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TOPIC 8

THE ENGLISH PHONOLOGICAL SYSTEM (II)

THE ENGLISH CONSONANTS
PHONETIC SYMBOLS
THE ENGLISH AND THE SPANISH AND
VALENCIA PHONOLOGICAL SYSTEMS
COMPARED

1-PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY

Phonetics deals with how speech sounds are actually made, transmitted
and received. Phonology, on the other hand, deals specifically with the ways
those sounds are organized into the individual languages. Phonology is, in
effect, a sub-category of phonetics.

Phonetics is the study of all the sounds that the human voice is capable of
creating whereas phonology is the study of a subset of those sounds that
constitute language and meaning. In the case of this course, Received
Pronunciation (RP) is the subset that is looked at in detail.

Of course, most of the principles that apply to the study of phonetics also
apply to the study of phonology. In many instances, they are indistinguishable
from one another. However, the scope of these pages deal with phonetics only in
as much as they are necessary for a further understanding of the phonology of
Received Pronunciation.

Phonemes are defined as:

- “A unit of significant sound in a given language” ( (The Oxford

English Dictionary)
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- “A group of related sounds of a given language which are so

used in connected speech that no one of them occurs in
positions which any other can occupy.” (Daniel Jones, The
Phoneme. Its Nature and Use; Heffer & Sons.
- “The Smallest contrastive linguistic unit which may bring about
a change in meaning.” (Gimson 1962)

The sound of phonemes may differ considerably according to three

factors:

- The position of each unit in the chain of sounds.

- The context where the speech is produced.
- Speaker’s individual features.

When the variations do not indicate a change in meaning, they are called
allophones.

2- CONSONANTS

In a consonant sound is produced by the interference of the flow of air

through the mouth (and nose). Consonants are created when that airflow is
directly restricted, or obstructed, so that air cannot escape without creating
friction that can be heard.

The speech sound being obstructed can be voiced or unvoiced. It can be

obstructed in a number of different places in the vocal tract. The nature of the
obstruction can take a number of forms, or manners.
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3- DEFINING CHARACTERISTICS OF CONSONANTS

Defining characteristics of consonants include:

- VOICE
- PLACE OF ARTICULATION
- MANNER OF ARTICULATION

3.1 - Voice
The level of vibration of the vocal cords determines whether a sound is
voiced or unvoiced. If the vocal cords are apart, then air can escape unimpeded.
Sounds produced in this way are said to be voiceless. The easiest example of this
is to whisper. When you whisper, your glottis is wide open and, therefore, all the
sounds produced are voiceless. However, if the vocal cords are very close
together, the air will blow them apart as it forces its way through. This makes
the cords vibrate, producing a voiced sound.

To feel the distinction between voiced and voiceless sounds is very easy.
Place your finger and thumb lightly on your throat. Say ssssssss to yourself.
Then say zzzzzzz. Repeat these a few times. Then substitute fffffff and vvvvvvv
sounds. You should be able to feel the vibration of the cords when you say zzzzzz
and vvvvvv, but nothing when you say sssssss and fffffff.

It is also possible to hear the vibration. Instead of putting your fingers on

your throat, put your index fingers in your ears and repeat the above sounds.
You should hear a low buzzing sound when you articulate zzzzzz and vvvvvv, but
hear almost nothing for the other two sounds.

Voicing is important in a language like English because the meaning of a

sound often depends on whether that sound is voiced or not.

For example, 'big' carries a very different meaning from 'pig'.

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English has many sounds that are paired up in this manner where
articulation and manner are the same, but the meaning is dependent upon
whether the sound is voiced or not.

3.2- Place Of Articulation

After the air has left the larynx, it passes into the vocal tract. Consonants
are produced by obstructing the airflow through the vocal tract. There are a
number of places where these obstructions can take place. These places are
known as the articulators.

They are:
- the lips
- the teeth
- the alveolar ridge
- the palate
- the soft palate
- the glottis

3.2.1- Lips -

If both of the lips are used to articulate a sound, then it is said to be a

bilabial sound.

Examples of bilabial sounds include: /p/,/b/ and /m/.

