5. The subject-matter of phonology.

The PN - unit of Ph. But to be able to characterize sounds from the linguistic point of view we should analyze the functional aspect of speech sounds, i.e. to study PNs which mean sounds in their contrastive sense, as well as APs as variants of PNs & structurally differ.iate between them. APs usually occurs in differ. environments & can neither contrast with each other nor make meaningful distinctions. In brief: PNs are mutually distinctive speech sounds, while APs are variants of one & the same position. The key problem of Ph. – to establish the set of relevant sounds. When achieving the purpose of comparing sounds we have to answer the “?”: “Is it the same sound or a differ. one?” E.g.: keIt – skeIt; paI – spaI. They are the same (aspirated & non-asp. [k] & [p]) they appear in differ. P. context & never compete with each other (because of their placement) & belong to APs of the particular PN. E.g.: skaI – spaI. They are differ. because they occur in the same context & cause a change in meaning of words. The other problem of Ph. – to determine the phonological status of sounds. The method of minimal pairs is used here (used only by phonologists) which represent the semantic approach the properties of PNs. The method consists in finding at least 1 pair of words which are differ. in respect of this sounds. E.g.: [pIt] – [bIt].

PN - phoneme, Ph. - phonology, P. - phonetics, AP - allophone

6. The main achievements in the historical development of phonology.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF PHONOLOGY.

The founder of the phoneme theory was the Russian scientist I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay (1845-1929). He did a lot in the study of phonemic alterations and was the first linguist who demanded accurate distinction between synchronic and diachronic approach to phonemic investigation.

His activity is usually divided into two periods:

1. morphological approach to the definition of the phoneme, when he was chiefly interested in the entity of the phoneme. He said that the same phoneme wasn’t always represented by the same combination of sounds (can serve the alteration of voiced and voiceless consonants within morpheme – ex. Луг – луга) According to Courtney the intention of the speaker and physical nature of sounds don’t always go inside. During this period he characterized the phoneme as the perception of sound.

Trubezkoy was influenced by Courney’s theory and his arch phoneme is practically based on Courtey’s morphological theory of the early period.

2. The change was caused by his psychological approach to the phoneme which he characterized as a fictious unit, an invention of the scientists.

It is a complex perception of the articulatorymovements and of the muscular sensations, connected with them together with the resulting acoustic impressions. This complex perception is THE PHONEME. Courtney’s phoneme theory was known to few linguists, namely through the works of his pupils, Kruscherskii and Shcherba and it was thoroughly analyzed and gained popularity only after 1928 when the first international congress took place at the Hague and especially when Trubezkoy’s monograph appeared in which he propounded his own theory.

V.Ya. Plotkin suggests two dichotomies:

1. Kinakemic system consists of two sub-systems: vocalic and consonantal, which are not rigidly separated.

2. All kinakemes are divided into two categories: modal and locational.

Modal kinakemes are concerned with the origin of sounds and the vertical dimensions of the vocal tract.

1)Obstruction: a) occlusion, b) constriction

2) Phonal: a) sonority, b) discordance

Consonantal modal kinakemes determine the mode of obstruction and the acoustic type of sound-tone or noise, their vocalic kinakemes deal with the height of the vocal tract.

Locational kinakemes : vocalic and consonantal function on their horizontal plane, activating certain areas along the vocal tract.

1) Articulatory: a) prelinguality, b) postlinguality

2) Pointal: a) prealveolarity, b) postalveolarity

I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay’s views were later developed and perfected by his disciple L.V. Shcherba, who separated phonetics from phonology and stated that sounds are not only articulatory and acoustic units but that they also possess functional properties. L.V.Shcherba stated that in actual speech we utter a much greater variety of sounds than we are aware of ; in every language these sounds are united in a comparatively small number of sound types, which are capable of distinguishing the meaning and the forms of words, that is they serve the purpose of social intercourse. Such sound types are called phonemes.

Professor Shcherba created a materialistic phoneme theory/

1. PRE-REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD

Is characterized by strong influence of Courney’s view upon Shcherba.

Definition of the phoneme is mentalist.

The PHONEME is the shortest generic phonetical perception capable of being associated with semantic perceptions, of distinguishing words, of being easily isolated from the word. He was the first to advance the idea o f the distinctive function of phonemes. The principal points of Shcherba’s phoneme theory.

1/ the theory of phonemic variance

2/ the theory of phonemic independence

Phonemic independence is very important as it may develop into two phonemes, on the other hand a phoneme may cease to function a such phoneme and may become a phonemic variant.

2. THE POST-REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD is characterized by his treating the phonemes as sound types which are capable of distinguishing the meaning and the form of words.

The various sounds which are universal and which are individual representing the universal are called PHONEMIC VARIANTS. And he characterized the phoneme as the dialectal unity of the individual and the universal that is speech sounds which are uttered in concrete sequenced and in general reflection in our mind.

Phonemes help to recognize words and morphemes and to distinguish one morpheme from another.

They form a system of phonemes – the set of oppositions.

N.S.Trubezkoy (1890-1938)

Was among those scholars whose works created quite a revolution in linguistics.

1. The separation of Phonology from Phonetics

2. The theory of phoneme opposition

3. The theory of archiphoneme

He said that the main points of investigation in phonology should be like this:

1. which sound features in a given language are distinctive.

2. what connection there is between these distinctive features. According to what rules they can be combined into words and sentences.

He further developed his own system of opposition by giving special prominents to the following essential moments:

1. THE PHONEME which he defined as a unity of the phonologically relevant features of the sounds (distinctive features)

2. THE SPEECH SOUND which he defined as a unity of all the features both relevant and irrelevant (redundant) of a sound representing the phoneme in connected speech.

Trubezkoy emphasized the fact that the inventory of phonemes in the language is practically a correlation of its system of phonological oppositions.

Some oppositions may be neutralizes as f.e. the German oppositions of two phonemes (t,d) in final positions of words. The phoneme in the position of neutralization is the arch phoneme and in this case it may be defined as a unity of relevant features common to two phonemes, it is therefore an abstraction.

In Russia there are two main phonological schools which investigate phonemes of Russian: the Moscow school and the Leningrad school.

The representatives of the Moscow trend (A.A. Reformatsky, R.S.Kusnetsov, R.I.Avanesov, M.V. Panov et al.). They did a lot in its thorough and multilateral morpho-phonological analysis.

The representatives of the Leningrad school (L.V.Shcherba’s disciples: L.R.Zinder, O.I.Dikushina, V.A.Vassilyev, and et al.) analyze and investigate sounds as real speech units. Shcherba’s followers always care for the practical appliance of phonemic analysis. For example, in solving the problem of phoneme identification in the neutral position they advocate the autonomy of the phoneme, its independence from the morpheme, which is simpler for practical purposes.