Accent, dialect and language

Laver, Chapter 3
ACCENT, DIALECT AND LANGUAGE
Everyone speaks with an accent. It is not possible to speak aloud without speaking with accent.
The notion of accent is a phonological and phonetic concept, with some implications for the
lexical level of analysis as well.
Dialects are discernibly different to the extent that they involve different morphological,
syntactic, lexical and semantic inventories and patters. A dialect can be expressed in either
spoken or written form. In spoken form, a given dialect can often be associated with more than
one accent.
It is also impossible to speak (or write) without exemplifying a choice of dialect in terms of the
vocabulary used and the sequences in which the words are combined.
Standard English: it is standard in the sense that it is a dialect understood and used in a
relatively standard way by a very large number of people.
THE STANDARD ENGLISH DIALEC, AND NON-REGIONAL AND REGIONAL ACCENTS
There are a number of detailed differences of usage between different national groups. British
and American English versions of Standard English will be treated as different dialects for the
sake of illustrating dialectical differences with familiar material.
Accents always mark the geographical origin of the speaker. Some accents mark regional origin
and some others mark only the fact that a speaker is an American, or is Australian, Canadian,
English, Scottish, etc.
Broad accents: highly localized regional accents.
A given speaker may be able to speak with two or more accents, with one accent often being
broader that the other(s).
Received Pronunciation (RP) is an example of a non-regional accent of British English. The
term receiver, in its Victorian sense of being received in polite society, gives a historical clue to
the origins of the RP accent. RP developed as an accent of the English public schools and is
maintained, and transmitted from generation to generation, mainly by people educated at public
schools.
Although the function of this accent as a marker of socioeconomic status is now a good deal
weaker than previously. RP is still perhaps better regarded as marking social rather than narrowly
regional aspects of identity.
The less regional variation is involved, the higher the status of the speaker.
RP is subject to change with time.
No accent is immune to change, not even the best.
Several contemporary politicians make a virtue out of their regional background, and the BBC
employs several announcers with regionally modified accents.
General American: -One may say that in America three main types of speech have come to be
recognized, a New England local type, a Southern local type and a general or Western Speech
covering the rest of the country. A convenient name for the range of United States accents that
have neither an eastern nor southern colouring; dialectologically, though, it is of questionable
status. General American Speech is defined as a pronunciation of American English showing few
regional peculiarities: most USA radio and television announcers use General American Speech.
It is important to appreciate the distinction between dialect and accent.
DIFFERENCES OF DIALECT BETWEEN SPEAKERS
We can consider some examples of differences of dialect between speakers, at the
morphological, syntactic, semantic and lexical levels of analysis of English. An example of a
morphological difference between dialects can be found from a comparison of American and
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British English versions of Standard English. Where British English has only one past participle of
the verb to get, namely goy, American English has two, as in Ive got. Versus Ive gotten.
Two speakers speaking the same language but different dialects can also differ syntactically:
the kettle needs to be boiled, the kettle needs boiling, the kettle needs to be boiled.
An example of the semantic differences between dialects can be found in British and American
versions of Standard English where the form of the word is the same but the meaning is different.
A lexical example is momentarily which means for a moments duration in British English and in a
moment, any minute now in some dialects of American English.
Differences of dialect very often show themselves as a matter of lexical differences, usually
where two or more different word-forms in the two dialects have approximately the same
meaning. An example of this is the very current use in the Scots version of Standard English of
the form outwith as in outwith the competence of the committee or outwith the city limits,
where the comparable word in most dialects of England would be outside, or beyond.
DIFFERENCES OF ACCENTS BETWEEN SPEAKERS
At the segmental level of consonants and vowels, the overall inventory of consonant phonemes
of a given accent makes up its consonant system and the vowel phonemes its vowel system.
RP has 24 consonants in its consonants system and 20 vowels in its vowel system. General
American has 24 consonants and 15 or 16 vowels. Depending on which sub-type of GA is being
considered.
Differences between accents which involve the number and type of word-differentiating
phonemic distinctions available to the accents are called systemic differences. RP speaker
differentiate between Sam and Psalm. Scots have only one vowel at this place in their vowel
system. They are homophones.
A structural difference between accents is a matter of the different rules governing the
permissible sequences of phonemes in the phonemic make-up of word-shapes. The type of
accent where accents where /r/ can be pronounced before consonants is called rhotic accent,
and the accents which do not allow this are called non-rothic accents.
The principal phonological difference is the one exemplified above. But there is a further type of
difference of phonological relevance and it concerns the distribution of phonemic recourses over
the vocabulary of the dialect, in terms of which phonemes are selected in which words.
Differences between two accents which are reflected in such variations of distribution are called
selectional differences. A selectional difference is only reflected when the two accents in
question share the same phonemic sub-system. But exploit the use of these phonemes
differently in given words.
The final difference between accents to be discussed is at the phonemic level, and is to do with
how speakers of the given accents actually pronounce the phonemes of those accents. Since this
is a matter of detailed phonemic realizations, such a difference can be called realizational
difference.
Some speakers have one or a small number of phonemic realizations that are sufficiently unlike
those of the majority of their accent-group that they strike the listener as notably idiosyncratic,
and strongly mark the identity of the speaker as an individual within the group. IN extreme
cases, such idiosyncrasy is perceived as a speech defect. It will be apparent on reflection that
the potential of being slightly different from those of many other speakers even of the same
general accent.
DIFFERENCES OF STYLE AND FREE VARIATION WITHIN THE ACCENT OF A SINGLE
SPEAKER
The speech of a single speaker on different occasions and with different conversational partners,
within the confines of what would qualify as a single group-accent, may nevertheless differ in two
further ways. The first of these types of differences is a matter of the style of speech, and the
second concerns free variations of the phonemic and phonetic make-up of individual words
within a given style is that part of linguistic behavior that signals the speakers assessment of the
relative formality or informality of the relationship between the participants in the interaction on
the occasion of the conversation. All these paralinguistic effects can be overload on the linguistic
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foundation of a speakers formal or informal style of speaking. It should also be distinguished for
matters of genre which are concerned with characteristics of language-use which are particular
to a given situation, such as television news reporting, academic lectures, etc.
Polysyllabic words in English have on overage about two or three such re-organized
pronunciations for use in informal speech, though some have many more alternatives. Another
form of phonemic re-organization for stylistic purposes is assimilation. This process results in
consonants at the margins of neighboring words being made more similar to each other, by the
phonetic identity of one consonant (usually the final one in the first word) being subordinated to
that another (usually the first consonant in the second word).
A speech style becomes more informal, with syllables often becoming structurally and
articulatorily less complex. With increasing informality, it does seem to be the case that
associated changes in pitch and loudness behavior also occur, with pitch levels and ranges rising
and loudness levels and rangers dropping.
A final point to be made about the variation in the speech used in different circumstances is that
the phonological rules underlying casual, informal speech are often different from those
applicable to formal speech. One example is the set of phonotactic rules which govern
permissible sequences of consonants and vowels in syllable structure. The logical extreme of the
reduction process mentioned above is deletion of individual segments from the pattern for
individual words and phrases pronounced in isolation. This may give rise to syllable structures
which are actually more rather than less articulatorily complex.
One might say that the phonotactic rules governing informal speech are different from those of
formal speech rather than that informal speech violates the rules of formal speech style.
The second type of variation to be discussed in this section is free variations.
This is where a speaker speaking in a single accent is free to choose between two more forms of
a particular word, without stylistic implications.
ACCENT AS A MAKER OF THE SPEAKERS GROUP-MEMBERSHIP AND INDIVIDUALITY
The accent of a given speaker can be viewed in (at least) two perspectives. It can be seen as a
group-maker of the speakers membership of a variety of special groupings, and as an
individuating maker uniquely identifying the speaker against the mass of other members of
the wider group. A term used for an accent which characterizes the speech of a whole social
group when speaking in a given style is sociolect. Within such a sociolect, the uniquely
idiosyncratic accent of a given speaker speaking in a given style is called the speakers idiolect.
The term LECT is then a neutral term for accent without specific implications for its sociolected of
idiolectal status.
Comment on a sociolect considers the speaker as a member of a particular social group.
Comment on an idiolect focuses on the speaker as an individual within his or her social group.
Accent is also taken to mark a range of social attributes other than merely that of geographical
origin.
DIALECTOLOGY AND DIALECT GEOGRAPHY
The customary name for the discipline that studies the phonemic and phonological patterns of
accents and dialects of languages, and their geographical distribution in space and time is
dialectology.
A very substantial body of work in dialectology has been invested in the mapping of the
geographical distribution of different dialectal forms. This part of the subject is therefore
sometimes called dialect geography, or regional dialectology.
ISOGLOSS: is one of the tools of the dialectologist. Is a line on a map drawn round all areas
displaying the same pronunciation for given consonant, vowel or word.
LANGUAGE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SPEAKERS.

The dialects of a given language can vary in their similarity to each other. Conventionally, the
limit that is set to maximum degree of differences between two dialects is one of mutual
intelligibility.
There are other problems with the criterion of mutual intelligibility. One is that intelligibility is a
multidimensional scale, when considered within and across the full range of linguistic levels.
Another problem is that matters of intelligibility are themselves subject to the judgmental
attitudes of the listeners involved. There are numerous cases where the listeners of language
from A find the speaker of language B quite intelligible but where listeners of B claim not to be
able to understand the speakers of A. Once again, factors of social and political attitude
dominate the question. It is therefore probably more practical to consider the differentiation of
dialects and languages to be primarily to be primarily a sociopolitical issue.
FIRST, SECOND AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE
A speaker who understands only one language can be described as a monoglot.
One who understands two or several is a polyglot.
To clarify the different status of a speakers experiences of other languages it is helpful to
differentiate between a first language, a second one and a foreign.
First language: is a speakers MOTHER TONGUE or NATIVE LANGUAGE, whose learning
normally begins in the speakers earliest years.
Second language: is any other language that the speaker learns to control, at any time, to a
level near native-like proficiency, Few speakers even learn to control a second language to the
point of being indistinguishable, in every linguistic and phonemic respect, from a native speaker
of that language. If they do succeed in attaining this level of expertise, then they can properly be
termed bilingual.
Foreign language: any language spoken by a speaker to less than second-language level can
be called a foreign language, and the state of being able to control more than one language can
be referred to as multilingualism.
LINGUA FRANCAS, PIDGINS AND CREOLES
Lingua franca: is the status of the foreign language as an instrument of general communication.
Is often a single homogeneous language.
Pidgin: is used for much the same purposes of communication between speakers of mutually
unintelligible languages. Is developed out of a mixture of the languages of the communities
concerned. When a pidgin is acquired as the first, native language of a group of speakers it is
said to constitute a creole language. Creole becomes more linguistically elaborated than their
antecedent pidgins, and become autonomous languages in their own right. The evolution of
creole languages, in the process called creolization, has claimed a good deal of recent research
attention as an arena of creative language acquisition claimed to reveal universal aspects of the
language faculty.
THE GENERIC RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LANGUAGES
All accents, dialects and languages are thus in continuous state of evolutionary change, and
describing and explaining the results and causes of such change is the function of comparative
and historical linguistics. When an account of an accent, dialect or language is offered as a
snapshot in time, describing its state at a given stage in its historical development, this is usually
called a synchronic description. When two or more stages in the evolution of a given accent are
compared, this is usually called a diachronic description.
In both the synchronic and diachronic comparisons, we are dealing with the branch of
comparative and historical linguistics that is set in the older tradition of comparative
philology. The part that approaches these questions from the perspective of the linguistic
sciences is usually called historical phonology.
The timing of the divergence of language-forms into separate languages is hypothesized in
historical linguistics by a comparative method which considers the scale of regular
correspondences between the language-forms concerned, drawing on data from
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lexicostatistics and on assumptions about typical rates of language change from

glottochronology. Languages such as Yoruba and Igbo are said to have descended from a
parent-language, and to be genetically related to that ancestral language, to each other and to
a number of other languages in a language-family. Common membership of a language-family
qualifies the languages concerned as cognate languages. Within language groups and subgroups. A language showing no discernible affiliation to other languages, perhaps as a relic of
earlier languages displaced by invading populations, is called a language isolate. IndoEuropean is the name for the language family uniting the Romance languages and Germanic
languages. In the case of Latin ones its Romance daughter-languages, we have good written
records that offer direct evidence of the earlier parent-language. The resulting hypothesized
reconstruction of a parent-language is sometimes called proto-language.
The process of phonological reconstruction depends on the assumption that sound-change (or
sound-shift) in a descendant of parent-language regular and widespread through the lexical
stock of that daughter-language.

