The subject – matter of theoretical phonetics

Phonetics appeared long before there were either grammar or linguistics. Ancient objects, drawings and written documents show that voice and speech always fascinated men. Written documents and evidences from the ancient civilizations point to an awareness of speech, its origin and abnormalities a long time ago.

But as a science, phonetics began to develop only at the beginning of the 19^th c. here are some data connected with the history of phonetic development:

1829 – the laringoscope was invented;

1852 – the first observation of the vocal cords were made;

1877 – the gramaphone was invented;

1886 – International Phonetic Association (IPA) was founded which started publications of a special phonetic magazine “Le Maitre Phonetique”. It stated phonemic symbols for sounds of many existing lges.

Phonetics is an independent branch of linguistics which studies not only separate speech sounds but also their aspects and functions. Phonetics is connected with other, non – linguistic, sciences: acoustics, physiology, psychology and logics.

The connection of phonetics with grammar, lexicology and stylistics is exercised via orthography, which in its turn is very closely connected with phonetics. Phonetics formulates the rules of pronunciation of separate sounds and sound combinations. The rules of reading are based on the relation of sounds to orthography and present certain difficulties in learning the Eng.lge. Thus, vowel sounds, for e.g., are pronounced not only as we name the letters corresponding to them:

e.g.: a [ei], e [i:], i [ai], y [wai], u [ju:]; a - [æ] can, [a:] car, [eә] care.

Through the system of rules of reading phonetics is connected with grammar and helps to pronounce correctly:

• singular and plural forms of nouns, the past tense forms and past participles of Eng. regular verbs:

e.g.: -ed = [d], [t], [id]; -(e)s = [s], [z], [iz];

• sound interchange, one of the most important phonetic phenomena, is another manifestation of the connection of phonetics with grammar. This connection can be observed in the category of number:

1. in interchange of [f–v, s-z, θ-δ] helps to differentiate singular and plural of forms of nouns

e.g.: calf – calves, house – houses, bath – baths;

2. vowel interchange helps to distinguish the singular and plural of such words as

e.g.: basis – bases, crisis – crises, man – men, foot – feet, mouse - mice;

3. vowel interchange is connected with the tense forms of irregular verbs

e.g.: sing – sang – sung; write – wrote - written;

• phonetics is connected with grammar through its intonation component. Sometimes intonation alone can serve to single out the logical predicate of the sentence:

e.g.: \ He came home. (Who came home?)

He \came home. (Did he come home?)

He came \home. (Where did he come?)

• pausation may also serve to perform differentiating function. If we compare two similar sentences pronounced with different place of pause, we shall see that their meanings will be different:

e.g.: \What writing the poet is doing is interesting. (What is he doing in general?)

What \writing the poet is doing is interesting. (What book is he writing?).

Phonetics is connected with lexicology:

• it is due to the presence of stress or accent in the right place, that we can distinguish certain nouns from verbs

e.g.: ‘abstract – to ab’stract, ‘object – to ob’ject, ‘transfer – to trans’fer;

• homographs can be differentiated only due to pronunciation because they are identical in spelling

e.g.: bow [bәu, bau]; lead [li:d, led]; row [rәu, rau];

• due to the position of word accent we can distinguish between homonymous words and word groups

e.g.: ‘blackbird, ‘black ‘bird.

Phonetics is connected with stylistics through intonation and its components: speech melody, word stress, rhythm, pausation and voice tambre, which serve to express emotions on the part of the author and the speaker:

• very often the writer helps the reader to interpret the idea through special words and remarks(

e.g.: a pause, a short pause, angrily, gently” (in brackets);

• if the author wants to make a word or a sentence specially prominent or logically accented he uses graphical expressive means

e.g.: You must paper it. You must paper it whether you like it or not. Don’t tell us you wouldn’t paper it.

• through repetition of words, phrases and sounds phonetics is also connected with stylistics. Repetition serves the basis of rhythm, rhyme and alliteration:

a) regular recurrence of accented elements or rhythm may be used as a special device not only in poetry but in prose as well:

e.g.: Now what I want is Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts.

b) the repetition of identical sounds is called alliteration

e.g.: … silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain.

Phonetics has its own branches:

• special phonetics – the aim of it is to study the sounds of one lge at a particular period of time, i.e. synchronically = descriptive phonetics, or diachronically, i.e. to study the sounds of a lge in its historical development = historical phonetics;

• general phonetics studies the sound systems of several lges. It is a part of general linguistics.

Phonetics has several branches in connection with non – linguistic sciences:

• physiological or articulatory phonetics studies speech sounds from the point of view of their articulation and in connection with the organs of speech, by which they are produced;

• acoustic phonetics investigates acoustic properties of sounds, i.e. quantity (length), timber, intensity and pitch;

• phonological (functional) phonetics studies the phonological properties of sounds, syllables and intonation.