PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY
OF ENGLISH
CLASS 1
Prof.ª Maria Lucia de Castro Gomes
TO START WITH
Understanding phonetics and phonology holds significant importance
across various domains, but for an English teacher for speakers of other
languages, these disciplines are particularly vital for mastering the pronunciation
of the target language. Achieving fluency in a foreign language depends greatly
on having good pronunciation skills. However, it is essential to recognize that
maintaining an accent is natural and acceptable; it is an inherent aspect of our
linguistic identity, unless we are exposed to the foreign language from infancy
alongside our native tongue. Despite any traces of our native tongue —such as
the "charming" Brazilian accent—we can still effectively articulate the sounds of
the foreign language, ensuring clear communication with native or non-native
speakers. By familiarizing ourselves with the phonetic nuances of the target
language, we can refine our pronunciation.
As each language has its own unique inventory of sounds, we need to
acquire unfamiliar phonemes distinct from those found in our native tongue.
English and Portuguese, for instance, exhibit different phonological systems,
comprising distinct sound inventories and pronunciation patterns. Understanding
these disparities is very important for attaining proficiency in English and
comprehending native speakers effortlessly.
Phonetics and phonology and the acquisition of a second language
In this discipline, we will delve into two crucial areas integral to
comprehending the intricacies of a language's sound system. In this lesson, we
will, firstly, explore the production and perception of linguistic sounds, gaining
insight into how they are articulated and perceived. Secondly, we will examine
how languages organize these sounds into an inventory, a fundamental
framework that underpins the construction of words within the language. Then,
we will discuss about the relation between letters and sounds, focusing
particularly on the correspondence between alphabet letters and English
language phonemes. At the conclusion of the lesson, we will utilize the
International Phonetic Alphabet to talk about transcription.
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TOPIC 1 – THE CONCEPTS OF PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY
When exploring the intricacies of language pronunciation, we rely on two
indispensable fields that are occasionally challenging to distinguish: phonetics
and phonology.
Phonetics investigates the realm of speech sounds. This domain
encompasses three core areas of inquiry: articulatory phonetics, which examines
the mechanisms behind speech sound production; acoustic phonetics, which
scrutinizes the physical characteristics of produced sounds; and perceptual
phonetics, which centers on the auditory system and the perception of sound.
Phonology, on the other hand, scrutinizes the abstract elements that exist
as mental representations within each speaker. It investigates how speech
sounds are structured and used to convey meaning in languages. As stated by
Hyman (1975), a phonetic study elucidates the production and acoustic
properties of language sounds, while a phonological study elucidates their use in
conveying meaning.
In a phonetic analysis of a language, an inventory of sounds is delineated.
Conversely, in a phonological examination, while there is also a sound inventory
of segments, two languages may possess the same phonetic segment inventory
yet exhibit markedly distinct phonologies. Consider, for instance, the sound [tʃ]
in Portuguese and English. Phonetically this sound is present in most Brazilian
dialects, as evidenced in the word “tia”, for example, pronounced as [tʃiɐ].
However, phonologically, /tʃ/ does not constitute part of the Brazilian Portuguese
sound inventory, as it fails to distinguish [tʃiɐ] from [tiɐ], the other possible
pronunciation for the word.
On the other hand, in English we can find the pair of words “chip” and “tip”,
pronounced [tʃɪp] and [tɪp], respectively, or “chalk” and “talk” articulated as [tʃɔk]
and [tɔk], which attest to the existence of both consonants /tʃ/ and /t/ within
English phonological inventory. The two sounds represent distinct phonemes in
English, but not in Portuguese.
In essence, phonetics investigates the physical attributes of speech
sounds, while phonology examines their structural and functional roles in
conveying meaning.
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TOPIC 2 – THE ACQUISITION OF A NEW PHONOLOGY
As children, when we acquire the phonology of the Portuguese language,
we construct mental representations for each sound native to our language – a
cognitive map of Portuguese phonology. Despite the adaptability of our phonetic
system in both sound production and sound perception over time, assimilating
new phonetic categories for similar sounds can pose a challenge for many of us.
It is common for us to unconsciously transfer sounds from our native language
into the language we are learning, impacting both our production and our
perception.
Extensive debates have revolved around the role of transfer in second
language (L2) acquisition, but there is a consensus that learners typically transfer
features of their first language (L1) to the new language being acquired,
particularly at the phonological level. Brown (2000, p. 6) highlights “how the
existing phonological system may block the accurate perception of the input,
thereby preventing the acquisition of novel segmental representations”.
