2016´s

PHONETICS I

PRACTICE HANDBOOK

IES “LOLA MORA”. TUCUMAN - ARGENTINA

WITH AUDIO CD AND KEYS

- Prof. Sergio Rojas -

2

1. The utterance. Pauses. Content and Structural words. Phonetics and Phonology. Prominence.

a. Read the following passage and predict the possible pauses in the following passage. Use slant bars.

My favourite Subject1

My favourite subjects at school were sciences, especially Chemistry and Biology. I’ve always been good with numbers,

so I was good at Mathematics. I didn’t really like the social science subjects like Sociology and History, and that’s

strange because when I went to university I did Geography.

b. Listen to the recording and check your predictions. (See Answer key Section). Where do pauses occur? Formulate your own rule.

The Utterance How would you read an utterance like the following ?

The boys ran quickly away and were soon out of sight. 1. 2 Pauses. 1. 2 What does segmentation (assignment of pauses) depend on? Why should we make pauses? Predict the answers before

reading what comes next.

Prosodic segmentation involves decisions concerning the relationships between fields such as syntax, morphology, phonology and phonetics. Sometimes, Paralinguistic or extra-linguistic features are associated with segmentation. a. Syntactic factors: many times pauses are placed at the end of grammatical units such as clauses or phrases. b. Phonological factor: pauses may mark the end of intonation units. c. Morphological factors: The decision for the placing of pauses may be conditioned by morphological implications on

part of the speaker or by context. d. Semantic factors: the use of a pause may distinguish two different ideas: e. Physiological factors: the need to breathe on part of the speaker. f. Extra-linguistic factors: there are also paralinguistic features, which are essentially interruptive. The most common

interruptive effect is PAUSE, which functions sometimes as part of the intonation system. Pauses may also function as a hesitation marker. In the latter, a filled pause is often involved, by some combination ofand resulting in fluency disruptions (like filled pauses [uh, um…], word repetitions, restarts of what have been said and repairs, correcting something that went wrong.

1.2.1 Read the passage in section 1 observing the pauses the speaker makes. 1.2.2 Read the following text silently. Split the text into as many utterances as you consider appropriate. Use a slant bar /

to mark pauses.

On Fridays, I come home from the BBC at about two in the afternoon. I just relax on Friday evening

because on Saturday morning I start very early. I don’t go out, but sometimes a friend comes for

dinner. He or she brings the wine and I cook the meal. I love cooking exotic dishes I learned from my

mum. After dinner, we listen to music or we just chat.

1 Adapted from English Pronunciation in Use. Hancock, M. (2003). Section 31. p.70. Cambridge University Press.

When language is written it appears to the eye as divided up into ‘words’. When it is spoken it is heard by the ear as divided up into chunks of sounds run together in the same way as we pronounce the sequence of single sounds of a word. An utterance consists of the continuous physiological activity which results in a span of sounds occurring between two silences. Within this unit of varying extend, it may be possible to find smaller segments.

3

1. 2. 3 Semantic and morphological implications derived from pauses. The decision for the placing of pauses may be conditioned by morphological implications on part of the speaker or by context. In the example below, the use of a pause may distinguish two different ideas: Tell the difference in meaning in the following utterances.

a. coffee cream / and milk.

coffee / cream / and milk.

b. I don´t know / John.

/ I don´t know John /

c. 52 - 7

50 - 2 - 7

Activity 1: Mark the alternatives do you hear.

1 a. 32 - 1 b. 30 – 2 - 1 2 a. 40 – 5 - 6 b. 45 – 6 3 a. 81 – 4 b. 80 – 1 – 4 4. a. 56 - 8 b. 50 – 6 – 8 5 a. 82 - 1 b. 80 – 2 - 1

b. Write 2 items or 3 items on the right column

1 Coffee cake and cream. 2 Chocolate ice-cream and cake. 3 Cheese sandwiches and milk. 4. Cream buns and chocolate. 5 Kitchen door and window.

c. Say whether the adjective modifies the first noun only (a) or both nouns (b) on the right column.

1 Green scarf and glasses. 2 Pedigree cats and dog. 3 One sock and shoes. 4. All men and women. 5 Milky tea and coffee.

Activity 2:

a. Predict where pauses might occur.

Hancock, Mark. English Pronunciation in Use. Audio C16.

b. Listen and check your prediction. c. Provide the missing punctuation marks. d. Read the passage respecting the original pauses.

a man wanted to buy his wife a new dress because it was her birthday so he

went to a department store and looked around and he was looking for about an

hour but he couldn’t decide and finally this shop assistant came and asked if he

needed help he said he was looking for a dress and the shop assistant asked is

it for you sir.

