Linguistics 4 Final Exam (Phonology)
Letters = 26 letters in the Roman alphabet.
Graphemes = more than 26 visual symbols for representing English phonemes and
allophones. 2 letter combinations: digraphs (ex: /sh/ - ship). 3 letter combinations: trigraphs
(ex: /tch/ - catch).
Checked values = closed syllables (= a syllable with 1(+) consonants in coda position (ex:
bile)).
Free values = open syllables (= a syllable with no consonants in coda position (ex: buy)).
Mute e = when the final ‘e’ isn’t pronounced in a word (ex: made, hide).
Free value Ex Checked value Ex
<a> /eɪ/ made /æ/ mad
<e> /i:/ Pete /ɛ/ pet
<i> /aɪ/ hide /ɪ/ hid
<o> /oʊ/ note /ɒ/ not
<u> /ju:/ or /u:/ cute, /ʌ/ or /ʊ/ cut, put
rule
Standard accents are GA, RP, and SSE. Other accents: London English, Tyneside English,
Standard Scottish English (SSE), New York City English, Texan English, Australian English,
Indian English.
Rhotic accent = pronounce the /r/ sound wherever it appears in a word.
Non-rhotic accent = drop the /r/ when it is not followed by a vowel (postvocalic).
Flapping = [ɾ] = flap (ex: pronouncing “butter” as “budder”).
Systemic accent difference = the set of phonological contrasts differ. Ex: Southern English
makes a contrast between /ʊ/ and /ʌ/ (book – buck), while Northern English has /ʊ/ in each
member of the pair.
Realizational accent difference = the realization of a phoneme differs. Ex: in RP, /i:/ and
/u:/ are typically realized as [i:] and [u:] respectively (geese – goose), while in SSE, /i/ is
realized as either short [i] (feet) or long [i:}+] (freeze), and /u/ is realized either as short [ʊ]
(foot) or long [ʊ:] (lose).
Phonemic split = a distinction which was once allophonic becomes phonemic (ex: Old
English umlaut with i-mutation).
Phonemic merger = where there was once a phonemic contrast, it came to be collapsed.
Prosodic = stress and rhythm. If a 2-syllable word in English lays the stress on the second
syllable, it’s often a loan word.
Suprasegmental = a segment is a speech sound. ‘Above’ the segment are syllables and
foot. ‘Below’ the segment are features.
# represents morphological boundary, . represents phonological boundary. These have
different positions.
Trisyllabic shortening = 3 syllables. Long vowels becoming short. (ex: serene -> serenity).
Great Vowel Shift (GVS) = all long vowels shifted upward in the mouth (chain shift = you
begin with the same number of vowels as you end up with, they just change places).
Syllable = σ, a unit containing an obligatory centre part (usually a vowel).
Nucleus = middle part of the syllable, often the vowel.
Onset = consonants before the nucleus.
1
, Coda = consonants after the nucleus.
Rhyme = nucleus + coda.
Maximal Onset Principle = consonants always prefer the onset position.
Light syllable = the nucleus and the rhyme don’t branch.
Heavy syllable = the rhyme branches.
Phoneme = each meaning-distinguishing sound (/ /). They function contrastively (/f/ - /v/).
When 2 sounds share features (/p/ - /k/), they’re members of a natural class of phonemes.
Allophone = the sounds that are actually produced in speech ([ ]) (realization of the
phoneme).
Humans speak rhythmically by putting regular beats (stressed syllables) in the speech
signal. Beats are louder, have a higher pitch, and are longer than unstressed syllables.
Primary stress [‘] = the strong position (stressed syllable) within a word which receives
most prominence.
Secondary stress [,] = when there’s another strong position in a word.
Functional word = syllable may have a reduced vowel.
Lexical word = has at least one full syllable.
Metrical foot = a stressed syllable followed by zero or more unstressed syllables (ex:
nuggets). The head is a stressed syllable. The most common foot in English is trochaic:
primary stress on the penultimate syllable for bisyllabic words and on the antepenultimate
syllable for polysyllabic words. Number of feet is the number of stressed syllables. W S is not
a possible foot.
Stressed-timed = interval between stressed syllables is roughly equal, causing unstressed
syllables to be shortened (ex: English, Dutch, German).
Syllable-timed = equal duration of all syllables & hardly any vowel reduction + no schwas
(ex: French, Italian, Spanish, Turkish).
General English stress principles:
1. The End-Based Principle: the placement of primary stress is calculated by counting from
the end of the word (final – penultimate – antepenultimate).
2. The Rhythmic Principle: while it’s possible for English words to end with up to 4
unstressed syllables (ex: ungentlemanliness), they can’t begin with more than 1 unstressed
syllable.
3. The Derivational Principle: often secondary stress on the syllable which had primary
stress in the deriving word (ex: characterize – characterization).
4. The Stress Clash Avoidance Principle: try to avoid having 2 adjacent stressed syllables
(ex: Japan – Japanese).
Word stress assignment in English:
- Monosyllabic lexical: one syllable for primary stress to fall on.
- Bisyllabic lexical: nouns are trochaic (ex: carpet), but sometimes final stress because of
borrowing (ex: shampoo). Adjectives are trochaic (ex: crazy), but sometimes final stress
because of prefixes of Latinate origin (ex: precise). Adverbs are trochaic (ex: slowly). Verbs
often have final primary stress (ex: export), again because of Latinate prefixes.
- Polysyllabic lexical: nouns are trochaic (ex: academy), but also often final stress (ex:
kangaroo). Adjectives are trochaic (ex: general).
