Đề cương ôn thi môn Ngữ âm âm vị học tiếng Anh hay, chọn lọc

Câu 1. What is intonation? Indicate types of intonation and functions of
intonation
Intonation may be defined such as a unity of the speech melody, sentence
stress, voice quality and speech tempo which enable to the speaker communicate.
It can be understood and recognized as the pitch of voice (high or low).
In term of forms of intonation, we focus on moving tones used by the speaker.
Basically, there are 2 main forms of tones: falling tone/tune which descends from a
higher to lower pitch and rising one, the movement from a lower to higher one. A
part from those, sometimes complex tones are frequently found. They are fallingrising tone and rising-falling one.
The 4 common functions are: the attitudinal, the accentual, the grammatical,
the discourse.
1, the attitudinal: the intonation enables us to express emotions and attitudes
as we speak and this adds a special kind of meaning to spoken language. This
means the same sentence can be aid ij different ways: angry, happy, grateful and so
on,
2, the accentual: this type of function help to produce the effect of prominence
of syllables that need to be perceived as stressed.
3, the grammatical: in this function, the listener is better to recognise the
grammar and syntactic structure of what is being said by using the information
contained in the intonation.
4, the discourse: in listening to the speaker, it is very important for the listener
to recognize the “new” or “given information” while the speaker is conveying,
indicating in his/her conversation.
Câu 2. What are aspects of connected speech? State the types of
assimillation
1, rhythm is a notion that involves some noticeable event happening at regular
intervals of time which you can compare with a heart beat, a flash light or a piece
of music,
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2, assimilation is something which varies in extend according to speaking rate
and style: it is more likely to be found in rapid, casual speech and less likely in
slow, careful speech,
3,elision is the sounds disappear which is also released as zero or be deleted,
4, linking is a phenomenon that happens when the final consonant of the first
word id linked to the initial vowel of the next word.
Type of assimilation: The assimilation occurs when 2 words stand near by the
first of which ends with a single final consonant (which we will call C’) and the
second of which starts with a single initial consonant (which we will call C”). If C’
changes to become like C” in some way, the assimilation is called regressive. If C”
changes to become like C’ in some way, the assimilation is call progressive.
Câu 3. How Speech sounds made? State the production of oral and nasal
sounds, voiced and voiceless sounds, consonants and vowels.
- All the sounds we make when we speak are result of muscles contracting. The
muscles in the chest that we use for breathing produce the flow of air that is needed
for almost all speech sounds: muscles in the larynx produce many different
modifications in the flow of air from the chest to the mouth.
- After passing through the larynx, the air goes through what we call the vocal
tract, which ends at the mouth and nostrils. Here the air from the lungs escapes into
the atmosphere. We have a large and complex set of muscles that can produce
changes in the shape of the vocal tract.
A nasal consonant is produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to
escape freely through the nose (m, n).
An oral consonant is a consonant sound in speech that is made by allowing air to
escape from the mouth, as opposed to the nose. for example [p], [w], [v] and [x].
Voiced sound
Voiceless sound
Consonants
Vowels are sounds in which there is no obstruction to the flow of air as it passes
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from the larynx to the lip.
Câu 4. Give the definition of Vowel, how are vowels classified? Name
types of vowel?
- Vowels are sounds in which there is no obstruction to the flow of air as it
passes from the larynx to the lips.
- There are 20 vowels in English. The classification of vowels is based on 4
major aspects: tongue height, tongue backness, lip rounding, and the tenseness of
the articulations
The qualities of vowels depend upon the positions of the tongue and lips. It is
important to classify them. According to the position of the main part of the
tongue. The part of the tongue that is raised: front, back and central vowels. The
height to which it is raised: close and open vowels. The position of the lips:
rounded and unrounded vowels. Spread vowels. Close lip-rounding and open liprounding.
Câu 5. What is an English syllable? State the nature and structure of
English syllable
-

