Main features of English phonology

1. Towards
Better English
Pronunciation

2. Objectives:
Participants will be able to:
 define the main features of good pronunciation,
 Improve their implementation of the English sounds




system,
Identify problems of English sounds,
Select and implement teaching techniques to teach
good pronunciation,
Demonstrate recognition/production drills with
problem sounds,
Implement appropriate pronunciation correction
techniques.

3. Phonetics and Phonology
Phonetics
Phonology
Language independent
Language dependent
Study of all sounds
Phonetic is different to
Phonology in matter that it is
the production of sounds.
Phonology is a subset of
phonetics.
Phonology, in the other
hand refers to the sound
systems of a language

4.  Phonemics: narrow study of sounds

Phonetics: broad study of sounds

5. What is Phonetics?
 Phonetics is the study of speech sounds.
Articulatory phonetics – how speech sounds
are produced
 Acoustic phonetics – the transmission and
physical properties of speech sounds
 Auditory phonetics – perception of speech
sounds


Phonetic transcriptions – one sound = one
symbol.

6. Why do I need to learn Phonetics?
 Phonetics increases your knowledge in
matters of pronunciation.
 By knowing how languages are produced
you can better your pronunciation.
 It facilitates the acquisition of new words.
 It helps you to read the dictionary using the
correct sounds inscripted in the words.

7. Task Sheet 1
What are the main features of good
Pronunciation?

8. Features of good Pronunciation
 Correct articulation of speech sounds.
 Correct stress.
 Correct intonation.
 Proper pauses.

9. Task Sheet 2
 Why should teachers know how sounds are
made?
 Can pronunciation written down?
 What is the term used for written
pronunciation?
 Do teachers need to know how to read
“written pronunciation”? Why?

10. Task Sheet 3
 Do your teachers/students have
pronunciation problems?
 What difficulties do they have?
 What are their problematic English
sounds?
Vowels
Diphthongs
Consonants

11. The Points of Articulation
1. Nasal Cavity
1
2. Oral Cavity
3. Lips
4. Teeth
6
5. Alveolar ridge
2
5
6. Hard palate
7. Soft palate
8. Tip of the
tongue
9. Blade of the
tongue
10. Back of the
tongue
7
9
4
10
8
13
3
11
11. Epiglottis
12. Vocal folds
13. Pharinx
12

12. The Articulators

13.  You should know:
Segmental
 (vowels – diphthongs – consonants )
Suprasegmental
( Intonation –
Stress –
Length)
word
sentence

14. Segmental
 Individual sounds
 Includes tongue height and advancement,
manner and place of articulation, lip rounding,
etc.
 Can be identified by viewing a single segment

15. Suprasegmental
 Supra- means ‘over’ or ‘above’
 These are things that “ride on top of”
individual sounds
 Include length, intonation, tone, and stress
 Almost impossible to identify in single
segment

16. Suprasegmentals ! What are those?
 Length
High vowels shorter than low vowels
 Voiceless consonants longer than voiced consonants
 Voiceless fricatives longest
 Length is influenced by the surrounding sounds
 Tone
 Can change meaning in some languages (like Chinese)
 Stress
 Stressed syllables more prominent than unstressed
ones
 Stressed syllables usually contain tense vowels
 Stressed syllables are often longer
 Unstressed syllables reduce vowel
 Intonation
 Rising and falling intonation can change meaning


17. Segmentals ! What are
those?

18. Vowels
 Vowels are all made in the mouth (place), with
little or no air flow constriction (manner) and are
always voiced in English
 So the system that describes vowels does so in
terms 3 characteristics:



tongue placement
tongue height
lip rounding

19. Diphthongs
Smooth glide from one vowel position to another as /au/
in now also made up of 2 vowels as /ou/, /oi/
Major
 /aɪ/
 /ɔɪ/
 /aʊ/
Minor (if at all)
 /eɪ/
 /oʊ/

20. Consonants
 The descriptions of the sounds we call
consonants are based on the human
articulatory system (lungs to pump air in and
out, vocal folds, oral cavity including tongue
and lips, and nasal cavity).
 Consonants are described using 3
characteristics:
vocal quality (voiced/voiceless)
 point of articulation
 manner of articulation ‫النطق‬


21. How to distinguish phonemes?
 Place of articulation
Ex. /p/ VS /t/
pop VS top
 Manner of articulation
Ex. /b/ VS /m/
Bob VS mob
 Voicing
Ex. /s/ VS /z/
Sue VS zoo

22. Minimal Pairs and Minimal Sets
 Sometimes listening activities are complicated
because of the minimal pairs. MPs are two word that
just differ in one phoneme. Some of them are very
similar in pronunciation and context helps a lot to
identify what word they are referring to:




Sheep-ship
Sheet-shit
Bet-bat
Soup-soap

23. Minimal Pairs and Minimal Sets
 A minimal set is a group of words that can be
differentiated by changing one phoneme.
Feat, fit, fat, fate, fought, foot.
 Big, pig, rig, gig, dig, wig


24. Minimal Pairs
A pair of words that differ by just one phoneme
in the same position and have different
meanings.
Ex.
sip VS zip

25. Important Rules

26.  Nouns and adjectives of 2 syllables usually
have the stress on the first syllable.
As: father, happy, window ,children, yellow,
lovely
 Verbs of 2 syllables usually have the stress
on the second syllable.
As:suggest , invite , reply , prepare , decide ,
agree
 Words borrowed from other languages
usually have the stress on the last syllable.

27. As:cassette , shampoo , degree , refugee
 Words with many syllables usually have the
stress on the syllable before the last.
As: information , accommodation , photographic
,terrific
Nouns usually have the stress on the first
syllable
Verbs usually have the stress on the second
syllable

28.  There are many exceptions to all these
guidelines.
 A very common exception is report
,it is the same in both the noun and verb form
and the stress is on the second part , result is
another exception.
Nouns: record , object , produce , import
Verbs: record , object , produce , import