Lecture 1 Phonetics as a Linguistic Science Plan

In mass communication one person or perhaps several speakers communicate with a large number of listeners. Usually these listeners are not physically present when the sending takes place. Newspapers and magazines, television and radio are examples of mass communication (O'Connor 1988).
Lecture 17

The combinatory-positional changes of phonemes

Plan:

1. 
   The combinatory-positional changes of phonemes
   
2. 
   Assimilation
   

Speech sounds, i.e. phones representing phonemes, are combined in strict order to form words, morphemes, word- combinations and sentences which influence each other, as a re­sult of which their articulatory-acoustic features may be changed and modified. These changes in pronunciation, which depend on the way they influence one another, their position and stress - are called combinatory-positional changes (or «combinatory pho­netics»). They are classified into assimilation, accomodation, dis­similation metathesis, sandhi, haplology, reduction and elision. Combinatory-positional changes are connected with the historic development of a language and its phonetic structure in particular. The fluency of speech, the unstressed position in words and word junction are the favourable conditions under which assimilation and reduction find their expression. These factors accelerate as­similation and reduction, though the cause of these phonetic changes cannot be explained from a narrow viewpoint.

Some linguists explain combinatory-positional changes as the result of speech effort economy or the tendency ease of pro­nunciation which occurs in pronunciation, owing to the fact that speakers try to obtain maximum effect with minimum effort¹. For example, in rapid speech the word ninth Ы /пандЭ is pronounced as a dental allophone owing to the influence of the dental (inter­dental) /0/. It is easier to articulate two dental consonants than pronounce alveolar and dental consonants. Such cases may often be observed in pronunciation.

There are some attempts to interpret combinatory-positional changes from the phonological point of view. According to Ch. A. Ferguson: «Phonology is variable. Variation has to be included in any type of phonological theory. It is important to study how

phonology works»¹. Various combinatory - positional changes may cause the system of phonological oppositions and distinctive features to grow or eliminate, which may be proved by diachronic phonology. The realization of phonological oppositions in speech and different allophonic variations of phonemes by the influence of some factors should be studied by methods of syntagmatic phonology. However, paradigmatic changes may depend on syn­tagmatic changes in the development of a phonological system. The problem of phonological interpretation of combinatory- positional changes has not been studied thoroughly yet.

Combinatory-positional changes are universal for all lan­guages, but the character of changes determined by certain factors may differ. Some combinatory-positional changes have been ex­plained in previous chapters in relation with the description of the allophones of vowel and consonant phonemes. Therefore, below we give classification of combinatory-positional changes and ex­plain them briefly.

ASSIMILATION

The articulations of sounds combined to form words, word combinations (junctions) and sentences influence each other. The process when the articulation of a sound under the influence of the articulation of a neighbouring sound becomes similar or takes on features of the neighbouring sound, is called assimilation. As­similation is a result of a modification process of adjacent pho­nemes. There are cases of modification when as a result of it, a phoneme may be formed which differs from either the assimilated or assimilating phoneme.

Although assimilation is a universal process in all lan­guages, its action may be different. The assimilatory processes in­clude the influence of a vowel on a consonant (V —» C), a vowel on a vowel (V —» V), a consonant on a vowel (С —» V), conso­nant on a consonant (С —> C).

The articulation of English vowels may be modified by the position of the tongue, lips, soft palate, and the degree of muscu­lar tension. This type of assimilation is known as adaptation of speech organs, making a convenient transition from one articula­tion to another. There are other types of vowel assimilation known as a vowel harmony, in which the vowel of the syllable may become more like the vowel of some other syllable, and vowels agree with each other in certain features. Vowel harmony is widely used in Turkic (except Uzbek) languages, e. g. in Turk­ish the plural suffix -lar or -ler may be used when the stem con­tains a velar vowel or a palatal vowel: gtil (a rose) - giiller (roses), at (a horse) - atlar (horses).

Phonologically, vowel harmony means that the vowel sys­tem of a language has its full value only in the first syllable of the word, whereas in other syllables the oppositions of the vocalic timbre (i.e. positions of the tongue) are neutralized, the choice of the archiphonemic representative being conditioned externally. Thus, vowels in any other syllables but the first always belong to the same class of articulatory position of the tongue as vowels of the preceding syllable². High vowels of a suffix agree in backness and rounding with the stem vowel. In some other languages back vowels are fronted before certain suffixes, containing a high front vowel which is called umlaut widely used in German (e. g. gut - good, giitik - kind). Vowel harmony and umlaut can be distin­guished by the direction of the assimilating vowels also by some prosodic factors.

The assimilation of consonants is frequently observed in modern English. It is possible to distinguish assimilations affect­ing (1) the place of articulation or both the place of obstruction and the active organ of speech; (2) the manner of production; (3) the work of the vocal cords and (4) the position of the lips.

1. 
   A) Assimilation, affecting the place of obstruction: the principal (alveolar) allophones of the phonemes Ixl, /d/, /п/, /1/, /s/, Izl are replaced by their subsidiary dental allophones when they are adjacent to dental consonant phonemes e.g. tenth /ten0/, in them /'in бэт/, width /wid0/, read this /ri:d'3is/, wealth /welG/, all that /'o:l'6£et/, sixth /siksB/, what's this /'wotsSis/.
   

1. 
   Assimilation, affecting the active organ of speech and the place of obstruction, is observed in words with the prefix con-, when it is followed by the consonant phonemes /к/, /g/ the alveo
   

lar sonorant Ы is replaced by the backlingual sonorant /q/ if the prefix bears either a primary or secondary stress e. g. congress /koqgres/, concrete /koqkri:t/, conquest /korjkwest/.

2. 
   Assimilation, affecting the manner of production, is ob­served when nasal consonant phonemes influence the plosive phonemes pronounced in the same place, e.g. sandwich /'saenwid3/, kindness /Tcainnis/, grandmother /^ггептлбэ/. In the word handkerchief the process of assimilation was more com­plicated. Under the influence of fnJ the consonant phoneme /d/ changed to the phoneme Ы and, then disappeared. The remaining phoneme Ini changed to /д/ under the influence of the phoneme /к/. Thus, in the word handkerchief we observe assimilation af­fecting the active organ of speech, the place of obstruction and the manner of production of noise.
   
3. 
   Assimilation, affecting the work of the vocal cords: a) a voiceless consonant phoneme, may be replaced by a voiced one under the influence of the adjacent voiced consonant phoneme, e.g. gooseberry /'guzbari/ from /gu:s/ influencing /Ь/ in berry; b) a voiced consonant phoneme may be replaced by a voiceless one under the influence of the adjacent voiceless consonant phoneme, e.g. newspaper /'nju:speipa/ from /nju:z/ and /peipa/ in which /р/ influence /z/, making it voiceless.
   
4. 
   Labialized subsidiary allophones of the phonemes /к/, /g/, Ш, /s/ are used under the influence of the following bilabial sonorant /w/, e. g. quite /kwait/, twinkle /twiqkl/, language /laeqgwid3/, swim /swim/.
   

This type of labial assimilation often occurs where elements of compound words meet (e.g. football /fupbo:l/, ninepence /'naimpans/, tenpence /'tempans/, sevenpence /'sevmpans/) and at the junction of words in rapid familiar speech, e. g. isn't it /'inmt/, wasn't it /wonmt/, give me /gimmi/³.

According to its degrees assimilation may be: (A) complete,

2.