An

English

syllable

is

a

unit

of pronunciation uttered

without

interruption, loosely, a single sound.
- The nature of the syllable: Syllable may be defined both phonetically and
phonologically. Phonetically, syllables are usually described as consisting of a
centre which has little or no obstruction to airflow and which sounds
comparatively loud, before and after this centre, there will be greater obstruction to
airflow and/or less loud sound
- Eg: i, what we might call a minimum syllable would be a single vowel in
isolation (the words ‘are’ ɑ: ‘or’ ɔ:) ii, some syllables have an onset (‘bar’ bɑ:
‘key’ ki:), iii, syllables may have no onset but have a coda (‘am’ æm ‘ought’ ɔ:t),
iv, some syllables have onset and coda (‘run’ rɅn ‘sat’ sæt),
- The structure:
+ English allows a very wide range of syllable types. Every English vowel can
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function as the nucleus of a syllable. Most English vowels may function as
complete syllables. A few vowels require a coda of at least one consonant. With
perhaps only one exception, every English consonant may function as the onset of
a syllable. Every English consonant except [h] can constitute the coda of a syllable.
English allows up to three consonants in the onset of a monosyllabic word.
However, when the onset consists of more than one consonant, there are
restrictions on just which consonants can occur together.
+ When two consonants occur as the onset of an English syllable, the first must
be a stop or a fricative and the second must be a liquid [l, r] or a glide [j, w].
English three consonant onsets are even more constrained than two consonant

ones. The first consonant must be [s], the second may be one of the voiceless stops
[p, t, k], and the third may be either a liquid [l, r], or a glide [j, w]. For the most
part, the codas of English syllables are approximately mirror images of English
syllabic onsets.
Câu 6. Indicate the types and levels of stress. State the rule to identify the
stress syllable of two-syllable nouns. Give example
- There are 2 types of stress: word stress and sentence stress.
- Type of stress:
+ Word stress:
1, primary stress: the prominence that results from this pitch movement, or
tone, gives the strongest type of stress.
2, secondary stress: is weaker than primary stress but stronger than another
syllable. Eg: around /əraʊnd/, school /sku:l/.
+ Sentence stress:
1, primary stress: is the strongest and loudest stress of all.
2, secondary stress: is the second loudest stress.
3, tertiary stress: is the weaker than the secondary stress.
4, weak stress: is called zero stress, the weakest degree of loudness.
- Function of stress: to draw the listener’s attention to a certain element
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altering the meaning or suggesting feeling or emotion. In word, stress may perform
a distinctive function, it may distinguish certain English verb from noun consisting
of the same phonemes.
- Rules to identify the stressed syllable of two-syllables nouns: if the second
syllable contains a short vowel the stress will be usually come on the first syllable.
Otherwise it will be on the second syllable. ‘money’ ‘mʌni ‘balloon’ bə’lu:n. verb:
‘apply’ ə’plaɪ ‘enter’ ‘entə
Câu 7. State the nature of stress. State the factors we have to consider in

order to decide of the stress placement.
- The nature of stress is simple enough. We can study stress from the point of
view of production and of perception; the two are obviously closely related but are
not identical. The production of stress is generally believed to depend on the
speaker using more muscular energy than is used for unstressed syllables.
Measuring muscular effort is difficult, but it seems possible, according to
experimental studies, that when we produce stressed syllables, the muscles that we
use to expel air from the lungs are more active, producing higher subglottal
pressure.
- Prominence is produced by 4 main factors: loudness, length, pitch, quality.
+ Most people seem to feel that stressed syllables are louder than unstressed.
+The length of syllables has an important part to play prominence.
+Every syllable is said on some pitch; pitch in speech is closely related to the
frequency of vibration of the vocal folds and to the musical notion of low and high
pitched notes.
+A syllable will tend to be prominent if it contains a vowel that is different in
quality from neighbouring vowels.
- In order to decide on stress placement, it is necessary to make use of some or
all of the following information:
+ Whether the word is morphologically simple, or whether it is complex as a
result either of containing one or more affixes or of being a compound word.
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+ The grammatical category to which the word belongs,
+The number of syllables in the word,
+ The phonological structure of those syllables.
Câu 8. What is consonant? What are factors for classifying English
consonants. Indicate briefly the types of consonants.
Consonant is a speech sound when pronounce it, the organ always form the