Two sounds use the lower lip together with the upper teeth and so are
called labio-dental consonants. These sounds are:/f/ and /v/.
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3.2.2- Teeth -

The two 'th' sounds of English are formed by forcing air through the
teeth.

If you say the soft /th/ in /thin/ and then the hard /th/ sound in /then/,
you can feel the air being forced through the teeth. The tongue tip and rims are
articulating with the upper teeth.

The upper teeth are also used when you say f and v. In this case however,
air is being forced through the upper teeth and lower lip.

3.2.3- Alveolar Ridge

An alveolar sound is when the tongue tip, or blade, touches the bony
prominence behind the top teeth.

The following sounds are alveolar:/t/,/d/,/s/,/z/,/l/,/r/,/n/.

Try saying all of them to yourself. They don't all touch in exactly the same
way due to the manner of articulation some are plosives whilst the others are
fricatives or laterals. But the place of articulation is clearly the alveolar ridge for
all of them.

Four sounds are said to be palato-alveolar. This is partly because the

blade of the tongue straddles both the alveolar ridge and the front of the hard
palate as air is forced through to make the following sounds:

The in sheep.

The in genre.

The in cheap.
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And the in jeep.

3.2.4- Palate

This is the hard bit of the arched bony structure that forms the roof of the
mouth. The /j/ sound in yes is the clearest example of a palato sound in RP.
You can feel the fricative sound being forced between the tongue and the very
top of your mouth.

3.2.5- Soft Palate And Glottis

The soft palate

The soft palate is toward the back of the mouth. It is where the roof of the
mouth gives way to the soft area behind it. It can just be felt with your tongue if
you curl it as far back and as high as you can.
The velar sounds are usually made when the back of the tongue is pressed
against the soft palate. They include the /k/ in cat, the /g/ in girl and the /ng/ in
hang.
/w/ is also regarded as a labio-velar sound, because it simultaneously
uses both lips whilst raising the back of the tongue towards the velum. Try
saying /wheel/ and /win/ and feel the position of your tongue.

Glottis

Glottal sounds are those sounds that are made in the larynx through the
closure or narrowing of the glottis. /h/ as in Helen is an example of a glottal
sound. It is physically impossible to feel the process using your tongue. It is as
far back as you can get in your mouth.
The glottal stop is becoming a more widespread part of British English,
but is still uncommon in R.P.
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You also use your glottis for speech when you whisper or speak in a
creaky voice. Try reading the above again, only outloud in a creaky voice.

3.3- Manner Of Articulation

As well as indicating the place of articulation, it is also necessary to

determine the nature and extent of the obstruction involved. The type of
obstruction is known as the manner of articulation. An example of this can be
found by looking at the following words:

• nine
• dine
• line

They all begin with voiced, alveolar consonants. Yet, they are all clearly
different in both sound and meaning. The kinds of constriction made by the
articulators are what make up this further dimension of classification.
There are two kinds of constriction that often occur in English:

3.3.1- Plosives

Plosive sounds are made by forming a complete obstruction to the flow of

air through the mouth and nose. The first stage is that a closure occurs. Then
the flow of air builds up and finally the closure is released, making an explosion
of air that causes a sharp noise.
Try to slowly say /p/ to yourself. You should be able to feel the build up of
air, that bursts into the /p/ sound when you open your lips.
It should be noted that a plosive cannot be prolonged or maintained.
Once the air has been released, the sound has escaped. Contrast this with a
fricative.
The other plosive sounds in RP are: /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, /g/.
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3.3.2- Fricatives

A fricative is the type of consonant that is formed by forcing air through a

narrow gap so that a hissing sound is created. Typically air is forced between the
tongue and the place of articulation for the particular sound.
Try it yourself. Say the /f/ in fin, the /th/ in thin and the /sh/ in shin. You
should be able to feel the turbulence created by the sounds.
It is possible to maintain a fricative sound for as long as your breath
holds out. This is very different from a plosive sound.
Other fricatives include the /v/ in van, the /s/ in sin, the /h/ in hat, the
/th/ in that, the /z/ in zoo and the /zjs/ sound in genre.

