 2011, 266-323. Have, Paul ten. Doing Conversation Analysis: A Practical Guide. London, England: Sage Publications, 2007. Nilsen, Alleen Pace, and Don L. F. Nilsen. Encyclopedia of 20th Century American Humor. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2000. Nilsen, Don L. F., and Alleen Pace Nilsen. Pronunciation Contrasts in English, 2nd Edition. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press in 2010. 18