barriers obstruction and the air-stream is stopped before going out of mouth and
the vocal cords are vibration or not vibration.
There are 24 consonants in English. The classification of consonants were
shown to based on 3 aspects of articulation: place of articulation, manner of
articulation and voicing.

Place of articulation
Manner
Bilabial

labiodental

dental alveolar Palato - palata

of
articulation

velar glo

alveolar l
Plosive
P,d
Fricative
Affricate
Nasal
M
Lateral
approxima W

F, v

ɵ, ð

T, d
S, z

al
K, g

ʃ, ʒ
ʧ, ʤ

H

N
l
R

j

nt
voicing refers to the relative size of the oral cavity which can change depending on
the position of the back of the tongue. Voicing is the sound that we will hear when
the vocal folds vibrate.

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Câu 9. How many plosives are there in English? List them. The plosives
have different places of articulation- what are they? which plosives are fotis

and which are lenis ones
- English has 6 plosive consonants: p, t, k, b, d, g. the plosives have different
places of articulation. P and b are bilabial: the lips are pressed together. T and d are
alveolar, the tongue blade is pressed against the alveolar ridge.
Normally the tongue does not touch the front teeth as it does in the dental
plosives found in many languages. k and g are velar, the back of the tongue is
pressed against the area where the hard palate ends and the soft palate begins. The
voiceless plosives p, t, k sometimes called fortis and b, d, g are then called lenis.
The plosive phonemes of English can be present in the form of a table as shown
below:

Fortis (voiceless)
Lenis (voiced)

Place of articulation
Bilabial
alveolar
P
t
B
D

Velar
K
G

1. Fricatives and of affricates
Fricatives are consonants with the characteristic that when they are produced,
air escapes through a small passage and makes a hissing sound.
Affricates are rather complex consonants. They begin as plosives and end as

fricatives. ʧ, ʤ are the only 2 affricate phonemes in English.

Fortis
(voiceless)
Lenis
(voiced)

Place of articulation
labiodental dental

alveolar

Palato-alveolar glottal

ʄ

s

ʃ

ɵ

H
V

ð

z

ɜ

Câu 11. The strong form will be used when:
a) they occur at the end of a sentence, as in “Chips are what I’m fond of”.

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b) A weak-form word is being contrasted with another word, as in “The letter
is from him, not to him.”
c) A weak-form word is given stress for the purpose of emphasis, as in “You
must give me more money.”
d) A weak-form is being “cited” or “quoted”, as in “You shouldn’t put “and” at
the end of a sentence.” The most common weak-form words are:
THE (ðə or ði) A (ə) AND (ən) BUT (bət) THAT (ðət as a conjunction of relative
pronoun) THAN (ðən) AT (ət or æt) FOR (fə or fɔ:) FROM (frəm or frɑm) OF (əv
or ɑv) TO (tə or tu) AS (əz or æz) SOME (səm or sʌm) CAN, COULD (kən, kəd
or kæn, kʊd) HAVE, HAS, HAD (əv, əz, əd or hæv, hæz, hæd) SHALL, SHOULD
(ʃəl, ʃəd or ʃæl, ʃʊd) MUST (məs, məst or mʌst) DO, DOES (də, du, dez or du:,
dʌz) AM, IS, ARE, WAS, WERE (əm, ə, ər, wəz, wə, wər or æm, a:, wɑz, wɜ:)
Câu 12. in order to learn how the sounds of speech
are produced it is necessary to become familiar with the different parts of the
vocal tract. These different parts are called articulators, and the study of them is
called articulatory phonetics.