3.3.3- Nasal

A nasal consonant is a consonant in which air escapes only through the

nose. For this to happen, the soft palate is lowered to allow air to pass it, whilst a
closure is made in the oral cavity to stop air escaping through the mouth.
You can feel if a sound is a nasal sound or not by placing your hand in front of
your mouth and feeling if any air is escaping or not.
There are three nasal sounds in English. The /m/ in mat, the/n/ in nasal
and the /ŋ/ in sing.

3.3.4- Lateral

To produce a lateral, air is obstructed by the tongue at a point along the

centre of the mouth but the sides of the tongue are left low so that air can escape
over its sides. /l/ is the clearest example of a lateral sound in English. Both the
clear and dark allophones of /l/ are lateral sounds.

When an alveolar plosive is followed by the lateral /l/, then what happens
is that we simply lower the sides of the tongue to release the compressed air,
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rather than raising and lowering the blade of the tongue. If you say /bottle/ to
yourself you can feel the sides of the tongue lower to let out the air.

3.3.5- Affricates

An affricate is a plosive immediately followed by a fricative in the same

place of articulation.

The “ch” in chap and the “j” in jeep are the two clear affricates in English.
If you think about it, the /t∫ / sound is made up from the plosive /t/ and the
fricative /∫/ sounds. Likewise, the /dZ/ sound is made up from the plosive /d/
immediatly followed by the fricative /z/ sound in genre.

Finally, we have to include her approximants.

3.3.6- Approximants

An approximant is a consonant that makes very little obstruction to the

airflow. Approximants are divided into two main groups: semivowels and
liquids.

The semivowels are /j/ and /w/. They are very similar to the vowels /u/
and /i/ but are produced as a rapid glide.

The liquids include the lateral /l/ and /r/ in that the sounds have have an
identifiable constriction of the airflow, but not one sufficiently obstructive
enough to produce a fricative sound.

Approximants are never fricative and never completely block the flow of
air.
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Symbols enclosed in / / are unusual varieties; in ( ) denotes a secondary

articulation.
The first element in each pair is voiceless, the second one, voiced.

4- DESCRIPTION OF THE ENGLISH CONSONANTS

4.1- English Plosive Consonants

A plosive is a consonant articulation with the following characteristics:

• One articulator is moved against another, or two articulators are

moved against each other, so as to form a stricture that allows no air
to escape from the vocal tract. The stricture is, then, total.

• After this stricture has been formed and air has been compressed behind it,
it is released, that is, air is allowed to escape.
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• If the air behind the stricture is still under pressure when the plosive is
released, it is probable that the escape of air will produce noise loud enough
to be heard. This noise is called plosion.
• There may be voicing during part or all of the plosive articulation.

English plosive consonants are made by a kind of explosion in the mouth.

To pronounce a complete plosive consonant three things are necessary:

1) contact must be made by the articulating organs (STOP)

2) the air must be compressed behind the closure by lung action.
3) the articulating organs must subsequently be separated (PLOSION)

A plosive consonant cannot be fully pronounced without being followed

by another independent sound, namely the sound produced by this rush of air.
This independent sound may be either breathed or voiced. English has six
plosive consonants: /p, t, k, b, d, g/

• Bilabial
/p/
Voiceless, very similar in English and Spanish excepting that in English it
is frequently followed by a puff of air (aspiration), especially when followed by a
vowel.
It is usually spelt “p”, there is also a silent “p” (cupboard)

/b/

Voiced between voiced sounds as in “able” /’eibl/; or partially voiced in

initial, final positions and next to voiceless consonants as in “dustbin”
/'dΛstbin/.
Note silent “b” in: comb, limb, thumb, and debt, doubt, subtle.
It is generally uttered with a weaker degree of force than /p/.
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• Alveolar plosive

/t/

Voiceless. The tip of the tongue is placed against the teeth-ridge while a
puff of air or aspiration is heard, especially in a strongly stressed syllable.

1) It is regularly spelt “t”, “tt” and sometimes “th” (Thames, Thomas).

