EVROPSKÁ UNIE Evropské strukturální a investiční fondy Operační program Výzkum, vývoj a vzdělávání MINISTERSTVO ŠKOLSTVÍ, MLADE2E A TĚLOVÝCHOVY Název projektu Rozvoj vzdělávání na Slezské univerzitě v Opavě Registrační číslo projektu CZ.02.2.69/0.0./0.0/16_015/0002400 Praktická fonetika Distanční studijní text Mgr. Marie Machničová Opava 2019 SLEZSKA UNIVERZITA F1L0ZOFICKO-přírodovědecká fakulta v opavě 2 Obor: Klíčová slova: 0231 - Osvojování si jazyka, 0232 Literatura a lingvistika Fonetika, fonologie, nácvik anglické výslovnosti, fonetická transkripce. Anotace: Tato studijní opora je hlavním podpůrným textem k předmětu Praktická fonetika. Cílem tohoto kurzu je získání schopnosti identifikace anglických hlásek a jejich správné výslovnosti a pochopení fonologického systému anglické výslovnosti na pozadí češtiny. V teoretických kapitolách této opory bude studentům představen systém anglické fonologie a anglická fonetika z praktického hlediska. V řešených úkolech této opory bude kladen důraz na praktický nácvik anglické výslovnosti, na korektivní opatření v případě špatné výslovnosti anglických hlásek, na vázání, slovní a větný důraz a také na nácvik plynulé mluvené angličtiny. Studentům slouží tento distanční studijní text jako průvodce při studiu povinné literatury, při rozvíjení komunikačních kompetencí na supra-segmentální úrovni nebo jako hlavní studijní text, který společně s LMS kurzem na e-learningové platformě Moodle poskytuje studentům dostatečný teoretický a praktický základ pro zvládnutí anglické fonetiky jako takové. Tento studijní text je rozdělen do třinácti kapitol, z nich každá má několik podkapitol v návaznosti na to, čím se daná kapitola zabývá. Každá kapitola se snaží uvádět teoretické poznatky, cvičení, obrázky pro lepší ilustraci, samostatné úkoly, zpětnou vazbu a nakonec také shrnutí probrané látky. Autor: Mgr. Marie Machnicovä Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Obsah ÚVODEM............................................................................................................................7 RYCHLÝ NÁHLED STUDIJNÍ OPORY...........................................................................8 1 PHONEMES AND OTHER ACPECTS OF PRONUNCIATION, ACCENTS, DIALECTS........................................................................................................................10 1.1 Phonetics and phonology....................................................................................10 1.2 Exercises..............................................................................................................12 2 THE PRODUCTION OF SPEECH SOUNDS, SHORT VOWELS.........................16 2.1 Articulators above the larynx..............................................................................16 2.1.1 Description of the articulators by Peter Roach............................................18 2.2 Vowel and consonant, English short vowels.......................................................18 2.3 Exercises..............................................................................................................20 3 LONG VOWELS, DIPHTHONGS, TRIPHTHONGS.............................................22 3.1 Long vowels........................................................................................................22 3.2 Diphthongs and triphthongs................................................................................23 3.3 Exercises..............................................................................................................26 4 VOICING AND CONSONANTS, PLOSIVES........................................................27 4.1 Respiration and voicing.......................................................................................27 4.2 Plosives, English plosives...................................................................................28 4.3 Exercises..............................................................................................................29 5 PHONEMES AND SYMBOLS, TRANSCRIPTION...............................................31 5.1 Phonemes and symbols.......................................................................................31 5.2 Exercises..............................................................................................................32 6 FRICATIVES AND AFFRICATES..........................................................................34 6.1 Fricatives and affricates......................................................................................34 6.2 Exercises..............................................................................................................36 7 NASALS, LATERAL L, SONORANT R, APPROXIMANTS J AND W...............37 7.1 Nasals, laterals, sonorants, approximants............................................................37 7.2 Exercises..............................................................................................................40 8 THE SYLLABLE......................................................................................................42 8.1 The nature and the structure of the syllable........................................................43 8.2 Strong and weak syllables...................................................................................44 8.3 Exercises..............................................................................................................46 5 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 9 STRESS, WORD STRESS, SENTENCE STRESS..................................................49 9.1 Word stress..........................................................................................................50 9.2 Complex word stress...........................................................................................52 9.3 Compound words................................................................................................54 9.4 Word-class pairs...................................... ............................................................56 9.5 Exercises..............................................................................................................57 10 WEAK FORMS.........................................................................................................59 10.1 Strong and weak forms of pronunciation........................................................59 10.2 Exercises..........................................................................................................62 11 ASPECTS OF CONNECTED SPEECH...................................................................64 11.1 Rhythm, assimilation, elision, linking.............................................................64 11.2 Exercises..........................................................................................................69 12 INTONATION...........................................................................................................71 12.1 Intonation.........................................................................................................71 12.1.1 Form and function in intonation..................................................................72 12.1.2 Complex tone s and pitch height...................................................................73 12.1.3 Functions of intonation................................................................................74 12.2 Exercises..........................................................................................................76 12.2.1 Introducing tones:........................................................................................76 12.2.2 Asking and checking tones:.........................................................................77 12.2.3 Tones in asking for information:..................................................................78 12.2.4 Agreeing and