Phonology portfolio

Facultad de Ciencias Sociales Escuela de Idiomas Subjet: Phonology.

Secciรณn: 02 Teacher: Lic. Julio Blanco.

Assistant teacher: Licda. Roxana Landaverde.

Name: Madeline Stefany Cruz Castillo

Carnet: 31-0492-2015

GENERAL INDEX Vocal tract____________________________________________

Phonemes________________________________________ Voice or voicing___________________________________ Vowel and consonant_______________________________ Primary cardinal vowels_____________________________ The difference between Diphthongs and Digraphs_________ Kind of vowels- Monophthong and Diphthong___________ Homophones And homographs_______________________ Phonetic transcription______________________________ SCHWA_________________________________________________________

Assimilation of the /J/______________________________ Word stress______________________________________ Contraction______________________________________ Allophone_______________________________________ Derivations of words_______________________________ Linking words____________________________________ Ellision_________________________________________ Ellipsis_________________________________________ Minimal Pairs____________________________________ Reduction (Informal Grammar)_______________________

VOCAL TRACT

Definition of Vocal Tract: the passages above the larynx through which air passes in the production of speech, including the buccal, oral, nasal, and pharyngeal cavities.

These different parts are called articulators, and the study of them is called Articulatory Phonetics:

Specific definition of each articulators:  The pharynx: Is a tube which begins just above the larynx. It is about 7 cm long in women and about 8 cm in men, and its top en it is divided into two, one part being the back of the mouth and the other being the beginning of the way through the nasal cavity.  The velum or soft palate: Is seen in the diagram in a position that allows air to pass through the nose and through the mouth. The other important thing about velum is that it is one of the articulator that can be touched by the tongue. When we make the sound K and G the tongue is in contact with the lower side of the velum, and we call these velar consonants.  The hard palate: Is often called the ―roof of the mouth‖. You can feel its smooth curved surface with your tongue.

 The Alveolar ridge: Is between the top front teeth and the hard palate. You can feel its shape with your tongue. Its surface us really much rougher than its feels, and is covered with little ridges. Sounds made with the tongue touching here (such as t and d) are called alveolar.  The tongue: Is, of course, a very important articulator and it can be moved into many different places and different shapes. It is usual to divide the tongue into different parts, though there are no clear dividing lines withing the tongue.

The fig 2. Shows the tongue on a larger scale with these parts shown: Tip, blade, front, back and root. (This use of the word ―front‖ often seems rather strange at first.)  The teeth (Upper and lower): Are usually shown in diagrams like Fig 1 only at the front of the mouth, immediately behind the lips. This is for the sake of a simple diagram, and you should remember that most speakers have teeth to the sides of their mouths, back almost to the soft palate. The tongue is in contact with the upper side teeth for many speech sounds. Sounds made with the tongue touching the front teeth are called dental.  The lips: Are important in speech. They can be pressed together( when we produce the sounds p, b), brought into contact with the teeth( as in f, v), or rounded to produce the lip-shape for vowels like u: sounds in which the lips are in contact with each other are called bilabial, while those with lip-to-teeth contact are called labiodental.

PHONEMES

ďƒ˜ Definition of phoneme: any of the abstract units of the phonetic system of a language that correspond to a set of similar speech sounds (as the velar \k\ of cool and the palatal \k\ of keel) which are perceived to be a single distinctive sound in the language.

Also they are composed for manner of articulation and place of articulation.

For example:

ďƒ˜ Manner of articulation: In articulatory phonetics, the manner of articulation is the configuration and interaction of the articulators (speech organs such as the tongue, lips, and palate) when making a speech sound. One parameter of manner is stricture, that is, how closely the speech organs approach one another. Others include those involved in the r-like sounds (taps and trills), and the sibilancy of fricatives. ďƒ˜ Place of articulation: An obstruction is necessarily formed when two articulators come close together. Generally, one is moving (the active articulator), and the other is stationary (the passive articulator). As a result, what is normally termed the "place of articulation" is actually a combination of a place of active articulation and a place of passive articulation. For example, the English f sound is said to be labiodental, which is a shorthand way of saying that the active articulator is the lower lip, which moves up (along with the jaw in general) to contact the upper teeth. The lower lip can also be the active articulator for other places of articulation (e.g. bilabial, where it contacts the upper lip, as in English p). Likewise, the upper teeth

can be the passive articulator for other places of articulation (e.g. dental, where the tongue contacts the upper teeth, as in the English th sound).

PHONETICS  Definition of phonetics: Is the systematic study of speech and the sounds of language. Traditionally phoneticians rely on careful listening and observation in order to describe speech sounds. In doing this, a phonetician refers to a classificatory framework for speech sounds which is based on how they are made and on aspects of the auditory impression they make.  The International Phonetic Alphabet recognises the following places of articulation(among others): Bilabial Labiodental Dental Alveolar

Postalveolar Palatal Velar Uvular Pharyngeal

Glottal

The point of maximum constriction is made by the coming together of the two lips.

The lower lip articulates with the upper teeth.

The tip of the tongue articulates with the back or bottom of the top teeth.

The tip or the blade of the tongue articulates with the forward part of the alveolar ridge. A sound made with the tip of the tongue here is an apico-alveolar sound; one made with the blade, a lamino-alveolar.

The tip or the blade of the tongue articulates with the back area of the alveolar ridge.

The front of the tongue articulates with the domed part of the hard palate.

The back of the tongue articulates with the soft palate.

The back of the tongue articulates with the very back of the soft palate, including the uvula.

The pharynx is constricted by the faucal pillars moving together (lateral compression) and, possibly, by the larynx being raised. "It is largely a sphincteric semi-closure of the oro-pharynx, and it can be learned by tickling the back of the throat, provoking retching" (Catford 1978:163).

The vocal folds are brought together; in some cases, the function of the vocal folds can be part of articulation as well as phonation, as in the case of [ʔ] and [h] in many languages.

 VOICE OR VOICING Is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterise speech sounds (usually consonants), with sounds described as either voiceless (also called unvoiced) or voiced.

For example: Voicing contrast in English fricatives

Articulation Voiceless Voiced Pronounced with the lower lip against the teeth: [f] (fan) [v] (van) Pronounced with the tongue against the teeth: [θ] (thin, thigh) [ð](then, thy) Pronounced with the tongue near the gums: [s] (sip) [z] (zip) Pronounced with the tongue bunched up: [ʃ] (Confucian) [ʒ] (confusion)

VOWEL AND CONSONANT

Classifying the Consonants Sounds of English According to the Manner and Place of Articulation According to the manner of articulation (how the breath is used) the consonants are: stops, also known as plosives, fricatives, affricates, nasals, laterals, and approximants. Nasals, laterals and approximants are always voiced; stops, fricatives and affricates can be voiced or unvoiced.

Stops /Plosives/

During production of these sounds, the airflow from the lungs is completely blocked at some point, then released. In English, they are /p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, and /g/.

Fricatives

The flow of air is constricted, but not totally stopped or blocked. In English, these include /f/, /v/, / /, / /, /s/, /z/, / /, / /, and /h/.

Affricates

These sounds begin like stops, with a complete blockage of air/closure of the vocal tract, and end with a restricted flow of air like fricatives. English has two affricates - the / / sounds of "church" and the / / of "judge".