2) “de” in verbal past tenses and participles after voiceless consonants

(jumped, laughed, stopped, worked, walked).
3) In a medial sequence of consonants, and particularly when the first
consonant is “s”, written “t” is often not sounded (silent “t”): listen castle
This also happens at word junctions and in compounds: Next Christmas,
postman.
4) In rapid speech and before the sound /d/, /t/ is often dropped:

Ø Varieties

1) /t/ has a lateral plosion before /I/: little /'litl/

2) nasal plosion before /n/, as in eaten /’i:tn/
3) post-alveolar articulation before /r/: tread/tred/

/d/

Uttered with less force than /t/. Voiced between voiced sounds
(addition), partly voiced or completely voiceless in initial and final positions.
/d/ is the regular sound of the letter “d” (deal) or “dd” (ladder)
Note that final -de is pronounced /d/ in the past tenses and past participles of
all verbs ending in vowels or in voiced consonants other than “d”:(stayed ,
seized , begged )
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• Velar plosives
Ø Voiceless velar plosive: /k/

1) The ordinary spelling is “k” (king).

2) “c”, “cc” followed by “a”, “a”, “u” or a consonant letter or finally (cat , cool,
cut, fact , electric)
3) “ch” is pronounced /k/ in some words: Christmas , character.
4) “qu” is generally pronounced /kw/ or /k/: queen
5) “x” is generally pronounced /ks/: six , box
6) silent “c” or “k” in muscle, knew, knit, etc.

Ø Voiceless or partially voiced velar plosive: /g/

a) Members of the g-phoneme are the regular sounds of the letter “g” when
followed by the vowels “a,o,u”, or a consonant or when final:

(gate, got , good , gum )

a) It is also used in some words spelt with “ge” and “gi”

(get, give , girl)

c) It is silent in:
gnat, gnaw, reign, sign.
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4.2- The English Fricative Consonants

Fricatives are consonants with the characteristic that when they are
produced, air escapes through a small passage and makes a hissing sound. All
languages have fricatives, probably always including something like s.
Fricatives are continuant consonants, which means that can continue making
them without interruption as long as you have enough air in your lungs.
(Plosives, for example, are not continuants.)

The English fricative consonants are:

1) labia-dental /f,v/
2) dental /θ,ð/
3) alveolar /s,z/
4) post-alveolar /r/
5) palato-alveolar / f, v/
6) glottal /h/

• Labio-dental

Ø Breathed labio-dental fricative /f/

1) /f/ is usually spelt <f>, <ff> or <ph> (flower, affable, off photograph,
physician)
2) /f/ is spelt <gh> in: rough, laugh. cough, though, draught, trough.

To form the /f/, the lower lip is placed against the upper teeth. The soft palate is
raised and the glottis is open. The air is forced out with a hissing sound. The
vocal cords do not vibrate.
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Ø Voiced labio-dental fricative /v/

/v/ is pronounced like f but the vocal cords vibrate (it is a voiced sound) /v/ is
the usual sound of the letter v (save, vane, varnish). Some pronounce <ph> as
/v/ in nephew and Stephen.

• Dental

Ø Breathed dental fricative /θ/

1) at the beginning of a word (excepting the pronouns: this, that, and the
adverbs then, etc)
2) at the end of a word: breath, mouth, south, etc.
3) in the middle of a word between a consonant and a vowel: healthy, anthem.
4) plurals of words which end in <th> are pronounced / θ / if / θ / is preceded
by:
• a short vowel: Smiths, moths
• a consonant: lengths, months
• <r>: births, hearths

Ø Voiced dental fricative /ð/

To form the / ð / sound the tip of the tongue is placed against the upper
teeth. The soft palate is raised and the vocal cords do not vibrate. / ð / is
pronounced like / θ / except that the vocal cords vibrate.

It is spelt <th> in:

1) pronouns and in: than, that, the, then, etc.

2) the middle of words and between vowels: father, rather
3) followed by mute <e>: clothe, bathe
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4) plurals of nouns ending in <th> but not preceded by <r>, and which
contain a long vowel or a diphthong: baths,-youths, truths, paths,
mouths.

• Alveolar

Ø Breathed alveolar fricative /s/

/s/ is pronounced by raising the blade of the tongue against the teeth-
ridge. Only a very narrow space is left for the air to pass through. The front of
the tongue is raised towards the hard palate and the teeth are closed together.
The soft palate is raised and the vocal cords do not vibrate. With /z/ the vocal
cords vibrate.

