- •Organs of speech
- •Sounds of speech:
- •Classification of vowels:
- •Modification of vowels in connected speech
- •Positional length of stressed vowels
- •Classification of consonants:
- •Modification of consonants in connected speech. Assimilation
- •Nasal plosion
- •Lateral plosion
- •Aspiration
- •Palatalization
- •Syllable structure
- •Syllable division
- •Types of syllables
- •Word stress
- •Word stress position
Modification of consonants in connected speech. Assimilation
The complete articulation of a speech sound consists of three stages:
The on-glide stage – the articulating organs move to the position necessary for the articulation of a sound.
The hold stage – the articulating organs are kept in the position for a certain period of time.
The off-glide stage – the articulating organs returns to the position of rest.
Assimilation is a process of alteration of speech sounds as a result of which one of the sounds becomes fully or partially similar to the adjoining sound.
Types of assimilation can be distinguished according to:
Direction,
Degree of completeness,
Degree of stability.
Direction of assimilation:
Assimilation can act in the following directions:
Progressive – the following sound is changed under the influence of the preceding one (grandmother, sandwich – [d] under the influence of preceding [n] changes into [n] and then disappears);
Regressive – the following sound changes the preceding one (width – alveolar [d] becomes dental before interdental [Ө]);
Double – complex influence of adjacent sounds (tree – the sonorant [r] is partly devoiced under the influence of the voiceless [t] and the alveolar [t] becomes post-alveolar before the post-alveolar [r]).