Nasals

Nasals are sounds made with air passing through the nose. In English, these are /m/, /n/, and / /.

Laterals

Lateral consonants allow the air to escape at the sides of the tongue. In English there is only one such sound - /l/

In the production of an approximant, one articulator is close to another, but the vocal tract is not narrowed to such an extent that a turbulent airstream Approximants is produced. In English, these are /j/, /w/ and /r/. Approximants /j/ and /w/ are also referred to as semi-vowels.

According to the place of articulation (where in the mouth or throat the sound is produced) the consonants are: Bilabial: with both lips

/p/, /b/, /m/

Labiodental: between lower lip and upper /f/, /v/ teeth Dental/Interdental: between the teeth

/ /, / /

Alveolar: the ridge behind the upper front /t/, /d/, /s/, /z/, teeth /n/, /l/, /r/ Alveo-palatal (or post-alveolar): it is the / /, / /, / area between / the alveolar ridge and the hard palate Palatal: hard palate, or 'roof' of the mouth'

/j/

Velar: the soft palate or velum

/k/, /g/, / /

/, /

Glottal (laryngeal): space between the vocal /h/ cords

The words VOWEL and CONSONANT are very familiar ones, but when we study the sounds of speech scientifically we find that it is not easy to define exactly what they mean.

The most common view is that vowels are sounds in which there is no obstruction to the flow of air as it passes from the larynx to the lips. A doctor who wants to look back of a patient‘s mouth often asks them to say ―ah‖; making this vowel sound is the best way of presenting an unobstructed view but if we make a sound like s or d it can be clearly felt that we are making it difficult or impossible for the air to pass through the mouth.

Most people would have no doubt that sounds like S and D should be called consonants.

However, there are many cases where the decision is not so easy to make. One problem is that some English sounds that we think of as consonants, such as the sounds at the

beginning of the word ―red‖ is felt to be a consonant by most English speakers, but in some other languages (some dialects of Chinese, for example) the same sound is treated as one of the vowels.

If we say that the difference between vowels and consonants is a difference in the way that they are produced, there will inevitably be some cases of uncertainty or disagreement; this is a problem that cannot be avoided. It is possible to establish two distinct groups of sounds (vowels and consonants) in another way. Consider English words beginning with the sound h; what sounds can come next after this h? We find that most of the sounds we normally think of as vowels can follow (for example e in the word ―hen‖), but practically none of the sounds we class as consonants. Now think of English words beginning with the two sounds br; we find many cases where a consonant can follow (for example d in the word ―bid‖, or L in the word ―bill‖), but hardly any cases where a vowel many follow. What we are doing here is looking at the different contexts and positions in wich particular sounds can occur;this is the study of the distribution of the sounds, and is of great importance in phonology. Study of the sounds found at the beginning and end of English words has shown that two groups of sounds with quite different patterns of distribution can be identified, and these two groups are those of vowel and consonant is not the way that they are made, but their different distributions. Of course, the distribution of vowels and consonants is different for each language.

There are many interesting theoretical problems connected with the vowel-consonant distinction, but we will not return to this question. For the rest of this course it will be assumed that the sounds are clearly divided into vowels and consonants.

We begin the study of English sounds in this course by looking at vowels, and it is necessary to say something about vowels in general before turning to the vowels of English. We need to know in what ways vowels differ from each other. The first matter to consider is the shape and position of the tongue. It is usual to simplify the very complex possibilities by describing just two things: firstly, the vertical distance between the upper surface of the tongue and the palate and, secondly, the part of the tongue, between front and back, which is raised highest.

For example:  Make a vowel like i: in the English word ―see‖ and look in a mirror; if you tilt your head back slightly you will be able to see that the tongue is held up close to the roof of the mouth. Now make a ae vowel (as in the word ―cat‖) and notice how the distance between the surface of the tongue and the roof of the mouth is now much greater. The difference between i: and ae is a difference of tongue height, and we would describe i: as a relativily close vowel and ae as a relatively open vowel.

Tongue height can be changed by moving the tongue up or down, ot moving the lower jaw up or down Usually we use some combination of two sorts of movement, but when drawing side of the head diagrams such as fig 1.

 In making the two vowels described above, it is the front part of the tongue tha is raised. We could therefore describe i: and ae as comparatively front vowels. By chaging the shape of the tongue we can produce vowels in which a different part of the tongue is the highest point is called a back vowel. If you make the vowel in the word ―calm‖, which we write phonetically as a:, you can see that the back of the tongue is raised. Compare this with ae in front of a mirror ae is a front vowel and a: is a back vowel. The vowel in ―too‖ (u: ) is also a comparatively back vowel, but compared with a: it is close.  So now we have seen how four vowels differ from each other; we can show this in a simple diagram:

FRONT

BACK

Close

i:

u:

Open

ae

a:

However, this diagram is rather inaccurate. Phoneticians need a very accurate way of classifying vowels, and have developed a set of vowels, arranged in a close-open, frontback diagram similar to fig 4 but which not the vowels of any particular language are.

These are the vowels that are most familiar to the speakers of most European languages, and there are other cardinal vowels no l has the symbol(i), and is defined as the vowel which is as close and as front as it is possible to make a vowel without obstructing the flow of hissing sound that one hears in consonants like s or f. cardinal vowel no, 5 has the symbol (a) and is defined as the most open and back vowel that it is possible to make.

Cardinal vowel no 8 (u), is fully close and back and no.4 (a), is fully open and front. After establishing these extreme points, it is possible to put in intermediate points ( vowels no 2, 3, 6 and 7). Many students when they hear these vowels find that they sound strange and exaggerated; you must remember that they are extremes of vowel quality. It is useful to think of the cardinal vowel framework like a map of an area of country that you are interested in. obviously, if the map is to be useful to you it must cover all the area; but if it covers the whole are interest it must inevitably go a little way beyond that and include some places that you might never want to go to. However, it is still important to know where the edges of the map are drawn.

When you are familiar with these extreme vowels, you have (as mentioned above) learned a way of describing, classifying and comparing vowels. For example, we can say that the

English vowel ae ( the vowel in ―cat‖) is not open as cardinal vowel no 4. (a) ( in this course cardinal vowels will always be printed within square brackets to distinguish them clearly from English vowel sounds.)

We have now looked at how we can classify vowels according to their tongue height and their frontness or backness. There is another important variable of vowel quality, and that is lip-rounding. Although the lips can have many different shapes and positions, we will at this stage consider only three possibilities. These are:

 Rounded, where the corners of the lips are brought towards each other and the lips pushed forwards. This is most clearly seen in cardinal vowel no. 8 (u).

 Spread,with the corners of the lips moved away from each other, as for a smile.

This is most clearly seen in cardinal vowel no. 1 (i).

 Neutral, where the lips are not noticeably rounded or spread. The noise most English people make when they are hesitating ( written ―er‖ ) has neutral lip position.

Long and Short English Vowels The English vowels are A, E, I, O, & U. (Sometimes Y is a vowel, pronounced as if it were I, and sometimes W substitutes for U.) Each can be pronounced in several ways.This page explains when each sound is commonly used.

(It's also available now as a 4-page pdf to download and print, as requested in the page comments.)