/s/ is the normal sound of the letter <s> in English, as in ’so' /sou/, 'sets'
/sets/.
<s> is always pronounced /s/ at the beginning of words, but in other
positions it is very frequently pronounced /z/. For example compare absurd
/∂b’sZ:d/ and 'absolve' /∂b'zolv/.
The <s> denoting the plural of nouns or third person singular of verbs is
pronounced /s/ when the preceding sound is a voiceless consonant:
cats /kæts/, 'takes /teiks/, laughs /la:fs/.

The <s> in the terminations ’-sive', '-sity is nearly always pronounced

/s/, e.g. 'conclusive, ’curiosity'
Final <s> preceded by one of the letters a,i,o,u, or y is pronounced /s/
(when not mute), e.g. gas’, ’atlas, 'this'. The only exceptions are the inflected
forms of nouns and verbs (e.g. 'plays /pleiz/, ’was’ or , and the single words ’his'
(weak form /iz/), as /æz/ (weak form /¶z/).
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Ø Voiced blade-alveolar fricative /z/

1) It is often written <z>, but also <s> (when not initial) or <ss>: zea/, zone,
plays, posses, houses, raise.
2) Final <s> is pronounced /z/ when it is the plural suffix of nouns or the third
person of verbs when preceded by a vowel or a voiced consonant: trees,
dogs, has, does.

Ø Palato-alveolar

o Breathed palato-alveolar fricative / ∫/

It is frequently written:

1) <sh>: shoe, shine.

2) <-si->, <-sci->, <-ci->, <-ti-> followed by an unstressed vowel or a
syllabic consonant (pension, conscience, magician, nation)
3) it is spelt <ch> in: moustache, machine, chassis
4) <-ssion>, <-sion>: passion, mission, decision, incision.

To pronounce / ∫ / the tip and blade of the tongue are pressed against
the hinder part of the teeth ridge. The blade of the tongue is raised towards the
hard palate. The tip of the tongue is about level with the teeth ridge. The space
between the tongue and the roof of the mouth is wider than for /s/ or /z/. The
soft palate is raised and the vocal cords do not vibrate. /∫/ is pronounced like
/V/ but the vocal cords do not vibrate and the amount of air expelled is not so
great.
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o Voiced palato-alveolar fricative /Z/

Occurs medially and finally in English. It is found with various spellings:

1) <-s>, <-si>: measure, usual, vision, occasion

2) 2) <z>: seizure.

Ø Post-alveolar
o Voiced post-alveolar fricative /r/.

(It can also be considered a semi-vowel)

1) It is not pronounced when followed in final position or before a consonant:

far /fa:/, fear, part
2) if a vowel follows in the same word or in a following, closely linked word, <r>
is pronounced: bearing, starting
3) it is usually pronounced in compounds: over-eat.
4) the usual English <r> is pronounced by keeping the tongue low, the tip of the
tongue near the teeth-ridge, and the front of the tongue in a concave
relation to the palate. The soft palate is raised and the vocal cords vibrate.

This sound is spelt <r>, <rr> when followed by a vowel: red, rod, run,
rise, story.

• Glottal /h/

The place of articulation of this consonant is glottal. This means that the
narrowing that produces the friction noise is between the vocal cords. If you
breathe out silently, then produce lb/, you are moving your vocal cords from
wide apart to close together. However, this is not producing speech. When we
produce /h/ in speaking English, many different things happen in different
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contexts. In the word hat, the <h> must be followed by an /m/ quality. The
same is found for all vowels following <h>; it always has the quality of the vowel
it precedes ('hit', ’hat’, ’hot’, 'hut, etc). It states that phonetically <h> is a
voiceless vowel with the quality of the voiced vowel that follows it.
Phonologically, <h> is a consonant. It is usually found before vowels. As
well as being found in initial position it is found medially in words such as:
'ahead’ /¶hed/, greenhouse’ /gri:nhaus/. It is noticeable that when <h> occurs
between voiced sounds (as in the words 'ahead and ’greenhouse’), it is
pronounced with voicing -not the normal voicing of vowels but a weak, slightly
fricative sound called breathy voice. It is not necessary for foreign learners to
attempt to copy this voicing, though it is important to pronounce /h/ where it
should occur in RP. Many English speakers are surprisingly sensitive about this
consonant; they tend to judge as sub-standard a pronunciation in which lb/ is
missing, though in fact practically all English speakers, however carefully they
speak, omit the /h/ in unstressed pronunciations of the words 'her’, 'he’, 'him’,
'his’ and the auxiliary have', has, 'had', though few of them are aware that they
do this.
There are two rather uncommon sounds that need to be introduced; since
they are said to have some association with /h/, they will be mentioned here.
The first is the sound produced by some speakers in words which begin
orthographically (that is, in their spelling form) with 'wh; most RP speakers
pronounce the initial sound in such words (e.g. 'which’, why’, whip’, 'whale') as
<w>, but there are some (particularly when they are speaking clearly or
emphatically) who pronounce the sound used by most American and Scottish
speakers, a voiceless fricative with the same lip, tongue and jaw position as <w>.

