2012-13 LINGUA INGLESE 1 modulo BIntroduction to English Linguisticsprof. Hugo Bowles

Lesson 6 Diphthongs + connected speech

1

Lessons and esonero 22 Ottobre – lesson 6

26 Ottobre – lesson 7

29 Ottobre – lesson 8

2 Novembre – lesson 9: revision +

exam practice Sabato 1 Dicembre – lesson 10

esonero 9-10 – AL; 10-11 - MZ 2

3

fear go house I pain pear tour toy

here know how my play there pour voice

beer home down either cave where choice

hear bone loud eye reign air

clear sew sigh made heir

dear crow thai maid wear

Don’t tie obey

foam pay

foe

4

TRIPHTHONGS

/ei/ + schwa

/ai /+ schwa

/au/ + schwa

/oi/ + schwa

schwa + /u/ + schwa

player fire hour royal lower

liar power

5

Minimal pairs

Beware of heard

a dreadful word that

looks like beard and

sounds like bird

6

While the position of the tongue is more or less stable for a pure vowel…

7

… a diphthong is characterised by a graceful movement from one point to another, for this reason they are also sometimes known as glides.

8

English diphthongs may cause Italian speakers difficulty for two main reasons:

Italian has four diphthongs while English has eight. All the Italian diphthongs have equivalents in English which are not the same but which are reasonably similar

Nowhere is the English spelling system more bizarre than in its representation of diphthongs

9

If one has a clear idea of where pure vowels are articulated on the quadrilateral then interpreting the diphthong symbols is not difficult.

10

Technically, English diphthongs are divided into two groups:

Closing diphthongs – which tend to move from an open to a close position, these roughly correspond to Italian sounds

Centring diphthongs – which tend

towards a central position

11

First we will look at the closing group…

12

… the ‘pay’, ‘ made’, ‘maid’, ‘reign’, ‘obey’, sound:

13

Then we have the ‘I’, ‘my’, ‘tie’, ‘sigh’, ‘either’, ‘eye’, ‘Thai’, sound:

14

Then there is ‘boy’, ‘choice’:

15

Then ‘down’, ‘loud’:

16

To end the closing group, the most common diphthong in English, that of ‘no’, ‘know’,‘bone’, ‘foam’, ‘sew’, ‘though’, ‘don’t’, ‘foe’, ‘crow’:

17

To start with the centring group, we have the most common, that of ‘clear’, ‘deer’, ‘here’, ‘wier’:

18

Then ‘air’, ‘where’, wear’, ‘care’, ‘heir’:

19

Finally, there is a diphthong which is quite rare - ‘tour’, ‘poor’:

20

Pronunciation change

Poor used to be pronounced like puer in Latin (and still is in some regions, e.g. Scotland).

Now it tends to be pronounced as a long vowel (like “door” and “more”)

Is there a difference between the pronunciation of “poor” and “paw” (zampa) ?

21

Finally:

Diphthongs are the element in a language which are most liable to change. The majority of the characteristics of a given accent are usually to be found in this area, so understanding of the underlying mechanics is vital if one wants to understand accents and accent change.

Connected speech

Aspects of Connected Speech

Weak Forms Yod coalescence Elision Assimilation

Weak syllables (vowels)

father

happy

thank you

open

photograph

radio

influence

Weak syllables (consonants)

bottle

parcel

threaten

seven

happen

Weak forms

When we talk about weak forms in the phonetics of English this regards a series of words which have one pronunciation (strong) when isolated, and another (weak) when not stressed within a phrase.

e.g. a car v I bought a car

Look at this phrase:

I went to the station and bought two tickets for my father and his best friend.

What are the most important words?

I went to the station and bought two tickets for my father and his best friend.

boughtstationwent

tickets best friend

two

father

If we eliminate the other words can we still understand the message?

went station booked two tickets father best friend.

Let’s look at the phrase transcribed:

ə’ δə ə’ıʃəə’’ ’ɔ ı ı

əə’δəəı’’

There is a tendency for vowels in unstressed syllables to shift towards the schwa (central position)

Weak form are commonly used words

Prepositions Auxiliary verbs Conjunctions

weak formpreposition    

to tu: tǝ

for fɔ: fǝ

from ɑ frǝm

into ɪntu: ɪntǝ

of ɒv

as æz ǝz

at æt ǝt

strong form

PronunciationSpelling

ǝv

Auxiliary verbs

 Strong  

do du: dǝare a: ǝ(r)*was wɒz wǝzwere wɜ: wǝwould wʊd wǝdcould kʊd kǝdshould ʃʊd ʃǝdcan kæn kǝnmust m^st mǝs(t)