Short Vowels The most common sound for each vowel is its ―short‖ sound: 

ă, pronounced /æ/ as in apple, pan, or mat,



ĕ, pronounced /ɛ/ as in elephant, pen, or met,



ĭ, pronounced /ɪ/ as in insect, pin, or mitt,



ŏ, pronounced /ɒ/ as in octopus, ostrich, upon, or motto,



and ŭ, pronounced /ʌ/ as in umbrella, pun, or mutt.

(The International Phonetic Alphabet symbol for each sound is inside the backslashes://. You do not need to understand the IPA symbols; just look for an example word you know how to pronounce. For those who want more, this Wikipedia article gives a fairly simple demonstration of the IPA as used in English, with links to more detailed information.)

When syllables end in a vowel and then consonant (as in the examples above), the vowel is usually short. If there is more than one consonant, the vowel is almost always short.

This becomes important as a way to keep the same vowel sound when adding -ed to put a verb into the past tense. We often double an ending consonant to keep a short vowel short. For example, the past tense of 'stop' is 'stopped.' Otherwise the silent 'e' rule below (which also applies when followed by 'd') would give it a long 'o' sound like soap or hope. See the Simple Past Tense explanation of spelling changes.

Long Vowels The alphabet sounds (when the vowel ―says its name‖) are called ―long vowels.‖ We call them ‗long‘ because we hold them longer than the short sounds, but they are completely different sounds-- not a longer version of the same sound. 

Long A (ā ), pronounced /eɪ/ as in ate or mate,



Long E (ē ), pronounced /iː/ as in eat or meat (or meet or mete-- all pronounced the same),



Long I (ī), pronounced /aɪ/ as in mite or might,



Long O (ō), pronounced /oʊ/ as in oats, mote or moat, and



Long U (ū), pronounced /juː/ in mute.

Silent ‗E‘ Rule: When a vowel and consonant are followed by an ‗e‘, the ‗e‘ is almost always silent, but it causes the preceding vowel to be long. (Examples: ate, plane, Pete, bite, nine, rope, note, cube, flute.)

Other Long Vowels: A vowel at the end of a syllable is almost always long.

Examples: I, we, he, she, go, try, potato and tomato.(Some English speakers use a short ‗a‘ in the 2nd syllable, while others use a long ‗a,‘ but both ‗o‘s are long for everyone.)

-Igh and -ight are usually long I (and silent GH): bright, fight, high, light, might, night, right, sigh, sight, tight.

Often the first letter of the vowel combinations, especially ‗ai‘, ‗ay‘, ‗ea‘ (sometimes-- see Digraphs, below), ‗ee‘, & ‗oa,‘ will be long & the second will be

silent. (An old rhyme for children says ―when 2 vowels go walking, the first does the talking.‖) So ‘plain‘ sounds just like ‗plane,' ‗meat‘ and ‗meet‘ like ‗mete,‘ etc.

However, there are many exceptions. (See the link to English Vowel Digraphs, at the bottom of this page, for the most common ones.)

Common Examples Of Short And Long Vowels These contrasts demonstrate the rules (in each column, first short, then long):

A: short

A: long

A: short

A: long

back

bake

can

cane

snack

snake

plan

plain/plane

fad

fade

tap

tape

mad

made/maid

at

ate

Sam

same

cat

Kate

E: short

E: long

E: short

E: long

bed

bead

bet

beat/beet

Ben

bean

met

mete/meat/meet

men

mean

pet

Pete

ten

teen

set

seat

I: short

I: long

I: short

I: long

lick

like

fin

fine

hid

hide

shin

shine

slid

slide

bit

bite

dim

dime

lit

light/lite

Tim

time

sit

sight/site

O: short

O: long

O: short

O: long

rob

robe

cot

coat

hop

hope

not

note

mop

mope

rot

rote/wrote

U: short

U: long

U: short

U: long

cub

cube

cut

cute

tub

tube

flutter

flute

hug

huge

mutter

mute

Other English Vowel Sounds (Schwa or R-Controlled) Besides the long and short sounds, there are other vowel sounds.

Any vowel in an unaccented syllable has a neutral or―schwa‖/ə/ sound: Examples: the ‗a‘ in above, or approve, the ‗e‘ in accident, camera or mathematics, the ‗i‘ in family or officer, the ‗o‘ in freedom or purpose, or the ‗u‘ in industry or succeed. if a vowel is followed by R, it changes in quality, and is neither long nor short. (ER, IR, and UR are often -- though not always--the same sound.)

Examples with phonetic symbols: /ɑr/ -- arm, car, charge, dark, farm, start /ɛər/-- air, bare/bear, hair, there /ɪər/-- beer, ear, hear/here, near /ɜr/ -- bird, burn, fur, herd, earth, service, sir, turn, urgent /ər/ -- baker, doctor, letter, summer /ɔr/ -- for, important, more, north, or Sometimes in English a vowel is pronounced with a sound that usually goes with a different letter. For example, in my California dialect, the ‗a‘ in ‗father‘ or ‗want‘ is pronounced very much like the ‗au‘ in ‗audio‘ or the short ‗o‘ in ‗pot‘ or ‗hot.‘ That‘s not true for all English speakers, however. Also, some common words use ‗o‘ for a short ‗u‘ sound: of, love, money, other, some, son.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN DIPHTHONGS AND DIGRAPHS

The terms digraph and diphthong are common terms in the reading world. At workshops on spelling or phonics, I often find that many people are confused about the difference between the two terms.

The clear difference is that digraphs are letters and diphthongs are sounds. The morphemes (meaningful word parts) in each word help us remember their meanings. Both words are derived from Greek. The first morpheme di in both words means ―two.‖ The morpheme graph means written, making the word digraph refer to something written that has two parts. The morpheme phthong means ―sound‖, making the word diphthong refer to a sound that has two parts. If you understand the meaning of the morphemes in each word, you will never confuse them again.

A digraph is two letters that spell one sound. Digraphs that spell consonant sounds include the letter pairs sh, ch, th, wh, ck, ph, ng. Digraphs that spell vowel sounds include the letter pairs ai, ay, ee, ea, ie, ei, oo, ou. ow, oe, oo, ue, ey, ay, oy, oi, au, aw. The important thing to remember is that a digraph is made of two letters, and although the letters spell a sound, the digraph is the two letters, not the sound.

A diphthong is a special kind of vowel sound. Most vowel sounds in English are made with the mouth in one position and with one pure sound. These vowel sounds are called monophthongs (mono meaning ―one‖ and phthong meaning ―sound‖). A diphthong is one vowel sound formed by the combination of two vowel sounds. A diphthong begins as one

vowel sound and moves toward another, such as the vowel sounds in coin or loud.

