10. The theory of Phoneme.

Ph studies sounds as articulatory and acoustic units, phonology investigates sounds as units which serve communicative purposes. The unit of phonetics is a speech sound, the unit of phonology is a phoneme. As a unit of phonology, phoneme is the smallest unit of speech sound, able to distinguish one word from another. Phonemes can be discovered by the method of minimal pairs. There are several theories of phoneme.

1.Бодуэн-де-Куртене defined the phoneme as a physical image of a sound. It is semantically differentiating unit.

2.The abstraction conception on the phoneme was originated by Фердинанд де Соссюр, the Danish linguist Hjemslev. The abst view regards the phoneme independent of the phonemic properties.

3.Трубецкой, Блумфилд, Jacobson viewed the phoneme as the minimal sound units by which meanings may be differentiated. They stated that the features of the phoneme involved in the differentiation of words are called distinctive.

4. The physical view on the phoneme was originated by Jhones. He defined the phoneme as a family of sounds, showing similarities. No member of the family can occur in the same phonetic context as any other member. This view was shared by Bloch and Treiger.

5.Щерба was the first to define the phoneme as a real, independent distinctive unit, which manifests itself in the form of allophones. Vasiliev developed his theory and wrote that a phoneme is a dialectical unity of 3 aspects: 1. material, real and objective, 2. abstractional, generalized, 3. functional. It serves to perform the following functions: constitutive, distinctive, recognitive. Vasiliev states that phoneme is material, real and objective, because it really exists in the material form of speech sounds, allophones. It is an objective reality, existing independently from our will or intention. It is an abstraction, because we make it from concrete realizations for classificatory purposes.

11.Stress in English.

Any word spoken in isolation has at least one prominent syllable which is called stress. Stress is defined differently by different authors. B. A. Bogoroditsky, for instance, defined stress as an increase of energy, accompanied by an increase of expiratory and articulatory activity. D. Jones defined stress as the degree of force, which is accompanied by a strong force of exhalation and gives an impression of loudness. H. Sweet also stated that stress is connected with the force of breath.  Generally Word stress can be defined as the singling out of one or more syllables in a word, which is accompanied by the change of the force of utterance, pitch of the voice, qualitative and quantitative characteristics of the sound, which is usually a vowel.

According to the most important feature different types of word stress are distinguished in different languages.

1. dynamic, or force stress is achieved mainly through the intensity of articulation

2. musical, or tonic is achieved mainly through the change of pitch, or musical tone. It is characteristic of the Japanese, Korean and other oriental languages.

3. quantitative is achieved through the changes in the quantity of the vowels, which are longer in the stressed syllables than in the unstressed ones

4. Qualitative type of stress is achieved through the changes in the quality of the vowel under stress.

English word stress is traditionally defined as dynamic, but in fact, the special prominence of the stressed syllables is manifested in the English language not only through the increase of intensity, but also through the changes in the vowel quantity, consonant and vowel quality and pitch of the voice. All English vowels may occur in stressed syllables with the syllabic /1, m, n/ are never stressed. 

Stress can be characterized as fixed and free. In English stress is shifting which helps to differentiate parts of speech(import – to import). Stress helps to constitute and recognize words and their forms.