disagreeing - question tags...................................................79 12.2.5 High tones: evaluative comments:...............................................................79 13 REVISION UNIT......................................................................................................82 PŘEHLED DOSTUPNÝCH IKON...................................................................................90 LITERATURA:.................................................................................................................91 SHRNUTÍ STUDIJNÍ OPORY.........................................................................................92 6 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika ÚVODEM Tato studijní opora se skládá z distančního textu a LMS kurzu a je nedílnou součástí kurzu Praktická fonetika. Je určena studentům, kteří si chtějí upevnit a rozšířit znalosti anglické fonetiky a fonologického systému anglického jazyka. Obsahuje dostatečný teoretický základ k tomu, aby byl student schopen pochopit systém anglických hlásek, ale hlavně je tato opora jakýmsi praktickým průvodcem, poskytuje studentům dostatečné množství cvičení a odkazů na videa, tutoriály a online poslechová cvičení. Tento studijní text a potažmo i celý kurz Praktická fonetika vyžaduje předchozí znalost anglického jazyka na úrovni B 2 Evropského referenčního rámce pro jazyky. Student může tuto studijní oporu využít jako hlavní studijní text, který je úzce spjat s LMS kurzem na e-learningové platformě Moodle. Tam student najde prezentace, odkazy na prověřená online cvičení, pracovní listy či audio nahrávky a poslechová cvičení. Každá kapitola využívá velkého množství distančních prvků, jako např. rychlý náhled, cíle, klíčová slova a dále pak je rozdělena do několika podkapitol v závislosti na látce a učivu, které je v dané kapitole obsaženo. Pro procvičování probrané látky jsou využívány samostatné úkoly, řešené úlohy, odkazy na online cvičení v LMS kurzu, atd. Každá kapitola má krátké shrnutí, které uvádí ty nej důležitější body k zapamatování. Autorka této studijní opory vycházela ze dvou základních publikací, pro definice, poučky, klasifikace, tabulky a obrázky využila knihu autora Petera Roache English Phone-tics and Phonology, 4th ed. z roku 2009, což je také povinná literatura tohoto předmětu. Pro procvičování a osvojování si správných výslovnostních návyků využila autorka knihu Martina Hancocka English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate z roku 2010. 7 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika RYCHLÝ NÁHLED STUDIJNÍ OPORY Cílem kurzu je získání schopnosti identifikace anglických hlásek a jejich správné výslovnosti a pochopení fonologického systému anglické výslovnosti na pozadí češtiny. Tento předmět je koncipován tak, aby na přednášce dostal student teoretický základ týkající se fonologického systému anglického jazyka a následně si tyto teoretické poznatky procvičil v praxi. V seminářích bude kladen důraz na praktickou fonetiku, na korektivní opatření v případě špatné výslovnosti anglických hlásek, na vázání, slovní a větný důraz a také na nácvik plynulé mluvené angličtiny. Studenti se naučí zvládnout fonologickou transkripci a čtení souvislého textu. Sylabus: 1. Introduction: Phonemes and other aspects of pronunciation, accents, dialects. 2. The production of speech sounds, articulators above the larynx, vowel and consonant, short vowels. 3. English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. 4. Voicing and consonants: the larynx, respiration and voicing, plosives, English plosives, fortis and lenis. 5. Phonemes and symbols: the phoneme, symbols and transcription, phonology. 6. Fricatives and affricates: classification and production of fricatives and affricates, problematic issues when pronouncing English dental fricatives, fortis consonants. 7. Nasals and other consonants: nasals, lateral 1, the sonorant r, the approximants j and w. 8. The syllable: the nature the syllable, the structure of the English syllable, syllable division, Strong and weak syllables, the vowel 'schwa', close front and close back vowels, syllabic consonants. 9. Stress: stress in simple words, the nature of stress, levels of stress, placement of stress within the word. Complex word stress: complex words, suffixes, prefixes, compound words, variable stress, word-class pairs 10. Weak forms: strong and weak forms of pronunciation. 11. Aspects of connected speech: rhythm, assimilation, elision, linking. 12. Intonation: form, function, tone and languages, complex tones, pitch height, fall-rise and rise-fall intonation. 13. Revision lesson: transcription test, English pronunciation practice exercise, taboo mistakes, reading, connected speech. Povinná literatura: Roach, P. (2009) English Phonetics and Phonology: A Practical Course. 4th ed. Cambridge: CUP. 8 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Doporučená literatura: Biiring, D. (2016). Intonation and Meaning. Oxford: OUP. Hancock, M. (2010). English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate with answers, audio CDs. Cambridge: CUP. Wayland, R. (2018). Phonetics: A Practical Introduction. Cambridge: CUP. Wells, J. C. (2016). Sounds Fascinating: Further Observations on English Phonetics and Phonology. Cambridge: CUP. Wells, J. C. (2008). Longman Pronunciation Dictionary. 3rd ed. Pearson: Longman. Online sources: BBC Learning pronunciation course - http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/english/features/pronunciation BBC English YouTube channel - https://www.voutube.com/user/bbclearningenglish 9 Phonemes and other acpects of pronunciation, accents, dialects 1 PHONEMES AND OTHER ACPECTS OF PRONUNCIATION, ACCENTS, DIALECTS QUICK OVERVIEW This unit brings overall introduction to the system of English phonetics and phonology, different accents and dialects in English. The practical part of this unit brings English words commonly mispronounced by Czech speakers of English. AIMS In this unit students will learn about the system of English phonetics and phonology, they will be explained an introduction to phonemes and other aspects of English pronunciation. Students will be given a list of words and identify the most commonly mispronounced words of Czech speakers of English, they are going to select the most problematic words in English, will categorize them according to individual problematic phonemes and will be given exercises and tips on how to improve their pronunciation. KEY WORDS Phonemes, phonetics, phonology, mispronunciation. 1.1 Phonetics and phonology According to Roach (2009), phonetics and phonology is a theoretical context about speech sounds and how they are used in language. It is a general theory but it would be very difficult to address the English language pronunciation phenomena without the knowledge of the basic theoretical concepts. Why is it essential to learn this theoretical background? If you want to understand the principles regulating the use of sounds in English, you have to go through the theoretical context to be able to apply it into practice. English spelling is considered by many to be difficult and making no sense so it is vital to learn to think of English pronunciation in terms of phonemes rather than letters of the alphabet. English phonemes are vowels and consonants and they are regularly used sounds in a particular language. Students of this course will have to address and learn the 10 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika phonemic symbols in the IPA - International Phonetic Alphabet (see the table 1 below) to be able to transcribe the text using phonemic symbols from the IPA. The phonemic transcription is one of the crucial abilities of advanced students of English so using the phonemic symbols actively is very important. When we talk about phonetics and phonology, we can divide what we hear into segments (individual sounds - phonemes) but we