Diphthongs can be contrasted with two monophthong vowel sounds together that form two syllables, such as in chaos, triage, or violin.1

When teaching reading, the two vowel sounds most commonly identified as diphthongs are /oy/ and /ow/. The most common spellings for the vowel sound /oy/ are oy (toy) and oi (void), and the two most common spellings for /ow/ are ow (cow) and ou (cloud). The fact that these two diphthongs are usually spelled with digraphs may explain the confusion between the terms

Diphthongs FOR EXAMPLE: [ei], [ai], [au], [oi], [ou]

ray – ride – how – boy – no;

The sound [ei] as in RAY

rate – late – Kate – fate – race – base – place – same – name – take – ache – lake – rage – age – wage – save – cave – wave;

dictate – educate – decorate – celebrate – concentrate – investigate;

cable – table – able – cradle – range – change – strange – taste – waste;

baby – bacon – paper – April – danger – angel – stranger – basis – lazy – crazy;

patient – racial – nation – nature – fatal – patriot – radio – vacant;

ray – gray – play – lay – day – may – say – way – pray – stay – stray – delay;

hey – prey – they – convey – obey;

rain – main – aim – brain – drain – train – stain – remain – explain – complain;

fail – mail – sail – rail – raise – raid – afraid – wait – straight – faint – paint;

weight – weigh – eight – vein – neighbor;

break – great – steak;

betrayal – portrayal – layer – player – conveyor – surveyor;

saying – staying – playing – laying – praying – delaying – conveying – obeying – archaic.

The sound [ai] as in RIDE

ride – nice – ice – life – file – smile – line – fine – quite – rise – wise – prize – hi;

polite – combine – arrive – surprise – despise – organize – modernize;

private – library – final – minus – crisis – climate – bicycle – horizon – item – Ida;

idea – ideal – identity – identical – biology;

find – kind – mind – blind – child – mild – wild – climb – rifle – trifle – title – idle;

high – sigh – sign – right – fight – night – light – sight – height;

lie – die – tie – dye – rye – bye – eye – buy – guy – alibi;

cry – dry – fry – try – by – my – sky – style – type – hype;

nylon – cycle – cyber – hybrid – dynamite – dynamic – hyperactive;

rely – reply – apply – deny – satisfy – modify – signify – analyze – paralyze;

buying – lying – flying – frying – trying – drying – crying – dying – denying – replying;

diet – client – quiet – riot – giant – lion – violet – dial – diary – diagram – denial – trial – science – society – pioneer;

buyer – flyer – dryer – higher – iron – liar – prior;

fire – hire – dire – wire – tire – tired – entire – aspire – expire – desire – require – acquire – empire.

The sound [au] as in HOW

how – cow – now – allow – owl – brown – down – town – clown – drown – crown – crowd – powder – browse – browser;

loud – proud – cloud – out – shout – about – doubt – foul – noun – house – mouse – mouth – south – couch;

found – ground – around – pound – sound – count – amount – mountain – announce – bounce;

allowing – plowing / ploughing;

towel – bowel – Powell;

power – tower – flower – shower – coward – Howard;

hour – our – sour – flour.

The sound [oi] as in BOY

noise – voice – avoid – poison – join – coin – point – boil – foil – oil – spoil – toil – exploit;

joy – toy – boy – annoy – employ – destroy;

toying – employing – destroying – annoying;

loyal – royal – voyage – annoyance – oyster – destroyer – employer.

The sound [ou] as in NO

role – bone – phone – stone – close – note – notice – lonely – home – hope – open – ocean – remote – suppose;

go – ago – no – so – toe – hero – zero – veto – ego – echo – radio – studio – Mexico – potato – tomato – logo – motto;

solar – polar – modal – total – motor – moment – bonus – focus – vogue – social – soldier – coworker;

cold – gold – hold – old – bold – sold – told – roll – poll – control – bolt – colt – folk – yolk – comb – don't – won't;

most – post – host – hostess – ghost – both;

road – load – boat – coat – oat – oak – soak – goal – coal – coach – approach – roast – toast – boast – coast;

soul – shoulder – though – although – dough;

OK – obey – omit – hotel – motel;

low – know – mow – snow – show – tow – owe – own – bowl – blow – blown – grow – grown – growth – throw – thrown;

follow – borrow – narrow – sparrow – window – yellow;

knowing – going – growing – throwing – showing – sewing – towing – blowing – owing – flowing;

following – borrowing – narrowing – zeroing – echoing;

heroic – stoical – poet – poetry;

lower – slower – mower – borrower – follower – widower.

KIND OF VOWELS – MONOPHTHONG & DIPHTHONG What is Monophthong? Monophthong is simply a vowel. The word monophthong comes from the old Greek language. Mono means one or single, and the -phthong means sound or tone. The word monophthong shows that a vowel is spoken with exactly one tone and one mouth position. For example, when you say ―teeth‖, then while you are creating the sound of the ―ee‖, nothing changes for that sound.

What is Diphthong?A Diphthong is a vowel that a person has to move his or her mouth into two different positions to make. Diphthong comes from the old Greek language. Di means two or double, while the part -phthong means sound or tone, It is a vowel where two different vowel qualities can be heard. For examples are: waist, die, noise, road, house, fierce, bear, sure.

Each of these is a different vowel sound.

The Difference between Monophthong and Diphtong A monophthong is a simple vowel sound that a person does not have to move his mouth to make, like the ―oo‖ sound in ―book.‖ In a diphthong, the person combines two different monophthongs, as with the ―oi‖ sound in the word ―oil.‖ The person starts with the mouth in the position to make an ―o‖ sound, then quickly moves the mouth to make a hard ―e‖ sound. Another example is the ―ou‖ sound in the word ―house.‖ The mouth starts out making a sound like the soft ―a‖ sound in ―flat,‖ then moves to make the a hard ―oo‖ sound

like the one in ―boots.― The main difference is that a monophthong is a phoneme that consists of only one (―mono‖ means one) vowel sound and a diphthong is a phoneme consisting of two (―di‖ means two) vowel sounds that are ―connected‖ or ―linked‖ to each other.

MONOPHTHONGS

Monophthongs, Diphthongs, Triphthongs

A vowel sound whose quality doesn't change over the duration of the vowel is called a monophthong. Monophthongs are sometimes called "pure" or "stable" vowels. A vowel sound that glides from one quality to another is called a diphthong, and a vowel sound that glides successively through three qualities is a triphthong.

All languages have monophthongs and many languages have diphthongs, but triphthongs or vowel sounds with even more target qualities are relatively rare cross-linguistically. English has all three types: the vowel sound in hit is a monophthong /ɪ/, the vowel sound in boy is in most dialects a diphthong /ɔɪ/, and the vowel sounds of flower, /aʊər/, form a triphthong or disyllable, depending on dialect.

In phonology, diphthongs and triphthongs are distinguished from sequences of monophthongs by whether the vowel sound may be analyzed into different phonemes or not. For example, the vowel sounds in a two-syllable pronunciation of the word flower (/ˈflaʊər/) phonetically form a disyllabic triphthong, but are phonologically a sequence of a diphthong (represented by the letters ) and a monophthong (represented by the letters ).

Some linguists use the terms diphthong and triphthong only in this phonemic sense.

HOMOPHONES AND HOMOGRAPHS Homonyms, homophones and homographs can bring confusion to even adults and teachers!

VocabularySpellingCity can help anyone master these word groups. For clarity, we‘ve brought them all together on one page. It makes it easier to learn the difference among the three types of words using the definitions and homonyms, homophones and homographs examples below.

Homonyms

Homophones

Homographs & Heteronyms

Multiple meaning words

Words that sound alike

Same spelling, different pronunciation, different meanings

the spruce tree… to spruce up…

addition for edition of a book

suit yourself… wore a suit…

I want to go bass = I like it too bass = instrument One plus one is two

weigh on the scale… capitol building scale the wall… state capital the price go to the fair…

math desert = desert = area of land

fish

close = close = to shut

is fair… pick a flower bow = to bake with flour bow = ribbon

abandon

nearby

bend

down

Homonyms, or multiple meaning words, are words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings. For example, bear. 

