english linguistics

ENGLISH LINGUISTICS
REVIEW
PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY
1.Phonetics and Phonology
a.What is phonetics?
*Phonetics and articulators/organs of speech
*Articulatory Phonetics:
*Auditory Phonetics:
*Acoustic Phonetics
*3 aspects of the study of phones/sounds:
-physical: articulation, height, length, quality, loudness, pitch,
melody
-accent: regional characteristics
-social: phonetically distinctive features, social effect
Phoneme - Phone - Allophone
1.Speech sounds are the movements of the air through human articulators
(organs of speech). The air moves through
* the nasal cavity (the nose), nasal sounds /m, n, …/ appear;
* the oral cavity (the mouth), oral sounds /p, b, f, v, t, d, …/ appear;
* the two lips, bi-labial sounds /p, b, m,…/ appear…
2.Unit of Phonetics and Phonology: Phoneme, phone, and allophone:
* A phonetic unit or segment is called a phone.

* A phoneme is a more abstract unit. It is defined as the smallest unit of language
existing as such a speech - sound which is capable of distinguishing one word from
another or one grammatical form of a word from another form of the same word.
* An allophone can be defined as a predictable phonetic variant of a phoneme. An
actually pronounced speech sound is always a variant ( allophone) of a phoneme.
Different allophones of one and the same phonemes are speech sounds which have
one or more articulatory features and, therefore, acoustic features in common and at
the same time differ from each other in some (usually slight) degree because of the

influence of their position, of the neighboring speech sounds and of other purely
phonetic factors upon them.
* An allophone is a variant of a phoneme. The allophones of a phoneme
form a set of sounds that
(a) do not change the meaning of a word,
(b) are all very similar to one another, and
(c) occur in phonetic contexts different from one another and
(d) have non -distinctive differences.
* In other words,
+ Phoneme is the minimal meaningless unit of language. It contains a
bundle of phonetic distinctive features,
e.g. / i: / [vocalic] [front] [long] [unrounded] [close] [high];
/ k / [consonantal] [velar] [stop/plosive] [voiceless]
b.The classification of phonemes:
*Segmental phonemes (consonants, vowels) based on
-phonetically distinctive features, articulation, height,
length, quality
*Suprasegmental phonemes (stress, intonation) based on
-loudness (height, length, voice quality),
-loudness, tempo, timbre, melody
c.The classification of Consonants based on
*Points of articulation/Articulators/Organs of speech
*Manner of articulation
*Voice
*Aspiration
d.The classification of Vowels based on
*Position of the tongue
*Length of the tongue
*Height of the tongue
*Shape of the lips

HỆ THỐNG PHIÊN ÂM QUỐC TẾ- IPA ALPHABETS
IPA: CONSONANTS/PHỤ ÂM QUỐC TẾ

DIPHTHONG

A diphthong is a combination of two vowels pronounced within one syllable.

The first element of a diphthong is called the nucleus, the second element is called
the glide. The nucleus is a strong, clear and distinct vowel sound. The glide is weak
in the articulation of a diphthong. The organs of speech start from the position
necessary for the first vowels and glide in the direction of the second vowels . The
first element in all the diphthongs is stressed and is stronger than the second.
e.g. /ai/ /au/ /i
∂
/ /u
∂
/
Diphthongs can be classified into
a- retracting ( ending in /u /, e.g. now, town, go, show),
b- fronting (ending in / i /, e.g. eye, why, say, day, boy, destroy), and
c- centering (ending in / ∂ /, e.g. hear, near).
Diphthongs can also be classified into
a- closing ( ending in either / i / or / u /, e.g. life, like, say, waiter,
phone, know ) or
b- centering (ending in / ∂ /,e.g. here, near, hair, sure).
e.Syllables based on
*the structure: ONSET + RHYME (NUCLEUS + CODA)
*the ending +with vowel: OPEN SYLLABLE
+with consonant: CLOSED SYLLABLE
*stressed or unstressed syllables