Description of consonants
Cruttenden, Chapter 4
PHONETIC DESCRIPTION
A speech sound has at least three stages available for investigations: the production,
transmission, and reception stages. The emphasis has always been laid on the articulatory
event.
VOWEL AND CONSONTANT
Consonants are those segments which occur at the edges of syllables, while vowels are those at
the centre of syllables. This reference to the functioning of sounds in syllables in a particular
language is a phonological definition. But once any attempt is made to define what sorts of
sounds generally occur in these different syllable positions, then we are moving to a phonetic
definition.
But difficulties arise in English with this definition because English /j, w, r/ which are consonants
phonologically are vowels phonetically.
Consonants might be voiced or voiceless, vowels are always voiced.
CONSONTANTS
(1) Is the airstream set in motion by the lungs or by some other means? (pulmonic or nonpulmonic)
(2) Is the airstream forced outwards or sucked inwards? (egressive or ingressive)
(3)Do the vocal folds vibrate or not? (voiced or voiceless)
(4) Is the soft palate raised, directing the airstream wholly through the mouth, or lowered,
allowing the passage of air through the nose? (oral, or nasal or nasalized)
(5)At what point or points and between what organs does closure or narrowing
take place? (place of articulation)
(6)What is the type of closure or narrowing at the point of articulation? (manner of
articulation)
Most speech sounds are made with egressive lung air.
PLACE OF ARTICULATION
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BILABIAL: the two lips are the primary articulators [p, b, m]

LABIODENTAL: the lower lip articulates with the upper teeth [f, v]
DENTAL: the tongue tip and rims articulate with the upper teeth [, ]
ALVEOLAR: the blade, or tip and blade of the tongue articulates with the alveolar ridge [t, d, l, n,
s, z]
POST-ALVEOLAR: the tip of the tongue articulates with the rear part of the alveolar ridge [r]
RETROFLEX: the tip of the tongue is curled back to articulate with the part of the hard palate
immediately behind the alveolar ridge.
PALATO-ALVEOLAR: the blade, or tip and blade, of the tongue articulates with the alveolar
ridge and there is at the same time a raising of the front of the tongue with the alveolar ridge
and there is at the same time a raising of the front of the tongue towards the hard palate. [ , , ,
]
PALATAL: the front of the tongue articulates with the hard palate [j]
VELAR: the back of the tongue articulates with the soft palate [k, g, ]
UVULAR: the back of the tongue articulates with the uvula [rouge]
GLOTTAL: an obstruction, or narrowing causing friction but no vibration, between the vocal folds
[h]
MANNER OF ARTICULATION
The obstruction made by the organs may be total, intermittent, partial, or may merely constitute
a narrowing sufficient to cause friction.
COMPLETE CLOSURE

Plosive: a complete closure at some point in the vocal tract, behind which the air pressure
builds up and can be released explosively. [p, b, t, d, k, g, ]
Affricate: a complete closure at some point in the mouth, behind which the air pressure builds
up; a separation of the organs is slow compared with of a plosive, so that more extended friction
is a characteristic second element of the sound [ , ]
Nasal: a complete closure at some point in the mouth but, the soft palate being lowered, the air
escapes through the nose [m, n, ]
INTERMITENT CLOSURE

Trill (or) Roll: rapid intermittent closures made by a flexible organ on a firmer surface [r]
Tap: a single tap made by a flexible organ on a firmer surface.
PARTIAL CLOSURE

Lateral: a partial (but firm) closure is made at some point in the mouth, the airstream being
allowed to escape on one or both sides of the contact [l]
NARROWING

Fricative: two organs approximate to such an extent that the airstream passes between them
with friction [ f, v, , z, s, , h]
NARROWING WITHOUT FRICTION

Approximant (or frictionless continuant). They dont have closure.

OBSTRUENTS AND SONORANTS
Obstruents: those in whose production the constriction impeding the airflow through the vocal
tract is sufficient to cause noise.
Sonorants: are those voiced sounds in which there is no noise component (i.e. voiced nasals,
approximants and vowels).
FORTIS AND LENIS
Lenis English consonants which are usually voiced tend to be articulated with relatively weak
energy.
Fortis Those which are always voiceless are relatively strong.
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INGRESSIVE PULMONIC CONSONANTS

Theyre made as were breathing in.
EGRESSIVE GLOTTALIC CONSONANTS
Its production is known as ejectives the glottis is closed, so that lung air is contained beneath
it. A closure or narrowing is made at some point above the glottis (the soft palate being raised)
and the air between this point and the glottis is compressed by a general muscular constriction
of the chamber and a raising of the larynx.
INGRESSIVE GLOTTALIC CONSONANTS
For these sounds a complete closure is made in the mouth, but instead of air pressure from the
lungs being compressed behind the closure, the almost completely closed larynx is lowered so
that the air in the mouth and pharyngeal cavities is rarefied. The result is that outside air is
sucked in once the mouth closure is released; at the same time, theres sufficient leakage of lung
air through the glottis to produce voice.
INGRESSIVE VELARIC CONSONANTS
They are produced entirely by means of closures within the mouth cavity; normal breathing
through the nose may continue quite independently if the soft palate is lowered and may even
produce accompanying nasalization.

Cardinal vowels
Cruttenden, Chapter 4
VOWELS
They are normally made with a voiced egressive airstream without any closure or narrowing. The
escape of the air is characteristically accomplished in an unimpeded way over the middle line of
the tongue.
(1) The position of the soft palate raised for oral vowels, lowered for nasalized vowels.
(2) The kind of aperture formed by lips degrees of spreading or rounding.
(3) The part of tongue which is raised and the degree of raising.
DIFFICULTIES OF DESCRIPTION
Were aware that when we pronounce most vowels sounds the tongue tip lies behind the lower
teeth.
It can be stated in articulatory terms that some vowel sounds require the raising of the front of
the tongue while others are articulated with a typical hump at the back.
CARDINAL VOWELS
The basis of this system is physiological. The two qualities upon which all the others were
hinged were produced with the tongue in certain easily felt positions: the front of the tongue is
raised as close as possible to the palate without friction being produced, for the Cardinal vowel
[i]; and the whole of the tongue as low as possible in the mouth, with very slight rising at the
extreme back, for de Cardinal vowel []. Starting from the [i] position, the front of the tongue
was lowered gradually, the lips remaining spread or neutrally open and the soft palate raised.

-Front series: i e a -Back series: } are pronounced with spread open lips.
A secondary series can be obtained by revising the lip positions:
Unrounded [I, e, , a, , , , ]
Rounded [y, , , , , , o]
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Such a scale is useful because:

(a) The vowel qualities are unrelated to particular values in languages.
(b) The set is recorded, so that the reference may always be made, to a standard invariable
scale.
Diacritics are available in the IPA alphabet to show modifications of Cardinal Vowels (a subscript
to mean more open, a subscript meaning closer, and raised dots to mean centralized).
The internal triangle is made by dividing the top line into three approximately equal section and
drawing lines parallel to the two sides, so that they meet near the base of the figure.

*This diagram shows, above all, quality relationships.

NASALITY
A vowel description must also indicate whether the vowel is purely oral or whether it is nasalized.
The 16 Cardinal Vowels may be all transformed into their nasalized counterparts if the soft palate
is lowered.
RELATIVELY PURE VOWELS vs. GLIDING VOWELS
It is not possible for the quality of a vowel to remain absolutely constant. Nevertheless, we may
distinguish between those vowels which are relatively pure (or unchanging) and those which
have a considerable and voluntary glide. The so-called pure vowels will be marked in the
diagram as a dot, showing the highest point of the tongue or, better, a ring, since it would be
inadvisable to attempt to be over-precise in the matter of these auditory judgements; the gliding
(or diphthongal) vowel sound will be shown as an arrow, which indicates the quality of the
starting point and the direction in which the quality change is made (corresponding to a
movement in the tongue).
ARTICULATORY CLASSIFICATION of VOWELS
Labels are provided to distinguish between front, central, and back, and between four degrees
of opening: close, close-mid, open-mid and open.

Cardinal vowels
Laver, chapter 10
RESONANT ARTICULATIONS
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All resonants have a stricture of open approximation, when the airstream passes through the
vocal tract in a smoothly laminar flow, with no audible friction. Resonants can be classifiable into
central resonants and lateral resonants.
Central Resonants are classified as non-contoid segments. When non-contoids are marginal in
the syllable, are called non-syllable approximants (or approximants). If they are nuclear in the
syllable (syllabic), they are syllabic vocoids or vocoids. Approximant by definition always function
phonologically as consonants. Vocoids by definition always function phonologically as vowels.
SYLLAVIC VOCOIDS
The very large majority of vocoids articulations in the languages of the world are voiced.
There are two active articulators in vocoid articulation the tongue and the lips.
Double Articulation: category of place of articulation in which there are two concurrent strictures
of equal degree.
Almost all vocoids representing vowels show the body of the tongue to have a regularly curved
convex surface, with the tip of the tongue held lower than the body.
Vocoids pronounced with the tongue curved in a convex shape, in both front-to-back and side-toside dimensions, are nevertheless overwhelmingly the most common type.
Two concoids can share the same position of the highest point of the tongue and nevertheless
still sound different in quality.
CHARTS OF THE VOCOID SPACE
The location of the highest point of the regularly curved surface of the body of the tongue falls, in
the production of vocoids into an area which lies below the palatal and the velar zones of
articulation. This can be called Vocoid space. The limits of the vocoid space are conditioned by
the fact that if the highest point of the tongue were raised further, the degree of stricture would
become fricative.
In the early part of this century, Daniel Jones created the Cardinal Vowel System. It was a
method for locating vocoids on the chart by reference to the relationship between their
Auditory and articulatory characteristics and those of certain selected vocoids of agreed quality.
Cardinal Vowel No. 1 is the sound in which the raising of the tongue is as far forwards as possible
and as high as possible consistently with its being a vowel the lips being spread. The second
was described as follow: Cardinal Vowel No. 5 is a sound in which the back of the tongue is
lowered as far as possible and retracted as far as possible consistently with the sound being a
vowel and in which the lips are not rounded.
Cardinal Vowel No. 2, 3 and 4 as a front series on the periphery of the vocoid space dividing the
vertical (and auditory) distance between Cardinal Vowel 1 and 5 into equal auditory intervals
upwards again, with progressive degrees of lip-rounding, ending in a close lip rounded position
for No. 8.
The horizontal dimension first (The Cardinal Vowel) corresponding to place of articulation, there
are three divisions, called front, central and back. The highest point of the tongue in front
vocoids lies on the front of the tongue, underneath the palatal zone. The highest point in back
vocoids is on the surface of the back of the back of the tongue, below the velar zone, Central
vocoids are intermediate between front and back. The vertical dimension is divided into four
areas, in effect sub-diving the degree of stricture of open approximation. Vocoids made in to area
closest to the roof of the mouth are close vocoids; those occurring in the lowest part of the chart
are called open vocoids; the space between the close and open zones is equally divided
vertically into two further zones, the upper being called close-mid and lower open-mid.
LABIAL ELEMENTS OF VOCOIDS SEGMENTS
The configuration of the lips is described with three main labels: spread, neutral and rounded.
The vocoids with close tongue positions and close-mid tongue positions have a spread lip
position: those with open-mid tongue positions and open tongue positions all neutral lip
positions.
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Rounded configurations are sometimes further divided into close rounded and open rounding.
INTERMEDIATE VOCOIDS
Central vocoid made with neutral lips is schwa the vocoid produced when the local tract is in its
neutral configuration, and is hence often referred to in other terminologies as the neutral vowel.
A central vocoid comparable in quality to Schwa is (3:). With schwa being reserved for the
realization of the vowel in unstressed syllables and (3:) for its manifestation in stressed
syllables.
TRANSITIONAL ASPECTS VOCOIDS PRODUCTION: MONOPHTHONG, DIPHTHONG AND
TRIPHTHONG
Vocoids can be regarded as normally having three component phases: an onset phase during
which the body of the tongue is approaching the representative target location in the vocoid
space, a medial phase where the target location is reached or most nearly reached, and an offset
phase where the local organs begin to take up the appropriate articulatory configuration for the
performance of the next segment.
The notion of articulatory transitions forms the basis for making a distinction of aspect of
articulation between three auditory different types of syllabic vocoid. These are monophthongs,
diphthongs and triphthongs. In all three cases, the performance of the vocoid is within the
articulatory span of a single syllable.
A monophthong is a vocoid where the medial phase shows a relatively stable articulatory
position of the tongue and the lips. Auditorily, monophthongs produce an impression of relatively
unvarying quality.
A diphthong is a vocoid in which the medial phase explicitly consists of an articulatory trajectory
across the vocoid space. If the trajectory moves upwards in the vocoid space, the resulting
diphthongs are closed closing diphthongs. Examples are the vocoids in English flight and flout,
where the body of the tongue starts in the open zone and moves up towards either the close-mid
or the close zone. Centring diphthongs have articulatory trajectories which start nearer the
periphery of the vocoid space, and move towards the central zone. Examples are the diphthongs
in Received Pronunciation in British English, where post-vocalic orthographic r has no rhotic
pronunciation.
Diphthongs are characterized by a relatively simple trajectory from one point towards an
intended target. Triphthongs, by contrast, have a more complex trajectory, involving a change of
direction in mid-course.