A bear (the animal) can bear (tolerate) very cold temperatures.



The driver turned left (opposite of right) and left (departed from) the main road.

Homophones, also known as sound-alike words, are words that are pronounced identically although they have different meanings and often have different spellings as well.

These words are a very common source of confusion when writing. Common examples of sets of homophones include: to, too, and two; they‘re and their; bee and be; sun and son;

which and witch; and plain and plane. VocabularySpellingCity is a particularly useful tool for learning to correctly use and spell the soundalike words. 

The toys are over there on the floor.



The wind gust blew away their papers.



Did they say they’re coming to my party?

Homographs are words that are spelled the same, but have different meanings and are often pronounced differently as well. Some examples of homographs are: 

bass as in fish vs bass as in music



bow as in arrow vs bow as in bending or taking a bow at the end of a performance



close as in next to vs close as in shut the door



desert as in dry climate vs desert as in leaving alone

Currently, VocabularySpellingCity cannot distinguish between homographs, as we are unable to have two pronounciations for the exact same word. We are looking for possibilities in the future.

Heteronyms or heterophones have the same spelling, different pronunciations, and different meanings. All heteronyms are homographs, but not all homographs are heteronyms. See why this concept can be so confusing to learn? 

Wind: I need to wind the alarm clock so I can fly my kite in the early morning gusty wind.



Record: Please record the program when they try to beat the world record for word nerdiness.



Excuse: Please excuse this poor excuse for art.



For example this picture :

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION

Definition : is the visual representation of speech sounds (or phones).

Phonetic transcription versus orthography:

 The pronunciation of words in many languages, as distinct from their written form (orthography), has undergone significant change over time. Pronunciation can also vary greatly among dialects of a language. Standard orthography in some languages, particularly French, English, and Irish, is often irregular, and makes it difficult to predict pronunciation from spelling. For example, the words bough and through do not rhyme in English, even though their spellings might suggest they do. In French, the sequence "-ent" is pronounced /ɑ/ in accent, but is silent in posent .

 Other languages, such as Spanish and Italian have a more consistent—though still imperfect—relationship between orthography and pronunciation (phonemic orthography).

 Therefore, phonetic transcription can provide a function that orthography cannot. It displays a one-to-one relationship between symbols and sounds, unlike traditional writing systems. Phonetic transcription allows us to step outside orthography and examine differences in pronunciation between dialects within a given language, as well as to identify changes in pronunciation that may take place over time.

FOR EXAMPLE:

SCHWA In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa (/ʃwɑː/, rarely /ʃwɔː/ or /ʃvɑː/) (sometimes spelled shwa) refers to the mid central vowel sound (rounded or unrounded) in the middle of the vowel chart, denoted by the IPA symbol ə, or another vowelsound close to that position. An example in English is the vowel sound in the 'a' of the word 'about'.

Schwa in English is mainly found in unstressed positions, but in some other languages it occurs more frequently as a stressed vowel.

In relation to certain languages, the name "schwa" and the symbol ə may be used for some other unstressed and toneless neutral vowel, not necessarily mid-central.

The word schwa is from the Hebrew word shva ( IPA: [ʃva], classical pronunciation: shewa‘ [ʃəˈwa]), designating the Hebrew niqqud vowel sign shva (two vertical dots written beneath a letter): in Modern Hebrew, it indicates either the phoneme /e/ or the complete absence of a vowel. (The Hebrew shva is also sometimes transliterated using the schwa symbol ə, but the schwa vowel has never been pronounced that way, whether now or any earlier pronunciation, such as the Tiberian vocalization.)

Sometimes the term "schwa" is used for any epenthetic vowel, but different languages use different epenthetic vowels (Navajo uses [i]).

In English, schwa is the most common vowel sound.[5] It is a reduced vowel in many unstressed syllables especially if syllabic consonants are not used. Depending on dialect, it may be written using any of the following letters:

'a', as in about [əˈbaʊt] 'e', as in taken [ˈtʰeɪkən] 'i', as in pencil [ˈpʰɛnsəl] 'o', as in memory [ˈmɛməri] 'u', as in supply [səˈplaɪ] 'y', as in sibyl [ˈsɪbəl] various combinations of letters, such as 'ai' in mountain [ˈmaʊntən] unwritten as in rhythm [ˈɹɪðəm] Schwa is a very short neutral vowel sound, and like all other vowels, its precise quality varies depending on the adjacent consonants. In most varieties of English, schwa occurs almost exclusively in unstressed syllables (there is also an open-mid central unrounded vowel or "long schwa", represented as ɜː, which occurs in some non-rhotic dialect stressed syllables, as in bird and alert).

In New Zealand English, the high front lax vowel (as in the word bit) has shifted open and back to sound like schwa, and both stressed and unstressed schwas exist. To a certain extent, that is true for South African English as well.

In General American, schwa and ɜː are the two vowel sounds that can be r-colored (rhotacized); r-colored schwa is used in words with unstressed "er" syllables, such as dinner. See also stress and vowel reduction in English.

Quite a few languages have a sound similar to schwa. It is similar to a short French unaccented ⟨e⟩, which is rounded and less central, more like an open-mid or close-mid front rounded vowel. It is almost always unstressed, but Albanian, Bulgarian, Slovene and Afrikaans are some of the languages that allow stressed schwas.

In most dialects of Russian an unstressed ⟨a⟩ or ⟨o⟩ reduces to a schwa. In dialects of Kashubian a schwa occurs in place of the Old Polish short consonants u, i, y.[6]

Many Caucasian languages and some Uralic languages (like Komi) also use phonemic schwa, and allow schwas to be stressed. In the Eastern dialects of Catalan, including the standard variety, based in the dialect spoken in and around Barcelona, an unstressed ⟨a⟩ or ⟨e⟩ is pronounced as a schwa (called "vocal neutra", 'neutral vowel'). In the dialects of Catalan spoken in the Balearic Islands, a stressed schwa can occur. Stressed schwa can occur in Romanian, as in mătură [ˈməturə] ('broom').

In European and some African dialects of Portuguese, the schwa occurs in many unstressed syllables that end in ⟨e⟩, such as noite ('night'), tarde ('afternoon'), pêssego ('peach'), and pecado ('sin'). However, that is rare in Brazilian Portuguese except in such areas as Curitiba in Paraná.

In Neapolitan, a final, unstressed ⟨a⟩, and unstressed ⟨e⟩ and ⟨o⟩ are pronounced as a schwa: pìzza ('pizza'), semmàna ('week'), purtuàllo ('orange').

The inherent vowel in the Devanagari script, an abugida used to write Hindi, Marathi, Nepali and Sanskrit is a schwa, written ⟨अ⟩ either in isolation or word-initially.

Other characters used to represent this sound include ⟨ը⟩ in Armenian, ⟨ă⟩ in Romanian, and ⟨ë⟩ in Albanian. In Bulgarian Cyrillic, the letter ⟨ъ⟩, which has a very different orthographic function in Modern Russian, is used.