f.Stress placed
*over + the root
*over + prefix
*over or before + suffix
*over + compounds
g.Intonation types classified into
*fall (affirmation, confirming information in WH-question)
*rise (YES-NO question)
*rise-fall (listing, correcting wrong facts )
*fall-rise (politeness, uncertainty, tail-questions)
*level (a feeling of saying something routine, uninteresting or boring)
PHONOLOGICAL CHANGES
1.Assimilation: Two adjacent consonants within a word or at word boundaries
often influence each other in such a way that the articulation of one sound
becomes similar to or even identical with the articulation of the other one.
2.Degrees of Assimilation:
2.1.Complete Assimilation: For example, horse shoe /ho:s
∫
u:/ >/'ho:
∫∫
u:/.
2.2.Partial Assimilation: For example, in the assimilation of the alveolar variants
of the consonants /t/, /d/, /n/, /l/, /s/,/z/ to the dental consonant /
θ
/ and/
δ
/ the
main phonemic features of the former are retained, but the point of
articulation is changed, and they are replaced by the dental variants of the
same phonemes under the influence of the following /

θ
/ and/
δ
/ . Another
example is the assimilation of the sound /v/ in fivepence /faiv p
∂
ns/ >
/faifp
∂
ns/.
2.3.Intermediate Assimilation: Examples of intermediate assimilation are
gooseberry /'guzb
∂
ri/, where / s/ in goose /gu:s/ is replaced by /z/ under the
influence of /b/ in berry; /'ko ŋ gres/, where / n / is replaced by /ŋ/ under the
influence of /g /.
2.Accommodation
In accommodation the accommodated sound does not change its main
phonemic features and is pronounced as a variant of the same
phoneme slightly modified under the influence of a neighbouring
sound. In modern English there are six main types of
accommodation:
2.1. Rounding: An unrounded variant of a consonant phoneme is
replaced by its rounded variant under the influence of a following
rounded vowel phoneme, as at the beginning of the following words :
Unrounded variants of Rounded variants of
consonant consonant
/ti:/ tea /tu:/ too
/les/ less /lu:s/ loose
2.2.Nasalization: a vowel becomes nasalized when it stands

before, after or between nasal consonants. For example: at,
attack > an, mad, man
2.3. Aspiration: a consonant /p, t, k/ becomes aspirated when
it stands before a vowel except rounded vowels.For
example: hat, stop, sky > time, people, can
2.4.Syllabication: some clusters of consonants become syllabic
when they are prounced as a syllable with a vowel inserted
between them.For example: /pl, bl, tl, dn/ > apple, table,
little, garden
3.Elision

The nature of elision may be stated quite simply : under certain
circumstances sounds disappear : one might express this in more technical
language by saying that in certain circumstances a phoneme may be
realized as zero, or have zero realization. As with assimilation, elision is
typical of rapid, casual speech. We will look at some examples of elision:
3.1.Loss of weak vowel after p,t, k. In words like potato, tomato, canary,
perhaps, today, the vowel in the first syllable may disappear; the aspiration
of the initial plosive takes up the whole of the middle portion of the syllable,
resulting in these pronunciations : /p'teitou/, /t'ma:tou/
3.2.Avoidance of complex consonant clusters. E.g. acts > /æks/, looked back
/luk bæk/
3.3.Loss of final v in "of" before consonants. E.g. lots of them /lot
∂
ð
∂
m/
3.4.Contractions of grammatical words. E.g. Had > 'd; Is > 's
4.Weakening:
In English speech, there are certain words which have two forms of

pronunciation:
a- strong, or full, form and
b- weak, or reduced form.
As an example, the word can can be pronounced as /kæn/ (strong
form) or /k∂n/, /kn/ (weak forms). The words which can have both
strong forms and weak forms belong to a category which might be
called grammatical words. It is important to remember that there
are certain contexts where only the strong form is acceptable, and
others where the weak form is the normal pronunciation.
There are three degrees of the reduction of strong forms:
1.The reduction of the length of a vowel without changing its quality
Strong form Weak forms with qualitative reduction
You [ju:] [ju] [ju]
He [hi: ] [hi] [hi]
Your [jo:] [jo] [jo]
2.The second degree of reduction consists in changing the quality of a vowel
Strong forms Weak forms with qualitative reduction
For [fo:] [f∂]
Her [h∂ ] [h∂]
3.The third degree involves the omission of a vowel or consonant.
Strong form Weak forms
Am [æm] [m]
Of [ov] [v]
Can [kæn] [kn] [kη]
5.Linking and Insertion of /r/

In natural communication, we sometimes link words together.
5.1.The normal linking is:
Ex.: What time is it? (It’s half past twelve.)
5.2.The most familiar case is the use of linking r.

