Phonetics
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Vowels in other Accents of English 225
Figure 9.6 A plot of the first two formants of the vowels of a group of Californian English speakers.
Figure 9.7 A plot of the first two formants of the vowels of (U.S.) northern cities English.
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226CHAPTER 9 Vowels and Vowel-like Articulations
Figure 9.8 A plot of the first two formants of the vowels of BBC English.
position in comparison with most forms of American English. British English speakers distinguish the vowel [ Ø ] in cut from the vowel [ ∏ ] in curt (which does not have any r-coloring) mainly by the frequency of the first formant.
CD 9.2
CD 9.3
VOWELS IN OTHER LANGUAGES
Next we will consider the vowels of three other languages for which acoustic measurements are available. Vowel charts for all three languages are shown in Figure 9.9. The sources for the data are listed at the end of the book.
Spanish has a very simple system, contrasting only five vowels. Note that the symbols used in broad transcriptions of Spanish are [ i, e, a, o, u ]. Obviously, these symbols do not have the same values in Spanish and in English, or in descriptions of cardinal vowels.
Japanese also has a set of five vowels. In a broad phonetic transcription, these might also have been transcribed [ i, e, a, o, u ]. But in a narrower transcription that reflects the phonetic quality of the vowels more accurately, the high back vowel could be transcribed as [ U ], as has been done in Figure 9.9. The point representing this vowel has been distinguished from the others. It has been marked by an asterisk to show that this vowel does not have the lip rounding associated with the primary cardinal vowel in this area. It is not, however, really unrounded. The lips are fairly close together. In a more detailed phonetic
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Vowels in other Languages 227
Figure 9.9 The vowels of Spanish, Japanese, and Danish. Front rounded vowels and back unrounded vowels are indicated by asterisks.
analysis, one could say that there are two types of lip movements. In one, the corners of the lips are brought forward, so that they are somewhat protruded, and in the other, they are simply narrowed vertically so that they may be said to be compressed. Note also that [ e ] in Japanese is slightly lower than it is in Spanish. This is the kind of small difference between vowels that is easily and conveniently expressible in terms of vowel charts.
Also shown in Figure 9.9 are the vowels of a conservative form of Danish. (Danish is changing rapidly, and young Danes have different vowel qualities.) Asterisks have been used to represent the quality of some of the Danish vowels in Figure 9.9, but in this case it is to indicate that those vowels differ from the primary cardinal vowels in the area by having more rather than less lip rounding. Danish contrasts three front rounded vowels in words such as dyr / dy…r / ‘expensive,’ d„r / d„…r / ‘dies,’ and dør (same spelling) / d{…r / ‘door.’ (As
you can hear in the recording of these words on the CD, Danish / r / is realized as 
a pharyngeal approximant.) All the Danish vowels shown in Figure 9.9 can oc- CD 9.4 cur in long or short form. The front vowels, which are on the CD, are illustrated
in Table 9.1. The qualities of most of the short vowels are very similar to those of the long vowels, but in the case of [ a, O, o ], the short versions are slightly lower and more centralized.
The three charts in Figure 9.9 are good examples of the way in which vowels may be described. They are in part descriptions of the relative auditory quality, in part articulatory descriptions. For the vowels in which the lip rounding is the same as that of the primary cardinal vowels, they reflect the acoustic
TABLE 9.1 Contrasts in vowel length in Danish.