In Korean, the letter (or rather jamo) is used, but it may also represent a "null" vowel used in the transcription of foreign consonant clusters, when it may be deleted. In most Sanskritbased languages, the schwa ⟨अ⟩ is the implied vowel after every consonant and so has no didactic marks. For example, in Hindi, the character क is pronounced "kə" without marking, but क is pronounced "ke" (pronounced "kay") with a marking.

ASSIMILATION OF THE /J/ Assimilation is when two sounds come together and change or melt into a new sound.

Assimilations may happen inside a word, or between two words, when the final sound of a word touches the first sound of the next word (because when we speak we join all the words together). When speaking, people make many assimilations, most of them can only be noticed by the trained ear of an academic speaker and are not important for us. But there are 4 assimilations that are very important, because the sound changes a lot and the student of English can notice the difference and feel confused about it.

The sound /j/ is usually found in the letter Y, the letter I and the letter U (when it is or was in the past pronounced /ju:/) 1- /t/ + /j/ = /tʃ/ (T+Y=CH) Nice to meet you meet + you /mi:t ju:/ = /mi:tʃu:/ picture 1 /pɪktjʊə*/ → 2 /pɪktʃʊə*/ → 3 /pɪktʃə*/ (1= old fashioned pronunciation, 2= transitional pronunciation, 3= present pronunciation, the vowel /ʊ/ weakened and disappears) 2- /d/ + /j/ = /dʒ/ (D+Y=J) would you like some soldier /səʊldjə*/ = /səʊldʒə*/

tea? would

+

you /wʊd

ju:/ = /wʊdʒu:/

3- /s/ + /j/ = /ʃ/ (S+Y=SH) special /spesjəl/ = /speʃəl/ it's just you = it's jus' you /dʒʌs ju:/ = /dʒʌʃu:/ (in conversational English "just" often loses its final T and it sounds "jus", so S + Y = SH) 4- /z/ + /j/ = /ʒ/ treasure /trezjʊə*/ → 2 /treʒʊə*/ → 3 /treʒə*/ (1, 2, 3= see comments to the word "picture" above) learning centres such as universities as + universities /əz ju:nɪvɜ:*sɪtɪz/ = /əʒu:nɪvɜ:*sɪtɪz/

Assimilation has a very precise meaning when it‘s related to studies of languages. Is a common phonological process bye which the phonetics of a speech segment becomes more like another segment in a word. In other words it‘s when a letter (sound) is influenced by the letter (sound) before or after it so that it changes its sound and/or spelling. The word assimilation it self it‘s said to be assimilated; it is derived from the latin prefix ad- meaning to and simil- meaning like but, instead of being adsimilated, it has the easier pronunciation of assimilated.

A common example of assimilation is ―don‘t be silly‖ where the /n/ and /t/ are assimilated to /m/ by the following /b/, in many accents the natural sound is ―dombe silly‖.

Assimilation can be synchronic being an active process in a language at a given point in time or diachronic being a historical sound change. There are 4 configurations found: the increase in phonetic similarity may be between adjacent segments or between segments separated by one or more intervening segments; the changes could be in reference to a preceding segment or a following one. Even when all four occur, it changes in regard to a following adjacent segment account for virtually all assimilatory changes. Assimilation to an adjacent segment are vastly more frequent than assimilation to a non-adjacent one.

If a sound changes with reference to a following segment, it is called ―regressive assimilation‖, the changes with reference to a preceding segment are called ―progressive assimilation‖. A lot of people find these terms very confusing because they seem to mean the opposite of the intended meaning. To avoid the problem exist a variety of alternative terms. ―Regressive assimilation‖ is also known as right to left, leading or reciprocal assimilation. ―Progressive assimilation‖ is known as left to right or preservative, lagging or lag assimilation.

Occasionally two sounds may influence one another in reciprocal assimilation. When such a change results in a single segment with some of the features of both components, it is known as coalescence or fusion.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

/ t / changes to / p / before / m / / b / or / p / / d / changes to / b / before / m / / b / or / p / / n / changes to / m / before / m / / b / or / p / / t / changes to / k / before / k / or /g/ / d / changes to / g / before / k / or / g / / n / changes to /ŋ/ before / k / or / g / / s / changes to /ʃ/ before /ʃ/ or / j / / z / changes to /ʒ/ before /ʃ/ or / j / /θ/ changes to / s / before / s /

WORD STRESS Word stress is your magic key to understanding spoken English. Native speakers of English use word stress naturally. Word stress is so natural for them that they don't even know they use it. Non-native speakers who speak English to native speakers without using word stress, encounter two problems: 1. They find it difficult to understand native speakers, especially those speaking fast.

2. The native speakers may find it difficult to understand them.

What is Word Stress?

In English, we do not say each syllable with the same force or strength. In one word, we accentuate ONE syllable. We say one syllable very loudly (big, strong, important) and all the other syllablesvery quietly.

Let's take 3 words: photograph, photographer and photographic. Do they sound the same when spoken? No. Because we accentuate (stress) ONE syllable in each word. And it is not always the same syllable. So the "shape" of each word is different.

This happens in ALL words with 2 or more syllables: TEACHer, JaPAN, CHINa, aBOVE, converSAtion, INteresting, imPORtant, deMAND, etCETera, etCETera, etCETera The syllables that are not stressed are weak or small or quiet. Fluent speakers of English listen for the STRESSED syllables, not the weak syllables. If you use word stress in your speech, you will instantly and automatically improve your pronunciation and your comprehension.

Try to hear the stress in individual words each time you listen to English - on the radio, or in films for example. Your first step is to HEAR and recognise it. After that, you can USE it!

There are two very important rules about word stress: 1. One word, one stress. (One word cannot have two stresses. So if you hear two stresses, you have heard two words, not one word.)

2. The stress is always on a vowel.

Why is Word Stress Important?

3. Word stress is not used in all languages. Some languages, Japanese or French for example, pronounce each syllable with eq-ual em-pha-sis.

4. Other languages, English for example, use word stress and pro-NOUNCE DIF-ferent SYL-la-bles with more or less im-POR-tance.

5. Word stress is not an optional extra that you can add to the English language if you want. It is part of the language! Fluent English speakers use word stress to communicate rapidly and accurately, even in difficult conditions. If, for example, you do not hear a word clearly, you can still understand the word because of the position of the stress.

6. Think again about the two words photograph and photographer. Now imagine that you are speaking to somebody by telephone over a very bad line. You cannot hear clearly. In fact, you hear only the first two syllables of one of these words, photo... Which word is it, photograph or photographer?

WHERE DO I PUT WORD STRESS? There are some word stress rules about which syllable to stress. But...the rules are rather complicated! Probably the best way to learn is from experience. Listen carefully to spoken English and try to develop a feeling for the "music" of the language.

When you learn a new word, you should also learn its stress pattern. If you keep a vocabulary book, make a note to show which syllable is stressed. If you do not know, you can look in a dictionary. All dictionaries give the phonetic spelling of a word. This is where they show which syllable is stressed, usually with an apostrophe (') just before or just after the stressed syllable. (The notes in the dictionary will explain the system used.)

Word Stress Rules There are two very simple rules about word stress: 1. One word has only one stress. (One word cannot have two stresses. If you hear two stresses, you hear two words. Two stresses cannot be one word. It is true that there can be a "secondary" stress in some words. But a secondary stress is much smaller than the main [primary] stress, and is only used in long words.)