Historical background
Cruttenden, Chapter 6
PALSGRAVE AND SALESBURY
Some of the first writers whose work possess were concerned with the relation between the
sounds of English and those of another language. Thus, John Palsgraves French grammar
Lesclarcissement de la Langue Francoyse 1530 includes a section which deals with the
pronunciation of French, much as any modern grammar would. In order to explain the values of
French sounds, Palsgrave compares them with the English.
Another early writer concerned with pronunciation is William Salesbury, a Welshman, whose
Dictionary in English and Welshe 1547 contained comments on the sounds of English.
SPELLING REFORMERS: SMITH, HART, GIL.
A more important type of phonetic inquiry stemmed from the activities of those who, particularly
in the 16th 17th centuries, were concerned at the increasing inconsistency of the relationship of
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Latin letters and the sounds which they represented, especially in English. There had been during
the previous five or six centuries great changes of pronunciation, particularly as far as the vowel
sounds were concerned.
A writer such as Thomas Smith makes many pertinent phonetic comments on matters such as
the aspiration of English plosives. Yet, he, as a phonetician, is overshadowed in the sixteenth
century by John Hart, whose most important work, the Orthographic, was published in 1569.
Besides making out his case for spelling reform and proposing a revised system, Hart describes
the organs of speech, defines vowels and consonants, and notes the aspiration of voiceless
plosives. Of the numerous seventeenth-century orthoepists, only Alexander Gil, Logonomia
Anglica (1619, 1621), can be compared with Hart on the phonetic level, though even his
observations lack the objectivity of Harts.
PHONETICIANS: WALLIS, WILKINGS AND COOPER
Phoneticians: people interested in speech and language.
Wilkins: described the function of the organs of speech. He proposed an alphabet of 34 letters.
Made reference also to Mexican, Chinese, Japanese
17th century There was a group of writers who were interested in speech and language for
their own sake. Because of their preoccupation with detailed analysis of speech activity, the
comparative study of the sounds of various languages, the classification of sound types, and the
establishment of systematic relationships between the English sounds, they can be said to be the
precursors of modern scientific phoneticians. Two of the most celebrated, John Wallis and Bishop
Wilkins, were among the founders of the Royal Society.
Wallis intended his grammar to help foreigners to learn English more easily and also to enable
Englishmen to understand more thoroughly the true nature of their language. He does not seek
to fit English into Latin mould but rather to examine the sounds of English correctly but also the
deaf and dumb to speak.
The linguistic fame of John Wallis, primarily a mathematician, spread out Europe and lasted into
the eighteenth century, his work being copied long after his death. His principal linguistic work,
Grammatica Linguae Anglicanae, was first published in 1653, and he indented to help foreigners
to learn English more easily and also to enable Englishmen to understand more thoroughly the
true nature of their language. He does not seek to fit English into a Latin mould, but rather to
examine the sounds of English as constituting a system in their own right. In his work, vowels are
classified in Guttural, Palatal, and Labial, subdivided into Wide, Medium and narrow. Consonants
are divided into three classes: Labial, Palatal, and Guttural, being different from vowels in that
the airstream from the lungs is obstructed or constricted at some point.
His fellow member of the Royal Society, Bishop John Wilkins, published in 1668 an Essay
towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language. It is of much wider scope than that of
Wallis, since it aims at no less than the creation of a universal language, expressed by means of
marks, which should signifie things, and not words. Wilkins acknowledges his debt to his
contemporary linguists, especially in respect of the account of pronunciation which forms
comparatively small part of the Essay. Wilkins, too describes the functions of the speech organs
and gives a general classification of the sounds articulated by them.
Any account of seventeenth-century phoneticians should include the name of Christopher
Cooper. His work was published in 1685. Hi was a schoolmaster than a member of the Royal
Society, and his aim was to describe and give rules for the pronunciation of English, rather than
to devise a logical system into which the sounds of English and other languages might be fitted.
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY: JOHNSON, SHERIDAN, WALKER, STEELE
A lot of dictionaries had been published in the seventeenth century, but the works having the
main stabilizing and standardizing influence on the language was to be the dictionaries of
Samuel Johnson (1755), Thomas Sheridan (1780), and John walker (1791).
NINETEENTH CENTURY: PITMAN, ELLIS, BELL, SWEET
11

In the nineteenth century the English traditional preoccupation with phonetic notation, and the
simplification of English spelling continued. Isaac Pitman, whose system of shorthand is so widely
used today, and Alexander J. Ellis, concerned at the difficulties which our spelling presented to
English children as well as to foreigners.
In 1867 Alexander Melville Bell published his book Visible Speech.
Ellis traces the history of English pronunciation and, at the same time, contributes descriptive
phonetic studies of contemporary dialects.
Henry sweet, a greater phonologist and scholar, applied stringent phonetic techniques to all his
work. His influence is clearly to be seen in the work of Daniel Jones, who dominated British
phonetics in the first half of this century.
SOUND CHANGE
The language spoken in English has undergone very striking changes during the last 1.000
years, on its morphological, syntax, and vocabulary as well as its pronunciation.
The pronunciation of a language seems to be subject to a continous and inevitable process of
change. Indeed, it would be surprising if a means of communication, handed on orally from one
generation to another, showed no variation over the centuries.
Today there are a number of reasons why we might expect these processes of change to operate
less rapidly.
TYPES OF CHANGE
The most important kind of change tends to affect a phoneme in all its occurrences. Such
changes are independent, and are called Internal Isolative. Changes of this type apply
particularly to the English vowel system.
Another kind of change is that which is brought about by the occurrence of phonemes in
particular contexts, a dependent change, called Internal Combinative.
Some changes are neither independent nor dependent, and they may said to be External.
In addition to changes in quality, there also have to be taken into account changes involving
length, and accentual pattern.
RATE AND ROUTE OF VOWEL CHANGE
The English vowels have been subject to more striking changes than have the consonants. For a
consonantal articulation usually involves an approximation of organs which can be felt; such an
articulation tends to be more stable in that it is more easily identified and transmitted more
exactly from one generation to another.
A modification of vowel quality will, however, result from very slight changes of tongue or lip
position.

SOUND CHANGE AND THE LINGUISTIC SYSTEM

The system of our language consists of a framework of significant oppositions by means of
which we communicate, it may be assumed that there is a tendency for the system to remain
stable.
The considerations of the phonetic relationship of phonemes have relevance in the historical,
DIACHRONIC, study of English. Although, it is often convenient in diachronic studies to
investigate the development of individual phonemes in terms of the quality of their realization, it
is clear that many sound changes can be explained only by reference to a readjustment of the
phonetic relationships of the phonemes of the system as a whole.
There is a general tendency for all unaccented vowels to shorten (if long).
SOURCES OF EVIDENCE FOR RECONSTRUCTION
12

Theoretical paths of development: If, in dealing with the changing realization of a particular
phoneme, we can be reasonably sure of its sound value at two points in history, we can from our
knowledge of phonetic possibilities and probabilities, infer theoretically the intervening stages of
development.
Old English: This term spans a period of some 400 years from about AD 700 to AD 1100. The
invasion of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes in the fifth and sixth centuries introduced four separate
varieties of English: the Angles, in the Midlands, north-east England, and the south of Scotland,
using types of English known as MERCIAN and NORTHUMBRIAN (or, in general terms, ANGLIAN);
the Saxons, in the South and South-west, using the WEST SAXON dialect; and the JUTES, settling
mainly in the region of Kent and using a dialect called Kentish. West Saxon became a kind of
standard language, is the one about which most is known from the extant texts. In its later formthat in use between about AD 900 and AD 1100- it is referred to as Classical OE.
The broad lines of the pronunciation of this language can be conjectured from a comparison of
the development of the other members of the West Germanic group of languages to which it is
related. But by far the most explicit evidence concerning its sounds is to be inferred from the
alphabet in which its written. The earlier runic spelling was replaced by a form of the Latin
alphabet. This alphabet was probably introduced into the country in the seventeenth century by
Irish missionaries. It can be assumed, therefore, that the sounds of OE were represented as far as
possible by Latin letters with their Latin values, with some modifications of Irish kind.
The vowel values of the OE system were particularly difficult to represent with the five Latin
vowel letters.
The OE pronunciation postulated from the spelling and the comparison of Germanic languages is
the only one from which later forms can be expected to have developed.
Middle English: Spelling forms can also help us to deduce the pronunciation of the ME period,
roughly AD 1100-1450. Generally speaking, it may be said that the letters still had their Latin
values and that those letters which were written were meant to be sounded. This persistence of
Latin values in spelling was no doubt due to the influence of the Church, which was still the
centre of teaching and writing. However, English spelling was modified by French Influences.
Rhymes, too, have their value, especially in this period.
Early Modern English: AD 1450-1600. The introduction of printing brought standardization of
spelling and already the spoken and written forms of the language were beginning to diverge.
But individuals, especially in their private correspondence, often used spellings of a largely
phonetic kind, in the same unsophisticated and logical way that children still do.

13

Cardinal Vowels
Cruttenden, Chapter 8
DESCRIPTION OF THE VOWELS
(Relatively) Pure Vowels

/i:/

Examples:
ee- tree, cheese, canteen
e- complete, be, these
ea- reason, leaft, sea
ie- piece, field
ei, ey- seize, key, receive
i- machine, police, suite
Description: The front of the tongue is raised to a height slightly below and behind the front close
position; the lips are spread; the tongue is tense, with the side rims making a firm contact with
the upper molars. Does not normally occurs in a syllable closed by //.

//

Examples:
i- rich, sit
y- city, symbol
e- pretty, houses
ie- ladies, cities
a- village, prvate
Description: The short RP vowel /I/ is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to the centre
than to front raised just above the close-mid position; the lips are closely spread; the tongue is
lax (compared with the tension for /i:/, with the side rims making a light contact with the upper
molars. The quality is that of centralized.

/e/

Examples:
e- bed, set
ea- dead, breath
a- many
Description: For the short RP /e/, the front of the tongue is raised between the close-mid and
open-mid positions; the lips are loosely spread and are slightly wider apart than for /I/; the
tongue may have more tension than in the case of /I/, the side rims making a light contact with
the upper molars. Does not occur in final, open, syllables.

//

Examples:
a- hand, lamp, marry
Description: The mouth is more open than for /e/; the front of the tongue is raised to a position
midway just above open, with the side rims making a very slight contact with the back upper
molars; the lips are neutrally open. This short vowel is generally longer than the other short
vowels.
14

//

Examples:
u- cut, drug
o- son, come
ou- country, one
oo- blood, flood
oe- does
Description: The short RP /^/ is articulated with a considerable separation of the jaws and with
the lips neutrally open; the centre of the tongue is raised just above the fully open position, no
contact being made between the tongue and the upper molars. The quality is that of a
centralized and slightly raised.

//

Examples:
a- after, pass
ar- part, car
ear- heart, hearth
er- derby, clerk
al- calm, half
au- aunt, laugh
Description: This normally long vowel is articulated with a considerable separation of the jaws
and the lips neutrally open; a part of the tongue between the centre and back is in the fully open
position, no contact between the rims of the tongue and the upper molars.

//

Examples:
o- dock, sorry, gone
a (following /w/ - want, what
ou, ow- cough knowledge
au- because, Austria
Description: This short vowel is articulated with wide open jaws and slight open lip-rounding; the
back of the tongue is in the fully open position, no contact being made between the tongue and
the upper molars. The quality is that of an open lip-rounding.

/:/

Examples:
ar, or- war, horse
ore- more, before
our- four, coart
oar, oor- door, board
au, augh- cause, daughter
a- all, talk
aw- saw, jaw
ou- bought, ought
Description: This relatively long RP vowel is articulated with medium lip-rounding; the back of the
tongue is raised between the open-mid and close-mid positions, no contact being made between
the tongue and the upper molars. May not occur before //.

//

Examples:
u-butcher
15

oo-book
o-bosom
ou-could
Description- The short RP vowel // is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to centre
than to back raised just above the close-mid position. The tongue is laxly held, no firm contact
being made between the tongue and the upper molars. There is an increasing tendency for this
vowel to be unrounded. This vowel occurs in both accented and unaccented syllables, it does not
occur in word-initial positions nor before final //.

/u:/

Examples:
u-rude
oo-food
o-do
ou-group
ew-chew
ue, ui, oe-blue, juice, shoe
Description- RP long /u:/ is a close back vowel, but the tongue raising is relaxed from the closest
position and is somewhat centralized from the true back. The lips tend to be closely rounded;
there is a tendency towards unrounding. The quality is that of a relaxed, slightly lowered and
centralized and does not normally occur before //.

/:/

Examples:
Er, err-her
Ur, urr-turn
Ir, yr, sir
W+or-word
Ear-earth
Our-journey
Description- is articulated with the centre of the tongue raised between close-mid and open-mid,
no firm contact being made between the tongue and upper molars; the lips are neutrally spread.
The quality is remote from all peripheral Cardinal Vowels values.
The quality of /:/ often coincides with that of //, the differences between the two being only
one length. Since /:/ usually occurs in accented syllables and // in unaccented allophones of the
same phoneme.

//

Examples: may be spelt with most vowel letters and their combinations.
Description- // has a very high frequency of occurrence in unaccented syllables. Its quality is
that of a central vowel with neutral lip position, having in non-final positions a tongue-raising
between open-mid and close-mid.