vi…d´ |
hvide |
‘white’ |
vilE |
vilde |
‘wild’ |
vi…lE |
hvile |
‘rest’ |
ve…dE |
hvede |
‘wheat’ |
menE |
minde |
‘remind’ |
me…nE |
mene |
‘mean’ |
v”…dE |
vœde |
‘wet’ |
l”sE |
lœsse |
‘load’ |
l”…sE |
lœse |
‘read’ |
vœ…dE |
vade |
‘wade’ |
mœsE |
masse |
‘mass’ |
mœ…sE |
mase |
‘mash’ |
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228 CHAPTER 9 Vowels and Vowel-like Articulations |
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data exactly. In these cases, they are equivalent to plots of the first formant |
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frequency against the difference between the frequencies of the second and first |
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formants. |
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Front rounded and back unrounded vowels cannot be represented on a vowel |
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chart that assumes the degree of lip rounding is like that of the primary cardinal |
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vowels. In describing these other vowels, the degree of lip rounding must also be |
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specified. One way of doing this is to use asterisks rather than ordinary points. The |
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asterisks indicate that the lip rounding is more like that of the secondary cardinal |
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vowels than that of the primary ones. The locations of the asterisks indicate the |
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vowel qualities in much the same way that the points indicate the qualities of the |
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other vowels. It is as if they show what the formant frequencies would have been |
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had the lip rounding been like that of the primary cardinal vowels. |
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When we consider the actual formant frequencies of front rounded vowels and |
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back unrounded vowels, we can see why these vowels are not quite so common in |
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most languages. Adding lip rounding to front vowels lowers the higher formants. |
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As a result, a high front rounded [ y ] sounds as if it were between [ i ] and [ u ], as |
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we noted at the end of the preceding section when discussing Figure 9.4. Similarly, |
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[ { ], which is the front rounded vowel corresponding to [ ” ], has a lower formant |
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two than [”]. When its formants are plotted on a chart, it appears nearer the center. |
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Conversely, removing lip rounding from the back vowel [u] to produce [U] raises |
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formant two, so that it would also be nearer the center of a formant chart. If the |
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vowels of a language are to be maximally distinct from one another, then the front |
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vowels will have to be unrounded, the back vowels rounded. |
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One of the forces acting on languages may be called the principle of sufficient |
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perceptual separation, whereby the sounds of a language are kept acoustically |
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distinct to make it easier for the listener to distinguish one from another. As a |
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result of this principle, in by far the majority of languages, the degree of lip |
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rounding can be predicted from the degree of backness and, to a lesser extent, |
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the degree of height. Front vowels are usually unrounded and back vowels are |
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usually rounded, with the degree of rounding increasing with the degree of |
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height. In this way, the vowels of a language are kept maximally distinct. Front |
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rounded vowels occur in a number of well-known languages spoken in Europe, |
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such as French, German, Dutch, and Swedish (all of which can be found on the |
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CD), but, in accordance with the notions of perceptual separation, they are not |
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particularly common among the languages of the world. |
CD Lg. |
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Index |
ADVANCED TONGUE ROOT |
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Differences in vowel quality can usually be described in terms of variations in |
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the degrees of height, backness, and lip rounding. But in some languages, there |
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are differences in vowel quality that cannot be described in these terms. For |
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example, in Akan, a West African language spoken mainly in Ghana, there are |
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two sets of vowels that you can hear on the CD. They differ primarily in the size |
CD 9.5 |
of the pharynx. In the one set, there are vowels in which the root of the tongue |
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Rhotacized Vowels 229
Figure 9.10 Narrow (−ATR, broken line) and wide (+ATR, solid line) vowels in Akan, a language spoken in Ghana.
is drawn forward and the larynx is lowered, so that the part of the vocal tract in the pharynx is considerably enlarged. These vowels are called advanced tongue root (or, more simply, +ATR) vowels. In the other set, there are vowels in which there is no advancement of the tongue root or lowering of the larynx (−ATR vowels). Figure 9.10 shows the shape of the vocal tract in two Akan vowels that differ in this way. In the +ATR vowel [ e ], the whole tongue is bunched up lengthwise in comparison with the −ATR vowel, here symbolized as [ i∞]. We should also note that not all speakers of Akan make a distinction between these two vowels in this way. Some seem to rely more on movements of the root of the tongue, and others more on differences in larynx height. What matters for the distinction between the two sets of vowels is that one should have a comparatively large pharyngeal cavity and the other a comparatively small one.
In English, no pairs of vowels are distinguished simply by this tongue gesture, although tongue root position varies to some extent in conjunction with vowel height. The tense high vowels [ i ] and [ u ], as in heed and who’d, have a more advanced tongue root than the lax mid-high vowels [ I ] and [ Á ], as in hid and hood. However, the distinction between +ATR vowels and −ATR vowels is not the same as the distinction between tense and lax vowels in English, which was discussed in Chapter 4. The two sets of English vowels are divided by phonological considerations, such as the fact that tense vowels can occur in open syllables and lax vowels cannot, rather than by a particular tongue gesture or shape of the vocal tract.
RHOTACIZED VOWELS
As we saw in Chapter 4, many forms of American English have rhotacized vowels in words such as sir, cur, bird. We also noted that r-coloring can be produced in more than one way. Figure 9.11 shows the tongue positions of three different
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230CHAPTER 9 Vowels and Vowel-like Articulations
Figure 9.11 Possible tongue positions for the vowel [ œ ] in American English. The tongue-tip-up post-alveolar approximant (thin black line) is the most common, followed by the bunched tongue (solid black line). The gray line indicates possible intermediate positions.