also talk about suprasegmental features of language which are larger units of speech such as the syllable and aspects of speech such as stress, intonation, accent or a dialect (Roach, 2009). See the definitions below to help you understand the basic concepts. DEFINITION Phonology is a linguistic branch studying the contrastive relationship between particular speech sounds and it can include or exclude phonetics which studies, classifies and categorizes individual phonemes - speech sounds. Other important terms which are inevitably connected to the sounds of languages are accents and dialects. Roach says that languages have a variety of accents and they depend on the different geographical places, different social classes, and different ages of the speakers as well as the different educational backgrounds. People often confuse the work "accent" with the word "dialect" but they are different. The word dialect refers to a variety of a language which not only sounds different but also uses different grammar, word order or vocabulary. The word accent only applies to the differences in how the language sounds (Roach, 2009). So the dialect varies from the accent not only in phonological feature but also in grammatical and lexical features of the language. POINTS TO PONDER Dialects and accents ore one of the variations in a language i.e. English. These two terms are not exactly the same. However, both of them are interwoven. Dialect is not a substandard of a language, it is not slang either. Dialect s a variety of a language spoken by group of people that is characterized by Systematic features (eg phonological, lexical, and grammaticd) that distinguish it from other varieties of that same language, whje accent i only variations in pronunciation only. Thus accent is a subset of dialect Source: https://www.slideshare.net/FaizSilalahi/dialects-and-accents, [Accessed 2. 5. 2019]. 11 Phonemes and other acpects of pronunciation, accents, dialects QUESTIONS _ 1. Explain in your own words what is the difference between phonology and phonetics? 2. In your own words, say what makes a dialect different from an accent? Make a list of British or American accents you know. 3. What is RP? What is BBC English? 4. What does IPA stand for? Can you explain its features and importance for English pronunciation? EXTRAS Have a look at the LMS course on Moodle, in the first tutorial; there are videos with famous people and celebrities each representing different accent. Watch the videos and complete the tasks. 1.2 Exercises Have a look at Tutorial 2 on Moodle, you will find a list of commonly mispronounced words by Czech speakers of English. Follow the instructions in the second tutorial and complete the tasks. Print the table with IPA and use it throughout the whole course as you will start transcribing the words in the upcoming unit. Task 1: Have a look at the list of commonly mispronounced words by Czech speakers of English. Try to pronounce the words, find the transcription in any recommended online dictionary (see the links below) and copy the phonemic transcription into the table. Task 2: Work with a partner and name any words which you personally find difficult to pronounce, make a new list of ten problematic words, including the phonemic transcription. At this point of the course, you have not learned the phonemic transcription yet but try and copy the symbols into your list/table. POINTS TO REMEMBER- ONLINE DICTIONARIES Cambridge dictionary online: 12 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika https://dictionary.cambridge.org/ Oxford Advanced Learner's dictionary online: https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/ Merriam-Webster Learners dictionary online: http://learnersdictionary.com/ Longman Pronunciation dictionary online: http s ://w w w. ldoceonline .com/ One of the recommended books for this course is the book by Mark Hancock English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. The extra pronunciation practice and the individual assignments will be taken from this book as it is available in the library, including the CDs, and it is highly advisable for students to get their own copy as it can serve as an extensive English pronunciation practice source. See the example exercise below: 1.1 In this story, there are 12 incorrect words. The correct word is pronounced the same as the incorrect one, but the spelling is different. Correct them using words from the box. son some meat way threw pears sent week buy piece road two Meet: Last weak, I cent my si bye sum food. He got: pairs. On the weigh he food fell onto the rode Jamie through the foo< in Jamie to the shops to i peace of meet and too 'me, the bag broke. The and got dirty. In the end, I in the bin. Source: English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate, p. 11. EXTRAS • To understand the basic concepts of phonetics, see the section A Letters and sounds in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate by Mark Hancock. In the units 1-20, students will complete tasks connected to pronunciation practice such which are mainly based on audio units coming with this coursebook, they 13 Phonemes and other acpects of pronunciation, accents, dialects are asked to match the words with identical phonemes, classify the phonemes according to the place and manner of articulation, repeat the words to drill correct pronunciation, etc. • To listen to audios presenting English pronunciation, see the link below which will take you to BBC Learning English website/Pronunciation, you can listen to Tim's Pronunciation Workshop and as it is stated on the website: 'It will help you become a better listener and a more fluent speaker'. _ DDITIONAL SOURCES For further studies of the English phonetics and phonology, read the first chapter in English Phonetics and Phonology: A practical course. 4m ed. Cambridge: CUP, 2009 by Peter Roach. 0 ANSWERS 2. Many languages have different accents. Languages are pronounced differently by people from different geographical places, from different social classes, of different ages and different educational backgrounds. 'Dialect' refers to a variety of a language which is different from others not just in pronunciation but also in such matters as vocabulary, grammar and word order. Differences of 'accent', on the other hand, are pronunciation differences only. 3. British English - most familiar as the accent used by most announcers and newsreaders on serious national and international BBC broadcasting channels. It has for a long time been identified by the rather quaint name received pronunciation. The pronunciation of English in America is different from most accents found in Britain. Exceptions -you can find accents in parts of Britain that sound American, and accents in America that sound English. The pronunciation that you are likely to hear from most Americans does sound noticeably different from RP. RP: the accent chosen by British teachers to teach to foreign learners the accent most fully described and used as the basis for textbooks and pronouncing dictionaries. In England and Wales, RP is widely regarded as a model for correct pronunciation, particularly for educated formal speech. The alternative name is BBC pronunciation. RP itself inevitably changes as the years pass. There is also a measure of diversity within it. 4. IPA - origin: first published in 1888 by the Association Phonetique Internationale (International Phonetic Association), a group of French language teachers founded by Paul Passy. The aim is to devise a system for transcribing the sounds of speech which was 14 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika independent of any particular language and applicable to all languages. A phonetic script for English created in 1847 by Isaac Pitman and Henry Ellis was used as a model for the IPA. SUMMMARY In the first unit, students were given the outline of the theory of English phonetics and phonology. They compiled a list of problematic words after going through a given list of typically and commonly mispronounced words by Czech speakers of English. Students listened to audios with different British and American accents and had to name at least two features representing particular accents. In LMS course, students completed the tasks by transcribing and pronouncing difficult words from the lists given. 