ENG507 Midterm Past Paper Set 2

Objectives:

1. Stress is a term used in phonetics to refer to the degree of force (for making it louder and longer) used in producing a syllable.
2. In typical ‘tone’ languages, the linguistic function of tone is to change the meaning of a word.
3. In Mandarin (Chinese), / ́ma/ said with high pitch means ‘mother’ while / ̌ma/ spoken on a low rising tone means ‘hemp’.
4. In the American structuralist tradition, four such degrees are usually distinguished, and analyzed as stress phonemes.
5. Diphthong is a vowel where there is a single (perceptual) noticeable change in quality during a syllable.
6. The term ‘stop’ is used in the phonetic classification of consonant sounds on the basis of their manner of articulation
7. Intonation refers (very) simply to the variations in the pitch of a speaker’s voice (f0).
8. In order to describe intonation, we need to analyze the role of a ‘stressed Syllable’.
9. This term is used to describe some varieties of English (e.g., American) pronunciation in which the /r/ phoneme is found in all its Phonological contexts.
10. Citation speech is a form where a word is in its complete form.
11. There are 20 vowels in English ..
12. English is a Stressed timed language .
13. The North wind and the sun is a folktale taken from (Arne Thompson)
14. /€:/ and /a:/ are the examples of ... (Tense)
15. The glottis is defined as the space (vocal folds)
16. In English /p t k/ at the beginning of a syllable are aspirated
17. Phoneme is a group of sound having the ability to change meaning.
18. It is primarily dependent on the use of instrumental techniques of investigation such as

Praat software.

19. Flap is front and back movement of tongue tip at the underside of tongue with curling Behind.

Subjective:

Q. No. of vowel and consonant 3

There are 44 sounds in English RP (BBC) accent. Out of them, 20 are vowels which, in turn, are further divided into pure vowels and diphthongs. Pure vowels or monophthongs are 12 out of which 5 are long and 7 are short vowels.

Q. VOT:

Voice Onset Time (VOT) is a term used in phonetics referring to the point in time at which vocalfold vibration starts in relation to the release of a closure (during the production of plosive sounds). In order to understand VOT, the three types of plosive sounds are to be explained – voiced, voiceless and a voiceless aspirated sound. For example, during the production of a fully voiced plosive (e.g., /b/ or /g/), the vocal folds vibrate throughout; in a voiceless unaspirated plosive (such as /p/ or /t/), there is a delay (or lag) before voicing starts; and, in a voiceless aspirated plosive (e.g., /pʰ/ or /tʰ/), the delay is much longer, depending on the amount of aspiration. The amount of this delay is called Voice Onset Time (VOT) which in relation to the types of plosive varies from language to language.

Q. Articulators:

We can only produce speech sounds by moving parts of our articulators (body parts), and this is done by the contraction of muscles. Most of the movements relevant to speech take place in the mouth and throat area (though we should not forget the activity in the chest for breath control), and parts of the mouth and throat area that we move when speaking. These are called articulators. In this branch of phonetics, we study the principal articulators (such as tongue, lips, lower jaw and the teeth, velum or soft palate, uvula and larynx) and other processes related to speech production. This includes the features of various sounds such as vowels and consonants and their specific properties including places and manners of articulation, phonation, etc.

Q. Lax vowels:

Lax vowels, remember, are short. Lax sounds are produced with less muscular effort and movement, and are relatively short and indistinct vowel sounds (e.g., i, e, ɒ, æ, ʌ, ʊ, ə vowels articulated near the center of the vowel area) compared to tense sounds (e.g., u:, i:, ɜ:, a:, ʊə, iə). In other words, a lax vowel is said to be the one produced with relatively little articulatory energy.

Q.Nasalization

Nasalization is an articulatory process whereby a sound is made ‘nasal’ (when the air is passing through the nasal cavity) due its adjacent nasal sound (it is an articulatory influence of an adjacent nasal consonant, as in words like mat or hand). A vowel can also be nasalised in words like man (when /a/ may be articulated with the soft palate lowered throughout), because of the nasal consonants’ influence (this is called anticipatory coarticulation).

Q. Lexical stress

Lexical stress is basically related to the primary stress applied at syllable level (when only one syllable is stressed) that has the ability to change the meaning and the grammatical category of a word as in the case of ‘IMport’ (noun) and ‘imPORT’ (verb). Q. write down 3 dipthongs and use them in words(3 marks)

English contains a large number (eight in total) of diphthongs including three ending at /ɪ/ (eɪ, aɪ, ɔɪ – as in words bay, buy and boy), two ending at /υ/ (əʊ, aʊ – as in words no and now) English diphthongs are divided into two categories: centering (which end with ‘ǝ’ sound) and closing (which end with either ‘ɪ’ or ‘ʊ’ sounds respectively). Examples for these diphthongs are given below:

• ɪǝ peer
• eǝ pair
• ʊǝ poor
• eɪ bay

Q. accent variation (3 marks)

• Lexical distribution e.g., /θ/ and /ð/ differences (as England and Wales have /ð/ and Scottishaccents have /θ/).

Q. what vocal fold assume in breathing sounds(3 marks)

The position of larynx (also known as sound box) and the vocal folds inside larynx are very important in the description of speech sounds. ‘Phonation’ is a technical term used for describing the forms of vibration of the vocal folds (or vocal cords) and the process is more commonly known as voicing. The glottis (which is defined as the space between the vocal folds) can assume a number of shapes (such as voiced, voiceless, murmuring and creaky positions). The most common positions of vocal folds are used to describe the two possible features of consonant sounds by considering sounds to be either voiceless with the vocal folds apart (such as /p/ and /t/) or voiced with the folds nearly together so that they will vibrate when air passes between them (such as /b/ and /g/). These glottal states are important in the description of speech sounds in particular languages and in the description of pathological voices. The process of phonation is also known as ‘voicing’ and laryngeal activity.

Q. Examples of Velaric airstream mechanism (5)

In addition to pulmonic and glottalic airstream mechanisms, there is a third possibility involving velum. Under this mechanism, speech sounds are made by sucking the air (see airstream). This sucking mechanism is used first by babies for feeding and by adult humans in later stages of life for such things as sucking liquid through a straw or drawing smoke from a cigarette (using the back of the tongue against the velum). The basic mechanism for this is the air-tight closure between the back of the tongue and the soft palate, just as if the tongue is then retracted, and the pressure in the oral cavity is lowered and suction takes place. Consonants produced with this