Câu 13. does a one-syllable word have a stress?
Yes, a one-syllable word have a stress when it is in a sentence. Some basic
rules:
1, disyllable words: in most disyllable words, primary stress falls on the first

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syllable.eg: ready, mother. Exception: disyllable word with a prefix or a suffix
which has lost its meaning, the primary stress falls on the root syllable: become
/bɪ’kʌm/, react /ri:’ækt/; disyllable verbs ending in ate, ize, ise. Fy: the primary
stress falls on the second syllable. Surprise /sə’praɪz/.
2. in words of 3 or 4 syllables the stress falls on the third syllable from the end
of the word. (family /fæmɪli/ cinema/sɪnɪmə) and especially with verbs ending with
suffixes such as ize, fy, ate, logy, logist, cracy, recognize /’rekəgnaɪz/
qualify /’kwalɪfaɪ/
Câu 14. phonetics and phonology
Phonetics is the study that deal with sound themselves how they are made,
articulatory phonetics how they are perceived, auditory phonetics and the physics
involved.
Phonology is the study that deal with how the speech sound are organized into
system for each individual language. Eg: how the sound can be combined the
relation between them and they affect each other.
Câu 15. why is it necessary for you to study phonetics and phonology?
A lower levels of study one is concerned simply with setting out how to form
grammatical sentences, but people who are going to work with the language at an
advanced level as teachers or researchers need the deeper understanding provided
by the study of grammatical theory and related areas of linguistics.
The theoretical material in the present course is necessary for anyone who
needs to understand the principles regulating the use of sounds in spoken English.
An important purpose if the course is to explain how English is pronounced in the
accent normally chosen as the standard for people learning the English spoken in
England. At the comparatively advanced level at which this course is aimed it is
usual to present this information in the context of generl theory about soeech
sounds and how they are used in language.
Câu 16. the larynx

The larynx is in the neck, it has several parts. Its main structure is made of
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cartilage, a material that is similar to none but less hard. The larynx’s structure is
made of 2 large cartilages. These are hollow and are attached to the top of the
trachea. The front of the larynx comes to a point and you can feel this point at the
front of your neck.
Inside the box made by these 2 cartilages are the vocal folds which are 2 thick
flaps of muscle rather like a pair of lips. At the front of the vocal folds are joined
together and fixed to inside of the thyroid cartilage. At the back they are attached
to a pair of small cartilages called the arytenoids cartilages. It is necessary to study
the larynx because it is main parts which make the sound. Studying about the
larynx we know about the structure of its, so we can make a very complex range of
changes in the vocal folds and their positions. These changes are often important in
speech.
The arytenoids cartilages are attached to the top of the cricoid cartilage but they
can move so as to move the vocal folds apart or together. We use the word glottis
to refer to the opening between the vocal folds. If the vocal folds are apart we say
that the glottis is open, if they are pressed together we say that the glottis is closed.
Câu 16. how many phases in producing a plosive consonant
4 phases:
the first is when the articulator or articulators move to form the stricture for
the plosive. We call this the closing phase.
The second phase is when the compressed air is stopped from escaping. We
call this the compression phase.
The third phase is when the articulator used to form the stricture are moved so
as to allow air to escape, this is the release phase.
The fourth phase is what happens immediately after the third phase, so we will
call it the post-release phase.

word

onset
Pre

initial

Post

Nucleus Coda
Pre

final

Post

Post

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initial
squealed s
eighths
splash
s
texts
strong
s
First

Exercise,

k
p
t
t

initial
w
l
r

final
i:
eɪ
Æ
E
ɔ:

t
k

t

s

Second
Third
concentrate, Familiar, rely, irregular, Manufacture, university,

universe,

politics, pacific,

necessary,

favorite, exactly, persuade

influence,

l
ɵ
ʃ
s
ɳ

final 1 final 2
d
s
Z

employee, mathematics, understand,

diamond,

diagram

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