15 The production of speech sounds, short vowels 2 THE PRODUCTION OF SPEECH SOUNDS, SHORT VOWELS QUICK OVERVIEW This unit is about the production of speech sounds, vowels and consonants in general, introduces the system of English short vowels and practises identification of articulators, pronunciation of short vowels and their transcription. AIMS In this unit, students will learn about the production of speech sounds, articulators above the larynx, vowels and consonants in general and analyse the system of English short vowels. In the second half of this unit, they will identify the articulators in the pictures, practise English short vowels in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate and transcribe short vowels from selected units in English Phonetics and Phonology. KEYWORDS Production of speech, articulators, vowel and consonant, English short vowels. 2.1 Articulators above the larynx All the sounds we make in any language are the result of muscles contracting. We possess a large number of muscles, either in the chest to produce to flow of air or in the larynx to produce many modifications to the flow of air from the chest to the mouth. Once the air leaves the larynx, it goes through what we call the vocal tract ending in the mouth and the nostrils. With the muscles we have, we can produce many different sounds because they are large and complex and can produce many changes to the flow of air which finally ends up in the atmosphere (Roach, 2009). To study the sound of speech, we need to outline and describe different parts of the vocal tract first. They are called articulators and you can see them in the picture below. 16 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Oral Cavity L, Pharynx Epiglottis / Larynx opening into pharynx Esophagus V Picture 1: articulators above the larynx: source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Articulation (phonetics) nose soft palate harcTV (velum) upper lip lower lip pharynx lower teeth Fig.01 The articulators Reprd from p.008, 09051 7 larynx Picture 2: source: http://www.personal.rdg.ac.uk/~llsroach/phon2/artic-basics.htm 17 The production of speech sounds, short vowels 2.1.1 Description of the articulators by Peter Roach PHARYNX is a tube which begins just above the larynx, it's about 7 cm long in women and about 8 cm in men. At its top end it is divided into two, one part being the back of the mouth and the other being the beginning of the way through the nasal cavity VELUM (SOFT PALATE) allows air to pass through the nose and through the mouth and it is one of the articulators that can be touched by the tongue. When you make the sounds k and g the tongue is in contact with the lower side of the velum, and we call these velar consonants. HARD PALATE is a thin horizontal bony plate of the skull, located in the roof of the mouth. ALVEOLAR RIDGE is between the top front teeth and the hard palate, its surface is really much rougher than it feels, and is covered with little ridges. Sounds made with the tongue touching here (such as t and d) are called alveolar. The soft palate (also known as the velum or muscular palate) is, in mammals, the soft tissue constituting the back of the roof of the mouth. The soft palate is distinguished from the hard palate at the front of the mouth in that it does not contain bone. TONGUE is divided into different parts: tip, blade, front, back and root TEETH (UPPER AND LOWER) The tongue can be in contact with the upper side teeth for many speech sounds. Sounds made with the tongue touching the front teeth are called dental. LIPS can be pressed together (when we produce the sounds p, b), brought into contact with the teeth (as in f, v), rounded to produce the lip-shape for vowels like u:, sounds in which the lips are in contact with each other are called bilabial, sounds with lip-to-teeth contact are called labiodentals. COMPREHENSION CHECK Stand in front of the mirror, take the handout with IPA and model each phoneme while looking in the mirror and discovering and examining each phoneme individually. Try to realise the place and the manner of articulation with each phoneme. 2.2 Vowel and consonant, English short vowels It is not always easy to define what the words vowel and consonant mean. Usually, students say that a vowel sound is a sound without any obstruction to the flow of air as it 18 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika passes from the larynx to the lips and vice versa, the consonant sounds are the ones where the production is obstructed at certain point by a certain articulator or articulators with specific place and manner of articulation (Roach, 2009). This division might not be right at all times. That is why Peter Roach is talking about the differences in distribution of speech sounds as to what really matters when defining vowels and consonants (2009, 11). It is also important to distinguish between primary cardinal vowels which are a standard reference system and people learning a language on an advanced level should be familiar with them. Students should be able to classify, describe, articulate and compare cardinal vowels to be able to classify, describe and actively use English short vowels, long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs (Roach, 2009). Cardinal vowels can be further divided into primary and secondary cardinal vowels. Have a look at the pictures below and say in what way the cardinal vowels differ from English short vowels. Is there a same number of vowels? Is the classification the same according to the tongue height? Are they front or back? Are the lips rounded, spread or in the neutral position? Front Central Back u 0 3 O Primary cardinal vowels Picture 3: Primary cardinal vowels: source: https://www.researchsate.net/fisure/Primarv-cardinal-vowels-Roach-1991-13 fis2 329806129 close, back, rounded: too tu:' half-close, back, rounded: put /put/ half-close to half-open, central, rounded: another s'n\ds half-close to half-open, central, rounded: bird b3:d half-open. back, rounded: saw /so:/ half-close, central, unrounded another i'twbsl open. back, rounded: dog dog/ Picture 4: English short vowels: source: httv://www.linsuisticsweb.ors/doku.vhv?id=linsuisticsweb:slossary:linsuistics slossary:vowels 19 neutral lip rounding: car cu: The production of speech sounds, short vowels 2.3 Exercises Task 1: Have a look at the tutorial 3 on Moodle and complete the following task: see the pictures in tutorial 3 and try to read two texts which are written in phonemic symbols. Task 2: take your IPA table and try to transcribe the list of words below, use a dictionary if you need. Submit your transcription to the tutor. In the class, discuss the problematic areas of this task with your partner and share them with the whole class. Then try pronouncing the words aloud, individually and as a whole class as well. Transcription: hot, wool, feel, rude, wall, fill, bird, man, fast, heard, what, this, young, thin, cup, father, sugar, teacher, jump, chair, television, bank, orange, actress, sing, lunch, that, yes, beat, your, quick, city, laugh, walk, work, cruel, three, thought Task 3: Open the book by Roach on p. 214, read the introduction, listen to audio unit 2 and complete the tasks in Audio unit 2 - English short vowels. The key will be given to you by your tutor. : DDITIONAL SOURCES 1 D k 2t 0 P 3 s S * i: 4t 31 t 0 1 1 r 5 D 6 I n s e k t s tj 3 Across 1 Sea animal with eight legs, 4 Swimming version of 2 down. 6 These animals all have six legs. Down 1 Big bird which can't fly. 2 Very slow animal, with four legs and a shell. 