Weak

Other words    

and ænd ǝnd, ǝn, nbut b^t bǝtthan δæn δǝnthat (as a relative) δæt δǝtyou (object pronoun) ju: jǝ

your jɔ: jǝ(r)her (as object pronoun)

hɜ:(r) (h)ǝ(r)*

a æ, ei ǝ*an æn ǝnthe δi: δǝ, δi: (before a vowel)

Strong form Weak form

 

Weak=unstressed

In the following sentences the underlined words arestressed and so would be pronounced using the strongform:

- I do like chocolate.  - She drove to Las Vegas, not from Las Vegas.  - We were surprised when she told us her secret. (stress on ‘were’ for emphasis)

Yod coalescence

Yod is the name of the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet – it stands for the vowel / I / or the semi-vowel / j /. In English phonetics Yod coalescence is a form of assimilation – it is a phenomenon which takes place when / j / is preceded by certain consonants most commonly /t / and / d /:

/t/ + /j/ = ʃ

…but use your head! / bǝtʃu:zjǝhed /

what you need…. / wotʃu:ni:d /

the ball that you brought / δǝbɔ:lδətʃu:brɔ:t /

last year…. /la:stʃiǝ/

/d/ + /j/ = /ʤ

could you help me? /kuʤu:helpmi:/

would yours work? /wuʤɔ:zwɜ:k/

she had university exams

ʃʤəɜəӕ

Yod coalescence is common in colloquial speech and is becoming ever more so. Note that it can occur:

- between word boundaries (as above examples)

- within words e.g. You Tube = /ju:ʃ

The fact that two extremely recurrent words in English, you and your, start with /j/ means that understanding of this simple mechanism is vital to the understanding of spoken English. Do you and also did you are often pronounced

as /ʤə/

 

Do you live here?

Did you live here?

/ʤəliviə/

/(di)ʤəliviə/

Exercise.

Identify places where yod coalescence may occur in the following phrases:

 What you need is a good job! You told me that you had your homework done. She didn’t go to France that year. Could you open the window please? You’ve already had yours!

Exercise. Identify places where yod coalescence may occur in the following phrases:

 What you need is a good job! You told me that you had your homework done. She didn’t go to France that year. Could you open the window please? You’ve already had yours!

Elision

 Elision is very simply the omission of certain sounds in certain contexts. The most important occurrences of this phenomenon regard:

1     Alveolar consonants /t/ and /d/ when ‘sandwiched’ between two consonants (CONS – t/d – CONS), e.g.

The next day…. δǝThe last car… δǝ

Hold the dog! ǝδǝ

Send Frank

consonant + affricate elision

This can also take place within affricates /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ when preceded by a consonant, e.g. 

lunchtime ʧʃ

strange days ʤʒ

Elision of ‘not’

The phoneme /t/ is a fundamental part of the negative particle not, the possibility of it being elided makes the foreign students life more difficult. Consider the negative of can – if followed by a consonant the /t/ may easily disappear and the only difference between the positive and the negative is a different, longer vowel sound in the second: 

+ I can speak…. ’ ’ә 

- I can’t speak… /’

Assimilation

Assimilation can be: of Place of Voicing of Manner

We will look at the first two

Assimilation of PlaceThe most common form involves the movement of place of articulation of the alveolar stops /t/, /d/ and /n/ to a position closer to that of the following sound. For instance, in the phrase ten cars, the /n/ will usually be

articulated in a velar position, ƞ so that the tongue will be ready to produce the following velar sound /k/. Similarly, in ten boys the /n/ will be produced in a bilabial

position, /tem b/ to prepare for the articulation of the bilabial /b/.

This phenomenon is easy to find also in Italian: think of the different pronunciations of the ‘n’ in Gian Paolo, Gian Franco and Gian Carlo.

Assimilation of place before a VELAR /n/ before a velar becomes /ƞ/

e.g. ban = /bӕn/

bank = ban+k = /bӕƞk/ not /bӕnk/

/d/ before a velar becomes /g/

e.g. good girl = /gʊg gɜ:l/

/t/ before a velar becomes /k/

e.g. that girl = / δæk gɜ:l /

49

Assimilation of place before a BILABIAL ( /b/ /m/ /p )/

/n/ before a bilabial becomes /m/

e.g. ten boys = / tem boiz/

/d/ before a bilabial becomes /b/

e.g. bad man = /bæb mæn/

/t/ before a bilabial becomes /p/

e.g. hot meal = / mi:l /

50

ASSIMILATION OF VOICING

The vibration of the vocal folds is not something that can be switched on and off very swiftly, as a result groups of consonants tend to be either all voiced or all voiceless. Consider the different endings of ‘legs’ // and ‘hats’ /æ/, of the past forms of the regular verbs such as ‘kissed’ // and ‘sneezed’ /sni:zd/.

The assimilation of voicing can radically change the sound of several common constructions:

have to

has to

əə

e.g. I have to go! əə

used to ə

e.g. I used to live near you. /əɪɪə