16

Intersegmental co-ordination
Laver, Chapter 12
As serial elements of a multisegmental utterance of continuous speech, all segments have
contextual neighbours. The articulatory events that make up the segment concerned have to be
co-ordinated with those of the neighbouring context. The articulation of segments can therefore
show a variety of co-ordinatory relationships.
THE DEVOICING PROCESS
The timing of voicing is one of the examples of intersegmental co-ordination. When the voicing
for a given segment starts late, or ends early, in the above terms, it is said to be partially
devoiced. When the voicing stars late, the segments is said to be initially devoiced. When the
voicing ends early, the segment is said to be finally devoiced.
Instances of different onset and offset timing of voicing within segments can be seen in the
relationship between voicing and alveolar friction in the realizations of /z/ in different contexts in
English (RP). I utterance-initial zoo /zu:/, voicing for the alveolar fricative /z/ typically beings (in
most accents) slightly later than the alveolar friction, showing initial devoicing. This late onset
can be bought of as an accent-specific accommodation of phonatory behaviour to the preceding
silence.
A distinction can be drawn between full voicing for a segment, where voicing lasts for the whole
duration of the segment and partial voicing where it lasts for only part of the segments duration.
A small problem of analysis needs to be clarified at this point. When considering the onset and
offset of segments internal to an utterance, one segments offset transition overlaps with the
onset of the next segment. It may be helpful to emphasize that the boundaries of the medial
phase of approximants and other vocoids are less distinctly identifiable than those stops and
fricatives. In a stop segment, the medial phase lasts from the first to the last instant of complete
closure. Ina fricative segment, the medial phase lasts from the first to the last instant of close
approximation and audible friction.
It becomes possible to say that for a stop or a fricative to have full voicing, this voicing must be
in evidence throughout the medial phase of segment. Any devoicing of stops or fricatives
therefore has to involve an absence of devoicing during some part of the medial phase of such
segment. In approximants and other vocoids, full voicing must involve continuous voicing
throughout onset, medial and offset phases.
First, there is an obvious phonological basis for identifying some particular segment as being
devoiced that is, as having lost the voicing that in some sense belongs to the phonetic
manifestation of that phonological unit in other contexts and other circumstances. Second a
question is prompted about whether devoiced and voiceless segments are phonetically identical
in all respects. One possible ground for maintaining that they are not identical would be that
when a segment is fully voiced, various phonetic features have different values than when the
corresponding voiceless segment is produced. The differences of overall muscular effort have
been posited as the basis for a distinction that is sometimes drawn between Fortis sounds with
high overall muscle tension (normally voiceless) and lenis sounds with low overall muscle tension
(normally voiced).
DEVOICING AS AN ALLOPHONIC PROCESS
Devoicing is a very common allophonic process in many languages, in the circumstances where
a VOICED consonant finds itself next to a voiceless segment. The process is often constrained to
apply under the influence of preceding context, or only succeeding context.
ASPIRATION
This is a particular type of late onset of voicing which occurs only syllable-initially. Aspiration is a
feature which can manifest a co-ordinary relationship between a voiceless segment and a
17

following voiced segment at the leading edge of the syllable. Aspiration is sometimes called
voice-onset delay. The phonetic diacritic for transcribing aspiration is a small superscript h place
to the right of the aspirated segment followed by a voiced one.
The auditory quality of the aspiration is strongly coloured by the articulatory quality of the
second segment. This reflects the fact that the relevant articulators are typically already in
position for this second process.
In RP aspiration is an allophonic feature, that it is contextually predictable. The allophones of
voiceless plosives which occur a syllable-initial position in stressed syllables and which are
followed by a syllable-nuclear voiced segment are all aspirated. The words tall, pall and call have
all aspirated plosives. The plosives in spy, sty and sky are unspirated for the phonological reason
that they are not initially in their syllables.
Pre-aspiration
Voiceless has been characterised as a co-ordinatory relationship between a voiceless segments
followed by a voiced one. An analogous feature is occasionally found as a mirror image process
in syllable-final sequences where a syllable-nuclear voiced segment precedes a syllable-marginal
voiceless segment. This involves early offset of normal voicing in the syllable-nuclear voiced
segment, anticipating the voicelessness of the syllable-final voiceless segment. It is called preaspiration.
Co-ordination of the marginal phases of stop segments
Stops also participate in a wide range of co-ordinary relationships with adjacents, in several
different types of articulary co-ordination, all involving one or both of the marginal phases of the
stop.
Release and non-release of stop segments
There are two contextual circumstances in which stops may optionally be incomplete. The first is
where the stop is followed by another stop. An example of English would be stacked, where
speakers have two options. The first option is to release the velar closure for /k/ before making
the alveolar closure for /t/. The second option is to make the alveolar closure for the initial /t/
before releasing the velar closure for /k/, so that the release of /k/ would be auditorily
incomplete. It is incomplete in the sense that the compressed air behind the velar closure is
prevented from causing an audible explotion by the alveolar closure in front being already
established. Oral stops lacking an audible explotion at the release phase can be called
unreleased stops.
If the two stops are homorganic, that is, they made the same place of articulation, the second
stop is by definition incomplete, in lacking its onset phase. Some of the most widespread
examples of this are found in homorganic sequences of nasal followed by an oral stop.
The second circumstance in which a stop may be incomplete is where, as an alternative to final
release, an utterance final stop is unexploited.
Lateral and central release of oral stop segments
When an oral stop is followed immediately by a segment made with a lateral aspect of
articulation and which is homorganic in place of articulation, there are two co-ordinatory options
for the releasing offset phase of the stop. The air which is compressed during the medial close
phase of the stop segment can be released before the central contact for homorganic lateral
segment is made.
Lateral release is frequent in many accent is frequent in many accents of English in homorganic
sequences of stop plus lateral, even across word boundaries.
Oral and nasal release of oral stop segments
When there are two homorganic stops in sequence, the first which is oral and the second nasal,
as in English hidden, the air which is compressed during the closure phase of the oral stop can be
released two different options of co-ordinatory control.
18

The second type of release is through the nasal cavity, and can be referred to as nasal released.
It can also be called nasal plosion. In nasal release the oral closure for the first stop is maintained
through the closure phase of the second, contact being made only once, and it is the lowering of
the velum that permits the escape of the compressed air. The nasal stop involved in nasal
released is always incomplete, since by definition it is homorganic with the preceding oral stop
and therefore lacks onset phase.

Affrication of stop segments

When a stop is followed by a contoid, the release of the air compressed during the medial phase
of the stop normally occurs very rapidly, and it makes its explosive exit to the outside
atmosphere so quickly that the moment of release is characterised by a burst of acoustic energy
that is only very short-lived. The release of the stop in its offset phase is simultaneous with the
onset phase of the contoid that follows, making up the shared overlap phase between the
adjacent segments. There is, however, another phonetic option of co-ordinatory control which
can be exercised in this overlap phase between the two segments. It consists of prolonging the
release of compressed air during the overlap phase, by allowing the active articulator to pass
slightly more slowly through the zone of close approximation before reaching the stricture of
open approximation for the medial phase of the contoid. The brief period of audible release
friction that results has a perceptible duration, and is necessarily homorganic with the place of
articulation for the stop. The phonetic process of making the overlap phase between a stop and
the following articulation audibly and momentarily fricative is called affrication.
PRE-AFFRICATION OF STOP SEGMENTS
Pre-affrication is a property of ordinatory relationship between two segments (a vocoid and a
following oral stop). The onset phase of the stop is made briefly but audibly fricative in the
transition to full closure.
The phonetic differentiation of a pre-affricated stop of this sort from a sequence of an
independent fricative followed by an oral stop will normally be a matter of relative duration.
CO-ORDINATORY FEATURES IN CLICK RELEASES
Some of the most complex co-ordinatory actions occur at the release of velaric ingressive click
articulations. The initiation of a velaric ingressive airstream involves two closures (one posterior
and one interior) which have to be released in the overlap phase with the next segment. The
release of the anterior closure normally takes place while the posterior closure is still being
maintained, so that co-ordinary options such as affrication can be applied to either stage of
release.
- If affrication is applied to an anterior lingual release, then this may take the form of central
or lateral frication.
- If the affrication is a characteristic of the posterior release, then the local friction will
normally be central, and will be velar or uvular.
The phonatory complement of clicks can potentially take any form from voicelessness to normal,
whispery, breathy or creaky voicing. It is also straightforward to accompany a click with a glottal
stop, to prolong the stop beyond the supraglottal release stages of the click, or to make the
posterior closure of the click into velar ejective or implosive or voiced implosive stop. Clicks can
therefore be voiced, voiceless, whispery voiced or creaky voiced and can involve a velar or
uvular ejective or implosive element.
Click accompaniments are all the phenomena described so far that can be related to the
activities of the posterior element of click formation.
Affrication, aspiration and nasal release qualify as options of co-ordination.
ARTICULATORY FEATURE SHARING
19

Neighboring segments exercise a certain degree of mutual influence on each others articulatory
characteristics. This influence can be extended to a number of different levels of analysis.
- Phonetically, adjacent segments can show an articulatory feature-copying process at
work as part of their accommodation to their occurrence in the particular context.
- Phonologically, segments can show an (optional) mutual influence being exercised across
word-boundaries in assimilation.
Segment harmony is a phonological phenomenon which constrains the choice of segments
within a word to either of two mutually exclusive sets, each characterized by one or more shared
phonological feature(s). This phenomenon is usually called vowel harmony or consonant
harmony.
CO-ARTICULATORY FEATURE SPREADING
Accommodation of at least some of the articulatory characteristics of any segment to those of its
contextual neighbors reflects inherent principles of strategic neuromuscular control.

*Sagital cross-sections of the vocal organs during the production of the medial closure phases of:
(a) a voiceless pre-velar stop [k];
(b) a voiceless post-velar stop [k];
(c) a voiceless fully velar stop [k].

The pronunciation of the two English (RP) words keys /kiz/ and cars /kz/ can be transcribed
phonetically as /kiz/ and /kz/. The pronunciations reflect a tendency, present in all languages,
for accommodations of place and aspect of articulations to occur between adjacent segments
within the same syllable.
The accommodatory adjustments visible in the transcribed examples can be thought of as
spreading of articulatory features from one segment to another. The detailed place of
articulation of the [k] segments in both cases is an anticipatory copy to some degree of that for
the following vocoid, with the advanced, pre-velar [k] anticipating the front tongue-body position
for [i] and the post velar [k] anticipating the back tongue-body position for [].
Lip position is also anticipated in an accommodatory way [cool] [keel].
Velic position participates in feature-copying in a similar way. In the English words [seen] and
[soon], the velic position for the syllable-final [n] is anticipated during the production of both
vocoids, though the effect here is less strong, with the velum opening before alveolar closure for
the [n] is reached, but late in the course of production of the vocoids.
The co-ordinatory phenomenon of accommodatory spreading of articulatory features of this sort
has come to be known as co-articulation.
- The term anticipatory co-articulation will be used to mean the articulatory influence
exercised by a segment on segments that precede in an utterance.
- Perseverative co-articulation will be the term used for the articulatory influence
exercised by a segment on segments that follow the utterance.
20

Co-articulatory feature-copying makes the segments involved more similar to each other than
they are in other contexts.
Te timing and degree of labial co-articulation also differs from speaker to speaker, and from
language to language.
The articulatory aspect of retroflexion involves the tongue tip/blade being curled upwards, and
this action must be complemented before the medial phase of the segment chiefly concerned.
A co-articulatory phenomenon complementarily related to that of retroflexion is the effect in
certain languages of segments with a tapped aspect of articulation. In most tapped segments,
the tongue hits the passive articulator at a perpendicular angle. In a minority of types of tapped
stops, however, there is a tendency for the tongue tip/blade to strike the alveolar ridge on an
oblique rather than a perpendicular angle, and to follow a retracting trajectory after making
momentary closure. The consequence of this action is ti inject a certain degree of retroflexion on
the following segment.
The timing of the phonetic features involved in co-articulatory action does not respect segmental
boundaries.
In co-articulation, articulatory features by definition spread across more than one segment. This
is also precisely the major attribute of a setting where a setting is characterized as and
articulatory property shared by to or more segments which are either adjacent or in close
proximity.
The segmental domain of co-articulatory settings tends to vary with the type of setting involved.
- The co-articulatory setting with the smallest span is the adjustment of tongue position,
which seems typically to exercise its chief effect within the syllable.
- The velic setting of nasality can cross both syllable and word boundaries.
- A co-articulatory labial setting seems to have the longest potential segmental span.
FEATURE COPYING IN ASSIMILATION
Assimilation is seen as an optional process consisting of one segment exercising a modifying
influence on the articulatory or phonatory characteristics of another segment across a wordboundary, or across the boundary between the components of a compound word. The influence
can be exercised in a forward direction along the chain of speech, from a segment at the end of
one word to a segment at the beginning of the next, as an instance of perspective
assimilation. When the influence is exercised in the other direction, from a segment at te
beginning of one word to a segment at the end of the preceding word is an instance of
anticipatory assimilation. The fact of assimilation is established by comparison with the form
of the word when pronounced in isolation. The segments can be made more similar in terms of
phonation, place of articulation, nasal aspect of articulation, or degree of stricture.
The original alveolar fricative [s] has become a palate-alveolar fricative [], in response to the
influence of the palatal approximant [j].
An example of an anticipatory assimilation in English involving a change from an oral to a nasal
aspect of articulation is the pronunciation of good morning (canonically /gd mn/) as [gm
mn]
Another type of assimilation is the case where both segments change their characteristics, under
their mutual influence across the word boundary, which Gimson refers to as coalescence. This
coalescent assimilation would involve adjustments of phonation type, place of articulation and
degree of stricture, in that the normal voiced palatal approximant [j] in year would be replaced
by a voiceless palate alveolar fricative, as well as the normal voiceless alveolar fricative [s] in
this being replaced by a voiceless palate-alveolar fricative [].
SEGMENTAL HARMONY
Is a phonological phenomenon where there is a phonotactic restriction of choice of the type of
segments that can co-occur in a word, or sometimes in a morphological component of a word,
such that the segments have to be chosen from either one or another of two entirely or largely
exclusive sets. This phenomenon is usually called vowel harmony or consonant harmony.
21

22

Diphthongs
Cruttenden, Chapter 8
DIPHTHONGAL VOWEL GLIDES
The sequences of vocalic elements included under the term diphthong are those which form a
glide within one syllable. They may be said to have a first element and a second element.
Most of the length and stress associated with the glide in concentrated on the first element, the
second element being only lightly sounded (/ / and //); diphthong of this type are said to be
falling.
They are equivalent in length to the long (pure) vowels and are subject to the same variations of
quantity. The reduced forms show a considerable shortening of the first element.
They are particularly susceptible to variation regionally and socially. Even within RP, considerable
variation is possible both elements.
No diphthong occurs before //.
Within the exception of //, the RP diphthongs principally derive from earlier pure vowels.

/e/

Examples:
a-ape
ai-waist
ea-great
ay-day
ei, ey-eight
Description: The glide begins from slightly below the close-mid front position and moves in the
direction of RP //, there being a slight closing movement of the lower jaw; the lips are spread.

