Spoken language phonetics: Transcription, articulation, consonants LING 200 Winter 2009

Plan for today Phonetic transcription Phonetics Articulation of speech sounds Description of consonants

First, some amazing things about language

What is a phonetic transcription? Way of writing languages that have no writing system or have writing systems that don’t represent sounds consistently Spoken vs. signed languages

A language with no writing system Witsuwit’en ‘driftwood’ ‘cane’ ‘footwear’ [təz] [thʌz] [qhɛ] no writing system until recently; one developed in the 70s based on phonetic transcription Notice some familiar symbols (but may have new values) some unfamiliar symbols

A language that doesn’t represent sound consistently English Different letters but same sound she, tree, ski, believe, receive, amoeba Same letter but different sounds red, she, the, get

Why phonetic transcription needed Allows us to “freeze” language and talk about structure how structure learned how structure may vary between speakers how structure may change over time Provides a universal framework for the description of spoken languages

What is phonetics? Articulatory phonetics how sounds are produced Acoustic phonetics acoustic properties of sounds Auditory phonetics how sounds are perceived All branches use phonetic transcription

Articulatory phonetics Some of the vocal tract structures relevant for speech nasal cavity pharynx oral cavity

A clip from The Human Language Evolves (Human Language, vol “6 dancers” “the lips” “3 different parts of the tongue” “the soft palate” “the larynx”

More vocal tract structures relevant for speech Distinct sound results from location, degree of constriction in vocal tract

Phonetic description =Description of speech sounds For consonants, mainly: State of glottis Place of articulation Manner of articulation This is just a first pass at some of the parameters that need to be mentioned when describing consonants. Even for English we need more detailed descriptions (need to mention more parameters) when describing consonants.

Some places of articulation upper articulator lower articulator “3 different parts of the tongue” tip(3)/blade(6) body(front-7/back-8) root

Some structures in vocal tract descriptive term lips labial teeth dental alveolar ridge alveolar hard palate palatal soft palate = velum velar

Some places of articulation in English lower articulator upper articulator example (bi-) labial bill (apico-) alveolar dill (dorso-) velar gill For some places of articulation, there is a default value for the lower articulator and it’s typically not mentioned in such cases see slide 13

Manner of articulation = “degree of occlusion” How close are lower and upper articulator? Relatively close, narrowed or constricted (‘occluded’) airflow: consonants Relatively far apart, unconstricted airflow: vowels

Some consonant manners of articulation Stops: complete occlusion of airflow bill, dill, gill Fricatives: air pressure build-up behind occlusion; turbulent airflow Liquids and glides: no pressure build-up

Some English fricatives place of articulation example labiodental fin interdental thin alveolar sin palatal (palato-alveolar) shin laryngeal hinder

Liquids and glides = Approximants: No pressure build-up, non-turbulent airflow place example liquids alveolar lip retroflex* rip glides palatal yip labial (actually labio-velar) whip *See slide 13

State of the glottis

The larynx and vocal cords vocal cords are muscles and ligaments on cartilage

Some states of the glottis in English voiced: vocal cords are close, vibrate when air passes through glottis voiceless: vocal cords apart, do not vibrate Some voiced and voiceless fricatives voiceless voiced fooey voodoo thin then sip zip Aleutian illusion

Back to phonetic transcription Transcription symbols abbreviate phonetic descriptions E.g. [p] = voiceless bilabial stop Phonetic transcription in square brackets International Phonetic Association (http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA/ipachart.html) interactive chart: http://www.ladefogeds.com/course/chapter1/chapter1.html

Summary Phonetic description of consonants place of articulation manner of articulation (degree of occlusion) state of glottis Phonetic transcription

Question Think of some consonant in a language you know that is not one of the speech sounds of English. Be sure to name the language. Describe that consonant using whatever terms you like. (Write your TA’s name on your paper and hand to your TA.)