CD 9.6
CD 2.2
forms of American English [ ∏± ]. Some speakers use one of these, others another. As shown by the heavy black line, the gesture can involve the tongue being bunched up in the center of the mouth, with the tip down and pulled back from the lower teeth. An important feature of this kind of rhotic articulation is that there is also a slight narrowing of the pharyngeal cavity. A second possibility, shown by the thin black line, is a gesture in which the tip of the tongue is raised to near the back of the alveolar ridge, forming a post-alveolar approximant. This is accompanied by a narrowing of the pharyngeal cavity at a slightly higher level. The third possibility, the gray line, is shown in the figure to indicate that there may be in-between positions. If you are a speaker of this form of American English, see if you can determine which of these articulations you use. One way of getting helpful information is to insert a toothpick between the teeth while you hold the position for the vowel [ ∏± ]. Does the toothpick touch the upper surface of your tongue, or is your tongue tip raised so that it touches the tip or the undersurface of the blade of the tongue? It seems likely that about 60 percent of speakers have the tip up, 35 percent have a bunched tongue position with the tip down, and the remainder, a small number, have an intermediate position. You can hear an American English speaker producing rhotacized vowels among those recorded for Chapter 2 on the CD. This speaker has his tongue bunched up with the tip down and (almost certainly, although we have no x-ray or other evidence) a constriction in the pharynx.
Rhotacization is an auditory quality, which, like height and backness, is most appropriately defined in acoustic terms. In a rhotacized vowel (or portion of a vowel) there is a marked lowering of the frequency of the third formant.
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Nasalization 231
Figure 9.12 A spectrogram showing the lowering of the frequency of the third formant (and the second formant) during rhotacized sounds in a sentence in American English.
The frequencies of the first two formants determine the vowel height and backness. The frequency of the third formant conveys comparatively little information about either of these aspects of vowel quality. If you look back at Figure 8.3, you will see that throughout the whole series of non-rhotacized vowels, the third formant falls only slightly. But, as you can see in Figure 9.12, there is a large fall in the frequency of the third formant in words such as deer and bear, in which the ends of the vowels are considerably rhotacized in many forms of American English. Furthermore, throughout most of the word heard, the third formant may be low, indicating that even at the beginning of the vowel, there is a rhotacized quality.
NASALIZATION
In all the vowels we have been considering in this chapter so far, the soft palate has been raised so that there is a velic closure, and air does not flow out through the nose. Vowels will be nasalized if the soft palate is lowered to allow part of the airstream to escape through the nose. The “tilde” diacritic [ ~ ] may be placed over any vowel to indicate that it is nasalized. Vowels of this kind are commonly
called nasal vowels. |
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Learn to produce a variety of nasalized vowels. Start by saying the low vowel |
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[ œ)] as in man [ mœ)n]. Alternate a series of nasalized and non-nasalized vowels, |
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saying [ œ œ)œ œ)œ œ)]. You should be able to feel your soft palate moving up |
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and down when you say these vowels. Try to say a whole series of nasalized |
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vowels [ i)e)”)a)A)O)o)u)]. Alternate each of these vowels with its non-nasalized |
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counterpart. Many languages have contrasts between nasal and oral vowels. |
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French contrasts are illustrated on the CD. |
CD 9.7 |
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232 CHAPTER 9 Vowels and Vowel-like Articulations
TABLE 9.2 The features of vowel quality.
Quality |
Correlates |
|
|
height |
frequency of formant one |
backness |
difference between frequencies of formant two and formant one |
rhotacization |
frequency of formant three |
rounding |
lip position |
ATR |
width of the pharynx |
nasalization |
position of the soft palate |
Consonants such as [m, n, N] are, of course, nasals, but they are not nasalized, since this term implies that part of the air goes out through the nose and part through the mouth. Contrasts between nasalized and non-nasalized consonants probably do not occur in any language, but some consonants, such as [ w, j, ®, l ], may be nasalized if they occur next to nasalized vowels. In Yoruba, the word for “they” is [ w)O)!], with the whole syllable being nasalized.
SUMMARY OF VOWEL QUALITY
Table 9.2 summarizes the discussion of vowels. There are two features of vowel quality—height and backness—that are used to contrast one vowel with another in nearly every language, and there are four other features that are used less frequently. Of the six features, the first three in the table reflect auditory properties, each of which may be produced in more than one way from an articulatory point of view, and the remaining three reflect relatively invariant articulatory properties with complex acoustic correlates that differ from vowel to vowel. Thus, lip rounding generally lowers the second formant, but in the case of high front vowels, it is predominantly the third formant that is lowered; similarly, ATR and nasalization affect different formants in different vowels.
SEMIVOWELS
Without being too precise about the meaning of the terms syllable and syllabic (a matter we will discuss in the next chapter), we can say that all sounds function either as the peaks of syllables or at the syllable margins. Vowels are clearly at the peaks of syllables and are syllabic. Consonants are generally not syllabic, although some consonants such as [l] and [n] can be syllabic in words like shuttle [·SØtl`] and button [·bØ/n`]. We can also divide sounds into those that have no obstruction in the center of the mouth, which may be called vocoids, and those that have an obstruction. The latter group, which will include most consonants, may be called nonvocoids. This gives us a pair of divisions that we can arrange as shown in Figure 9.13.