2. We can only stress vowels, not consonants.

Here are some more, rather complicated, rules that can help you understand where to put the stress. But do not rely on them too much, because there are many exceptions. It is better to try to "feel" the music of the language and to add the stress naturally.

A. Stress on first syllable

rule

example

Most 2-syllable nouns

PRESent, EXport, CHIna, TAble

Most 2-syllable adjectives

PRESent, SLENder, CLEVer, HAPpy

C. Stress on penultimate syllable (penultimate = second from end)

rule

example

Words ending in -ic

GRAPHic, geoGRAPHic, geoLOGic

Words ending in -sion and -tion

teleVIsion, reveLAtion

D. Stress on ante-penultimate syllable (ante-penultimate = third from end)

rule

example

Words ending in -cy, -ty, phy and -gy

deMOcracy, dependaBIlity, phoTOgraphy, geOLogy

rule

example

Words ending in -al

CRItical, geoLOGical

E. Compound words (words with two parts)

rule

example

For compound nouns, the stress is on the first part

BLACKbird, GREENhouse

For compound adjectives, the stress is on the second part

bad-TEMpered, oldFASHioned

For compound verbs, the stress is on the second part

underSTAND, overFLOW

CONTRACTION A contraction is a shortened version of the written and spoken forms of a word, syllable, or word group, created by omission of internal letters and sounds.

In linguistic analysis, contractions should not be confused with crasis, abbreviations nor acronyms (including initialisms), with which they share some semantic and phonetic functions, though all three are connoted by the term "abbreviation" in loose parlance. Contraction is also distinguished from clipping, where beginnings and endings are omitted.

The definition overlaps with the grammatical term portmanteau (a linguistic blend), but a distinction can be made between a portmanteau and a contraction by noting that contractions are formed from words that would otherwise appear together in sequence, such

as do and not, whereas a portmanteau word is formed by combining two or more existing words that all relate to a singular concept which the portmanteau describes.

FOR EXAMPLE: Full form

Contracted

Notes

Irregular forms: "ain't", "won't", "shan't", "amn't". "n't" can only be attached to an auxiliary verb which is itself not contracted.

not

-n't

let us

let's

I am

I'm

are

-'re

we're /wɪər/ or /wɛər/ is, in most cases, pronounced differently from were /wɜr/.

does

-'s

informal, as in "What's he do there every day?"

is -'s has

have

-'ve

had

did

-'d

would

will

-'ll

informal, as in "Where'd she go?"

of

o'-

used mostly in o'clock, where it is mandatory in contemporary use

of

o'

as in "cup o' coffee," "barrel o' monkeys," "Land o' Goshen," "lots o' luck"

it

't-

Archaic, except in stock uses such as 'Twas the night before Christmas

them

'em

Actually from hem, which is not the same word as them, a Norse loan.[2][3]

WHAT IS A ALLOPHONE? Definition An allophone is a phonetic variant of a phoneme in a particular language.

Examples (English)  

[p] and [pH] are allophones of the phoneme /p/. [t] and [tH] are allophones of the phoneme /t/.

Examples (Spanish)  [b] and [B] are allophones of the phoneme /b/.  [d] and [D] are allophones of the phoneme /d/.

What is complementary distribution?

Definition Complementary distribution is the mutually exclusive relationship between two phonetically similar segments. It exists when one segment occurs in an environment where the other segment never occurs.

Discussion The rationale for complementary distribution comes from one of the principles of phonemics: Sounds tend to be modified by their environments.

Source:

Pike 1947 58

A phoneme is made up of certain features that are basic to it. When this phoneme occurs in certain phonetic environments, one or more of its features may undergo changes caused by those environments.

Examples (English) The phones [p] and [pH] are in complementary distribution. [pH] occurs syllableinitially in a stressed syllable, but [p] never does, as demonstrated here: Phonetic representation

Gloss

Underlying representation

pHEpp«&u0279;

'pepper'

/pEpp«&u0279;/

spIn

'spin'

/spIn/

Examples: Cashinahua (Brazil/Peru) The phones [b] and [B] are in complementary distribution. [b] occurs only at the beginning of words, while [B] occurs between vowels, as demonstrated here: Phonetic representation

Gloss

Underlying representation

baka

‗fish‘

/baka/

taBa

‗washboard‘

/taba/

Compare: Morpheme-morph-allomorph and phoneme-phone-allophone

The relationship between a morpheme and its morphs and allomorphs is parallel to the relationship between a phoneme and its phones and allophones.

A morpheme is manifested as one or more morphs (surface forms) in different environments. These morphs are called allomorphs.

A phoneme is manifested as one or more phones (phonetic sounds) in different environments. These phones are called allophones.

DERIVATIONS OF WORDS Derivation processes form new words (generally of a different category) from existing words, in English this is mainly done by adding affixes. For example, industrialization, and destruction can be thought of as being derived in the way illustrated below. As one can see from destruction, it is not necessarily the citation form of a word that appears in derivations, for this reason it is common to talk of derivational processes involving stems and affixes (rather than words and affixes). 

industry +ize



+ial

+ation destroy +ion

In a paper dictionary, some derived words are listed, under the relevant head word. This is partly because affixes differ in their productivity and in the regularity of the effect they have on the words or stems that they combine with. For example, there seems to be no real basis on which to predict which of the noun-forming affixes produce nouns from particular verbs. This is illustrated below by the verbs arrive, destroy, and deport.

However, some derivational processes are quite regular and can be described by means of a bf word grammar. This involves: (i) entering the affix in the dictionary; (ii) allowing it to subcategorize for what it combines with (e.g. -able combines with transitive verbs: witness read- readable) --- this is just like normal syntactic subcategorization ; (iii) making sure that

the rules to combine words and affixes give the derived word the correct features for the result, and take care of any spelling changes in word or affix; (iv) finding some way of specifying the meaning in terms of the meanings of the word and affix.

As with inflection , the rules must be set up so as to produce only genuine lexical items. For example, we can ensure that the rules that analyse cordiality as cordial+ -ity do not produce qual+ -ity from quality, because there is no lexical item * qual.

One approach to handling derivational morphology in MT is to simply list all derived words, and for some derived words (e.g. landing, in the sense of area at the top of stairs), this is clearly the right approach, because their meaning is unpredictable. But not all derivational morphology is unpredictable. Some affixes almost always have just one sense, like the prefix un which (when combined with an adjective) normally means `not X' ( unhappy means not happy)gif, and for others there are certain tendencies or regularities: with the examples in ( ) the addition of the suffix -ing to the verb stem seems to have the same, regular consequence for the meaning of the word, so the derived word denotes the action or process associated with the verb (the act of Xing). Speakers exploit this fact by creating new words which they expect hearers to understand.

The killing of elephants is forbidden.

Driving off went without any problems.

The painting of still lives never appealed to me.

In contrast with the examples in ( ), one should consider the nouns in ( ), where the meaning, although common, is not predictable from the suffix -ing:

   

Painting: a picture produced with paint Covering: something which covers something Cutting: something which has been cut out Crossing: a place were e.g. roads cross

We see here that a verb+ing noun can refer to a product ( a), a thing which performs an action ( b), a thing which undergoes an action ( c), or a place ( d). At the same time, however, it is true that in most cases the regular interpretation `the act of Xing' is also

available. What this means is that there is almost always a problem of ambiguity with derived words.