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Letters = 26 letters in the Roman alphabet.
Graphemes = more than 26 visual symbols for representing English phonemes and
allophones. 2 letter combinations: digraphs (ex: /sh/ - ship). 3 letter combinations: trigraphs
(ex: /tch/ - catch).
Checked values = closed syllables (= a syllable with 1(+) consonants in coda position (ex:
bile)).
Free values = open syllables (= a syllable with no consonants in coda position (ex: buy)).
Mute e = when the final ‘e’ isn’t pronounced in a word (ex: made, hide).
Free value Ex Checked value Ex
<a> /eɪ/ made /æ/ mad
<e> /i:/ Pete /ɛ/ pet
<i> /aɪ/ hide /ɪ/ hid
<o> /oʊ/ note /ɒ/ not
<u> /ju:/ or /u:/ cute, /ʌ/ or /ʊ/ cut, put
rule
Standard accents are GA, RP, and SSE. Other accents: London English, Tyneside English,
Standard Scottish English (SSE), New York City English, Texan English, Australian English,
Indian English.
Rhotic accent = pronounce the /r/ sound wherever it appears in a word.
Non-rhotic accent = drop the /r/ when it is not followed by a vowel (postvocalic).
Flapping = [ɾ] = flap (ex: pronouncing “butter” as “budder”).
Systemic accent difference = the set of phonological contrasts differ. Ex: Southern English
makes a contrast between /ʊ/ and /ʌ/ (book – buck), while Northern English has /ʊ/ in each
member of the pair.
Realizational accent difference = the realization of a phoneme differs. Ex: in RP, /i:/ and
/u:/ are typically realized as [i:] and [u:] respectively (geese – goose), while in SSE, /i/ is
realized as either short [i] (feet) or long [i:}+] (freeze), and /u/ is realized either as short [ʊ]
(foot) or long [ʊ:] (lose).
Phonemic split = a distinction which was once allophonic becomes phonemic (ex: Old
English umlaut with i-mutation).
Phonemic merger = where there was once a phonemic contrast, it came to be collapsed.
Prosodic = stress and rhythm. If a 2-syllable word in English lays the stress on the second
syllable, it’s often a loan word.
Suprasegmental = a segment is a speech sound. ‘Above’ the segment are syllables and
foot. ‘Below’ the segment are features.
# represents morphological boundary, . represents phonological boundary. These have
different positions.
Trisyllabic shortening = 3 syllables. Long vowels becoming short. (ex: serene -> serenity).
Great Vowel Shift (GVS) = all long vowels shifted upward in the mouth (chain shift = you
begin with the same number of vowels as you end up with, they just change places).
Syllable = σ, a unit containing an obligatory centre part (usually a vowel).
Nucleus = middle part of the syllable, often the vowel.
Onset = consonants before the nucleus.
1
, Coda = consonants after the nucleus.
Rhyme = nucleus + coda.
Maximal Onset Principle = consonants always prefer the onset position.
Light syllable = the nucleus and the rhyme don’t branch.
Heavy syllable = the rhyme branches.
Phoneme = each meaning-distinguishing sound (/ /). They function contrastively (/f/ - /v/).
When 2 sounds share features (/p/ - /k/), they’re members of a natural class of phonemes.
Allophone = the sounds that are actually produced in speech ([ ]) (realization of the
phoneme).
Humans speak rhythmically by putting regular beats (stressed syllables) in the speech
signal. Beats are louder, have a higher pitch, and are longer than unstressed syllables.
Primary stress [‘] = the strong position (stressed syllable) within a word which receives
most prominence.
Secondary stress [,] = when there’s another strong position in a word.
Functional word = syllable may have a reduced vowel.
Lexical word = has at least one full syllable.
Metrical foot = a stressed syllable followed by zero or more unstressed syllables (ex:
nuggets). The head is a stressed syllable. The most common foot in English is trochaic:
primary stress on the penultimate syllable for bisyllabic words and on the antepenultimate
syllable for polysyllabic words. Number of feet is the number of stressed syllables. W S is not
a possible foot.
Stressed-timed = interval between stressed syllables is roughly equal, causing unstressed
syllables to be shortened (ex: English, Dutch, German).
Syllable-timed = equal duration of all syllables & hardly any vowel reduction + no schwas
(ex: French, Italian, Spanish, Turkish).
General English stress principles:
1. The End-Based Principle: the placement of primary stress is calculated by counting from
the end of the word (final – penultimate – antepenultimate).
2. The Rhythmic Principle: while it’s possible for English words to end with up to 4
unstressed syllables (ex: ungentlemanliness), they can’t begin with more than 1 unstressed
syllable.
3. The Derivational Principle: often secondary stress on the syllable which had primary
stress in the deriving word (ex: characterize – characterization).
4. The Stress Clash Avoidance Principle: try to avoid having 2 adjacent stressed syllables
(ex: Japan – Japanese).
Word stress assignment in English:
- Monosyllabic lexical: one syllable for primary stress to fall on.
- Bisyllabic lexical: nouns are trochaic (ex: carpet), but sometimes final stress because of
borrowing (ex: shampoo). Adjectives are trochaic (ex: crazy), but sometimes final stress
because of prefixes of Latinate origin (ex: precise). Adverbs are trochaic (ex: slowly). Verbs
often have final primary stress (ex: export), again because of Latinate prefixes.
- Polysyllabic lexical: nouns are trochaic (ex: academy), but also often final stress (ex:
kangaroo). Adjectives are trochaic (ex: general).
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