4.3- The English Affricate Consonants

Affricates are rather complex consonants. They begin as plosives and end
as fricatives. However, the definition of an affricate must be a little more
restricted than what has been said so far. We would not class all sequences of
plosive plus fricative as affricates; for example, we find in the middle of the
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word breakfast the plosive /k/ followed by the fricative /f/. English speakers
would generally not accept that <kf> forms a consonantal unit in the way that
/t J/ seems to. It is usually said that the plosive and the following fricative must
be made with the same articulators - to use a technical term, the plosive and the
fricative must be homorganic. /k/ and /f/ are not homorganic, but /t/ and /J/,
both being made with the tongue blade against the alveolar ridge, are
homorganic.
t ƒ , dv are the only two affricate phonemes in English.

• Voiceless palato-alveolar affricate: /t∫/

/t∫/ is slightly aspirated in the positions where /p/, /t/, /k/ are
aspirated, but not strongly enough for it to be necessary for
foreign learners to give much attention to it.

This is the usual sound of:

1) <-ch> and <tch>: chain, watch

3) unstressed <-ture>: furniture, nature
4) 3) <-tion> preceded by <s>: question

• Voiced or partially voiced palato-alveolar affricate /dZ /

It is the usual sound of:

1) <j>: job, James

2) <ge>, <gi> and <gy>: gem, giant, gymnastic
3) <dg>: judgment
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4.4-Nasal Consonants

The basic characteristic of a nasal consonant is that the air escapes

through the nose. For this to happen, the soft palate must be lowered; in the
case of all the other consonants, and all vowels, the soft palate is raised and air
cannot pass through the nose. In nasal consonants, however, the air does not
pass through the mouth; it is prevented by a complete closure in the mouth at
some point.
The three types of closure are: bilabial (lips), alveolar (tongue blade
against alveolar ridge) and velar (back of tongue against the soft palate). This set
of places produces three nasal consonants, /m/, /n/, /q/, which correspond to
the three places of articulation for the pairs of plosives /p b/, /t d/, /k g/.

• Voiced bi-labial nasal /m/

The principal member of the English m-phoneme is formed as follows.
The mouth-passage is completely blocked by closing the lips; the soft palate is
lowered so that, when air is emitted by pressure from the lungs, it passes out
through the nose; the tongue is held in a neutral position; the vocal cords are
made to vibrate so that ’voice'is produced. The formation of the sound may be
expressed shortly by defining it as a
voiced bi-labial nasal consonant.

When a vowel follows, the position of the tongue during the production of
m approximates to the position required for that vowel. To this extent,
therefore, it may be said that there are subsidiary members of the phoneme.
/m/ is the regular sound of the letter /m/; examples.”make /meik/, 'come’
/kΛm/, thumb . M is, however, silent in initial mn-, as in 'mnemonic’ /ni:
monik/.
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• Voiced alveolar nasal /n/

The principal member of the English n-phoneme is formed as follows.

The mouth-passage is completely blocked by raising the tip of the tongue to
touch the teeth-ridge; the soft palate is lowered so that, when air is emitted by
pressure from the lungs, it passes out through the nose; the vocal cords are
made to vibrate so that ’voice is produced. This formation may be expressed
shortly by defining the sound as a voiced alveolar nasal consonant. Here are
are some examples: now /nau/, nine /nain/.