Given this division, we can define vowels as syllabic vocoids and semivowels as nonsyllabic vocoids. The term semiconsonant is sometimes used for syllabic
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Semivowels 233
Figure 9.13 Vowels are syllabic vocoids, semivowels are nonsyllabic vocoids, and nonvocoids, whether syllabic or not, are consonants.
nonvocoids, but we will refer to them simply as syllabic consonants. Similarly, nonvocoids are sometimes called true consonants, a term that could be applicable whether they are syllabic or not.
Here we are concerned with semivowels, which are vocoids that function as the beginning or end of a syllable. When at the beginning of a syllable, a semivowel usually consists of a rapid glide from a high vowel position to that of the following vowel. The semivowels in English are [ j ] and [ w ], which are like nonsyllabic versions of the English high vowels [ i ] and [ u ], respectively. In some languages (for example, French), there are the three high vowels [ i, u, y ]. In some of these languages, there is also a semivowel corresponding to the high front rounded vowel [ y ]. The symbol for this sound is [ μ ], an inverted letter h, which is intended to look a little like [ y ]. Examples of words contrasting the three semivowels in French are given in Table 9.3.
Earlier in this chapter, we noted that Japanese has a high unrounded vowel [ U ]. It does not have spread lips like [ i ] but lips that are fairly close together, compressed vertically, with the corners neither drawn back as in a spread vowel nor pulled together as in a rounded vowel. There is a Japanese semivowel bearing the same relation to this vowel as [ w ] does to [ u ] in English. The symbol for this semivowel is [ Â ].
TABLE 9.3 Contrasts involving palatal, labial-palatal, and labial-velar approximants in French.
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Palatal |
Labial-Palatal |
Labial-Velar |
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Mj”t |
‘crumb’ |
mμ”t |
‘mute’ |
mw”t |
‘sea gull’ |
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lje |
‘tied’ |
lμi |
‘him’ |
lwi |
‘Louis’ |
CD 9.8 |
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μit |
‘eight’ |
wi |
‘yes’ |
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234 CHAPTER 9 Vowels and Vowel-like Articulations
The gesture for a semivowel is like that for an approximant in that it can be considered to have a particular place of articulation, like other consonants. We have already noted that [j ] is a palatal approximant, and [ w ] is a labial-velar approximant. The semivowel [ μ ] is a labial-palatal approximant. We have not discussed this place of articulation before because approximants are almost the only sounds that are made in this region. The semivowel [ Â ] is a velar approximant.
When learning to produce the distinction between the French sounds / w / and / Â /, note that the English / w / is between the two French sounds. It is not the same as French / w /. It is, of course, also true that / u / in English is between the two French sounds [ u ] and [ y ]. As is often the case, when a language does not have to distinguish between two possibilities, it produces a sound that is between the two. Recall, for example, the quality of English vowels before [ N ] and before [ r ], where there are no oppositions between tense and lax vowels.
To produce the French sound / w / as in oui [ wi ] “yes,” start from a high rounded vowel that is fully back, like a cardinal [ u ]. Glide from this vowel very rapidly to the following vowel. The result will be similar but not identical to the English word we [ wi ]. Now try to say the French sound [ μ ] as in huit [ μit ] “eight.” This time, start from the secondary cardinal vowel [ y ], and glide rapidly to the following vowel.
It is also possible to consider the common form of English [ ® ], as in red, as a semivowel. In the same way that [ w ] may be said to be a nonsyllabic counterpart of [ u ], so [ ® ] as in red may be said to be a nonsyllabic version of the vowel in American English fur. From a phonetic point of view, regarding [ ® ] in red as a semivowel may be a valid description. But from a phonological point of view, it may not be appropriate in describing the sound patterns that occur in English.
SECONDARY ARTICULATORY GESTURES
It is appropriate to consider secondary articulations in conjunction with vowels because they can usually be described as added vowel-like articulations. Formally defined, a secondary articulation is a gesture with a lesser degree of closure occurring at approximately the same time as another (primary) gesture. We will consider four types of secondary articulation.
Palatalization is the addition of a high front tongue gesture, like that in [ i ], to another gesture. Russian and other Slavic languages have a series of palatalized consonants that contrast with their nonpalatalized counterparts. Palatalization can be symbolized by [ ] after a symbol. Russian words illustrating palatalized sounds are given in Table 9.4.
The terms palatalization and palatalized are sometimes used in a slightly different way from the way in which we have been using them so far. Instead of describing a secondary gesture, these terms may describe a process in which the primary gesture is changed so that it becomes more palatal. Thus, sounds are said to be palatalized if the point of articulation moves toward the palatal region in some particular circumstance. For example, the English / k / in key may be
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