5. Phonotactics as a branch of phonology

Every language has phonemes, and every language has its own common patterns in which phonemes are arranged to form syllables and the syllables are arranged to form larger units. In some languages all syllables consist of one consonant followed by one vowel (CV), so that no word has a cluster of consonants or of vowels; any word has the form CV, or CVCV, or CVCVCV…, depending on how many syllables it has. In English there are never more than two vowels in sequence in a single word (as in neon, poet, cruel, radio), but clusters of two, three, or more consonants are fairly common: prescribe, district,splints, tempts, for example. Still, not just any two, three, or more consonants can cluster. There are definite limits, or constraints, on co-occurrence. Phonotactics is

When a syllable onset has more than one consonant, the less sonorant sounds tend to be first, followed by more sonorant sounds.

When a syllable coda has more than one consonant, the more sonorant sounds tend to be first, followed by less sonorant sounds.

In other words, the more sonorant sounds tend to be closer to the syllable nucleus.

obstruents < [+son] consonants < vowels

This is called the Sonority Scale or Sonority Sequencing Generalization.

As A.A. Kalita writes, in English the vowel of the syllable may be preceded by up to three consonants as in stress (CCCVC) and followed by up to four as in texts (CVCCCC); this is the most general statement of the possibilities of phoneme sequences in the English language. English does not exploit all the possible clusters of phonemes in the word and in the syllable. For instance, long vowels and diphthongs do not precede final /q/, sounds /e, , Œ, ”/ never occur finally. The types of consonant clusters permitted are subject to constraints. It is the feature of English that in initial position, i.e. before the vowel, there can be any consonant except /N/; the sound /™/ is rare in a word initial position, but it does appear in rather recent borrowings like gigolo, jabot; no consonant combinations are possible with /T, z, ›, G/; such consonant clusters as /pw, bw, tl, dl, mh, sr, sj, spw, fs, hr, stl/ never occur initially. Clusters of two consonants before the vowel have one of two forms: /s/ + C as in stay, swim, sleep, etc. or C + /w, j, r, 1/ as in twin, beauty, creame, plain, etc. J. D. O'Connor noted that final clusters are more complex in English than initial ones since they express grammatical meanings of plurality, tense, ordinal number, e.g. /-ksts/ as in texts, /-kst/ as in mixed, /-mpst/ as in glimpsed, /-ksT / as in sixth, /NTs/ as in strengths. According to their position in the phonetic structure of a word clusters can be divided into: (1) prevocalic, (2) postvocalic and (3) intervocalic. In English the largest number of consonants in prevocalic clusters is three:

/spl/ splash	/str/ straw	/skl/ sklent
/spr/ spray		/skr/ scream
/spj/ spume	/stj/ student	/skj/ skua /skw/ square

(after Kalita 2010: 127-128).

Most phonotactic analyses are based on the syllable since phonotactic possibilities of English phonemes, for instance, predetermine the rules of syllable division. Certain sequences are sometimes associated with particular feelings or human characteristics, e.g. bump, lump, hump, rump, mump(s), clump and others are associated with large blunt shapes; a whole family of the words muddle, fumble, straddle, cuddle, fiddle, buckle (vb.), struggle, wriggle are associated with clumsy, awkward or difficult action because they all end with a plosive and a syllabic /l/.