/a/

Examples:
i-time
ie-die
y, ye-cry
igh, eigh-high
Description: The glide of RP /a/ begins at a point slightly behind the front open position, and
moves in the direction of the position associated with RP //. The starting point may be similar to
the articulation used in RP //. The lips change from a neutral to a loosely spread position.

//

Examples:
oi-boil
oy-boy
Description: For RP // the tongue glide begins at a point between the open-mid and open back
positions and moves in the direction of //, generally not reaching a level closer. The tongue
movement extends from back to centralized front, but the range of closing in the glide is not as
great as for / a/; the jaw movement, though considerable, may not, therefore, be as marked as
in the case of / a/. The lips are open rounded for the first element, changing to neutral for the
second.

//

Examples:
23

o-so
oe-toe
ow-know
oa-oak
ou-soul
Description: The glide of RP // begins at a central position, between close-mid and open-mid,
and moves in the direction of RP //, there being a slight closing movement to the lower jaw; the
lips are neutral for the first element, but have a tendency to round on the second element. The
starting point may have a tongue position similar to that described for /:/.

/a/

Examples:
Ou-house
Ow-allow
Description: The glide of RP /a/ begins at a point between the back and front open positions,
slightly more fronted than the position for RP /:/ and moves in the direction of RP //, though the
tongue may not be raised higher than the close mid level. The glide is much more extensive than
that used for /a/ and is symmetrically opposed to the front glide of /a/. The lips change from a
neutrally open to a weakly rounded position.
DIPHTHONGS +
All the preceding diphthongal glides /e, a, , , a/ are FALLING (i.e. have decreasing
prominence, indicated by a longer first element and not to be confused with the falling pitch of
intonation) and CLOSING (i.e. gliding from a more open to a closer position); three of them /a, ,
o/, require an extensive movement of the tongue.
DIPHTHONGS +
CENTRING DIPHTHONGS /,

e,/

//
Examples:
Er, err-material
Ear, eer-dear
Ia-materail
Ea-idea
Eu, eo, eou-museum
Ie-soviet
Io, iou- period
Iu-medium
Description: begins with a tongue position approximately that used for //, i.e. close-mid and
centralized from front, and moves in the direction of the more open variety of // when // is
final in the word. The lips are neutral throughout, with a slight movement from spread to open.

/e/
Examples:
Ar, are-rarity
Air-air, chair
Ear-bear, pear
Description: the glide begins in the open-mid front position, and moves in the direction of the
more open variety of //, especially when the diphthong is final; where /e/ occurs in word-medial
position, the element tends to be of a mid type. The lips are neutrally open throughout.
24

//

Examples:
Oor-poor
Our-tour
Ure-pure
Ur-curious
Ue, ua-cruel
Description: RP // glides from a tongue position similar to that used for // towards the more
open type of // which forms the end-point of all three Centring diphthongs with, again, a
somewhat closer variety of when the diphthong occurs in word-medial position. The lips are
weakly rounded at the beginning of the glide, becoming neutrally spread as the glide progresses.

25

Words in connected speech

Cruttenden, Chapter 12
CITATION FORMS AND CONNECTED SPEECH
The word (consisting of one or several morphemes) is, like the phoneme, an abstraction from this
continuum and must be expected to be realized in phonetically different ways according to the
context, the various allophonic (phonetic) realizations of the abstract unit know as the phoneme.
The word constitutes a separable linguistic reality for the speaker. It must be considered as an
abstraction on a higher level than the phoneme.
If the word is admitted as an abstracted linguistic unit, Its important to note the differences
between its concrete realization when said in isolation, and those which it has when, in
connected speech, it s subjected to the pressures of its sound environment or the accentual or
rhythmic group of which it forms part. The variations involved may affect the word as a whole.
NEUTRALIZATION OF WEAK FORMS
A number of function words may have different pronunciations according to whether they are
accented (or said in isolation) or are unaccented. Such is the reduction and obscuration of the
unaccented forms that words which are phonetically and phonemically distinct when said in
isolation may be neutralized under weak accent.
VARIATION IN THE ACCENTUAL PATTERNS OF WORDS
When a word (simple or compound) pattern consists in isolation of primary accent preceded by a
secondary accent , the primary accent may be lost, if, in connected speech, a strong accent
follows closely.
Example: thir`teen, but thirteen `pounds
The secondary accent in the word rather than the primary may be lost when another word with
secondary accent immediately precedes.
Example: eight thir` teen; near West` minster
In English, there is a tendency to avoid adjacent accented syllables. Its in order to avoid the
placing of primary accents on adjacent syllables that accent shift occurs in phrases such as
Chinese `restaurant (but Chi`nese).
Where the accents are separated by an unaccented syllable, the accent shift is optional.
PHONEMIC AND PHONETIC VARIATIONS AT BOUNDARIES
Allophonic variations
The same types of allophonic variation, involving a change of place of articulation, voicing, lip
position, or position of the soft palate, may be found within the word and also at words
boundaries:
Place of articulation
- Within a word:
/t/ - post-alveolar in try (influence of /r/)
Dental in eight (influence of //)
/k/ - advanced (pre-velar) in key (influence of i: )
/n/ - dental in tenth (influence of //)
/m/ - labiodentals in nymph, infant (influence of /f/ )
// - retracted in result (influence of /l/ )
/u/ - centralized in music (influence of /j/ )
- At words boundaries:
/t/ - dental in not that (influence of // )
/d/ - dental in hide them (influence of // )
26

/m/ - labiodentals in ten forks, come for me (influence of /f/ )

/s/ - retracted in this road (influence of /r/ )
Voice devoicing of continuants following a voiceless consonant
- Within a word:
- /l,r,w, j/ - devoiced following voiceless consonants. Eg: cry, quite, queu
- /m,n, / - slightly devoiced following voiceless consonants. Eg: smoke, snow. Open / upm/
- At words boundaries (only in close-knit sequences):
- /l,r,w, j/ devoiced following voiceless consonants in close-knit sequences.
Example: at last / ` tlst/
Note algo the devoincing of word-final voiced plosive or fricative consonants before silence, and
of fricatives when followed by a voiceless consonant: and of word-initial voiced fricative or
plosive consonants when preceded by silence.
Lip position under the influence of adjacent vowels or semi-vowels
- Within a word:
Examples:
Lip spread
Lip rounded
/p/
pea, heap
pool, hoop, upward
/t/
tea, beat
two, boot, twice, outward
/k/
keep, speak
cool, spook, quite, backward
/m/
mean, seem
moon, loom, somewhat
/n/
knee, seen
noon, onward
/k/
leave, feel
bloom, fool, always
/r/
read
rude
/f/
feel, leaf
fool, roof
/s/
seat, geese
soon, goose, sweep
//
sheet, leash
shoot, douche, dishwasher
/h/
he
who, etc.
- At word boundaries (only in close-knit sequences):
Examples: /t, k, n, , l, s/ are somewhat labialized in cases such as that one, wrong one, this way,
the syllables with initial /w/ carrying no accent;
A rounded vowel (as opposed to semi-vowel) in an adjacent words does not seem to exert the
same labializing influence. Example: /u:/ does no labialized /s/ markedly in who said that?
Nasal resonance - resulting particularly from regressive but also from progressive lowering of
the soft palate in the vicinity of a nasal consonant.
- Within a word:
Nasalization of vowel preceding /m/ in ham and /n/ in and, of vowel between nasal consonants
in man, men, and sort of short vowels on each side of the nasal consonant in any, sunny,
summer, singer, also /l/ in situations such as helmet, wrongly; and possible slight nasalization of
vowel following /m, n/, as in meal, now.
- At word boundaries:
Vowels may sometimes be nasalized somewhat by the boundary nasal consonant of an adjacent
word, especially when an adjacent nasal consonant also occurs in the word containing the vowel.
Example: the first // bring another .
However, sometimes it occurs with no adjacent nasal consonant in the word containing the vowel
(usually unaccented). Example: / / in come along.
Approximants may also be nasalized by a nasal in an adjacent word. Example: /l/ in tell me.
27

Phonemic variations
There are different pronunciations for a same word. From a diachronic point of view, a phonemic
change within a word may sometimes be attributable to the combinatory pressures exerted on a
phoneme by the word environment. Example : by labialization
Voiced and voiceless variations
Word-final voiced fricatives followed by a word-initial voiceless consonant may with some
speakers be realized as the corresponding voiceless fricatives, if the two words form part of a
close-knit group.
A long vowel or a diphthong may be realized in the reduced form appropriate to a syllable closed
by a voiceless consonant.
The week form of is or has is /s/ or /z/ according to the final consonant of the preceding word.
Example: the cats paw , the cats gone VS the dogs gone
Nasality and Labialization
Phonetic assimilations involving nasality (i.e. anticipation or perseveration of the lowered soft
palate) would be likely to show /b/ (or /v/) /m/, /d/ (or /z/ or / /) /n/, /g/ / /, such changes
based on roughly homorganic mouth articulations; nasalization of the other sounds. Example: /l/
or vowels, is never phonemic, there being no nasalized counterpart with approximately
homorganic mouth articulation. This may happen within alveolars, especially adjacent to the
negative nt.
/d n/ -- He wouldnt do it [hi wnn(t) du t] Good news [gn njuz]
/d g / -- He wouldnt go [hi w(k) g]
/d b m/ -- Good morning [gm mn]
/v m/ -- You can have mine [ju k hm man]
/z n/ -- He doesnt know [hi dnn(t) n]
/ n/ -- He wasnt there [hi wn(t) ne] To win the race [t wn n res]
The extension of labialization produces no changes of a phonemic kind, since lip-position is not a
distinctive feature opposing any two phonemes in RP.
Example: / / and / / come nearest to having an opposition of lip action, but the lip-rounding
for / / is very slight and open and, in any case, there is some difference of tongue position and
considerable difference of length.
VARIATIONS OF PLACE
Regressive (or anticipatory) assimilation
Word final /t, d, n, s, z/ readily assimilate to the place of the following word-initial consonant
whilst retaining the original voicing.
/t, d, n/ are replaces by bilabials before bilabial consonants and by velars before velar
consonants.
/s, z/ are replaced by palato-alveolars before consonants containing a palatal feature.
Examples:
/t/ /p/ before /p, b, m / eg. That pen, that boy, that man [p pen, p b, p mn]
/k/ before /k, g/ eg. That cup, that girl [k kp, k gl]
/d/ /b/ before /p, b, m/ eg. Good pen, good boy, good man [gb pen, gb b, gb mn]
/g/ before /k, g/ eg. Good concert, good girl [gg knst, gg gl]
/n/ /m/ before /p. b, m/ eg. Ten players, ten boys, ten men [tem plez, tem bz, tem men]
/n/ / / before /k, g/ eg. Ten cups, ten girls [te kps, te glz]
Assimilations to alveolars and between labials and velars are generally felt to be substandard in
RP.
28

/s/ / / before / , , , j/ eg. This shop, cross channel, this judge, this year [ p, kr nl,
s j]
/z/ / / before / , , , j/ eg. Those young men [ j men] cheese shop [i p]
Other assimilations involving fricatives are generally felt to be substandard in RP, although
/
/ // may assimilate to /s,z/ in fast speech.
Alveolars have a high frequency of occurrence in word-final position, so their assimilation leads
to many neutralizations in connected speech or, with a neutralization to a labiodental
articulation.
When alveolar consonants /t,d,n/ are adjacent in clusters or sequences susceptible to
assimilation, all (or none) of them will undergo assimilation.
Coalescence of /t,d,s,z/ with /j/
The process which had led historically to earlier /t,d,s,z/ + /j/ giving / / / / / / / / medially in a
word(ex. Nature) may operate in contemporary colloquial speech at word boundaries.
Example:
/t/ + /j/ - what you want / w u: wnt /
Progressive
Assimilation is relatively uncommon. It rhay occur when a plosive is followed by a syllabic nasal
and the nasal undergoes assimilation to the same place of articulation as the preceding plosive.
Example: /n/ /m/ after /p,b/ happen
Elision
Sounds may be elided in fast colloquial speech, especially at or in the vicinity of word
boundaries.
Vowels
Allophonic variation when one syllable ends with a closing diphthong and the next syllable
begins with a vowel, the second element of the diphthong may be elided. It may result in
neutralization.
Phonemic elision Initial / / is often elided, particularly when followed by a continuant and
preceded by a Word-final consonant (compensation for the loss of / / frequently being made by
the syllabicity of the continuant.
When final / / occurs with following linking /r/ and word-initial vowel, / / may be elided.
Example: after a while /a:ftr wail/
Consonants
The alveolar plosives are apt to be elided. Such elision appears to take place the most readily
when /t/ or /d/ is the middle one of three consonants. Any consonant may appear in third
position, though elision of alveolar plosive is relatively rare before /h/ and /j/. Thus elision is
common in sequence voiceless continuant + /t/ or voiced continuant + /d/ followed by a word
with an initial consonant.
The final clusters /-nt, -lt/ are less prone to elision.
Elision of the final /t/ or /d/ is rarer before initial /h/.
Final /t,d/ followed by a word beginning with /j/ are usually kept in coalesced form. Example: //
and / / - help you, liked you.
Liaison
Linking /r/
/r/ acts as a linking form when the following word begins with a vowel.
The vowel endings to which an /r/ link may, in this sense, justifiably be added are / :,: /, and
those single or complex vowels containing final / / .
29