4

2. LINGUISTICS AND PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY. ( See “ Appendix, T heoretical notes”

The speech chain.

2. 1. Phonetics and Phonology.

Phonology studies the selection and organization of phonic substance into a meaningful pattern. It deals with both aspects of spoken language, the abstract one ( encoding , decoding ) and the material one ( speech sounds). ( Finch & Ortiz Lira, 1982, A Course in English Phonetics for Spanish Speakers. p 4. Heinemann Educational Books) When we turn to the characteristics of the English sound system that make it specifically English, and different from French or Welsh or Quechua, we move into the domain of Phonology, which is the language-specific selection and organization of sounds to signal meaning. Phonologists are interested in the sound patterns of particular languages, and in what speakers and hearers need to know, and children need to learn, to be speakers of those languages. McMahon, April. 2002, An Introduction to English Phonology. p. 1, Edinburgh University Press.

5

2.2. The branches of Phonetics. Phonetics

3. Prominence. Listen to the extract below. Some words are more “noticeable” than others. Underline those words that you notice more prominent. What kind of words are they? (adjectives, nouns, prepositions, etc)

She gets up at about seven o'clock and then drinks a cup of coffee. When she feels a bit more alert

she showers and changes. She buys breakfast at the café below her block and takes it to work to

eat.

3.1. Complete the following paragraph with the most appropriate words.

________ likes something sweet _______ ______ morning ______ she _________ croissants

________ Danish pastries. ________ travels ________ work ________ ________

underground ______ arrives _______ _______ 8:45.

What kind of words are missing from the passage above? Was it easy or difficult to guess them? Why?

3.1.1 Listen and check your predictions.

3.1. 2. Complete the paragraph below with the most appropriate words.

She ______ to her ______ for a ______ and ______ ______ at ______ ______. She ______

her ______ and then ______ the ______ of the ______ on the ______ to ______ .

What kind of words are missing from the passage above? Was it easy or difficult to guess them? Why? 3. 2. Content and Structural Words.

Some words are predisposed by their function in the language to receive prominence. These LEXICAL or CONTENT words are typically main verbs, adverbs, nouns, and adjectives. Other categories of words, the so-called FUNCTIONAL or STRUCTURAL WORDS, such as auxiliary verbs, conjunctions, articles, pronouns and prepositions, are more likely to be unaccented, although, they, too, may be made exceptionally prominent if the meaning requires it. In this case, much will depend on the speaker’s decisions as to what words he/she wants to highlight.

Gimson, A. C.

b. Acoustic Phonetics: ………………………..…....

..………………………………………..…………….

a. _____________________: studies the organs of

speech involved in the production of speech .sounds.

c. ______________ Phonetics: studies the effect sound

waves have on a hearer’s ears and brain.

6

3.2.1. Prominence: ( key to section 3 above ) This is what speech looks like. Words in capital letters below sound more

prominent than the rest.

She GET UP at about SEVEN o'clock and then DRINKS a CUP of COFFEE. When she FEELS a BIT more ALERT

she SHOWERS and CHANGES. She BUYS BREAKFAST at the CAFÈ below her BLOCK and TAKES it to WORK

to EAT.

3.2.2 Complete the last part of the routine above.

She leaves the ________ for ________ at 12 o'clock. She goes ________ after work or

sometimes eats out or ________ her friends for a drink. She ________ to bed at ________

most weekdays and saves her energy for the ________.

3.2.3. Daily routine.

Read the text and put a slant bar where you think a pause may occur. Listen and check if your pauses are correct.

She gets up at about 7 o'clock and then drinks a cup of coffee. When she feels a bit more alert she showers and

changes. She buys breakfast at the café below her block and takes it to work to eat. She likes something sweet

in the morning so she gets croissants and Danish pastries. She travels to work on the underground and arrives

at about 8.45. She chats to her colleagues for a while and starts work at nine o'clock. She checks her email and

then spends the rest of the morning on the telephone to customers. She leaves the office for lunch at 12 o'clock.

She goes home after work or sometimes eats out or meets her friends for a drink. She goes to bed at midnight

most weekdays and saves her energy for the weekends.

3.3. Dictation: Education.

1. What did you like most about your experience at school? 2. What did you hate most about school? 3. How far are university or higher education institutions different from high schools?

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

...................................................................................................................................................................................................