Let me give you an example. How often have we, as Portuguese speakers,
found ourselves producing or hearing sentences like:
[aɪ'lɔv.ju] instead of [aɪ'lʌv.ju] for “I love you”?
Many of us might persist on pronouncing (and hearing) [lɔv ] for the word
“love” for an extended period without encountering any significant issues, except
for the presence of an accent, since it likely will not result in a communication
breakdown (/lɔv/ is not an English word). However, what if we were to say:
/aɪ'lɛft/ “I left” if we mean /aɪ'læft / “I laughed”?
In such instances, misunderstanding can arise. “Left” and “laughed”
constitute a minimal pair, meaning they share identical segments of phonemes
(significant sounds), except for a distinction lying in one element. In the example,
the sole disparity emerges in the vowel sound – “left” features the vowel /ɛ/,
present in Portuguese phonology, while “laughed” features the vowel /æ/, absent
in our language. Consequently, there is a prevalent tendency among Brazilians
to pronounce both words with the familiar sound /ɛ/.
When embarking a journey of learning a second language, unlike the
process of acquiring our native tongue, we already possess a mental
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representation of a set of sounds – the sounds that make up the phonology of our
mother tongue.
So here we encounter two levels of difficulty for mastering the
pronunciation of the new language. Firstly, on the phonetic level, we have to
struggle for articulating the sounds themselves. For many English learners,
pronouncing words containing the “th”, for example, poses an initial challenge, as
few languages incorporate the sounds /θ/ and /ð/. Secondly, we confront
obstacles on the phonological front, which not only impact sound production but
our ability to perceive these sounds accurately. If, as learners, we fail to discern
the peculiar sound at the beginning of “think”, we Portuguese speakers may
inadvertently pronounce it as /sɪŋk/ or /fɪŋk/ as the sounds /s/ and /f/ are familiar
to us and closely resemble /θ/, which does not exist in our native language.
Secondly, as English learners, we face the challenge of shared letters
between English and Portuguese alphabets, yet with distinct sound values.
Letters do not always correspond to the same phonemes. The discrepancy in
sound inventories and the corresponding letters compound this challenge.
Therefore, the study of phonetics and phonology enables us to understand
the formation of a sound inventory and the mechanisms in acquiring them as a
second language.
TOPIC 3 – LETTERS AND SOUNDS
When faced with the diverse sound inventories of languages, as stated
above, another pronunciation challenge may arise for learners – dealing with
spelling systems. Even when languages use the same alphabet, as the case of
English and Portuguese, the correspondence between letters and sounds
typically varies. Let us explore this through a poem:
PRONUNCIATION POEM
(By P. Thomas O’dea)
When the English tongue we speak
Why is break not rhymed with weak?
Won’t you tell me why it’s true
We say sew, but also few?
And the maker of a verse
Cannot rhyme his horse with worse?
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Beard is not the same as heard
Cord is different from word
Cow is cow, but low is low
Shoe is never rhymed with foe
Think of hose, dose and lose
And think of goose and choose
Think of comb and tomb and bomb
Doll and roll and home and some
And since pay is rhymed with say
Why not paid with said, i pray?
Think of blood and food and good
Mould is not pronounced like could
Why is it done, but gone and lone?
Is there any reason known?
To sum it up, it seems to me
That sounds and letters don’t agree
Are you entirely confident in the pronunciation of every word in the poem?
Let us examine the words from the poem, each with the correspondent
transcription.
break /breɪk/ weak /wik/
sew /soʊ/ few /fju/
horse /hɔrs/ worse /wɜrs/
beard /bird/ heard /hɜrd/
cord /kɔrd/ word /wɜrd/
cow /kaʊ/ low /loʊ/
shoe /ʃu/ foe /foʊ/
hose /hoʊz/ dose /doʊs/ lose /luz/
goose /gus/ choose /tʃuz/
comb /koʊm/ tomb /tum/ bomb /bɑm/
doll /dɑl/ roll /roʊl/
home /hoʊm/ some /sʌm/
/səm/
pay /peɪ/ say /seɪ/
paid /peɪd/ said /sɛd/
blood /blʌd/ food /fud/ good /gʊd/
mould /moʊld/ could /kʊd/
/kəd/
done /dʌn/ gone /gɔn/ lone /loʊn/
As evident from the words in the poem, they highlight the significant
challenge English learners face in pronouncing words accurately. If you have
acquired English in an English-speaking environment, you may not even notice
the distinctions, because you naturally pronounce the words much like native
speakers. However, for many of us who learned English in a classroom setting
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as non-native speakers, it is important to be mindful of these differences to attain
proficient pronunciation and fluency in the language.