Prescriptivists seek to limit the allowability of linking /r/ to those cases where there is an /r/ in the
spelling; nevertheless many examples of linking /r/ occur where there is no /r/ in the spelling,
such /r/s being labeled as intrusive.
The focusing of attention on intrusive /r/s as an undesirable speech habit has led to the use by
some speakers of a pause or glottal stop in such cases of vowel hiatus, with the result that, in
avoiding intrusive /r/s, they have also abandoned other linking /r/s in favour of a vowel glide or
glottal stop.
The environment is phonetically comparable whether the /r/ link is inserted before a suffix or
before a separate word and whether it is linking or intrusive.
a) The insertion of /r/ is obligatory before a suffix beginning with a vowel, where the /r/ is
historically justified.
b) The insertion of /r/ is optional, though generally present, before a following word beginning
with a vowel, where the /r/ is historically justified.
c) After / /, even an intrusive /r/ is generally used before a following word. Example: Vodka and
tonic / vdkr n tnk/
d) After / :/ and / :/, an intrusive /r/ is often avoided before following vowel.
Phonetically the resulting /r/ closes the syllable rather than being initial in the text. Example:
the /r/ of more ice / m: r as/ is shorter than that of more rice / m: ras/.
Linking / j,w/
In vocalic junctures where the first word ends in/i:/, / /, / e/, / a/ , or / o/, a slight linking / j/ may
be heard between the two vowels.
There are minimal pairs which illustrate the difference between linking [ j] and phonemic / j/. Eg,
my years [ma j z] I earn [a j n]
A linking [] may be heard between a final /u:/, //, and /a/ and a following vowel.
Example: /wnd pn/.
In yet another possibility, the linking [] may be replaced by a glottal stop. This is most common
before a vowel beginning an accented syllable. However, glottal stop in such cases is not so
often used as in some other languages.
As regards boundaries where a consonant precedes a vowel, it is unusual for a word-final
consonant to be carried over as initial in a word beginning with an accented vowel.
Juncture
Despite the fact that the word may have its isolate-form identity considerably modified by its
immediate phonemic and accentual context, both as regards constituent sounds and its
accentual or rhythmic pattern, phonetics features may be retained in the speech continuum
which mark word or phoneme boundaries. Thus, the phonemic sequence / pi:st:ks/ may
means pea stalks or peace talks according to the situation of the word boundaries (that is to
say, /i: + st:/ or /i:s + t:/. In this case, if the boundary occurs between /s/ and /t/, the identity of
the words peace and talks may be established by the reduced /i:/ (in a syllable closed by a fortis
consonant) and by the slight aspiration of /t/ (initial in a syllable carrying a secondary accent).
I scream /a skrim/ : long /a/, strong /s/, little devoicing of /r/
Ice cream /as krim/ : reduced /a/, weak /s/, devoiced /r/
Why choose /wa uz/ : long /a/, short [] as element of //
White shoes /wat uz/ : reduced /a/, long //
A name / nem/ : relatively long /n/ (beginning accent)
An aim /n em/ : relatively short /n/ (accent onset on /e/)
Possibility of glottal stop before /e/
Simple word entities may be distinguished from words composed of separable morphemes:
Nitrate /natret/: devoiced /r/
30

Night-rate /nat ret/: little devoicing of /r/

Illegal / ligl/: clear [l] before vowel
Ill eagle /l igl/: dark [] in word-final position possibility of glottal stop /i/

English phonology
Heinz J. Giegerich

A CHOICE OF REFERENT ACCENTS

The consonant system of English is relatively uniform throughout English-speaking world;
accents of English differ mainly in terms of their vowel systems as well as in the phonetic
realizations of vowel phonemes. (Southern) English, Scotland and United States vowel systems
are standard systems in that they are used by speakers of Standard English rather than by
speakers of nonstandard regional dialects.
Each of them differs from the others in a phonologically interesting way: the discussion and
comparison of the three systems will reveal general properties of the vowel phonology of English.

Three inventories
The Southern British Standard vowel phonemes
Most areas of Southern Britain (that is, excluding Scotland and to some extent the North of
England) share a standard vowel system that is subject to little regional variation. The bestknown manifestation of the Southern British Standard is the one referred to as Received
Pronunciation (RP), an accent that no longer has any regional definition but is, instead, defined in
social terms, RP is the accent spoken, throughout England, by the upper-middle and upper
classes; it is widely used in the private sector on the education system and spoken by most
newsreaders of network BBC.
The vowel phonemes of Scottish Standard English
Scottish Standard English (SSE), the variety of Standard English spoken in Scotland, has few
lexical and syntactic characteristics that set it apart from the Standard English used in England.
SSE is very different from the Scots spoken in the non-Gaelic-speaking part of the country. Scots
is a group of dialects in its own right, with many lexical, syntactic, morphological and
phonological features that distinguish it from Standard English.
SSE is, however, spoken with accents that are quite radically different from any other accent of
Standard English.
The SSE accent is no single accent in Scotland that has the sociolinguistic status of a standard.
But it can be localized at least to some extent. SSE is, roughly, spoken by the middle class of

31

Central Scotland, notably in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Surrounding areas- the Borders and the
North of Scotland- share many but not all of the characteristics of the SSE accent.

The vowel phonemes of General American

General American (GA) is a cover term used for the group of accents in the United States that do
not bear the marked regional characteristics of either the East (more precisely, Eastern New
England and New York City) or the South (mainly from Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia to
Louisiana and Texas). These two areas are easily perceived as linguistically distinct from the rest
of the United States, while the rest- the GA area- appears to be the variety that has no marked
regional characteristics.

ENGLAND
The basic vowel system of RP
RP vowel inventory in terms of pairs:
Bee, beat //-// bit
Bay, bait /e/-/e/ bet
Shah, psalm //-// Sam
Shoe, pool //-// pull
Show, boat //-// butt
Shaw, caught //-// cot, cough
Bite, buy /a/
Bout, brow /a/
Coin, boy //

These pairs can be further structured in terms of the high-low and front-back dimensions. The
members of each pair are phonetically similar to each other. Moreover, the left-hand member of
each pair is realized longer than its right-hand counterpart is in comparable contexts; and the
left-hand member can occur in open syllables while the right-hand one can only occur in closed
syllables.

Some variation
32

The basic vowel system of RP is shared by the majority of Southern British speakers. But there is
some amount of variation among the accents of this linguistics area that is worth noting.

1. Realisational variation: where the number and systematic relationship of the phonemes
are the same and only their phonetic relations differ from one accent to another. Firstly,
London speakers commonly pronounce /i/ as [i] (see), /e/ as [] (say), and /a/ as //
(sigh), and // as [o] (boy). The second example is the variable realization of the
phoneme // in the accents of England. // is realised as a low vowel in RP but as a
considerably higher one in the Midlands and South-West.
2. Phonemic variation: The variability of // does have phonemic consequences in the more
northern parts of England. North Midlands and Northern English accents make no
distinction between // and //. These accents, then, do not have //.
3. Lexical variation: Two accents may share the same system of phonemes, and even their
principal realizations, but they may use different phonemes in different words. Firstly,
some of the Northern English speakers that do not have the //-// contrast pronounce
book and look in such a way that they rhyme with Luke. Such speakers have both /u /
and // (though not normally //), but in certain words they use /u/ where non-Northern
speakers would have //. Such variation is purely a matter of the lexical incidences of
phonemes and has no consequences for the phonemic system itself. The second example
is also a well-know shibboleth of non-Southern speech. Midland and Northern English
speakers have bath as /b/ and similarly past, fast, cast, laugh, etc., with // rather than
/b/. Such speakers do have the // phoneme in father, darn, psalm, etc.
SCOTLAND

The basic Scottish Standard English (SSE) vowel system

SSE has a considerably smaller inventory of vowel phonemes than RP. In this system //, /u /, //
and the true diphthongs (/a/, /a/ and //) are not members of pair phonemes: these phonemes
can all occur in open as well as closed syllables and they do not have counterparts that are
phonetically similar but can occur in closed syllables only.
Comparison with RP

1. Phonemic differences: SSE lacks a pair wise opposition found in RP and has a single
phoneme instead.
SSE
/i/

RP
/i/

SSE
/a/

Beat
33

RP
/a/

Bite

//

//

Bit

/a/

/a/

Bout

/e/
/e/
//

e
/e/
//
//
/u/

Bait

//

//

Boy

//

Pull

//

//

Boat

//

//

Butt

//

//

Caught

//

Cot

/u/

Bet
Psalm
Sam
Pool

These phonemes differences between RP and SSE are, in the broader framework of accent
variation in mainland Britain, rather surprising in that they are unparalleled by differences
between RP and Northern English accents. In part the Northern of England, the Southern (RP) / /
is absent. This phoneme is maintained further north in SSE, while the contrasts that SSE does
collapse are all undamaged south of the Scottish border. This observation shows that the Scottish
border is a rather sharp linguistic divide: derivation from the RP vowel system that are found in
Scotland are not a continuation of derivations already found in the North of England but from a
pattern in their own right.

2. Realisational differences:
- /e/ and // have diphthongal realizations in RP -[/e/][//]- while in SSE they are pure
monothongs.
- The vowel //, while corresponding in systemic terms to RP // is usually produced further
front than its RP counterpart is.
- The SSE phoneme /u/ is considerably further forward than its RP counterpart but as rounded.
- The true diphthongs /a/ and // of SSE have higher and more central starting points than their
RP counterparts and are usually realised as [], [] respectively.
A mayor realisational difference between RP and SSE concerns the length of vowels. In each of
the RP pairs of vowels, one member is significantly longer than the other in comparable contexts.
SSE has no such length differentiation among its vowels not even within the pairs that it
remains: the vowels in beat and boat, bait and bet, etc., are all of the same length, compared to
RP vowels, they are all short. In SSE, the members of such pairs are distinct in terms of quality
alone while in RP they differ in terms of quality as well as length. It is not actually the case that
all SSE vowels are, whatever they occur, of the same length: many (but not all) SSE vowel
phonemes have long and short allophones. Vowels are realised long before voiced fricatives, /r/
and in word-final position; elsewhere, they are short. This rule is known as Scottish Vowel34

Length Rule, which governs vowels length in all members of the basic system except // and //
and /e/, which are short in all contexts.

THE UNITED STATES

Bee, beat //-// bit

Bay, bait /e/-/e/ bet
Shah, psalm //-// Sam
Shoe, pool //-// pull
Show, boat //-// butt
Shaw, caught //
Bite, buy /a/
Bout, brow /a/
Coin, boy //
In each of the pairs, the left hand member is in comparable contexts longer than its phonetically
similar counterpart on the right and can occur in open syllables. // and the true diphthongs are
not members of pairs: all of these can occur in open syllables and none has a phonetically similar
counterpart that can occur in closed syllables only.

Comparison with Received Pronunciation

1. Phonemic difference: RP has //, which constitutes a pair with //. GA does not have this
phoneme.
2. Lexical differences: In addition to the difference in the lexical incidence of // caused by the
absence of // in the GA,
There is a difference in the lexical distribution of // and // between GA and RP. Both accents
have // and // but some words that have // in RP have // in GA. Thus, bath, fast, cast, laugh
and many other words have // in GA but // in RP. There are a number of further lexical
difference between GA and RP, they are sporadic and largely resist generalization. Some of the
best-known examples are: tomato (/e/ in GA, // in RP), leisure (// for many GA speakers, /e/
in RP), neither (// in GA, /a/ for most RP speakers), lever (/e/ for many GA speakers, // in RP),
progress (// in GA, // in RP) compost (// in the second syllable in GA, // in RP), wrath (// in
GA, // in RP)

35

Some variation
The phonemic contrast of // and // is not as clear cut in GA as the other contrast in the vowel
system are. Dog has generally // but cog generally //. Similar words such as fog, log, hog, etc.,
tend to have // in the North and // in the Midlands of the United States, and the same holds
for ma and pa. Water has // in the South and // elsewhere.
For some GA speakers, however, // and // are not separate phonemes. For such speakers,
many of whom are found in the West of the United States.

VOWELS AND /r/

Rhotic and /r/

Speaking in purely historical terms, the peculiarities of the RP vowel system in this context were
caused by the loss of rhyme-/r/. It is important to bear in mind that present-day RP simply does
not have /r/ in words like here, sure, sport, etc.
Accents of English that have /r/ in syllable rhymes often called postvocalic position- are called
rhotic accents; accents that do not have /r/ in this context are Nonrhotic. RP is Nonrhotic, as are
the Australian, New Zealand, South African and some east coast and Southern American accents.
GA, SSE and some English West Country accents, to name a few, are rhotic.

Scottish Standard English

In SSE, the vowel phonemes occurring before rhyme-/r/ are the same as those found in the basic
SSE system. However, the phonemes //, /e/, and //are unstable in this context: some speakers
rhyme word and bird (having // in both), and in addition some SSE speakers have no phonemic
contrast between these two and heard.

GENERAL AMERICAN
In GA, word, bird and heard rhyme. Again we use the symbol // for the central vowel present in
all three words.
Few GA speakers have the /r/-/or/ contrast in short-sport; many rhyme these two words but
many nevertheless maintain the contrast in morning-mourning.
36

RECEIVED PRONUNCIATION
RP in non-rhotic; it does no permit /r/ to occur in syllabic rhymes. In addition to the basic vowel
system, RP has the following vowel phonemes: /r/ in here, beer; /e/ in hair, bear;
// in sure, cure. These phonemes are referred to as the centring diphthongs of RP.
Nonrhotic accents do have postvocalic /r/ if it is at the same time part of a syllable onset rather
than a rhyme; in other words, if it is intervocalic. Thus, words such as hearing, herring, hurry,
etc., contain /r/ in RP as they do, of course, in all other accents.
Intervocalic /r/ occurs in RP not just in the middle of words, in connected speech, it is also found
in word-final position if the next word begins with a vowel. Infar and wide, for example, /r/ occurs
in connected speech, similarly, /r/ occurs in here and there, sure of, etc. In such cases, /r/ forms a
syllable with the following vowel in connected speech and therefore occurs in a syllable onset.
The phenomenon of /r/ occurring in this context is usually referred to as linking /r/.
In addition, /r/ can be inserted intervocalic ally where it is not for historical reasons expected;
that is, where it is not presented in the spelling. Such intrusive /r/ is found in word-final position
in phrases such as Shah of Persia, law and order, the idea is, etc.