3 Animal that lives in the sea and on land, and has flippers. 5 These brown mammals live in rivers or the sea and eat fish. 20 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika SUMMARY In unit 2, students have been explained the production of speech sounds; they classified and learned to pronounce cardinal vowels and English short vowels. They mastered the transcription and pronunciation of English short vowels and created a list of words containing English short vowels. 21 Long vowels, diphthongs, triphthongs 3 LONG VOWELS, DIPHTHONGS, TRIPHTHONGS QUICK OVERVIEW This unit further develops students' knowledge of English vowels, namely long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. The practical part revises pronunciation of English short vowels and practises pronunciation and transcription of English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. AIMS In this unit, students will learn about English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. In the first part of this unit, students are going to analyze a list of words and categorise English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. The aim is to list short vowels, mater their pronunciation and compare them to English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs and apply the knowledge of phonemic symbols from the IPA. The aim is to master correct pronunciation of vowels in general, paying attention to the correct place and manner of articulation. KEYWORDS Long vowels, diphthongs, triphthongs. 3.1 Long vowels There are five long vowels in English and compared to short vowels, the length of all English vowel sounds varies very much according to their context (the type of sound that follows them) and the fact whether the syllable with a particular vowel sound is stressed or not. See the words with long vowels in them; they are basically short vowel symbols with a length mark of two dots: car, key, cool, bird, four. 22 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika COMPREHENSION CHECK Take the table with English consonant and vowel phonemes and insert the phonemic symbols to words above, put the transcription into square brackets. 3.2 Diphthongs and triphthongs Peter Roach (2009) defines the diphthongs as speech sounds which consist of a movement or glide from one vowel to another. A vowel which does not glide is called pure vowel and it is a common pronunciation mistake with foreign learners of English. When they pronounce vowels but not diphthongs or the quality of the two vowels forming a diphthong is not as accurate as it should be. In terms of quality, diphthongs are like the long vowels described above. There are eight diphthongs in English and it is very easy to remember them by looking at the picture below and dividing them into three basic groups, diphthongs ending in hi. We call them centring diphthongs and they can be found in words like Ian, fierce, aired, cairn, scarce, moored, tour. Then we have closing diphthongs and they end in two possible vowel sounds, ending in III and lul. Ad 1 - we can find them in words such as paid, pain, face, tide, time, nice, void, loin, voice. Ad 2 - we can find them in words such as load, home, most, loud, gown, house. Triphthongs are the most complex sounds of the vowel type to be found in English. They are quite difficult to pronounce and ever harder to recognize. The sound itself is a glide from one vowel to another and then to a third vowel sound but happening very quickly without any interruption. Student of English and foreign learners have troubles recognizing them as in the spoken English, triphthongs are almost impossible to be heard because the extent of each vowel is very small, only in careful and slow pronunciation. Learners might mistake triphthongs for diphthongs or long vowels. 23 Long vowels, diphthongs, triphthongs Diphthongs Sounds which consist of a movement or Glide from one vowel to another Diphthongs are like the long vowels The First part is much longer and stronger than the second part Elements of Diphthongs 1. Centering is movement or glide to the a 2. Closing is movement or glide to / and u Centering Diphthongs Closing Ending i is ed U9 ei ai oi Ending u au au Roach P. 1998. English Phonetics and Phonobgy. UK: Cambridge University Press p. 21 Examples i 3 beard [biad] ea chair [tjea] Ud tour [tua] ei face [feiz] ai time [taim] oi voice [voiz] 3U go Igau] au loud [laud] ADDITIONAL Your [Jo:] you're [jua] 24 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Tripthongs Tripthongs Ending u eia aia oia aua au3 Examples Closing in Ending i is ended by a • [ai+a= aia ] as in liar/fire • [oi+a= oia ] as in loyal • [ei +a= eia ] as in player Closing in Ending u is ended by a • [au+a= aua ] as in power • [au+a= aua ] as in lower [I aia/f aia] [bial [pi eia] [paua] [laud ] COMPREHENSION CHECK Write symbols for the diphthongs and triphthongs in the following words: tone, style, out, way, beer, coil, hair, why, they, shower, lower, power, player, fire, loyal, tower, mower. 25 Long vowels, diphthongs, triphthongs 3.3 Exercises Task 1: have a look at the audio unit 3 from Roach's Phonetics and Phonology, listen to the Audio unit 3 and complete the tasks, paying attention to correct articulation of English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. Do not forget to practise the transcription of the long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Task 2: as an individual task, to practise more long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs, have a look at units: 2, 6, 7, 11, 14, 16, 18, 19 and 20 - all practising long and short vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. SUMMARY In this unit, students have classified English long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs, they have mastered their pronunciation and phonemic transcription and finally, they have role-played the dialogues practising long vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs. 26 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 4 VOICING AND CONSONANTS, PLOSIVES QUICK OVERVIEW This unit is about voicing and the system of English consonants. Students will learn about the larynx, the system of English plosives, fortis and lenis articulation and they will practise pronunciation and transcription of English plosives. AIMS In the first part of this unit, students will learn about the importance of the larynx for proper pronunciation and how voicing of the consonants and respiration is vital for correct pronunciation of individual sounds. Further on, students will analyze and define the general rules and definitions of English consonants, depending on the place of articulation, the manner of articulation and the voicing - lenis and fortis articulation. Students will get a list of individual words containing plosives and their task is to identify plosives in initial, mid and final position and master their correct pronunciation and transcription. KEYWORDS Voicing, respiration, larynx, fortis, lenis, plosives. 4.1 Respiration and voicing To understand the system of English plosives, it is highly advisable to understand what respiration and voicing is about as it is vital for the place and manner of plosive articulation. So the first thing, students have to do is to go to p. 27 in English Phonetics and Phonology by P. Roach, read chapters 4.1 The larynx and 4.2. Respiration and voicing and complete the activity below: Questions: 1. Name the functions of the larynx in speech. 2. Show the Adam's Apple on your neck. 3. Define the words: cartilage, trachea, glottis, glottal stop. 27 Voicing and consonants, plosives 4. What is egressive pulmonic airstream? 