8. The system of phonemes.

All English phonemes can be divided into consonants phonemes and vowels phonemes. The following 20 vowel phonemes are distinguished in BBC English (RP): [i:, a:, o:, u:, з:, i, e,; ei, ai, oi].

Principles of classification provide the basis for the establishment of the following distinctive oppositions:1.   Stability of articulation1.1. monophthongs vs. diphthongsbit - bait, kit - kite, John - join, debt — doubt1.2. diphthongs vs. diphthongoids bile - bee, boat — boot, raid - rude

2.   Position of the tongue 2.1. horizontal movement of the tongue a) front vs. Central cab — curb, bed — bird b) back vs. Central    pull –  pearl, cart - curl, call - curl 2.2. vertical movement of the tongue : -close (high) vs. Mid -open (mid)bid — bird, week - work open (low) vs. mid-open (mid) lark - lurk, call — curl, bard-bird

3.  Position of the lips rounded vs. unrounded don — darn, pot - part

The phonological analysis of English consonant sounds helps to distinguish 24 phonemes.. Principles of classification suggested by Russian phoneticians provide the basis for establishing of the following distinctive oppositions in the system of English consonants:

1.Degree of noise: bake - make, veal - wheel                                           

2. Place of articulation labial vs. lingual: pain — cane lingual vs. glottal: foam — home, care — hair, Tim - him

3.Manner of articulation 3.1 occlusive vs. constrictive pine -fine, bat - that, bee – thee 1.constrictive vs. affricates fare — chair, fail –jail 2. constrictive unicentral vs. constrictive bicentral same – shame 4. Work of the vocal cords and the force of articulation 4.1 voiceless fortis vs. voiced lenis pen — Ben, ten - den, coat - goal 5. Position of the soft palate 5.1 oral vs. nasal pit — pin, seek — seen

9. By the degree of noise English consonants are devided into two general kinds: a) noise consonants; b) sonorants. If it is sound in which noise prevails over tone it is noise consonant (ex. p, b, fv, s, z, ð, θ )

Sonorants are sounds that differ greatly from other consonants. This is due to the fact that in their production the air passage between the two organs of speech is fairly wide, that is much wider than in the production of noise consonants. As a result, the auditory effect is tone, not noise (m, n, w, r, ŋ, l).

Consonants and sonorants may be occlusive and constrictive.

10. 10. Occlusive and Constrictive consonants

According to the manner of articulation consonants may be of 3 groups:

Occlusive consonants are sounds in the production of which the air stream meets a complete obstruction in mouth. Occlusive noise consonants ( stops ) – the breath is completely stopped at some point of articulation and then it is released with an explosion ( plosive ). Occlusive sonorants ( nasal ) – made with a complete obstruction but the soft palate is lowered and the air stream escapes through the nose. 2. Constrictive consonants apw the air stream meets an incomplete obstruction in the resonator, so the air passage is constricted. Constrictive noise consonants ( fricatives ) – apw the air passage is constricted and the air escapes through the narrowing with friction. Constrictive sonorants ( oral ) – made with an incomplete obstruction but with a rather wide air passage; so tone prevails over noise. 3. Occlusive – constrictive consonants ( affricates ) – noise consonant sounds produced with a complete obstruction which is slowly released and the air escapes from the mouth with some friction.

11. labial, lingual, glottal consonants

According to the position of the active organ of speech against the point of articulation (the place of obstruction) consonants are classified into: 1) labial, 2) lingual, 3) glottal.

Labial consonants are subdivided into: a) bilabial and b) labio-dental. Bilabial consonants are produced with both lips. They are the /p, b, m, w/. Labio-dental consonants are articulated with the lower lip against the edge of the upper teeth. They are /f, v/.

Lingual consonants are subdivided into: a) forelingual, b) mediolingual and c) backlingual.

