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Theoretical phonetics. Lectures.

Lecture №1

Introduction

The plan

  1. a brief historical outline

  2. the role of phonetics in foreign language teaching

  3. Phonetics as a branch of linguistics. Its application to the other areas of science

  4. branches of phonetics

  5. aspects of speech science

  6. methods of investigation in phonetics

  7. types of transcription

  1. A brief historical outline

The term “phonetics” comes from the Greek word “phone” which means “sound”, so it is the science of voice. Phonetics is the oldest linguistic discipline. For a very long time phonetics was not considered to be an independent branch of linguistics. The problems attending to phonetics were considered within the scope (в рамках) of grammar. Even nowadays the first chapter of Russian grammar is called phonetics. The first meaningful record of a serious phonetic investigation was made in the 4th B.C. Mr. Panini may be considered to be the 1st phonetician. He __________ and described very old even for him texts which are called Vedas and Rig-Vedas. They were large collection of old religious ____________ (ведические гимны). They were written in a kind of a language prior to Sanskrit and he had to decipher (расшифровывать) them. Sanskrit is a classic old Indian language. They began to use it in the 10th century B.C.

  1. The role of phonetics in foreign language teaching

Is it important for a language teacher to be a skillful phonetician? Some teachers meet this question with understanding, others may protest and say that it is not important to be a good phonetician; the 3rd may deny that it is really important. D. Abercrombie said: “I would reply that all language teachers willy-nilly are phoneticians. It is not possible for practical purposes to teach foreign languages to any types of teachers, for any purpose, by any methods without giving some attention to pronunciation. And any attention is _______________”

  1. Phonetics as a branch of linguistics. Its application to the other areas of science

Phonetics is the science of speech properties of the language. Modern phonetics constitute an independent branch of linguistics: lexicology, grammar and phonetics are closely connected. They form the theory of linguistics. Every branch has its own sphere, objects and methods of study. Taken together they form. Phonetics is a special branch of linguistic knowledge; it is an essential part of language, because the vocabulary and the grammar may function only when the language is phonetically formed. The object of phonetics is to study the oral aspect of language. Its field of study is speech. That is why a lot of linguists say that phonetics is the most fundamental branch of linguistics. As a linguistic science phonetics has its subject matter. It studies the following phonetic units:

  • speech sounds/phonemes

  • the syllabic structural words

  • the accentual structure of words

  • intonation

Phonetics studies the mentioned phonetic units and their function in relation to meaning. Our speech and language may be investigated at 2 levels:

  • a content level (we mean the contents of the information)

  • an expression level (we mean the way we express this information)

What level is phonetics concerned with? Primarily, it is concerned with the expression level; however, it is obliged to take the content level into consideration.

Phonetic means serve to distinguish the meaning in the same way as lexical and grammatical means. No meaning can be expressed antiquely if it has no phonetic form. Very often the meaning of words depends only on the phonetic form they are pronounced with. If we change one sound only, the meaning of the word changes (cut-nut). Even the meaning of the sentence may change. Intonation can also differentiate the meaning: “yes” when it is pronounced with the falling tone it means that you are agree, you are categoric, but express no interest. If the rise is used, much interest is expressed.

Is phonetics concerned with all the sounds we hear?

It is concerned only with such combinations and modifications of them which may be carriers of meaning of language.

Fields of study

  1. communication engineering

  2. medical sciences

  3. dialectology

  4. social sciences

  5. psychology

Phonetician is strongly needed in:

  1. constructing machines that will understand and respond to human speech

  2. the programming for computers

  3. The constructing machines that could simphasis human speech with a high degree of intelligibility. There are devices for reading the printing page that is for converting the printed symbols into synthetic speech. The phonetic typewriter will convert speech directly into words on paper

  4. the constructing of all sorts of teaching machines

As for medical sciences are concerned, phonetics enters the problems as teaching deaf and dumb people or even defective. As for dialectology, phonetics is proved extremely useful in such spheres as designing and improving autography for unwritten languages.

Language is not an isolated phenomenon. It is a part of society. The study of linguistics in general and of phonetics in particular as a social science has become well appreciated over the past 3 decades. All this time we have seen the development of such subject as so-so linguistics and so-so phonetics. So-so linguistics studies the way in which pronunciation interacts with society (in a broader sense) it includes national differences, relationships of people belonging to the different social group, sex…so-so phonetics studies variations of pronunciation in extra linguistic situations (beyond language). It studies differences in talking to superiors speech of people of different age, sex…

Phonetics has strong mutual bounds with psychology. The problems of speech production and possession are important for language teachers. They cannot be solved without any cooperation between linguists and psychologists. Psycho phonetics is a distinct area of study. It started developing some 30 years ago. No phonetic research can be done without it.

  1. The aspects of Phonetics:

    1. Articulatory

    2. Acoustic

    3. Functional

  1. studies the work of speech organs and their ability to perform speech sounds

  2. studies the acoustic effect which is produced by the organs of speech. Like any other sounds speech sounds are communicated in the form of sound waves. Thus speech sounds have pitch, intensity and timbre. And they can be investigated according to all acoustic laws

  3. it is also known as linguistic or social aspect, it is called functional because of the role speech sounds play in the functioning of language as most important means of human communication

Language performs the communicative function that is why it is a social phenomenon.

  1. Methods

    1. theoretical research

    2. experimental research

    1. By it we mean phonological procedure like minimal pair of opposition. Extensive reading of linguistic sources and drawing general conclusions from them it is what we call linguistic sources analysis

    2. By it we mean direct observation aided or unaided. The investigator studies the speech sounds produced by the informant (a person, a native speaker whose speech is investigated)

Certain techniques are applied carried out articulating phonetics

  1. Palatography (the work with an artificial palate which helps to fix articulation)

  2. Photography (it is used for the organs of speech which are seen)

  3. X-ray photography (it is used to see the articulations of the organs which are not seen)

2 and 3 fix articulation statically at a given moment

  1. Cinematography

  2. X-ray cinematography

They are used to show the process of articulation, nowadays computer programmes are very widely used in investigation. Any research can hardly avoid working with computers now.

Direct observation is also used in acoustic phonetics. Such techniques can be applied here:

  1. oscillograph - an operator which records speech, but its results are very hard to analyze

  2. spectrograph – is used to analyze the sounds recorded by means of oscillograph

  3. intonograph – is used to investigate intonation

Nowadays computers combine in themselves all the three techniques and fulfill the role of a synthesizing machine

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