5. What is the other name for voicing1} 6. Name three differences in sub glottal pressure. Tasks: make small groups, each group gets one of the questions, together the group will answer the question, define the terms used in their answers. Activity 1: students will form groups of six so that they mix up with students from other groups. The aim is to teach other students about the facts they found out when answering the question. Students take it in turns, one of them is a teacher and the rest of the students are making notes on all the theoretical information about respiration and voicing. When the student-teacher finishes, another student takes up the role of a teacher. They continue the activity until all of them tried teaching and making notes and all have answers to the six questions. 4.2 Plosives, English plosives DEFINITION Plosives: a plosive is a consonantal sound which is produced when two articulators move against each other, this forms a stricture, air cannot escape from the vocal tract. The stricture makes air compression and once the air is released, the plosive is articulated. We call this the plosion and is has four stages: closing phase when the articulator or articulators move to form the stricture for the plosive. The compression phase is when the compressed air is stopped from escaping. The release phase is when the articulators are moved and allow air to escape. And finally, post-release phase which we call any voicing happening immediately after the previous one (Roach, 2009). English plosives: There are six plosives in English: p, t, k, b, d, g and they have different places of articulation. Students should take the table with English consonant and vowel phonemes and while defining, demonstrating and pronouncing each plosive, they should do so aloud and in front of the mirror. The aim of demonstrating the plosives aloud is the fact that if we work with our articulators, it is much easier to remember the characteristics of plosives and classify them accordingly. Activity 2: Read the chapter 4.4 Plosives and 4.5 Fortis and lenis, work in pairs or individually, define the places of plosive articulation, demonstrate the articulation and master the plosive pronunciation, say whether they are voiceless or voiced and give examples 28 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika of words containing plosives in all positions - initial, medial and final position. Go through your notes together, classify the plosives, create a list of words containing plosives, and plan a short presentation for your classmates. After the presentations, assess and evaluate the presentation of other students. Ask your teacher any additional questions concerning pronunciation and phonemic transcription of English plosives. 4.3 Exercises Task T. Have a look at Audio unit 4 in the "Roach - seminar handouts", listen to the audio and complete the tasks accordingly, the key will be given to you by a tutor. Task 2: For further plosives practice, have a look at units 3, 5 and 9 in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. Task 3: Have a look at Tutorial 4 on Moodle, follow the instructions and submit your tasks there. The aim is to master the pronunciation and phonemic transcription of English plosives. INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT In the vegetable grid below, search for ten words depicting vegetables but written pho-nemically. Write them orthographically next to the grid. * J S w • i: t k o: n au 1 f i 1 D k t u k s P r au t 9 k ae r t n au m k b v q 3: b r a: h i z u n • i: P t b d3 f • i: i n f 9U t ei t 3 P z 3 29 Voicing and consonants, plosives - SUMMARY In this unit, students evaluated previously learned theory on English vowels and added the practical knowledge of plosives and the system of English plosives. They worked individually and in pairs, interpreted a text from English Phonetics and Phonology by Peter Roach, answered the given questions, applied their knowledge by presenting English plosives to their classmates. Students also created their own list of words containing plosives and mastered their pronunciation and phonemic transcription. 30 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 5 PHONEMES AND SYMBOLS, TRANSCRIPTION QUICK OVERVIEW This unit is slightly different to the previous units as it brings an introduction to the phenomenon of the English phoneme, symbols and transcription and overall importance of English phonology. Students will receive a table with phonemic symbols according to International Phonetic Alphabet. Students will learn about the rules and definitions connected to English phonology, they will analyse English phonemes in detail and learn about the specifics of phonemic transcription. AIMS The aim of this unit is to bring another theoretical lesson on English phonology where students will classify the phonemes and individual symbols we use for phonemic transcription. In the practical part of this unit, students will analyse the list of English phonemes in the simple table, they will name the differences between the manner and the place of articulation and try to imitate individual sounds when reading the table with phonemic symbols. Each student should be able to classify the phonemes according to place and manner of articulation and pronounce them properly as individual sounds as well as in individual words, naming of the phonemes, stating the number of phonemes in each word and listing all the words containing such phoneme. KEYWORDS English phonemes, symbols, IPA, manner of articulation, place of articulation. 5.1 Phonemes and symbols In the previous chapters, students have come across some of the terms connected to phonetics and phonology so this chapter brings deeper insight into the terminology used when talking about speech sounds. When we speak, we use a continuous stream of sounds and when studying speech, we divide this stream into small pieces we call segments. The word 'man' has initial segment 31 Phonemes and symbols, transcription m, middle segment ae and a final segment n. But we can easily change the meaning of words only by changing one phoneme in a word. Have a look at the words below with short vowels in them: pit, pet, pat, putt, pot, put and their transcription: pit, pet, pa;t, pAt, prjt, put and you can easily conclude that by changing one letter of the alphabet and consequently changing the vowel sound in these words, the words then get a completely different meaning. So this abstract set of speech sounds we call phonemes actually forms a complete set of units we call phonemic system of the language (Roach, 2009). When you search the word in a pronunciation dictionary and then have a look at the list of English consonant and vowel phonemes you worked with in previous tutorials on Moodle, you can spot some differences. The reason is that we differentiate two sets of symbols for transcription, the one which is very simple is called phonemic transcription and the one which is complex and when transcribed words have more symbols in the square brackets, we call this phonetic transcription. The latter also contains more information than phonemic transcription we are using in this phonetics course. As students, you can approach and be given two different kinds of phonemic transcription. If you are asked to transcribe a text written in orthography, we call this transcription from the text and if your teacher is reading a text or dictating words or sentences, we call this transcription from dictation (Roach, 2009). In this course, you will get both equally but the texts for transcription will be prevailing as all the tasks on Moodle will be based on your individual work. QUESTION See the theoretical part of unit 1 and answer the following question: How is it possible to acquire a full understanding of the use of speech sounds in English? Is the study of phonetics matters enough? Or do we need to take other features of speech into consideration? 