Introduction to Phonetics

Developing Linguistic Skills

What is Phonetics?
„ Phonetic competence: the ability to
know what sounds are in the language
and how they may be `connected'
together to form meaningful units.
„ Phonetics is thus the study of how we
human beings produce, perceive,
and analyze speech sounds.
Branches of phonetics
„ Articulatory phonetics: the study of how the vocal tract
produces the sounds of language (speaker's encoding meaning
into sounds produced by using the tongue, lips and other
articulatory organs

„ Acoustic phonetics: study of the physical properties of the

sounds such as intensity, frequency, and duration, sound
vibration by spectrograph (transmission of the sounds through
the air to the hearer)

„ Auditory phonetics: the study of the way listeners perceive

these sounds (translation of the sounds into the meaning by the
hearer)
 Main steps in studying speech
sounds
zto know what an individual sound
(segment) is
ztofind out how each individual
sound differs from the others
zto segment one stream of sounds
into parts
What is phonetics good for? (1)
„ help us understand certain phonological
changes (e.g.,assimilation)
a. illegal, presumptive
„ help us to sort out differences between

pronunciation and spelling

a. cats vs. dogs
b. hiss vs. buzz
What is phonetics good for? (2)
„ help us capture the relation between
one sound and another by comparing
their characteristic properties
a. t/d b. s/z
„ help us to learn new sounds more easily
a. d vs. 
 How are speech sounds made?

„ Preliminary:
The basic
source of
power is the
respiratory
system pushing
air out of the
lungs.
Production of sounds
„ English sounds are produced
when air is existing (egressive)
from the lungs (pulmonic).
The air in the lung travels up
to the wind pipe (trachea)
and through the larynx
(Adam's apple: voice box).
Across the larynx, there are
two muscles called vocal
cords
Voiced vs Voiceless
„ The space between the cords when they are
open is known as the glottis.The vocal cords
can be relaxed so that the flow of air coming
up from the lungs passes through freely
(voiceless) or held close together so that they
vibrate as air passes through (voiced). Check
this difference with your Adam's apple.
And then what?
„ The air then moves to either the oral or the
nasal cavities. The oral cavity, generating
speech sounds via the active articulators such
as the tongue and the lower lip, or the
passive articulators such as the teeth and the
roof of the mouth.
IPA system
„ To allow any sound (including English, Spanish, etc)
that we humans produce to be written down
uniformally, linguists developed a phonetic alphabet,
IPA (International Phonetic Association) System.

„ This phonetic alphabet is one-to-one and universal.

„ all IPA sounds are represented by the bracket [ ] or

slashes / /

„ IPA Table of English Consonants and Vowels: You

should memorize all these.
Ipa Vowels (12)
„/i/ eat „ // sort
„// it „ // look
„/e/ when „ /u/ too
„/æ/ cat „ // up
„/a/ hard „ // bird
„// not „ // about
 IPA Consonants (24)
„ pan /p/ „ chain /t/ „ vine /v/ „ sun /n/
„ tan /t/ „ Jane /d/ „ the // „ sung //
„ can /k/ „ fought /f/ „ zoo /z/ „ light /l/
„ beer /b/ „ thought // „ seizure // „ right /r/
„ dear /d/ „ so /s/ „ how /h/ „ yet /j/
„ gear // „ show // „ sum /m/ „ wet /w/
IPA diphthongs (8)
„ train /e/
„ my /a/
„ boy //
„ owl /a/
„ go //
„ here //
„ chair /e/
„ tour //
 Vowels, 2 dimensions
„ Which part of the tongue is raised?

„ Front /i/,// ,/e/ , /æ/

„ Centre //, //, //
„ Back /a/, // ,// ,// ,/u/
 Vowels, 2 dimensions
„ How high the raising is?

„ Close /i/,/u/
„ Half- close // ,//
„ Half- open /e/, //, // ,//
„ Open /a/, //, //, /æ/
Cardinal Vowels
Consonants: buccal chamber
„ 1Upper and lower lips
4 5 „ 2 Teeth
6
2 3 „ 3 Alveolar ridge
1 8 7
„ 4 Hard palate
„ 5 Soft palate
„ 6 Uvula
„ 7 Blade
„ 8 Tip
Consonants: Place of articulation

„ Bilabial „ Palato-alveolar
„ Labiodental „ Palatar
„ Dental „ Velar
„ Alevolar „ Glottal
„ Post-alveolar
Consonants: Manner of articulation

„ Plosives
„ Fricatives
„ Affricates
„ Lateral
„ Nasal
„ Semi-vowels
Consonants