• Voiced velar nasal /ŋ/

It is formed as in /m/ and /n/ except that the mouth passage is blocked
by raising the back of the tongue to touch the fore part of the soft palate. There
are some ways in which the distribution of / ŋ / is unusual:

1) In initial position we find /m/ and /n/ occurring freely, but never / ŋ / in
this position.
2) Medially, / ŋ / occurs quite frequently, but there is in RP a rather
complex and quite interesting rule concerning the question of when / ŋ / may
be pronounced without a following plosive. When we find the letters <nk> in
the middle of a word in its orthographic form, a /k/ will always be pronounced;
however, some words with orthographic <ng> in the middle will have a
pronunciation containing / ŋg/ and others will have /ŋ / without /g/. For
example, in RP we find the following:

A B

finger fiŋg∂ singer siŋ∂

anger æŋg∂ hanger hæŋ∂
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4.5- Lateral Consonants

A lateral consonant is one in which the passage of air through the mouth
does not go in the usual way along the centre of the tongue and the part of the
roof of the mouth where contact is to be made (the alveolar ridge in the case of
/I/). Because of this complete closure along the centre, the only way for the air
to escape is along the sides of the tongue.

We find /I/ initially, medially and finally, and its distribution is therefore
not particularly limited. In RP, the consonant has one unusual characteristic:
the realisation of /I/ found before vowels sounds quite different from that found
in other contexts. For example:

• the realisation of /I/ in the word lea /li:/ is quite different from that in
eel’ /i:I/. The sound in /i:I/ is what we call a “dark I”; it has a quality rather
similar to an <u> vowel, with the back of the tongue raised.

The sound in /li:/ is what is called a “clear I”; it resembles an <y> vowel,
with the front of the tongue raised.
The “dark I” is also found when it precedes a consonant, as in eels /i: Iz/.
We can therefore predict which realisation of /I/ (clear or dark) will occur in a
particular context:

• “clear I” will never occur before consonants or before a pause, but only
before vowels and before /j/: let /let/, value
• “dark I” never occurs before vowels: bell
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5. THE ENGLISH SEMI-VOWELS

They may be defined as “independent vowel glides in which the speech

organs start by forming a weakly articulated close or a fairly close vowel and
immediately move to another sound of equal or greater prominence”.
These are the consonants found at the beginning of words such as yet and
wet. They have been called semivowels by many writers, but it is used the more
modern term “approximant” too.
The most important thing to remember about these phonemes is that
they are phonetically like vowels but phonologically like consonants.
Despite the fact that semi-vowels are, in phonetic terms, generally
vocalic, they are treated within the consonant class, mainly because their
function is consonantal; they have a marginal situation in the syllable. Their
consonantal function is seen in the fact that:

1) words beginning with “w” or “y” take the indefinite article: a wish, a
yawn.
2) they take the weak form or the definite article: the wish
3) in the infinitive of verbs beginning with “w” or “j” the weak form of “to” is
used: to wish

5.1. Labio-velar semi-vowel /w/

/w/ is represented by the letter <w> when:

1) it occurs in initial position or at the beginning of a syllable (want, wide, wet)

2) or is preceded by a consonant (twelve, twist)
3) or <u> preceded by <q> or <g> (language, anguish; quick)

The starting point for pronouncing <w> is as for a long <u> but
immediately it glides to another vowel position or occasionally to that of the
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consonants <I> or <j>. The /w/ must be short and weak as with <j>, but the
lips must be rounded quite firmly.

52. Unrounded palatal semi-vowel /j/

/j/ is frequently spelt:

1) <y> in initial position (yes, yield)

2) <y> or <e> in medial position (tedious, companion, hideous)
3) sometimes before /u:/: <u>, <ue>, <ui>, <ew>, <eu> (uniform )

This semi-vowel is usually called “yod”. It is produced by rising the front

of the tongue towards the hard palate as for/i/. The lips are spread, the soft
palate is raised and the vocal cords vibrate.

53. Post-alveolar approximant /r/

An approximant, as a type of consonant, is rather difficult to describe;
informally, we can say that it is an articulation in which the. articulators
approach each other but do not get sufficiently close to each other to produce a
“complete” consonant such as a plosive, nasal or fricative.
The important thing about the articulation of /r/ is that the tip of the
tongue approaches the alveolar area in approximately the way it would for a /t/
or /d/, but never actually makes contact with any part of the roof of the mouth.
The tongue is in fact usually slightly curled backwards with the tip raised;
consonants with this tongue shape are usually called retroflex.