........................................................................................................................................................................................

content words are responsible for carrying meaning and considered the most relevant pieces of information in a message. They are usually made prominent in spoken language and most of the time are not recoverable ( predictable ) by the listener

Some CONTENT words are not made prominent when they have already been mentioned, when they are predictable from context or when they are part of collocations.

7

WEAK VOWELS.

Among unstressed syllables, some will be more prominent than others owing to the quality and quantity of their vowel. Long vowels and diphthongs are more prominent than short vowels, while among short vowels, the short vowels / / (when unstressed) are the least prominent of the group. These short vowels are referred to as REDUCED, WEAK or UNPROTECTED VOWELS as opposed to full vowels.

PROTECTED VS. UNPROTECTED VOWELS

David Brazil (1994) claims that speakers of English pronounce some vowels more carefully than others, especially when these vowels are prominent in the citation form of words of more than one syllable. On the other hand, speakers do not pay so much attention to the pronunciation of vowels that occur in non prominent position, and as a result of this they are reduced to a weak vowel / /, / or their neutralised variants

Note: The most common structural words are characterized by carrying a weak vowel when unstressed. Neutralized vowels The i vowel is neither the of 'beat' nor the I of 'bit', and is not in contrast with them. We can set up a corresponding vowel u that is neither the u: of 'shoe' nor the of 'book' but a weak vowel that shares the characteristics of both. We find neutralized [ i ] :

a. in word-final position in words spelt with final 'y' or 'ey' (after one or more consonant letters), e.g. 'happy' , 'valley' and in morpheme-final position when such words have suffixes beginning with vowels, e.g. 'happier' 'easiest' , hurrying

b. unstressed prefixes ending in ‘e’ spelling such as those spelt 're', 'pre', 'de' for example: 'react' ,

'preoccupied' , 'deactivate' .

c. the suffixes spelt 'iate', 'ious' when they have two syllables, for ample in 'appreciate' , 'hilarious' .

d. pronouns ending in ‘e’ spelling when unstressed: 'he', 'she', 'we', 'me', :' and the word 'the' when it precedes a

vowel.

8

3. 4. Prominence at the level of the utterance. Exercise 1:

a. Predict the prominent words in the following utterances. b. Listen to the recording and check your predictions c. Read them aloud.

1 . W e can wa i t f o r t he b us .

2 . Ho w d o t h e l i g h t s wo rk ?

3 . Ther e a r e s ome new b ook s I mus t r ead .

4 . Sh e t o ok he r a un t f o r a d r i ve .

5 . The ba sk e t was f u l l o f t h ing s t o ea t .

6 . W hy sho u ld a m an e a rn m ore t ha n a wom an ?

7 . Yo u o ug h t t o h a ve yo ur o wn c a r .

8 . He wa n ts t o com e a nd se e u s a t h ome.

9 . Ha ve you t ak en t h em f rom tha t bo x?

1 0 . I t ’ s t r ue he wa s l a te , bu t h i s c a r c ou ld h a ve b r ok en do wn

1 1 . I s ha l l t ak e as mu ch as I wa n t .

1 2 . W hy am I t oo la t e t o se e h im to da y?

Exercise 2:

a. Predict the pauses in the passage below. b. Mark the prominent words. Use the diacritic ( ). c. Transcribe the weak vowels in the non-prominent syllables. d. Listen to the recording and check your predictions.

I went to an interesting restaurant on Wednesday. First I had a chicken with a lot of

different vegetables. Then I had a piece of chocolate cake. In general, I don´t like

chocolate, but the cake was lovely.

From English Pronunciation in Use, by Mark Hancock. Tapescript B 3.

9

4. PROMINENCE AT THE LEVEL OF THE WORD.

What makes a syllable more prominent than another? Prominence: is primarily achieved by pitch change, sometimes assisted by extra loudness. For example: Insult (noun) Insult (verb)

PITCH: is simply the rate at which vibrations are produced. This is usually expressed as the number of Hz (hertz, or cycles per second). The number of Hz is the frequency of the tone. The higher the frequency of a tone, the higher its pitch is. LOUDNESS: Loudness is a component of prominence. It involves greater breath effort, greater amount of air from our lungs and muscular energy in the production of on the articulation of a sound. A loud sound is characterized by high volume and intensity reinforcing resonance in the supraglottal cavities as when we shout . VOWEL QUALITY: A syllable will tend to be prominent if it contains a vowel that is different in quality from neighbouring vowels. Among UNACCENTED syllables, some will be more prominent than others owing to the quality and quantity of the vowel. VOWEL QUANTITY ( or Vowel length):There is a quite strong tendency for long vowels to be heard as stress. LONG VOWELS and DIPHTHONGS are MORE PROMINENT than short vowels, while among short vowels, the short vowels (when unaccented) are LESS PROMINENT to the other short vowels. These short vowels are referred to as REDUCED or UNPROTECTED VOWELS as opposed to other FULL VOWELS ( / / ) 4.1 For instance, in the word “Saturday”, there are three syllables. The first one is the stressed syllable

or tonic syllable. Stress can be “visualized” in different ways:

