ENG507 Short Notes Set 2

Q. What are gestures?

In phonetics and phonology, speech sounds (segments) using basic units of contrast are defined as gestures.

Q. What are Articulatory Targets?

All consonants have a fixed articulatory target which is realised at a single precise place of articulation. The articulatory target for a particular consonant is known as its target for a particular consonant is known as its articulatory locus. The traditional terms which are used for all the places of articulation are not just names for particular locations (on the roof of the mouth). They should be thought of as names for articulatory targets.

Q. Write down types of Articulatory Gestures.

i. Bilabial gesture – (e.g., stops and nasal: p, b, m). The symbols for the voiceless and voiced bilabial fricatives are [ɸβ]. These sounds are pronounced by bringing the two lips nearly together, so that there is only a slit between them.

ii. Labiodental fricatives – [f, v]. In English, a labiodental nasal, [ɱ], may occur when /m/ occurs before /f/, as in emphasis or symphony.

iii. Dental - e.g. dental fricatives [θ, ð] but there are no dental stops, nasals, or laterals except allophonically realized (before [θ, ð] as in eighth, tenth, wealth). any speakers of rench, Italian, and other languages (such as rdu, ashto and indhi typically have dental stops such as [t d ].

iv. Alveolar are very common targets and stops, nasals, and fricatives all occur in English and in many other languages at alveolar as a target of articulatory gestures (e.g., t, d, n, l, r., etc.).

v. Retroflex is very common sound in many Pakistani languages which is made by curling the tip of the tongue up and back so that the tongue tip moves during the retroflex sounds such as [ɳ, ŋ, ɲ, ʈ, ɽ].

vii. Palato-alveolar and palatal are also possible articulatory gestures commonly found in world languages. Similarly, velar sounds found in Urdu and other Pakistani languages need to be mentioned here including [x, ɣ] which are velar fricatives. The gestures for pharyngeal (such as Arabic pharyngeal fricative [ʕ] and epiglottal sounds (such as epiglottal fricative [ʢ] involve pulling the root of the tongue or the epiglottis back toward the back wall of the pharynx.

Q. What are types of stops?

The following table shows stop sounds found in various languages:

Description · Symbol · Language

1. Voiced b English and other languages
2. Voiceless unaspirated p -do-
3. Aspirated pʰ Sindhi and many other Pakistani languages
4. Murmured (breathy) bʱ Sindhi
5. Implosive ɓ Sindhi
6. Laryngealized (creaky) b Hausa
7. Ejective kʼ Hausa
8. Nasal release dn Russian
9. Prenasalized nd Swahili
10. Lateral release tɬ Navajo
11. Ejective lateral release tɬʼ Navajo
12. Affricate ts German
13. Ejective affricate tsʼ Navajo

Describe nasals.

Like stops, nasal can also occur voiced or voiceless (for example, in Burmese, Ukrainian and French) though in English and other most languages nasals are voiced. As voiceless nasals are comparatively rare, they are symbolized simply by adding the voiceless diacritic [ ] under the symbol for the voiced sound. There are no special symbols for voiceless nasals and it is written as /m / - a combination of the letter for the voiced bilabial nasal and a diacritic indicating voicelessness.

Q. Explain Fricatives

Fricative as an articulatory gesture may be divided into voiced or voiceless sounds but we can also subdivide fricatives in accordance with other aspects of the gestures that produce them. For example, some authorities have divided fricatives into sounds such as [s], in which the tongue is grooved so that the airstream comes out through a narrow channel, and those such as [θ], in which the tongue is flat and forms a wide slit through which the air flows. On the other hand, a slightly better way of dividing fricatives is to separate them into groups on a purely auditory basis.

Q. Define sibilant sounds.

The fricatives [s, z, ʒ, ʃ] are called sibilant sounds. They have more acoustic energy—that is, greater loudness—at a higher pitch than the other fricative sounds.

Q. Where are Trills, Taps and Flaps found?

In approximants, trills, taps and flaps are commonly found with different articulatory gestures in the world languages. These languages vary not only in terms of the nature of the sounds but they also vary in terms of the length of the sound.

Q. Write down various types of approximant sounds.

The following table covers various types of these approximant sounds found in the world languages:

Voiced alveolar trill r Spanish Voiced alveolar tap ɾ Spanish Voiced retroflex flap ɽ Hausa Voiced alveolar approximant ɹ English Voiced alveolar fricative trill ɻ Czech Voiced uvular trill ʀ French Voiced uvular fricative or ʁ Parisian French approximant Voiced bilabial trill ʙ Kele Voiced labiodental flap Margi

Q. What are Laterals? What are forms of laterals?

Laterals are important articulatory gestures. Laterals are usually presumed to be voiced approximants unless a specific statement to the contrary is made. a lateral stop a lateral fricative lateral approximant

Q. Write a note on different types of sounds.

tap and flap (together one category of approximants sounds (i.e., r, ɾ, ɽ, ɹ, ɻ, ʀ, ʁ, ʙ, * with a range of similarities in terms of their articulatory gestures.

Q. Write a detailed note on Acoustic Phonetics.

Acoustics is the study of the physics of the speech signal (i.e., when speech sound travels through the air in a wave form from the speaker‘s mouth to the hearer‘s ear through vibrations. In acoustics, it is possible to measure and analyze these vibrations (physical properties) by mathematical techniques usually by using specially-developed computer software to produce spectrograms of speech. Acoustic phonetics also studies the relationship between activity in the speaker‘s vocal tract and the resulting sounds by involving physics, computer, statistics and a number of experiments in lab. Thus, the analysis of speech using the expertise available in acoustic phonetics is claimed to be more objective and scientific than the traditional auditory method which mostly depends on the reliability of the trained human ear. It also involves advanced level speech software for analyzing sound differences (in terms of pitch, loudness and quality) and distinguishes largely among speech sounds by giving the detailed composition of energy (e.g., frequency on spectrum).

Q. Describe in detail Acoustic Analysis.

According to the experts of speech sounds (phoneticians), acoustic analysis can provide a clear, objective datum for the investigation of speech – the physical ‗facts‘ of utterance. In other words, acoustic evidence is often referred to when one wants to support an analysis being made in articulatory or auditory phonetics. Acoustic analysis not only gives us the features of a sound but also tells us about the duration or length of a speech sound. For such an analysis, we need to carefully know about material and procedure of recording. Thus, acoustic analysis describes the durational characteristics, articulatory properties and phonetic differences through physiological measurement.

Q. What is Acoustic Analysis of Vowels?

The experts of phonetics are particularly interested in analyzing vowels acoustically. They describe vowels in terms of numbers (in a language that how many vowels are possible). It is also possible to analyze vowel sounds so that the measurement of the actual frequencies of the formants (the formant structure of the vowels of a language) is taken.

Q. Source Filter Theory of Speech Production

It is a model of speech (e.g., vowel) production. According to this theory, source refers to the waveform of the vibrating larynx. Its spectrum is rich in harmonics, which gradually decrease in amplitude as their frequency increases. The various resonance chambers of the vocal tract, especially the movements of the tongue and lips, act on the laryngeal source in the manner of a filter, reinforcing certain harmonics relative to others. Thus the combination of these two elements (larynx as source and cavity as filter) is known as the source-filter model of speech (e.g., vowel) production.

Q. Define formants.

The overtones are called formants, and the lowest three formants distinguish vowels from each other.