A highly beneficial resource for enhancing our understanding of English
pronunciation is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). This comprehensive
system comprises symbols that accurately represents the sounds found in
human languages. While many IPA symbols closely resembles standard letter
symbols of our alphabet, some are not familiar. For instance, he symbol //
represents the voiceless dental fricative sound, often spelled as “th” in English
words like “think”, or alternatively, represented as “z” in certain varieties of
Spanish, as seen in the word “corazón”.
In our exploration of phonetics and phonology, the IPA will serve as a
fundamental resource. Therefore, it might be interesting to have some
information about its creation.
3.1 The International Phonetics Alphabet – IPA
Also under the acronym IPA, the International Phonetic Association was
established in 1896 by a group of phoneticians led by Paul Passy, a French
phonetician, who also participated in the creation of the IPA alphabet. The
association aims to promote the scientific and applied study of phonetics, and
the alphabet is an important and essential tool for the research and practice in
the field.
As stated before, the alphabet consists of symbols representing
segments of human languages, namely vowels and consonants, as well as
symbols that can describe suprasegmental features such as stress and rhythm,
along with diacritics to add special characteristics to segments, such as
devoicing, labialization, or nasalization. The IPA chart is regularly reviewed and
may be updated whenever proposals are made by association members and
authorized by the Council. The latest version, from 2020, can be found on the
association’s website1, freely available under Creative Commons Attribution.
1Available at:
<https://www.internationalphoneticassociation.org/IPAcharts/IPA_chart_orig/pdfs/IPA_Doulos_2
020_full.pdf>. Acessed on Set. 25, 2024.
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TOPIC 4 – ENGLISH SOUND SYSTEM
Tables are created from the IPA for the purpose of teaching pronunciation,
serving as a visual representation of a language’s sound system. Adrian
Underhill, in 1994, introduced a table for English sounds, widely embraced by
English teachers. Since Underhill’s table delineates the sounds of British English,
I have customized it to illustrate the sounds of American English. This adapted
table will be our primary reference:
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Source: Adapted from Underhill, 1994.
The table exhibits 24 consonants, 11 vowels (10 in yellow and the vowel
/ɜ/, always followed by /r/) and 5 diphthongs. At the bottom line, we find the vowels
followed by “r”, commonly referred to as r-colored vowels. According to Celce-
Murcia (2004), when the consonant /r/ follows a vowel within the same syllable
(as in fur, pour, bird, party), the vowel preempts and glides towards the central /r/
position, acquiring some retroflex quality of /r/, often resulting in a significant
alteration in its pronunciation. This phenomenon, identified as /r/-coloring, reflects
the influence of the adjacent /r/ sound on the vowel articulation.
The phenomenon of /r/-coloring stands out as one of the main distinctions
between American and British English, prompting me to modify Adrian Underhill’s
table. In the original version, the vowel system notably differs, featuring 12 vowels
and 8 diphthongs. However, there is no difference in the number of consonants.
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Source: Underhill, 1994.
To illustrate the disparity between the two tables, let’s examine the
examples provided on the chart:
Source: Gomes, 2024.
As observed, when the /r/ is not pronounced, the vowel is either prolonged
or followed by a schwa, the neutral vowel /ə/.
TOPIC 5 – TRANSCRIPTION
An essential aspect of phonetics and phonology is transcription. Crystal
(2008) defines transcription as a method of presenting speech sounds in two
distinct ways: phonetic or phonemic. Phonetic transcription, enclosed in square
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brackets, depicts sounds on their articulatory and auditory characteristics,
irrespective of their linguistic function. Conversely, phonemic transcription,
enclosed in oblique lines, only represents units that carry linguistic significance,
namely phonemes. Let’s explore this topic further by examining Cristófaro-Silva’s
(2011) definitions. It is worth noting that this author categorizes transcription into
three distinct types:
• Phonetic transcription – representation of speech sounds that generally
uses IPA symbols. From a phonetic transcription, it is possible to recover
the pronunciation of a statement. It is a useful resource in the
documentation and description of world languages, in dictionary
compilations, and in foreign language teaching. It is pronounceable and it
is presented in square brackets, as in the word “pen” [pʰɛn].