Saturday

PITCH

LOUDNESS

Vowel Quality

Vowel length

Make a syllable PROMINENT

Prominence is produced by four main factors: (i) loudness, (ii) length, (iii) pitch and (iv) vowel quality. Generally these four factors work together in combination, although syllables may sometimes be made prominent by means of only one or two of them. The strongest effect is produced by pitch, and length is also a powerful factor. Loudness and quality have much less effect.( P.Roach, 2000, p.95)

10

Let´s see another example below:

abbreviation

/@ bri: vi eI Sn /

CONCLUSION : There are four degrees of prominence in English. a) Primary accent: marked by the last major pitch change in a word ( syllable “a” above) b) Secondary accent: non-final pitch change (syllable “bre” above). c) Minor prominence: the occurrence of full vowel without pitch change. (syllable “vi” above) d) Non-prominent syllable: syllables containing no pitch change and reduced vowels (first and last syllables “a”

and “tion” respectively ). 4.1.1 Exercise on word stress: Put the following words into their corresponding stress pattern.

Pronounce America sentence different mountain today letter police again

4.1. 2. EXERCISE: Stress in word families. a. Provide the missing words. b. Predict their stress patterns ( Use the diacritics(

) or ( ) to indicate primary and secondary stress when possible) Listen and check your predictions.

noun adjective person verb

industry

invention

competition

criticism

politics

nation

analysis

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………...

…………………... Adapted from New Headway Pronunciation Upper-intermediate. T 1.5a

11

4. 1. 3. Stress pattern can help you hear the difference between similar words, for example, numbers ending in –teen or –ty. Listen to these examples.

Thirteen

Fourteen

Sixteen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Thirty

Forty

Sixty

Eighty

Ninety

Can you provide the stress pattern in the empty boxes? Use big and small circles.

4.1.4. a. Write the full words in the correct column, according to their stress pattern.

b. Write one word from exercise 2 in each sentence below. The word must have the stress pattern shown.

1. I’m going to have a party on __________________ ().

2. My grandfather is ___________________ () years old.

3. I often sleep for an hour in the ___________________( ).

4. My birthday is on the _____________________() of March. 4.1.5 Word stress, Sentence Stress, Compound words, Pauses and Prominence.

Monday - Tue - Thu - Sat – today – tomorrow - Apr - Jul - Aug - Sept - Oct Nov - holiday - 2nd - 11th - 13 - 30 - 13th - 30th - 17 - 70 - afternoon

12

(English Pronunciation in Use Elementary. Tapescript C16.) 4.1.6

(English Pronunciation in Use Elementary. Tapescript C22.) 4.1.7. Listen to the poem. The compounds are underlined. Circle the stressed part of each compound.

(English Pronunciation in Use Elementary. Tapescript C28.) 4.1.8. Pauses and Prominence: ( Eng. Pronun in Use, Elementary. Tapescript C 29 a)

a. Read the text and put the pauses you consider appropriate. Supply the correct punctuation marks. b. Listen and check your predictions. c. Mark the prominent words by means of the diacritic ( ) d. Transcribe the weak vowels in non-prominent syllables.

lots of people get arrested for dangerous driving of course but how old is the oldest who’s the world record holder

well I read about a man who was a hundred and four he went through red lights crashed into parked cars and drove

along the pavement and how old was his car only thirty

13

4.1.9. Stress patterns.

( Eng. Pronun in Use, Elementary. Tapescript C 46 a) 4.1. 10. Prominent or non-prominent? ( Eng. Pron. in Use, Elementary. Tapescript C 51)

Decide whether the underlined words below are pronounced in a prominent or non prominent way.

4. 1. 11. Linking.

14

POLITICAL SPEECHES. Listen to the following speeches, and mark the pauses the speakers make. Then try to imitate their speeches. Speech 1:

“In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the

role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from

this responsibility. I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange

places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the

devotion with we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve

it. And the glow from that fire can truly light the world.

And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask

what you can do for your country.

My fellow citizens of the world, ask not what America will do for you, but what

together we can do for the freedom of man”