UNESTRESSED AND LOW-STRESSED SYLLABLES: SCHWA AND SOME OTHER VOWEL.

When a word consists of more than one syllable, only one syllable will bear full stress, in
unstressed syllables, the range of vowel contrasts is severely restricted.
The most common vowel in unstressed position is the central vowel //. Often referred to as
schwa. Schwa is, in terms of articulation, neither high nor low, neither front nor back. It is a
vowel produced with a neutral setting of the articulators and is in this respect a minimal vowel,
involving, as it does, no displacement of the articulators from the neutral position. Schwa can
occur in open and closed syllables (sofa, China, London) word initially (about, oblige, affect),
work medially and word-finally.
The realization or // is subject to some variation in all accents. On the whole, it is lower in wordinitial position (sofa) than it is word-medially. This is especially true for SSE, where the final
vowels in sofa, China, as well as the initial vowels in about. Alert, etc., have a phonetic quality
rather similar to //.

SOME MORE ACCENTS OF ENGLISH

Australian, New Zealand and South African English
These three accents may be grouped together in that all three of them are typologically closer to
RP than to GA or SSE in one sense and closer to RP and GA than to SSE in another sense. Firstly,
all three of them are Nonrhotic like RP but unlike GA and SSE. And secondly, in all three accents,
pairs of vowel phonemes such as the ones in beat-bit, bait-bet etc, display distinctive vowel
37

length, which makes them conform with the RP/GA type but not with the type presented in SSE:
as we saw earlier, RP and GA have distinctive vowel length as well as distinctive vowel quality,
while in SSE such pairs of vowel phonemes are distinct in terms of quality alone.

Australian and New Zealand English

There no major phonemic differences between those accents and RP: both the Australian and
with one possible exception- the New Zealand basic vowel system are the same as the RP one, if
only in terms of the number of phonemes they contain.
All nonlow long vowels have typically diphthongal realisations- a feature that may also be
observed as a tendency in RP. The typical realisations of these phonemes are roughly, as follows:
/
/ []
/a/ [o]

Of the long low vowels, // displays no notable difference from its RP counterpart; bit the
Australian/new Zealand counterpart of RP // requires comment. It is a low vowel as in RP, but it
is front rather than back.
Of the short vowels, the back series //, //, // are not significantly different in their typical
realisations from their RP counterparts. But the realisations of the front series (bit, bet, bat), the
last two are significantly higher than they are in RP.

South African English

South African English shares with Australian/new Zealand English the feature of nonrhoticness, as
well as the distinctive vowel length.
In the subsystem of long vowel phonemes, two features distinguish South African English from
other systems with distinctive vowel length. Firstly, the high vowels (beet, boot) are
diphthongised to a far lesser extent that they are in Australian/New Zealand English and perhaps
even in RP. Secondly, the psalm vowel is extremely back (unlike in Australian/New Zealand,
where it is front, and more so than in RP/GA) and for many broad speakers slightly rounded. The
others members of this subsystem are similar in their realisations to their RP counterparts: the
mid vowels (bait, boat) are invariably diphthongised.

Hiberno-English: Southern and Northern

The accents of English spoken in Ireland fall into two distinct groups: Southern and Northern
Hiberno-English. This division is related to the political division between the Republic of Ireland
and the UK province of Northern Ireland. Both are rhotic, and the former is historically derived
38

from Southern (or perhaps South-Western) British accents and is consequently, of the type
represented by RP. The latter group is historically more closely related to Scots and is
typologically on a par with Scottish Standard English in terms of its basic vowel system and also
in the sense that vowel length has no phonemic status.

39

The English Consonants

Cruttenden, Chapter 9
THE DISTINCTIVE CONSONANTS
Those articulations in which there is a total closure or a stricture causing friction, in this class
there is a distinctive opposition between voiceless and voiced types.
Those articulations in which there is only a partial closure or an unimpeded oral or nasal escape
of air; such articulations, typically voiced, and share many phonetic characteristics with vowels.
Bilabial
Labiodental
Dental
Alveolar
Post-alveolar
Palatoalveolar
Palatal
Velar
Glottal

Plosive
p, b

Affricate

Fricative
f, v
,
s, z

t, d
,

Nasal
m

Approx.
(w)

l
r

k, g

j
w

CLASS A: OBSTRUENTS.
PLOSIVES.
(1) The closing stage, during which the articulating organs move together in order to form the
obstruction; in this stage, there is often an on-glide (a transition) audible in a preceding sound
segment.
(2) The compression stage, during which lung action compresses the air behind the closure; this
stage may or may not be accompanied by voice, vibration of the vocal folds.
(3) The release stage, during which the organs forming the obstruction part rapidly, allowing the
compressed air to escape abruptly; if stage (2) is voiced, the vocal fold vibration will continue in
stage (3) if a vowel follows; is stage (2) is voiceless, stage (3) may also be voiceless (aspiration)
before silence or before the onset of voice or stage (3) may coincide with the onset of vocal fold
vibration, as when a voiceless is followed without intervening aspiration bay a vowel; again, an
off-glide (transition) associates the plosive with a following sound.
THE PHONETIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH PLOSIVES.
Initial
Medial

/p/
pole
riper
caper

Final

lopping
rip

/b/

caber
rubber
lobbing
rib

/t/
toll
writer
bitter
cater

/d/
dole
rider
bidder

/k/
coal

/g/
goal

bicker

bigger

locking
rick

rugger
logging
rig

rudder
write

ride

These oppositions may be realized by means of one or several of the following phonetic features:
Place of articulation: /p, b/, generally bilabial: /t, d/, generally alveolar; /k, g/, generally velar.
Force of articulation: /p, t, k/ tend to be pronounced with muscular energy and a stronger
breath effort than /b, d, g/; the former are known as relatively strong or fortis, the latter as
relatively weak or lenis.
Aspiration: The voiceless series /p, t, k/, when initial in unaccented syllable, are usually
accompanied by aspiration, there is a voiceless interval consisting, of strongly spelled breath
40

between the release of the plosive and the onset of a following vowel, e.g. pin, tin, kin. When /l,
r, w, j/, e.g. in please, pray, try, clean, twice, quick, pew, tune, queue; some devoicing may also
occur in relatively unaccented situations, e.g. apricot, atlas, applicant, heckler, buckram,
vacuum. In other positions, preceding a vowel in an unaccented syllable and finally, such
aspiration as may occur is relatively weak, e.g. /p/ in polite, lip, in absolute final positions,
preceding silence, /p, t, k/ may have no audible release. Where a plosive follows /s/ within the
same syllable the distinction between /p, t, k/ on the one hand and /b, d, g/ on the other is
neutralized; the resulting plosives are unaspirated, although they have no voicing in the
compression stage; only the apparent fortis nature of this articulations suggests a preferred
transcription of spin, stop, skin as /spIn, stp, (160)skIn/, rather than /sbIn, sdp, sgIn/.
Voicing: the voiced series /b, d, g/ may have full voiced during their second stage when they
occur in positions between voiced sounds, e.g. in labour, leader, eager, windy, rub out, read it
and to be, to do, to go. In initial and especially in final positions, following or preceding silence,
/b, d, g/, while remaining lenis, may be only partially voiced or completely voiceless, e.g. in bill,
done, game, cub, lid, bag. In these positions
/b, d, g/ are realized as / b, d, /, vocal cord vibration beginning only in the last portion of the
compression stage in initial position and finishing in the first portion of the compression stage in
final position (or having no voicing at all in this stage).
Aspiration and voicing in syllable-initial position can together be regarded as involving
differences in Voice Onset Time (or VOT), the interval between the release burst and the onset of
voicing.

Length of preceding sounds: syllables closed by voiceless consonants are considerably

shorter than those which are open or closed by a voiced consonant. Preceding consonants,
notably /l, n, m/, are also shortened by a following /p, t, k/, especially when the consonants are
themselves preceded by a short vowel. The effect of reduction also operates when /p, t, k/ occur
medially in a word.
Summary: plosives may be said to distinguished:
By means of place of articulation; bilabial vs alveolar vs velar.
Aspiration operates where /p, t, k/ are in syllable-initial position. It is most apparent initially in
accented syllables. /p, t, k/ in pre-accent unaccented positions like the /p/ in potato are auditorily
almost indistinguishable from /b, d, g/.
Shortening of vowels and sonorants operates where /p, t, k/ are in syllable-final position, rope vs
robe, kit vs killed.
Full voicing of /b, d, g/, voicing throughout the compression stage applies only in word-medial
positions between voiced sounds rabid vs rapid. This phonetic feature of voicing may operate in
addition to the features of length and aspiration.
The aspiration cue for /p,t,k/ should also be retained, when /p, t, k/ are followed bay / l, r, j, w/, by
the devoicing of this latter, e.g. compare plight, try, crate, tune, twelve, with blight, dry, great,
dune, dwell.
ACOUSTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH PLOSIVES.
41

Plosives differ from other consonants mainly in the stage corresponding to the articulatory hold
. This part of the consonant is generally characterized acoustically by a perceptible period of
silence throughout the whole spectrum or an absence of energy.
/b, d, g/ may often be voiceless, in which case they are distinguished from /p, t, k/ initially by the
comparatively weak burst of noise associated with the onset of the release stage and by the
longer VOT characterizing /p, t, k/finally, by their influence on the duration of the preceding
sounds, medially, by the longer closure period (absence of energy) required for /p, t, k/.
Cues to the distinction between bilabial, alveolar and velar plosives are provided by the
frequency of the noise burst at the onset of the release stage toward following vowels and from
preceding vowels. Before [a] bilabial /p, b/ have minus transitions, transitions which start from
and go to a point (called a locus) lower than the steady-state formants for the vowel, while
alveolar /t, d/ have plus transitions accord to the location of the noise burst associated with the
various places; low for bilabials, high for alveolars and intermediate for velars.
ACQUICITION OF PLOSIVES BY NATIVE LEARNERS.
Plosives, along with nasals, are the first consonants to be acquired. During early babbling labials
and velars occur more frequently but in late babbling and early words it is more usually labials
and alveolars which predominate, the velars being replaced by alveolars. Like most consonants
plosives are generally acquired first in syllable-initial positions; final plosives in adult words are
often completely omitted in childrens early words.
THE RELEASE STAGE OF ENGLISH PLOSIVES.
It s not always the case that plosives in English have a third stage consisting of a sudden oral
release of air. The main variant are:
No audible release in final positions: In syllable-final positions (particularly before a pause),
as in map, mat, mac, or robe, road, rogue, the closure stage may be maintained, the air
compression becoming weak and the release being achieved by a gentle, delayed and relatively
inaudible opening of the oral closure; or the compress air may be released nasally and relatively
inaudible by lowering the soft palate and delaying the separation of the organs forming the oral
closure. When an audible third stage is missing, the plosive is sometimes termed incomplete.
Unreleased final bilabial, alveolar and velar plosives will, therefore, be distinguished mainly by
the transitional features of the preceding sound.
No audible release in stop clusters: It is also a feature of most kinds of English that in a
cluster of two stops (plosives or plosive + affricate) either within a word boundaries, the first
plosive has no audible release, e.g. in dropped (/p/ + /t/), white post (/t/ + /p/), good boy (/d/ +
/b/), locked (/k/ + /t/), big boy (/g/ + /b/), object (/b/ + //), great joke (/t/ + //), big chin (/b/
+ //). In English the closure for the second stop is made before the release of the first, forming a
further obstacle to the airstream if the second closure is at a more advanced point. No separate
release of the first plosive is made in cases of germination, sequences of identical stops, e.g. top
people, good dog, big girl, in such cases, one closing stage and one release stage are involved
together with an approximately double-length compression stage. In addition to the omission of
an audible third stage of the first plosive in clusters, the first stage (onglide, transition) of the
following stop is also inaudible. In sequences of three plosives, e.g. wept bitterly (/p/ + /t/ + /b/),
locked door (/k/ + /t/ + /d/), jogged by (/g/ + /d/ + /b/) the central plosive has no audible first or
third stage; when this position is occupied by /p, t, k/, the plosive is manifested only by a silence
of a certain duration, the length of its second stage.
Glottal reinforcement of final /p, t, k/: in words as shop, shot, shock, have the oral closure
reinforced by a glottal closure []. In some cases this glottal coincides in time with the oral
closure, inhibiting much of the air pressure behind the oral closure, whether or not this latter is
release audible; in others the glottal closure may slightly anticipate the articulation of the oral
obstruction so that the closing stage of a glottal closure is heard followed by the audible release
of an oral plosive.
Nasal release: When a plosive is followed by a homorganic nasal consonant, either syllabic or
initial in a following syllable, the release of air is normally effected not by a removal of the oral
42

