1. Vowels and consonants. General information.

There are 2 major classes of sounds which are traditionally distincted by phoneticians in any language: vowels and consonants.

The division is based on the auditory effect. When pronouncing vowels the air stream meet no obstacles on its way from lungs. When pronouncing consonants the air stream meets an obstacle on its way: lips, teeth, tongue etc. So consonants have closed articulation(there is a closure)

Some scientists(Sokolova among them) separate the following groups of sounds according to their sonority:

-vowels (the most sonorous sounds)

-sonorants (voice prevails over noise)

-affricates (consonants consisting of 2 elements)

-plosives (consonant sounds in which a kind of plosure is heard)

-voiceless consonants(consisting of pure noise)

-[h] – the least sonorous sound

2. Principles of articulation

While characterizing the sounds we must take into account the following articulatory properties:

-the position of the organs of speech

-the tension of the organs of speech

-the force of the air-steam

Concerning these items vowels have the following characteristics:

-in production of vowel sounds the articulators don’t come very close together and this causes the absence of closure in mouth cavity

-when pronouncing vowels speech organs are generally tense

-the air-stream coming from lungs is really weak

The consonants are characterized by:

-the fundamental feature of E.consonants is that speech organs make some abstraction to the flow of air

-the main tension of speech organs is concentrated in the place of abstraction.

-the flow of air is generally strong

Historically, separately stands a class of sonorants (semi-vowels, liquids, glides)in which both vowel and consonant characteristics take place.

-in the articulation of sonorants 1 articulator moves close to another but the air-passage is rather large.

-there’s a tension in the place of abstraction, it brings them closer to vowels

All above mentioned makes it logical to concern the classification of vowels and consonants separately.

3.Vowels

Speaking about vowels the following characteristics are to be concerned

-the stability of articulation

E vowel phonemes are divided into 3 sub classes

a)monophtongs (all short and long vowels but i: and u:).the tongue position is stable.

b)diphthongs (consist of 2 vowel elements, the nucleus – the strongest element, the glide – the weaker element)

c)diphthongoids (the tongue moves from one position to another. The change is not very strong, this makes diphthongoids an intermediate group b/w monophthongs and diphthongs)

All R sounds are monophthongs е,ё, ю, я(consonant+vowel)not diphthongs

-position of the tongue

For the sake of convenience this principle is concerned from 2 aspects: horizontal and vertical movements

Horizontal movements

Russian phoneticians (Vassiliev among them )distinguish 5 groups:

1)front i: e æ

2)front-retracted i

3)central Λ ə ε:

4)back o: o u:

5)back-advanced u a:

British phoneticians (D Jones) take slightly different approach. They don’t single out front-retracted and back-advanced vowels.

Vertical movements

Russian phoneticians single out 3 classes and 2 variations

Narrow Broad

High/close i: u: i u

Mid/half-open e 3: eə ə

Low/open Λ o: a: æ

British phoneticians single out only 3 classes, no variations.

-lip-rounding. Traditionally 2 lip-positions are distinguished:

a)Round/labialized, lips are active o o:

b)unrounded/neutral, lips are passive e 3

-vowel length/quantity. Vowels are historically short and long o O:

-tenseness. Degree of muscular tension. It characterizes the speech organs when producing a certain vowel sound. All English vowels are lax(short) and tense(long)

-checkness. Only some phoneticians (among them Schevchenko) concentrate on such a feature. According to them short vowels are checked due to glottal activity that releases a quick energy discharge in a short interval of time. Long vowels are unchecked (free), it implies a lower energy discharge over a larger time interval.

Russian vowels are checked. This characteristic makes it difficult for R learners to pronounce the vowels correctly according to their position in a word and to the following consonants.