• Phonological transcription – or underlying representation, expresses
the linguistic knowledge of the speaker and belongs to the domain of
competence (Generative Phonology). It is presented between slashes,
and redundant information indicating linguistic variation is excluded from
the representation, for example in the word “pen” /pɛn/.
• Phonemic transcription – representation of phonemes of a language,
which have been determined based on the phonemic model. It is an
abstract representation that expresses a specific analysis. It is not
pronounceable and is represented between slashes, such as /pɛn/.
In phonetic transcription, there are instances where the phonetic alphabet
alone falls short of accurately representing certain nuances of word production.
Thus, we resort to using specific symbols known as diacritics. These symbols,
also included in the IPA, provide additional details to convey the precise
articulation of the sound.
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Source: part of the IPA2.
Let’s examine the word “pen” as illustrated above. In English, the voiceless
plosive consonants /p/, /t/ and /k/ are pronounced with a puff of air, a
characteristic that is not distinctive. Since it lacks distinctiveness, it does not serve
a linguistic function and thus does not belong to phonology; rather, it constitutes
a phonetic feature. To represent this feature in a phonetic transcription, we
employ the diacritic /ʰ/ - [pʰɛn], which is not necessary in a phonological or
phonemic transcription - /pɛn/, much like the example of [tʃiɐ] and [tiɐ], for “tia”
ou /tiɐ/, examined above.
In our exercises, we will primarily use slashes for phonological
transcription, capturing the sound system of American English. However, we will
resort to square brackets and some specific characteristics with diacritics, when
the emphasis is on particular features of the sound segment, whether due to
phonological context or sociolinguistic variation.
2
Available at:
<https://www.internationalphoneticassociation.org/IPAcharts/IPA_chart_orig/pdfs/IPA_Doulos_2
020_full.pdf>. Acessed on Set. 25, 2024.
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IN PRACTICE
To practice transcription recognition, you will be presented with a series of
words in phonological transcription3. Read each word aloud and write it down.
A - Write the following words down, comparing the vowel sounds:
3if you want to practice the symbols with sounds, you can go to the ipa website
<https://www.internationalphoneticalphabet.org/ipa-sounds/ipa-chart-with-sounds/>.
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B - Write the following words down, comparing the consonant sounds:
SUMMING UP
In this class, our aim was to introduce the concepts of phonetics and
phonology, emphasizing their significance in grasping the acquisition of a new
phonology and in teaching pronunciation effectively. We also mentioned the
importance of the International Phonetic Alphabet and the practice of
transcription.
Next class will be focused on phonetics, encompassing its three areas of
study: articulation, perception and acoustics.
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REFERENCES
BROWN, C. The interrelation between speech perception and phonological
acquisition from infant to adult, IN ARCHIBALD, J. Second language
acquisition and linguistic theory. New Jersey: Blackwell Publishers, 2000.
CELCE-MURCIA, M. ET AL. Teaching pronunciation: a reference for teachers
of English to speakers of other languages. New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1996.
CRISTÓFARO-SILVA, T. Dicionário de fonética e fonologia. São Paulo:
Contexto, 2011.
CRYSTAL, D. A dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing, 2008.
HYMAN, L. Phonology theory and analyses. New York: Holt, Rinehart &
Winston, 1975.
UNDERHILL, A. Sound Foundations. Oxford: MacMillan Heinmann, 1994.
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ANSWERS
A:
1. BATH 16. SOUTH
2. BATHE 17.SOUTHERN
3. BAT 18. LICK
4. BET 19. LEEK/LEAK
5. BIT 20. PULL
6. BEAT/BEET 21. POOL
7. BUT 22. SAUD
8. BOUGHT 23. SAD
9. BOOT 24. WARM
10. BATON/BATTEN 25. WORM
11. BOTTOM 26. ILL
12. BUTTON 27.EEL
13. BREATH 28. ROCK
14. BREATH 29. RACK
15. BREATHE 30. RUCK
B:
1. ICE 16. THOUGHT
2. EYES 17.TAUGHT
3. COULD 18.SOUGHT
4. GOOD 19.FOUGHT
5. BUS 20. JOKE
6. BUZZ 21. CHOKE
7. THINK 22. MOUSE
8. SINK 23. MOUTH n.
9. FINK 24. MOUTH v.
10. HI/HIGH 25. TOE/TOW
11. HEIGHT 26. DOE/DOUGH
12. WAY/WEIGH 27. CAME
13. WAIT/WEIGHT 28. GAME
14. CHIP 29. LOSE
15. SHIP 30. LOOSE
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