Chapter 3 Consonants

PHONOLOGY

Obstruent vs sonorant
Obstruents: airflow is restricted with articulators either in complete closure or close approximation includes (stops, fricatives, & affricates) May be voiced or voiceless Sonorants: there is no such restriction in the oral tract, or the nasal tract is open (air has free passage through the vocal tract) includes (nasals, liquids, & glides) Only voiced

Stops
A complete closure at the place of articulation Pulmonic egressive oral stops a.k.a (plosives) Two types: oral and nasal Oral stops
Velum is raised Articulators are close enough (in different points) to build pressure in the oral cavity. Airstream is released with a burst of sound

Stops
1. 2. 3. English has 3 pairs of voiceless/voiced stops: bilabial [p, b] alveolar [t, d] velar [k, g] Glottal stop [] (- voice) There are palatal stops (Malayalam), uvular (Quechua)

Stops
Ejectives: stops produced with glottalic egressive mechanism (the glottis closed then raised, the air above it pushed upwards, compressed & then released) Implosives: involves glottalic airstream, but glottis is lowered 10% of the world languages have implosives
Click: involves velaric ingressive (dual closure in the oral tract)

Production of stops
Pulmonic egressive oral stops involve 3 stages:
1. Closing stage: when active articulator comes in contact with the passive one 2. Closure stage: when articulators remain in contact & air builds up behind the blockage 3. Release Stage: when active articulator is lowered allowing air to be released with some force (the closing stage and/or release stage may be missing)

The release stage

Nasal release: occurs when an oral stop precedes a nasal; e.g. mutton
Lateral release: occurs when an oral stop [t, d] precedes the lateral liquid [l]; tongue tip remains in contact with the alveolar ridge for the [l] & air is releases when sides of the tongue lower; e.g. beetle, badly

Aspiration
In pie, there is a puff of air following the [p] release (aspiration) Indicated as [ph] For aspirated stops: vocal cord remain open after the release of the plosive; 1st part of the vowel in pie is produced without vibrating vocal cords In English, aspiration occurs in v stops at the beginning of stressed syllables Words dont contrast for aspiration in English

Voicing
Voiceless stops remain voiceless
Voicing is not always constant for voiced stops (fortition and lenition) Fully voiced between voiced sounds

Duration of the preceding segment decides whether the final stop is voiced or voiceless when +v stops follows liquids, nasals, vowels, cause the sound to lengthen, e.g (back, bag)

Glottalisation and the glottal stop

Voiceless stops in final position can be glottalised In some kinds of English, intervocalic voiceless stops are glottalised, e.g. super [p] Voiceless stops may be replaced by a glottal stop (before a nasal a[n]ight, a homorganic obstruent grea[s]mile. Word final [t] may be [] as in ra[] (rat) Word-initial vowels can be glottals as in its [ ]over!

Variation in stops
Assimilation: when a sound becomes similar to a neighboring sound; e.g, [t] & [d] assimilate to their context ho[p p]otato instead of hot potato & ba[b b]oy instead of bad boy Bilabials [p] & [b] remain bilabials Velars can be fronted; e.g. kick & cook

Variation in stops
Assimilation that involve manner: Flapping: the distinction between [t] & [d] is neutralized between vowels latter & across word boundary get away They are replaced by a voiced alveolar flap transcribed as [] For many Americans, Adam & atom may be homophones When the stop begins a stressed syllable, its not flapped, as in attend In some English, t becomes r when occurring after a short vowel & the next sound is a vowel; lo [r] of fun

Affricates
An affricate is a stop with an extended and controlled fricative phase following the obstruction a combination of stop + fricative):

= voiceless post-alveolar affricate; chin = voiced post-alveolar affricate; jaguar

Fricatives
As the air exits, its forced through a narrow passage between the articulators resulting in friction
Think of friction Airstream partially obstructed

Other languages have velar, bilabial, uvular & pharyngeal fricatives

Distribution
[f, v, , , s, z, , ] occur in all positions
[] word-initial is restricted to a small set of function words (the, that) [] occurs in a few words, e.g, (treasure) & never word initially [h] occurs only word initially or word-medially.

Voicing
Fricatives may be voiceless or voiced.
+ voice fricatives may undergo devoicing word-initially & word-finally

Voiced fricatives lengthen the duration of any sonorant they follow face & phase

Variation in fricatives
[f] & [v] dont show assimilation [v] becomes voiceless word-finally preceding a voiceless obstruent as in ha[f] to In faster speech, a sound may be lost in unstressed function words (elision), e.g piece of cake [, ] might be deleted when precede [s, z] as in clothes & months

Variation in fricatives
In some English, [, ] may be replaced by [f, v]; three & free sound identical in some other varieties, word initial [, ] may be replaced by [s]; e.g. ([s]ousand) Word initial [] assimilates entirely to a preceding alveolar sound as in; I [z z] ere any food?

Variation in fricatives
[s, z] often assimilate to a following palatal glide [j], or palato-alveolar fricative [] as in; (mi [ j]ou) & it wa [ j] ellow
[h] is dropped by all speakers in unstressed pronouns & auxiliaries such as her, him In words like human & huge, there may be no [h]

Nasals
Velum is lowered allowing air into the nasal cavity Only voiced (sonorants) In English: - Bilabial [m] - Alveolar [n] - Velar []

Distribution & Variation

[m] & [n] occur in all positions [] cannot occur word initially in English There is alternation between [] & [n] for the inflection -ing which may be [n] or [] [m] may be labio-dental before labio-dental fricatives [f] & [v] as in some fun [n] assimilates to the following segment as in i[m p]aris

Liquids
refers to l & r (laterals or rhotics) produced with free airflow, but with some obstruction in the oral tract Liquids are sonorants (+ voice)

Laterals
There is contact between the active articulator (central of the tongue) & the passive articulator (roof of the mouth) English has l in lion

Distribution & Variation

[l] occur in all positions After voiceless obstruent, [l] is devoiced as in play [l] is velarised in final position, before a consonant & syllabically (dark l) as in fill & film& bottle Non-velarised version is known as (clear l) & occurs word initially

Rhotics

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Rhotics include:
The alveolar trill [r] The alveolar tap [] The alveolar continuant [] The retroflex [] The uvular roll [R] or fricative [] They are grouped together in terms of phonology, not phonetics

Distribution
Non-rhotic accents: rhotic was lost post-vocalically (i.e. word finally or before a consonant) Rhotic accents: have rhotics in all words linking r: [r] is pronounced before a vowel, across word boundaries, & within words (far away, soar vs. soaring intrusive r: the occurrence in non-rhotic accents of a word- final rhotic which is absent in spelling as in tuna [r] alert

 Rhotics are devoiced following voiceless stops as in pray Following [t] & [d], the rhotic will be fricativised as in tree & dream The continuant rhotic may become a tap between vowels as in very& after [] & [] as in three There may be a degree of lip rounding with the rhotic

Variation

Glides
They are more like vowels in articulation (semivowels) They dont form syllabic nuclei like consonants (appear at the edge of a syllable)

English has 2 glides: 1. Palatal [j] as in yes 2. Labial-velar [w] as in weigh

Distribution
English [j] appears in word-initial position In word-initial clusters, [j] is restricted to appear before the vowels [u] & []; e.g. (mute, pure) The labial-velar [w] appears word initially English doesnt allow [w] after consonants other than [t], [d], [k], [s], [] May follow [g] in some loanwords like Gwynneth

Variation
[j] varies according to the following vowel; higher before high vowels ([j]east) & lower before low vowels as in ([j]ak)
[w] & [j] are devoiced after voice obstruents; e.g (twilight)