5.2 Exercises Task 1: complete all the tasks in Audio unit 5 - revision, you will listen to the recording in the lesson and master the transcription at home. You should now be able to recognise all the vowels, diphthongs and triphthongs in English, and all the plosives. Task 2: See the list of 'taboo words' in Tutorial 5 on Moodle, work with a pronunciation dictionary or any recommended online dictionary and transcribe the words in the list with phonemic symbols. In pairs or individually, master the articulation in front of the 32 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika mirror, paying attention to the movement of articulators. And finally, test your knowledge in the transcription test in Tutorial 5. INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT On Moodle, in Tutorial 5, watch the video by an English teacher called Lucy about Pronunciation of place names and complete the tasks. ANSWER Yes, we need to make differences between phonetics and phonology, segmental and suprasegmental features such as stress, intonation, rhythm, etc. SUMMARY In this unit, students have defined what phonemes and symbols have in common, they analysed segmental and suprasegmental features of English pronunciation, watch a video about pronunciation of English place names and created a list of place names and mastered their pronunciation and phonemic transcription. They have also compared the list of Taboo words on Moodle with their own list of problematic words in English which Czech speakers have huge troubles pronouncing and often make mistakes in them. The aim was to correct the pronunciation mistakes and to improve the articulation and word stress. 33 Fricatives and affricates 6 FRICATIVES AND AFFRICATES QUICK OVERVIEW This unit is about the system of English fricatives and affricates, deals with their classification and production and practises their pronunciation and transcription, emphasising the problematic areas when pronouncing dental fricatives. AIMS The aim of this unit is to introduce, classify and practise English fricatives and affricates. Students will classify English fricatives according to the place and manner of articulation; they will identify problematic issues when pronouncing English dental fricatives and for-tis consonants. In the practical part of this unit, students will imitate proper articulation of fricatives and affricates, identify the problematic issues in individual words and make a list of twenty problematic words containing English fricatives and affricates. KEYWORDS Fricatives, affricates, fortis consonants, dental fricatives practice. 6.1 Fricatives and affricates Fricatives are consonants and their characteristic feature is that when they are produced, they make hissing sound as the air escapes a small passage. Fricatives are continuant consonants and you can make a continuous hissing sound when articulating them. Try saying sss and start opening your mouth and lowering your tongue, the hissing sound will stop as soon as the passage gets larger. Try saying fffff and while you do that, use your finger and press your lower lip away from the upper teeth, again one your lower lip and upper teeth are not in contact, the hissing sound will stop (Roach, 2009). The reason is that it takes two articulators the air goes through when articulating fricatives. If you do any obstruction or change the position of your tongue, the hissing sound has to stop as the two articulators are not in contact anymore. 34 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Affricates are quite complex consonants as they begin as plosives and end up as fricatives but such definition would be somewhat inaccurate as it takes more to describe affricates. They should be made with same articulators to have the quality of an affricate, compare consonant k and t - they are not homographic = they are not made with same articulators, but consider t and tf - they are homographic as they are both made with a tongue (Roach, 2009). With English fricatives we have to again think about fortis and lenis articulation when fortis consonants are articulated with bigger force than lenis consonants. Same applies to fricatives, according to place of articulation, we have two phonemes with each fricative, one is fortis (voiceless) - f, 9, s, J, one is lenis (voiced) - v, 5, z, 3. There is one fricative which does not have a fortis/lenis change and it is the glottal fricative h (see the activity 1 below). Activity 1: See the phonemic symbols for fortis, lenis and glottal fricatives and write down at least 5 words containing such fricatives in initial, medial and final position. Do the same with the only two affricates in English which also make a fortis/lenis pair. f,v: 0,5: s, z: h: tf,ck COMPREHENSION CHECK Based on unit 6 from English Phonetics and Phonology, classify the above mentioned fricatives into groups depending on their place of articulation. Activity 2: See the description of articulation of one word and try to figure out which word it is. The aim is to stand in front of the mirror, read the description and try to move the articulators as described below. Starting from the position for normal breathing, the lower lip is brought into contact with the upper teeth. The lungs are compressed, causing air to flow through the constriction producing fricative noise. The tongue moves to the position for 1. The vocal folds are brought together, causing voicing to begin, and at the same time the lower lip is lowered. Then the tongue blade is raised to make a fairly wide constriction in the palate-alveolar 35 Fricatives and affricates region and the vocal folds are separated to stop voicing; the flow of air causes fricative noise. Next, the vocal folds are brought together to begin voicing again and at the same time the tongue is lowered from the constriction position into the i vowel posture. The tongue blade is then raised against the alveolar ridge forming a constriction which results in fricative noise. This is initially accompanied by voicing, which then dies away. Finally, the articulators are separated and normal breathing is resumed (Roach, 250, 2009). 6.2 Exercises Task 1: take your seminar handouts and complete the Audio unit 6 by listening to the audio, practising the transcription of English fricatives and affricates. You will practise the correct articulation in the lessons, it is vital to be facing your partner so that you can assess your pronunciation, especially when it comes to dental fricatives as they are the most problematic phonemes to articulate for Czech students of English. If you decide to complete the tasks in this unit individually at home, make sure that you do so in front of the mirror. Task 2: have a look at Tutorial 6 on Moodle, print the PDF file, go through the dialogues and exercises, practise both roles in the conversations, create a list of twenty words containing fricatives and in pairs, agree on some useful tips to improve the pronunciation of English fricatives and affricates. The aims are to: • master the articulation of fricatives, especially the dental fricatives in individual words as well as in connected speech e.g. in monologues, conversations, etc. • list at least twenty words containing fricatives in initial, medial and final position • name the articulators used when pronouncing fricatives and affricates, using accurate terms • create a list of tips on how to master the pronunciation of English fricatives and affricates Task 3: To further practise and master the pronunciation or fricatives and affricates, see the units 4, 8, 10, 12 and 17 in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. - SUMMARY In this unit, students have been explained how we classify English fricatives which are one of the most problematic consonantal speech sound for Czech learners of English. Students have practised articulation and transcription, compiled a list of own twenty troublesome - or shall we say - taboo words in English which they have troubles pronouncing and created a list of tips on how to master the pronunciation of English fricatives and affricates. 