PHONETIC PROCESS Assimilation Metathesis Epenthesis Epithesis

Assimilation

A process by which one speech sound comes to resemble or become identical with a neighboring sound between words or within a word

Types of Assimilation Regressive

the sound changes because of the the influence of the following sounde.g. ten bikes /ten baiks/ /tembaiks/ AS CS

Progressivethe sound changes because of the influence of the preceding sounde.g. He left the town /hi lef ð∂ taun/ /hi lef ∂ taun/

CSAS Reciprocal

There is mutual influence, or fusion, of the sounds upon each othere.g. Did You /did ju:/ /did ∂/

Ket CS :Conditioning sound AS : Assimilated sound

Metathesis

the transposition of speech sound

e.g. tragedy tradegyaks ask

Epenthesis

The insertion of extra consonant within a word.

e.g. something /s∆mθiŋ/ /s∆mpθiŋ/

Epithesis

The addition of an extra consonant to the end of a word.

e.g. soun /sun/ sound

Elision Elision is a process where one or more

phonemes are ‘dropped’, usually in order to simplify the pronunciation.

For Example: police, correct or suppose, friendship being realised as [pli:s], [kɹɛkt] or [spəʊz], [frenʃip]

<h> is a feature that is very common in many accents of (especially English or English-influenced) English.

For example: as in give her/give him,

[gɪvɜ:]/[gɪvɪm] or tell her/tell him, [tɛlɜ:]/[tɛlɪm] –, or forms of the auxiliary have – as in would have, [wʊdəv], should have, [ʃʊdəv], etc. –

Cluster Reduction

Aya's Prop/Int to Ling (2)

When two or more consonants, often of a similar nature, come together, there is a tendency in English to simplify such a cluster by eliding one of them.

The longer the cluster, the more of a chance there is of elision. Cluster reduction can occur in between as well as inside words

and mainly involves the deletion of voiceless oral plosives where it would otherwise be more difficult to produce two plosives in a row as this would require two closure phases.

If a reduction occurs inside a word, it may also lead to a reduction in the number of syllables, such as in the examples given in the introductory section above, which have become mono-syllabic.

Elision itself is often a precursor to or occurs in conjunction with assimilation, which we’ll discuss in one of the next sections.

Example of Cluster Reduction

Aya's Prop/Int to Ling (2)

word/combination no elision elision

asked [ɑ:skt] [ɑ:st]

lecture [ˈlɛktʃə] [ˈlɛkʃə]

desktop [ˈdɛskˌtɒp] [ˈdɛsˌtɒp]

hard disk [ˌhɑ:dˈdɪsk] [ˌhɑ:ˈdɪsk]

kept quiet [ˌkɛptˈkwaɪət] [ˌkɛpˈkwaɪət]

at least twice [əˌtli:stˈtwaɪs] [əˌtli:sˈtwaɪs]

straight towards [ˌstɹeɪtˈtʊwo:dz] [ˌstɹeɪˈtʊwo:dz]

next to [ˈnɛkstˌtʊ] [ˈnɛksˌtʊ]

seemed not to notice [ˈsi:mdˌnɒttəˈnəʊtɪs] [ˈsi:mˌnɒtəˈnəʊtɪs]

for the first time [fəðəˌfɜ:stˈtaɪm] [fəðəˌfɜ:sˈtaɪm]