UNIABEU / Faculdades de Licenciatura em Letras. Subject: Tpicos Especiais em Lngua Inglesa (Fontica) 80h.a.

. Professor: Edson Estarneck Special Topics of English Personal presentation Presentation of the program: Introduction to the study of Phonetics and Phonology, applied to the speech sounds and phonemes. Presentation of the organs of speech, manner of articulation and place of articulation. The Phonetic Alphabet and the classification of vowels and consonants. Analysis of the mechanism of accent, rhythm and intonation. Phonetics is the branch of Linguistics which studies the formation of speech sounds by the vocal organs, their transmission as air-vibrations and their perception by the hearer. So it can be divided into three: a) articulatory phonetics; b) acoustic phonetics; and c) auditory phonetics. From the three branches of Phonetics, the first, articulatory phonetics is the most important for second language teaching, and it is the foundation for the study of Phonology. The speech sounds are the units of phonetic description. Phonology is the branch of Linguistics which is concerned with the sounds of a language as a system, observing the functional differences of one sound from another sound, which make the words semantically distinguishable in a given language.Such sounds which are essential to the functioning of the language are called phonemes, the units of phonological description. In this way, it is only possible to refer to sounds as phonemes if they are related to the same linguistic system. The word sound or phone is a general reference to any speech sound, for exemple, the [p] sound is a voiceless bilabial oclusive sound. Nevertheless, it is not possible to use the word phoneme in the same way, but when it is related to a specific language, such as the /p/ phoneme of Portuguese, the /s/ phoneme of English. Phonology then is responsible to distinguish which sounds of a language are phonemes and which of them are allophones, variants of a given phoneme. For exemple, the /t/ phoneme of Portuguese has allophones (distinguishing sounds) in the words tia and tato(from Rio de Janeiro dialect), that is, one single phoneme may have several different sounds. By the way, allophones of a language may be different phonemes in another language. The distinguishing sounds of the words tia and tato, which are allophones of the /t/ phoneme of Portuguese (in Rio de Janeiro dialect), are different phonemes in English with the words talk / chalk, tin/chin. Phoneme simbols are transcribed in oblique brackets, / /, and phonetic simbols are transcribed in square brackets, [ ]. So, the /t/ phoneme of the Rio de Janeiro dialect of Portuguese has two allophones in the words tia e tato, which are [ts] and [t], respectively. The organs of speech The lungs and the chest as well, which function as bellows, expel breath, and the air stream is modified in various points producing different sounds. The larynx is the first place through which the air passes. It is at the upper part of the windpipe (or trachea), the conduct

which connects the lungs to the larynx. The vocal cords are situated in the larynx, they function as a vibration set when the stream of air comes from the lungs. As the matter of fact, they are two membranes (tissues) situated cross the larynx whose front part is fixed and back part is moving. If they are brought close together, the vocal cords are made to vibrate, producting a voiced sound. If they are drawn apart, the stream of air has a free passage, producting a voiceless sound. The space between the vocal cords is called glottis. There is an organ just above the larynx called epiglottis, but it does not take part in the formation of any speech sounds. It only serves to prevent food from falling into the larynx during the action of swallowing. Modifications will happen with the air stream after passing trought the larynx in the resonance chambers (or resonators), the pharynx, the mouth, and the nasal cavity. They amplify the sound produced in the larynx. The organs of articulation proper are the tongue (it has three parts for the phonetic purposes: the blade, the front, and the back), the roof of the mouth (it comprises the teethridge, the hard palate, and the soft palate whose the loose handing end is the uvula), the teeth, and the lips. Classification of sounds The souds of speech are divided into two groups: the vowels and the consonants. The characteristic of the vowels is that they are produced when the air issuing from the lungs passes freely through the mouth without any obstruction or narrowing of the channel. On the other hand, when the air from the lungs is obstructed in such a way as to produce audible friction, it is produced a consonant. Classification of vowels (simple vowels, diphthongs, diphthongs before /l, r/. * The fundamental vowels: /iy, ey, a, ow, uw/ * Diphthongization : with y and w. The upward movement toward the front of the mouth. The upward movement toward the back of the mouth. * The eleven vowel of English. (the fundamental /iy, ey, a, ow, uw/+ 6 vowels / , , , , ] , U/). Classification of consonants The voiced consonants are b l d m g n The voiceless consonants are f k h p r s v w y t z d hw t

What happens if you stop the vibration of the vocal cords while pronouncing /v/? What sound is left? We may say that /v/ is the voiced conterpart of /f/. Voiceless counterpart of the voiced consonants: /b,p/ /g,k/ /d,t/ /,/ /v,f/ /z,s/ /,/ /d,d/

We may classify a consonant according to the vibration of the vocal cords, whether they vibrate or not, producing voiced or voiceless sounds. In a second way, it is useful to classify them as stops or continuants. A continuant is a sound that may be prolonged like /m/. A stop is a sound that must be pronunced instantaneously like /t/. We may also classifiy the consonants according to the manner of articulation Plosives (Stops): p, t, k, b, d, g Nasals: m, n, Lateral: l Fricatives (Spirants): f, , s, , h, v, , z, , r Affricates: t, d Semi-vowels: w, y Consonats classification may also be according to the place of articulation Bilabial: p, b, m, w Alveolar: t, d, n, l, s, z Velar: k, g, Labio-dental: f, v Dental: , Palato-alveolar: , , t, d Post-alveolar: r Glottal: h Palatal: j