Forelingual consonants are articulated with the tip or the blade of the tongue. According to the position of the tip of the tongue they may be: apical articulated by the tip of the tongue against either the upper teeth or the alveolar ridge /t, d, s, z, n, l/ and cacuminal /r/. According to the place of obstruction forelingual consonants may be: (1) interdental / /, (2) alveolar /t, d, s, n, l/, (3) post-alveolar /r/, (4) palato-alveolar / /

Mediolingual consonants are produced with the front part of the tongue. They are always palatal. Palatal consonants are articulated with the front part of the tongue raised high to the hard palate /j/.

Backlingual consonants are also called velar, they are produced with the back part of the tongue raised towards the soft palate “velum”  /k, g, /

The glottal consonant /h/ is articulated in the glottis.

12.modifications of consonants Ph mod-ns take place w/in the words which are connected and at their boundaries. All the sounds are prone to change. Assimilation is the adaptive modification of a consonant by a neighbouring consonant in the speech chain. Can be: progressive (a sound is influenced by a preceding sound) ex. Bridge – score [dζ]→[s]→[ς] lenis – fortis – fortis lingular forelingual apical palate-alveolar – alveolar – palate-alveolar occlusive-constrictive – constr – const noise-noise bicentral – unicentral – bicentral oral regressive (anticipatory) the sound is influenced by the following sound ten balloons [m]←[n] [b], because [b] is bilabial Good night – both alveolar, but [d] disappears, because of [n] → g’ night partial – only one or several distinctive features are modified and sounds become similar (bridge score) complete – the sound becomes absolutely similar to the influencing sound in all distinctive features (good night) coalescence – a mutual influence, where two sounds fuse into a sg new onewon’t she? [w∂Ụtςi] alveolar, occlusive, plosive [t] and palate-alveolar, constrictive [ς] →[tς] – palate-alveolar, a new sound – affricate (occlusive-constr), partial ass-n Practically in all cases – the change of the place of articulation Then the manner of articulation: -loss of plosion (glad to see u); -nasal (not now) -lateral (table, at last) Accommodation is the adaptive modification of V+C or C+V type. Affects lip position →labialization of consonants: appears under the influence of the neighbouring back vowels: pool, woman It’s also possible to speak ab the spread lip position of consonants followed or preceded by front vowels [i] – meet and [i:] – team, meat Such sounds as [r], [tς], [dζ] are pronounced by most speakers w/ rounded lips ever after [i:]. In the casual discourse: in the intervocalic position voiceless cons-ts change their voicing value and become voiced: [t] → [d] (letter) Elision (zero reduction) is the loss of sounds. Min – in slow, careful speech; max – in rapid, careless speech loss of [h] is widespread here he is ['iәr i iz] [l] tend to be lost when preceded by [ō] – always [‘ﺭ:wiz] Alveolar plosives ([t], [d]) are always elided in case the cluster is followed by another consonant: next day [‘neks ‘dei], just one [‘dζ^s ‘w^n] there also exist the so-called historical elision initial cons-s in “wright”, “know”,”knife” the medial cons-t [t] “fasten”, ‘listen”, “castle” the ways the sounds are elided in general: whole syllables – library [‘laibri:] some words are esp prone to elision: “of” + cons-t: a cup of tea [k^pә’ti:], going to [gon^], want to [won^] Liaison – the process of introducing sounds b/w syllables or words to help pronounce them in a more smooth way: “linking” r: clear [kliә] – clearer [‘kliәrә], teacher of English “intrusive” r – sometimes appear b/w the vowels. It’s not wanted here, doesn’t exist, but appears in speech to help pronounce more smooth: Ex. the idea [r] of it When the word-final vowel is a diphthong which glides to [i]: [ai], [ei] the palatal sonorant [j] tends to be inserted: saying [‘sai(j)iη] In case of the u-gliding diph-s: [ou], [au] the bilabial sonorant [w] is smtimes inserted: Ex. do it

All these phenomena manifest the economy of pronouncing effort on the part of the speaker.