closure, which is retained, but y the escape of the compressed air through the nasal passage,
opened by the lowering of the soft palate for the nasal consonant, e.g. /p/ + /m/ topmost, /p/
+ /m/ sometimes in happen [hpm], /b/ + /m/ submerge , /b/ + /m/ sometimes in ribbon
[rIbm], /t/ + /n/ chutney, /t/ + [n] cotton, /d/ + /n/ madness, /d/ + [n] sudden; and, more
rarely, /k/ + [] thicken [k], /g/ + [] organ [], token [tk], pagan [pe]. The same
release takes place when the plosive and homorganic nasal occur at word boundaries, e.g. cheap
meat, robe mistress, not now, red nose.
A different kind of nasal release occurs when the nasal consonant following a plosive is not
homorganic, e.g. in cheap nuts, rub, now, nutmeg, bad man, black magic, big nose, big man. In
this cases the plosive closure is not normally released until the articulatory movements for the
nasal consonant, the second oral closure and the lowering of the soft palate, have been
accomplished.
Lateral release: The most frequent tongue contact for English /l/ being alveolar, the
sequences /t/ or /d/ + /l/ are homorganic. /t/ and /d/ in such situations are normally released
laterally, one or both sides of the tongue are lowered to allow the air to escape, the tongue-tip
contact remaining. Such a release occurs whether the following /l/ is syllabic, e.g. in cattle [ktl],

medal [medl] or if it is initial in the next syllable or word, e.g. in atlas, at last, regardless, bad
light.
Affrication and weakening of plosives: If the release of plosive closure is not maid rapidly, a
fricative sound, articulated in the same area of articulation as the plosive, will be heard; plosives
made with this slow, fricative release are said to be affricated.
BILABIAL PLOSIVES /p, b/.
/p/:
Syllable-initial, accented, aspirated: pin, pill, appear, impatient, play, pray, pew.
Syllable -initial, accented, after /s/, unaspirated: spin, spill, Spain, spear, splay, spray,
spew.
Weakly accented, slightly aspirated: upper, capable, opportunity, gospel, simply, apricot,
champion.
Syllable final (often with no audible release): cheap, lip, lap, shape, pulp, pump, upright,
chaplain upward.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: captain, topcoat, wiped, hop picker,
top boy, top girl, top dog, ripe cheese.
Nasal release, followed by nasal consonant: topmost, happen, cheap meat.
Lateral release, followed by lateral consonant: apple, couple, please, up late.
/b/:
Word-initial, partially devoiced: big, boast, banana, begin, blow, brain ,beauty.
Between voiced sounds, fully voiced: rubber, labour, harbour, husband, symbol.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: obtain, rubbed, subconscious, sob
bitterly, sub-perfect, rib cage, object.
Nasal release, followed by nasal consonant: submerge, robe mistress, ribbon.
Lateral release, followed by a lateral consonant: bubble, blow, rub lightly.
*
Description: The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off; the primary obstacle
to the airstream is provided by the closure of the lips. Lung air is compressed behind this closure,
during which stage the vocal folds are held wide apart for /p/, but may vibrate for all or part of
the compression stage for /b/ according to its situation in the utterance. The air escapes with
force when the lip closure is released, unless the airstream has been blocked by a second closure
at a point behind the lips (as for a following /t/) or has been diverted through the nose by the
lowering of the soft palate (as for /m/); when a lateral sound follows, the airstream will have a
lateral escape round the point of alveolar closure. In those cases where a bilabial plosive
43

precedes a labiodental sound (/f, v/), as in pup-full, obvious, the stop is often made by a
labiodental rather than a bilabial closure, in anticipation of the following fricative articulation.
*
ALVEOLAR PLOSIVES /t, d/.
/t/:
Syllable-initial, accented, aspirated: take, tall, tone, attend, obtain, try, between, tune.
Syllable-initial, accented, after /s/, unaspirated: steak, stall, stone.
Syllable-initial, unaccented, slightly aspirated: butter, letter, after, taxation, phonetic,
entry, antler, outward.
Syllable-final (often with no audible release): beat, boat, late, past, sent, halt, tuft.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: outpost, hatpin, football, catgut,
white tie, that dog, white chalk, great joke.
With homorganic nasal release: cotton, button, eaten ,not now.
Nasal released, followed by /m/: nutmeg, utmost, that man.
With homorganic lateral release: little, cattle, atlas, at least.
/d/:
Word-initial, partially devoiced: do, dog, double, date, dry dwindle, duke.
Between voiced sounds, fully voiced: leader, order adorn, hiding, London, elder, under
middle, sundry, fiddler, endways.
Final, fully devoiced: bid mad road, rubbed, bend, loved, old, raised, bathed, judged.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: head boy, head girl, bad pain, red,
car, good dog, good, judge, good cheese.
With homorganic nasal release: sudden, madness, red nose.
Nasal release followed by /m/: admit, road map.
With homorganic lateral release: middle, headless, badly, good luck.
*
Description: The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle
to the airstream is usually form by a closure made between the tip and rims of the tongue and
the upper alveolar ridge and side teeth. Lung air is compress behind the closure, during which
stage the vocal folds are wide apart for /t/, but may vibrate for all or part of the compression
stage for /d/ according to its situation in the utterance. The lip position for /t/ and /d/ will be
condition by that of the adjacent sounds, specially that of a following vowel or semi-vowel, e.g.
spread lips for /t/ in teeth, anticipatory lip rounding for /t/ in tooth, twice. The air escapes with
varying force upon the sudden separation of the alveolar closure, unless the airstream has been
blocked by a second closure either behind the alveolars (as for /p/), or unless it has been
diverted through the nose by the lowering of the soft palate (as for /n/); if the release is lateral,
only part of the alveolar obstruction is removed, the tongue-tip contact remainig. Nasal plosion
will be heard in the sequences of /t/ or /d/ plus /n/ and lateral plosion wil be heard in sequences
of /t/ or /d/ plus /l/.
*
/t, d/ are specially liable to affrication and even replacement by the equivalent fricative in weakly
accented situations, e.g. time, important.
Before a following vowel the use of [] for word-final /t/ is now acceptable, e.g. get off, got it,
right order.
VELAR PLOSIVES /k, g/.
/k/:
Accented, aspirated: come, car, according, clean, quick.
44

Accented after /s/, unaspirated: scar, scum, skin.

Weakly accented, slightly aspirated: income, baker, talking, biscuit, secret, equal.
Syllable final (often with no audible release): duck, rock, choke, bank, desk.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: locked, blackboard, thick, dust,
black cat, dark grey.
Nasal release, followed by a nasal consonant: dark night, thicken, black magic.
Lateral release, followed by a lateral consonant: clean, close, blackleg.
/g/:
Word-initial, partially devoiced: go, girl, glass, grass.
Between voiced sounds, fully voiced: eager hunger, figure, ago, begin, eagle, angry, argue.
Word-final, fully voiced: dog, leg, vague.
Followed by another plosive, with no audible release: rugby, begged, bagpipes, big game,
eggcup, big jaw, big chin.
Nasal release, followed by a nasal consonant: dogma, ignore, big man, drag-net.
Lateral release, followed bay a lateral consonant: bugle, glow, dog lead.
CUADRO (page 176)
Description: The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle
to the airstream is formed by a closure made between the back of the tongue and the soft
palate. Lung air is compress behind this closure, during which stage the vocal folds are wide
apart for /k/, but may vibrate for all or part of the compression stage for /g/ according to its
situation in the utterance. The lip position will be conditioned by that of adjacent sounds,
specially following vowels or semi-vowels, e.g. spread lips for the plosives in keen, geese, and
rounded lips for the plosives in cool, goose, quick. The air escapes with force upon the sudden
separation of the liguo-velar closure, unless the airstream has been blocked by a second closure
forward of the velum; when a lateral sound follows, the airstream will have a lateral escape
round the point of alveolar closure.
The velar stop contact is particularly sensitive to the nature of an adjacent vowel. Thus, when a
front vowel follows, e.g. /i/ in key, geese, the contact will be made on the most forward part of
the soft palate and may even overlap on to the hard palate; when a back vowel follows, e.g. //
in cot, gone, the contact on the soft palate will be correspondingly retracted; a contact in the
central region of the soft palate is made when a vowel of a central type follows, e.g. // or // as
in come, gun, girl.
*
GLOTTAL PLOSIVE [].
Description: In the case of the glottal plosive (stop), the obstruction to the airstream is formed
by the closure of the vocal folds, thereby interrupting the passage of air into the supraglottal
organs. The air pressure below the glottis is release by the sudden separation of the vocal folds.
The compression stage of its articulation consists on silence, its presence being perceived
auditorily by the sudden cessation of the preceding sound or by the sudden onset of the
following sound. Nevertheless where [] substitutes for /p, t, k/ in English, it has the usual effect
of voiceless plosives in the shortening preceding vowels.
It is clear that there is no acoustic manifestation of the glottal plosive other than the abrupt
cessation or onset of the adjacent sounds.
Usage: [] serves regularly as a syllable boundary marker, when the initial sound of the second
syllable is a vowel. A hiatus of vowels belonging to different syllables (specially when the second
vowel is accented), may in careful speech be separated by [] instead of being joined by a
vocalic glide, e.g. in law and order, drama and music and in cases where a regular linking /r/ is
permissible, e.g. in later on, far off, four aces.
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Finally, any initial accented vowel may be reinforced by a preceding glottal stop when particular
emphasis is placed on the word, whatever the preceding sound, e.g. in Its [] empty, I havent
seen [] anybody, Shes [] awfully good; or again, any vowel, initial in an accented morpheme
may receive this glottal reinforcement.
Extended glottal reinforcement in RP: /p, t, k/ and also // may be reinforced by a glottal closure
which generally precedes it. The glottal closure takes place just before the mouth closure and the
glottal release just before the oral release, so that phonetically the glottal plosive and the oral
plosive are in a sequence just like other sequences of plosives. As such the closing stage of the
oral closure and the release stage of the glottal closure are masked in the overlapping of the two
closures. This type of reinforcement occurs in syllable-final position where a vowel, nasal or
lateral precedes and where a pause or a consonant follows. Reinforcement is more likely to occur
at the end of an accented syllable. E.g. for /p/, help, apt, stop me; for /t/, beat, melt, atlas, at last;
for /k/, beak, bank, chocolate, back down; for // , rich, bench, searched, reach it.
The replacement of final /p, k/ y [] occurs only when the following consonant is homorganic, e.g.
soap powder, back garden, bookcase.
NASALS
Nasal consonants resemble oral plosives on that a total closure is made within the mouth, they
differ from such plosives in that the soft palate is in its lowered position, allowing an escape of air
into the nasal cavity and giving the sound the special resonance provided by the nasapharyngeal cavity. Since the air-stream may escape freely through the nose, nasal consonants or
continuants.. They differ, however, from continuants such as fricatives in that no audible friction
is produced and from the fact that theyre usually voiced, without significant fortis/lenis or
voiced/voiceless oppositions. In many respects, therefore, being normally frictionless continuants
they resemble vowel type sounds.
-Three nasal phonemes correspond to the three oral plosive areas of articulation: bilabial /m/ /p,
b/, velar //, /n, g/. If in the articulation of a nasal consonant, the nasal passage is blocked as for
instance, often happens during a cold /m, n, / will be realized as /b, d, g/; E.G. morning /mn/
The vocalic nature of the nasals is underlined by the fact they perform the syllabic function of
vowels; most often /n/; E.G. button /btn/
Bilabial nasal /m/
Word initial: meal, move
Following word initial /s/: snear
Word final: seem, lamb, ham
Description: The lips form a closure as for /p, b/, the soft palate is lowered, adding the resonance
of the nasal cavity to those of the pharynx and the mouth chamber closed by the lips, the tongue
will generally anticipate or retain the position of the adjacent vowel or /l/. Except when partially
devoiced by a preceding voiceless consonant.
Examples: Smoke, happen, /m/ is voiced.
When followed by a labio-dental sound /f,v/ the front closure may be labio dental // rather than
bilabial. Examples: in nymph, triumph, comfort.
// frequently results in context from a final /n/ of the isolate word from before a following
bilabial. Examples: one mile /wn mal/, more and more /m r n m/, ten pairs /ten pez/.
Alveolar nasal /n/
Following word initial /s/ snow, sneeze
Syllabic /n/ listen, dozen, button
Description: The tongue forms a closure with the teeth ridge and upper side teeth as for /t, d/.
The soft palate is lowered, adding the resonance of the nasal cavity to those of the pharynx and
of that part of the mouth chamber behind the alveolar closure, the lip position will depend upon
that of adjacent vowels,
Examples: Spread lips in neat, keen, neutrally open lips in snearl, barn, somewhat rounded lips in
noon, soon. Except when partially devoiced by a preceding voiceless consonant, eg: snup,
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chuntey, cutton, /n/ is voiced. The articulation of /n/ is particulary liable to be influenced by that
of the following consonant, eg: before dental sounds / . /, its realized with a linguadental
closure / n/, as in tenth. Before /r/; /n/ may have a post alveolar contact, as in unrest henry; in
addition, in cotext, word final /n/ frequently assimilates to a following word initial bilabial or velar
consonant, being realized as /m/ or // eg: ten people, ten boys, ten men, where the final /n/ of
ten may assimilate to /m/ and ten cups, ten girls, where the final /n/ of then may assimilate
to //.
Velar nasal //
Word medial: singer, longing.
Word medial + /g/: finger, anger, language.
Word medial + /k/: monkey, uncle.
Word final: sink, tongue.
Word final + /k/: sink, clunk.
Word syllabic (occasionally): bacon, taken, organ.
Description: A closure is formed in the mouth by the back of the tongue and the velar as for /k, g/
(the point of closure will depend on the type of vowel preceding the contact being more
advanced in sing than sang), the soft palate is lowered, adding the resonance of the nasal cavity
to that of the pharynx and that small part of the mouth chamber behind the velar closure, the lip
position will depend upon that of the preceding vowel, being somewhat spread in sing and
relatively open in sang. // is normally voiced, except for partial devoicing in the possible, though
less common case of syllabic / / in such words as bacon, chicken. Word final / / may result in
context from the isolate word final form /n/ eg, ten cups.

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