Examples: red , arrive , hearing

In these words <r> is followed by a vowel: But in the following words there is
no /r/ in the pronunciation:

car, ever, , hard, verse, cares

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Many accents of English do pronounce /r/ in words like the last ones
above (for example, most American, Scots and West of England accents);
accents which have <r> in final position (before a pause) and before a
consonant are called rhotic accents, while accents in which <r> only occurs
before vowels (such as RP) are called non-rhotic.

6-ENGLISH AND SPANISH CONSONANTS COMPARED

6.1- Spanish.

- There are 19 consonantal phonemes.

- When compared to the English system, the main features are:

a) Stops instead of plosives:

No aspiration

/t/ and /d/ are dental.

/p/ does not occur in final position.

/b/, /d/ and /g/ have fricative allophones.

b) There is a voiceless fricative that does not occur in

English. Although this sound is not found in RP but is found in
some varieties of English such as in Scottish English.

c) Only one palatal and voiceless affricate /t∫/

d) There is also a voiced palatal lateral consonant /l/

e) Nasals:
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There is a nasal /n/ that can be alveolar, dental or velar

according to adjacent sounds.
There is a voiced palatal nasal consonant ‘ñ’ which does not
exist in English.

f) There are two rolled consonants:

A voiced alveolar vibrating consonant /r/

A voiced multiple alveolar vibrating consonant /r/.

6.2- English

There are twenty-seven consonants used in spoken Spanish and twenty-

five in spoken English. Many English speakers use three extra consonants in
addition to the normal twenty-five.

English consonants are used more than in Spanish, and occur in many
positions not found in Spanish, especially in final position; they also occur in
clusters more than in Spanish. They are more intensely articulated than in
Spanish, the voicing is much stronger and more sustained. They are not
weakened in the medial and final position as they are in Spanish.
To end with, most of the time the tongue is further back in the mouth than in
Spanish.

When compared to Spanish system, these are the main differences.

a) Plosives.
- They may be aspirated or unaspirated.
- Plosives /t/ and /d/ are alveolar.
- Glottal stop: /t/, allophone. cotton, mutton

b) Some fricatives that do no exist in Spanish.

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- A voiced labio-dental /v/.

- A voiced dental /d/.
- A voiced alveolar /z/
- A voiceless palato-alveolar /∫/.
- A breathed glottal /h/.
- Also a breathed post-alveolar /r/ which is not vibrating in English.

c) Affricates: There is:

- A voiced palato-alveolar affricate /dZ/ which does not exist in

Spanish.

d) Two lateral variants:

- Clear and dark /l/ are not differentiated in Spanish.

e) Nasals. Main differences:

- Voiced alveolar nasal consonant /n/
- Voiced velar nasal consonant / ŋ / which does not exist in Spanish.

f) Semi-vowels do not exist in Spanish.

- Labio-dental /w/
- Unrounded /j/

6.3 – Didactic Implications

English and Spanish phonetic differences make necessary specific

didactic procedures in order to:
- Rise students’ awareness of FL phonological system.
- Master FL distinctive phonemes for comprehension and
production, e.g. long and short vowels.
- Teacher training programs should also consider language
teachers’ need of mastering FL phonological system.
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Classroom strategies to help students develop competence in oral skills should

consider the following:
- Strategies for error correction, e.g. peer correction, using a
code…
- Provide opportunities for oral practice in the classroom, e.g.
pair work, discriminating minimal pairs….
- Combine bottom-up and top-down approach to language
learning, e.g. focus on stressed words, intonation, etc…
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7-BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Cárdenas, D. 1960 Introducción a una Comparación Fonológica del Español
y del Inglés, Washington; Center for Applied Linguisitics.
- Gimson, A.C, 1970. An Introduction to the Pronunciation of English.
London, Edward Arnold.
- Jones, D.1972. An outline of English Phonetics. Cambridge, W. Heffer &
Sons.
- Alcaraz, E; Fonética Inglesa para Españoles, Marfil 1984