Examples are:
a- here / hi∂ / but here are / hi∂r∂ /
four /fo: / for egg / fo: regz /
b- formula A / fo:mi∂l∂r ei /
c- media event / mi: di∂r ivent /
Sometimes we should be careful when we link words together. For
example, / maitrein / can be my train or might rain.
GRAMMAR: MORPHOLOGY
1.1.WORD-STRUCTURE
a.What is morphology?
*Rules of word-structure: rules of forming words from morphemes
b.What is a morpheme?
*A minimal/smallest meaningful unit of language
*An elemental minimal meaningful unit of forming word-structure
*MORPHEME and ALLOMORPHS/ MORPHS
c.Types of morphemes identified on the basis of
*FREE-BOUND: IDENTIFIED = IDENTITY + FY (derivational) + ED (inflectional)
*ROOT-AFFIXES (PREFIXES, INFIXES, SUFFIXES) – STEM/BASE
*DERIVATIONAL – INFLECTIONAL
d.Rules of word-formation
*Types of Word based on types of morphemes:
SIMPLE (EASE) – COMPLEX (EASY) – COMPOUND (EASY-GOING)

1.2.WORD-FORMATION
1. AFFIXATION : adding affixes to the old roots/ words
Ex.: GANGSTER, LONDONER, NON-SMOKING
2. COMPOUNDING : joining the old roots/ words
Ex.: EASY-GOING, MISSING-IN-ACTION
3. CONVERSION : changing the word classes of the old words
Ex.: KNIFE (n) > KNIFE (v),

MOTHER (n) >MOTHER (v)
4. BACK-FORMATION : shortening the ending of the old words
Ex.: BURGLE (v) < BURGLAR,
TELEVISE (v) < TELEVISION (n)
5. ABBREVIATION / CLIPPING : shortening the initial, middle, or / and final
parts of the old words
Ex.: (IN)FLU(ENZA), (TELE)PHONE, EXAM(INATION)
6. ACRONYMY / INITIALISM : shortening the final parts of each word in the
old phrases and joining their initial parts into one new word
Ex.: A(TOMIC)-BOMB, UN, UNESCO,
7. BLENDING : shortening the final part of the first word and the initial part
of the second word and blending them into one new word having the new
concept
Ex.: SM(OKE) + (F)OG = SMOG, TRANSISTOR,
8. REDUPLICATION : doubling the old words by repeating the same rhyme of
the old words
Ex.: TALKIE-WALKIE, TICK-TOCK,
9. BORROWING : borrowing the foreign words and changing the sounds by
assimilation
Ex.: SOVIET, SPUTNIK,
10.INTERNATIONAL TRANSLATION:
Ex.: 3-READINESS MOVEMENT;
3-NO CAMPAIGN- 3-YES CAMPAIGN;
RED AND EXPERT;
ROUND TABLE DISCUSSION;
1
ST
5-YEAR PLAN
GRAMMAR: SYNTAX
1.WORD-CLASS (PARTS OF SPEECH)

*Criteria to classify words into word classes: N, V, ADJ, ADV, ART,
PRO, NUM, AUX, PREP, CONJ, RELATOR, NEGATOR,
INTENSIFIER,

+word order/position

+grammatical function

+form/word stress

+meaning

+development:

-OPEN CLASSES: N, V, ADJ, ADV

-CLOSED CLASSES: PRO, ART, AUX, MODAL, NUM, PREP,
CONJ.,EXCLAMATIONS, INTENSIFIER……
2.PHRASES:
2.1.Syntactic relations in Phrases: MODIFICATION, COMPLEMENTATION,
COORDINATION
2.2.PHRASES can be classified on the basis of
+sentence structure: NP, VP
+word classes of the head/centre: NP, VP, ADJP, ADVP, PREPP
+ -ENDOCENTRIC P./HEADED-P.
-EXOCENTRIC P./NON-HEADED-P.
+meaning:
-FREE P.
-SET P. (Idiomatic)