PHONOLOGY:

THE SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE

• SPEECH ORGANS AND ARTICULATION

PHONETICS

Phonetics is the science of speech sounds, which aims to provide the set of features or properties that can be used to describe and distinguish all the sounds used in human language. Phonetics deals with the articulator and acoustic properties of speech sounds, how they are produced, and how they are perceived.

Phonetics has three main branches:

1. Articulator phonetics is concerned with how sounds are formed

2.Acoustic phonetics is concerned with acoustics of speech.

3.Auditory phonetics is concerned with speech perception.

DEFINITION

Phonology is the study of how sounds are organized and used in language. The root "phone" in phonology relates to sounds and originates from the Greek word phoneme which means sound. The phonological system of a language includes list of sounds and their features, and rules which specify how sounds interact with each other.

Here is an illustration that shows the place of phonology in an interacting hierarchy of levels in linguistics: -

Comparison: Phonology and phonetics

Phonetics … Phonology …

• Deals with how speech sounds are actually made, transmitted, and received.

• Deals specifically with the ways those sounds are organised into the individual language. It is a sub-category of phonetics.

Analyzes the production of all human speech sounds, regardless of language.

Analyzes the sound patterns of a particular language by

determining which phonetic sounds are significant

explaining how these sounds are interpreted by the native speaker.

SPEECH ORGANS

Speech organs or articulators produce the sounds needed for language. Passive articulators remain static during the articulation of sound. Active articulators move relative to these passive articulators to produce various speech sounds, in different manners.

Lips

Teeth

Tongue

Lips form different shapes, such as an oval, and movements in order to make different sounds. Sounds can be formed by using the teeth to shape the lips, in combination with the tongue, or to block air from escaping the mouth. The tongue moves throughout the mouth and with many of the other organs, as well as making shapes like the lips, in order to formulate speech.

Uvula

The uvula is used to make guttural sounds. It helps to make nasal consonants by stopping air from moving through the nose.

Glottis

The glottis is used in controlling the vibration made by the vocal chords, in order to make different sounds.

Alveolar Ridge

To make different sounds, known as alveolar sounds, the tongue touches the ridges found on this organ.

Hard Palate & Velum

The tongue touches and taps the hard palate when articulating speech. The movable velum (soft palate) can retract and elevate in order to separate the mouth from the nasal cavity, helping to make speech less nasally.

PLACE OF ARTICULATION

Phonemes are classified according to the place where the articulator constriction occurs.

• “WHERE” the sound is formed

MANNER OF ARTICULATION

•Stops (plosives)Airflow completely stopped (air pressure built) in the vocal tract before being released in a quick, explosive burst.

•FricativesAirflow is continuous but forced through a tiny fissure in the vocal tract

•Affricates (stop + fricative)

Airflow completely stops (air pressure built) and then released in a continuous stream through a tiny fissure in the vocal tract.

•NasalsAirflow channels through the nasal cavity due to closure of the velopharyngeal port

•GlidesArticulators glide from a constricted to a more open position.Also called “semi-vowels”

•LiquidsTongue held tight at midline with openings laterally; air flows around the sides of the tongue

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