Moreover, there are cases where one can translate derived words by translating the stem, and translating the affix. For example, the French translation of English adverbs formed from an adjective plus - ly is often made up of the translation of the adjective plus - ment (e.g. quick+ly rapide+ment, easy+ly facile+ment), etc. But this is only possible for some affixes, and only when the interpretation of the derived word is predictable. The difficulties of translating derived words by translating stems and affixes can can be seen from the translation of the previous examples into Dutch .

      

killing doden driving off wegrijden painting (the act) schilderen painting (the product) schilderen, but schilderij covering bedekken, but bedekking cutting knippen, but knipsel crossing kruisen, but kruispunt LINKING

When we say a sentence in English, we join or "link" words to each other. Because of this linking, the words in a sentence do not always sound the same as when we say them individually. Linking is very important in English. If you recognize and use linking, two things will happen: 1. you will understand other people more easily 2. other people will understand you more easily There are basically two main types of linking: 

consonant ⇔ vowel We link words ending with a consonant sound to words beginning with a vowel sound



vowel ⇔ vowel We link words ending with a vowel sound to words beginning with a vowel sound

Linking Consonant to Vowel

When a word ends in a consonant sound, we often move the consonant sound to the beginning of the next word if it starts with a vowel sound.

For example, in the phrase turn off...

we write it like this:

turn off

we say it like this:

tur-noff

Remember that it's the sound that matters.

In the next example sentence, have ends with... 

the letter e (which is a vowel)



but the sound v (which is a consonant)

So we link the ending consonant sound of have to the beginning vowel sound of the next word a.

And in fact we have four consonant to vowel links in this sentence: We write it like this:

Can I have a bit of egg?

We say it like this:

ca-ni-ha-va-bi-to-vegg?

Linking Vowel to Vowel When one word ends with a vowel sound and the next word begins with a vowel sound, we link the words with a sort of Y or W sound. It depends on the shape of our mouth at the end of the first word.

Lips wide When the first word ends in an a, e, i vowel sound [ eɪ / i: / aɪ ], our lips are wide.

Then we insert a Y sound at the beginning of the next word:

oo | —

we write

first word ends with

we say

pay all

/eɪ/

payyall

the end

/i:/

theyend

lie on

/aɪ/

lieyon

Lips round oo | o

When the first word ends in an o, u vowel sound [ əʊ / u: ], our lips are round. Then we insert a Wsound at the beginning of the next word:

we write

first word ends with

we say

go out

/əʊ/

gowout

too often

/u:/

toowoften

ELLISION In linguistics, elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. Sometimes sounds are elided to make a word easier to pronounce. The word elision is frequently used in linguistic description of living languages, and deletion is often used in historical linguistics for a historical sound change.

In English as spoken by native speakers, elision comes naturally, and it is often described as "slurred" or "muted" sounds. Often, elision is deliberate. It is a common misconception that contractions automatically qualify as elided words, which comes from slack definitions: not all elided words are contractions and not all contractions are elided words (for example, 'going to' → 'gonna': an elision that is not a contraction; 'can not' → 'cannot': a contraction that is not an elision).

ELLIPSIS Definition: An omission of unnecessary information.

Which are the two ways of Ellipsis? Series of two dots and inappropriate omission of words.

These are the different types of ellipsis: Gapping, Stripping, Verb phrase, Answer Ellipis, Sluicing, Nominal Ellipsis.

MINIMAL PAIRS In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language that differ in only one phonological element, such as a phoneme, toneme or chroneme,[1] and have distinct meanings. They are used to demonstrate that two phones constitute two separate phonemes in the language.

Many phonologists in the middle part of the 20th century had a strong interest in developing techniques for discovering the phonemes of unknown languages, and in some cases setting up writing systems for these languages. The major work of Kenneth Pike on the subject has the title Phonemics: a technique for reducing languages to writing.[2] The minimal pair was an essential tool in the discovery process, arrived at by substitution or commutation tests.[3] Modern phonology is much less interested in such

issues, and the minimal pair is consequently considered to be of little theoretical importance.

As an example for English vowels, the pair "let" + "lit" can be used to demonstrate that the phones [ɛ] (in let) and [ɪ] (in lit) do in fact represent distinct phonemes /ɛ/and /ɪ/. An example for English consonants is the minimal pair of "pat" + "bat". The following table shows other pairs demonstrating the existence of various distinct phonemes in English. All the possible minimal pairs for any language may be set out in the same way. word 1

word 2

IPA 1

IPA 2

pin

bin

/pɪn/

/bɪn/

rot

lot

/rɒt/

/lɒt/

note

initial consonant thigh

thy

/θaɪ/

/ðaɪ/

zeal

seal

/ziːl/

/siːl/

bin

bean

/bɪn/

/biːn/

pen

pan

/pɛn/

/pæn/

cook

kook

/kʊk/

/kuːk/

hat had /hæt/

/hæd/

final consonant

vowel

REDUCTION (GRAMMAR INFORMAL) Relative Clause Reduction Rules

1. In defining clauses, we can omit the relative pronoun in the position of object.

The boy who / whom / that you don‘t like much wants to talk to you.

The boy you don‘t like much wants to talk to you.

Note: In non-defining sentences you neither omit the relative pronoun nor use "that".

My My

2.

mother,

We

who / whom that you met mother you

can

a) Present

use

participles

yesterday,

when

Participle

wants met

to

reducing

V-ing

talk

the

to you. yesterday...

sentence.

(simultaneous)

We stood on the bridge which connects the two halves of the city.

We stood on the bridge connecting the two halves of the city.(Present Participle)

b) Past The The

Participle

V3

or

boy who was attacked boy attacked by a dog

being

V3

(passive

simultaneous)

by a dog was taken to was taken to hospital. (Past

hospital.

Participle)

c) Perfect Participle having V3 (active-explaining sth.happened before the others) The The

girl who girl having

has asked a

asked a question

question is very

is very clever.(Perfect

clever.

Participle)

d) Perfect passive participle having been V3 (passive-explaining sth happened before the others) The teacher who has been asked a question is very clever.

The teacher having been asked a question is very clever.(Perfect passive participle)

3. If "To be" verb is used after a relative pronoun we can omit "Relative Pronoun + To be".

The The

car which is parked car parked next

next to

to mine

mine is

is

very very

expensive. expensive.

Hamlet, which was written by Shakespeare sometime in the early 1600s, is among the classics.

Hamlet, written by Shakespeare sometime in the early 1600s, is among the classics.

4. When the verb ―have‖ meaning possession, we can omit relative pronoun and ―have‖ and use with(+) or without(-).

Students who have enough math and English skills will be Students with enough math and English skills will be People who don‘t People without their

5.

We

can

1.

2.

3.

The

John John

is the is

have their ID ID cards

use

infinitive

cards can

―to‖

can not

in

the

The first,

last,

only person the only

Tom Tom

is the most handsome boy is the most handsome

Jack Jack

is the first student is the first

who person to

second, who

not

get get

in. in.

cases

below.

only...to Superlative...to next...to

understands person to understand

who came boy to come

admitted. admitted.

me. me.

to to

this this

school. school.

has handed in have handed

the in the

exam. exam.