The system of english vowel phonemes

1. THE SYSTEM OF ENGLISH VOWEL PHONEMES

B Y F I L I M O N O VA A . E L E N A

2.

How you look to a phonetician

3. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Tongue

4. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Palate
Tongue

5. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Palate
Velum
Tongue

6. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Palate
Velum
Tongue
Glottis
(vocal folds)

7.

8. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Palate
Velum
Tongue
Lips, teeth etc.
Glottis
(vocal folds)

9. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Alveolar
Al
l
Palate
ridge
Velum
Tongue
Lips, teeth etc.
Glottis
(vocal folds)

10. HOW DO YOU LOOK TO A PHONETICIAN

How you look to a phonetician
Nasal
Cavity
Oral
Cavity

11.

12.

Do you remember now?
Tongue
Lips, teeth etc.

13.

Describing Speech Sounds
•Is the air-flow blocked?
vowel vs. consonant
•What are the vocal folds doing? (=voicing)
voiced vs. voiceless
•Where is the air-flow blocked? (=place)
labial,, alveolar,, p
palatal,, velar etc.
•Where/how is the air flowing? (=manner)
nasal/oral,, stop,
p, ffricative,, liquid
q etc.

14.

What can you do to
p of
alter the shape
yyour vocal tract?

15.

16.

[u]

17.

18. You can

•- raise or lower your
tongue
•- advance or retract
your tongue
•- round or not round
your tongue
•- tense or lax
YOU
CAN

19. Test it at home

TEST IT
AT HOME
Test
•slowly pronounce the vowels, feel where
the tongue
g is
•look in the mirror as you pronounce them
•close your mouth and try to pronounce the
vowels
•use a lollipop
l lli

20.

21.

Vowel features
•High/mid/low: raise or lower the tongue
•Front/central/back: advance or retract tongue
g
•Round/unrounded: round or spread lips
•Tense/lax:
Tense/lax: tense tongue muscles or not
E.g.
E
g
[i] is a high, front, (unrounded) tense vowel.
[ ] is
[u]
i a high,
hi h back,
b k round
d tense vowel.
l

22.

23.

Some dialectal differences
•caught/cot, dawn/Don[Mid back lax vowel
andd mid
id bback
k ttense vowel]:
l] many American
A
i
speakers do not have both of these.
•aunt/ant, plaza, etc

24.

25.

26.

27.

28. Quality of a vowel

QUALITY OF A VOWEL
Size
Volume
Shape of resonator
Stability of active speech organs
Segment duration
Force of articulation
Degree of tenseness of speech organs
etc
INTERCONNECTED
INTERDEPENDENT

29.

Tongue is in the back position
Lip rounding
Tongue is in the front position
Tongue raised higher
Lengthening of a vowel
Tension in speech organs

30. PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION

31. Stability of articulation

STABILITY OF ARTICULATION
• - monophthongs/ diphthongs/ diphthongoids
The problem of diphthongs status!
Vassilyev and Zinder vs British scientists

32. Tongue position

TONGUE POSITION
TONGUE
POSITIO
N
horizontal
vertical

33. Lip rounding

LIP ROUNDING
What is phonologically relevant?
1) Spread lips?
2) Neutral lips?
3) Rounded lips?
Can you name any physiological connection
of this aspect and other articulatory features?

34. checkness

CHECKNESS
LENGTH

35. DURATION/ LENGTH

D.Jones:
V.Vassilyev:
1) sit-seat
chronemes
2) pull-pool
3) Berlin – Berlin street
4) dark – duck
5) door - doll
Gimson: beat bee bid bit

36. tenseness

TENSENESS
HISTORY

37. WHAT CHARACTERISTICS ARE FUNCTIONALLY RELEVANT?

STABILITY OF ARTICULATION
TONGUE POSITION

38. Thank you for attention!

THANK YOU FOR
ATTENTION!