36 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 7 NASALS, LATERAL L, SONORANT R, APPROXI-MANTS J AND W QUICK OVERVIEW This unit introduces English nasals, lateral /l/, sonorant /r/ and two approximants - /w/ and /j/. Students will learn how to classify them, how to produce them and will practise their correct pronunciation and transcription. AIMS The aim of this unit is to define, classify and model the correct pronunciation of English nasals, laterals and approximants. Student will classify them according to the place and manner of articulation and model correct pronunciation after watching a video and listening to an audio unit outlining English nasals, lateral and approximants. Students will also read a text about specific features of English lateral / and a sonorant r; they will then complete comprehension questions. Students will make a list of words containing the above mentioned words and transcribe them using the IPA symbols. KEYWORDS Nasals, lateral 1, sonorant r, approximants w and j. 7.1 Nasals, laterals, sonorants, approximants You have so far learned two biggest groups of consonants in English - plosives and fricatives and we are left with seven more, three nasals, one lateral consonant 1, one ap-proximant r and two approximants - j and w, which are phonetically like vowels but pho-nologically like consonants. See the picture below: 37 Nasals, lateral I, sonorant r, approximants j and w The Nose and Nasal Cavity nasal vestibule frontal sinus nose sphenoid sinus nasal cavity I \ W\ \ Picture: source: http://www.cancer.ca/en/cancer-information/cancer-type/nasal-paranasal/nasal-cavity-and-paranasal-sinus-cancer/the-nasal-cavity-and-paranasal-sinuses/?region=bc Activity 1: For this activity, you need to form pairs or work individually on one of the tasks listed below. Each student/pair should work on their own, not discussing nasals and other consonants with other students/pairs. Each student/pair should follow the allocated and/or chosen task below and to download the PDF file on Moodle in Tutorial 7. The aim is to: • classify nasals, laterals and approximants according to the place of articulation • master the articulation of the above mentioned consonantal phonemes in individual words as well as in the connected speech • model and role-play two dialogues from the handout on Moodle 'Nasals and other consonants' • create a list of at least twenty words containing nasals and other consonants • plan a presentation for your fellow students in other groups so that they can make notes, ask questions and discuss the above mentioned consonants GROUP ASSIGNMENT 38 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika TUTORIAL 1 - NASALS Student/pair 1 - task - Nasals: read the chapter 7.1 Nasals on pages 59-60 in English Phonetics and Phonology. Define and classify English nasals paying attention to the movement of articulators, place of articulation, all the unusual features including morphological matters. Demonstrate the articulation to other students and let them repeat the words you have chosen for this activity (at least five words containing nasal consonants). Choose one dialogue with nasals practice you have practised and role-play it in front of the class, paying attention to correct articulation of all the consonants we have gone through and mastered so far. Create a list of at least twenty words containing nasals and make a copy for each student in your class. Analyse the list with your classmates and discuss any peculiarities of English nasal consonants. TUTORIAL 2 - LATERALS Student/pair 2 - task - Laterals: read the chapter 7.2 The consonant I on pages 60-61 in English Phonetics and Phonology. Define and classify the consonant / according to the place and manner of articulation paying attention to the movement of articulators and all the unusual features of this particular phoneme. Demonstrate the articulation to other students and let them repeat the words you have chosen for this activity (at least five words containing consonant I). Choose one dialogue with lateral / practice you have practised and role-play it in front of the class, paying attention to correct articulation of all the consonants we have gone through and mastered so far. Create a list of at least twenty words containing lateral / in initial, medial and final position and make a copy for each student in your class. Analyse the list with your classmates and discuss any peculiarities of English consonantal sound /. TUTORIAL 3 - APPROXIMANTS Student/pair 3 - task - Approximants: read the chapter 7.3 The consonant r on p. 63 in English Phonetics and Phonology. Define and classify the consonant r according to the place and manner of articulation paying attention to the movement of articulators and all the specific features of this particular phoneme. Demonstrate the articulation at home in front of the mirror or to other students and let them repeat the words you have chosen for this activity (at least five words containing consonant r). Choose one dialogue with consonant r practice you have practised and role-play it in front of the class, paying attention to correct articulation of all the consonants we have gone through and mastered so far. Create a list of at least twenty words containing consonant r in initial, medial and final 39 Nasals, lateral I, sonorant r, approximants j and w position and make a copy for each student in your class. Analyse the list with your classmates and discuss any peculiarities of English consonantal sound r. TUTORIAL 4 - APPROXIMANTS Student/pair 4 - task - Approximants: read the chapter 7.4 The consonants j and w on pages 63-64 in English Phonetics and Phonology Define and classify the consonants j and w according to the place and manner of articulation paying attention to the movement of articulators and all the specific features of these phonemes. Demonstrate the articulation at home in front of the mirror or to other students and let them repeat the words you have chosen for this activity (at least five words containing consonants j and w). Choose one dialogue with approximants j and w practice you have practised and role-play it in front of the class, paying attention to correct articulation of all the consonants we have gone through and mastered so far. Create a list of at least twenty words containing approximants j and w in initial, medial and final position and make a copy for each student in your class. Analyse the list with your classmates and discuss any peculiarities of English approximants we might also call semi-vowels (it is important to explain why we call them semi-vowels). COMPREHENSION CHECK • List all the consonants phonemes of the BBC accent, grouped according to manner of articulation. • Transcribe the following words phonemically: sofa, verse, steering, breadcrumb, square, anger, bought, nineteen. 7.2 Exercises Task 1: have a look at Tutorial 7 on Moodle and complete the tasks, do not forget to submit your answers to the comprehension check at the end of this tutorial. Task 2: See the table below with various categories. Students will choose a sound or a phoneme and have to think of a word and fill it in each category. 40 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Food Place Part of Body Animal Colour Verb peas Poland pupil pig purple press Task 3: choose one phoneme and the words you created in the previous task and transcribe them phonemically below. e. g.: peas, Poland, pupil, pig, purple, press transcription: pi:s, 'pautand, 'pju:pl, pig, 'p3:pl, pres INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT To practise more nasals, laterals and approximants, it is highly advisable to complete the listening and pronunciation practice exercises in the units 13 and 15 in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. SUMMARY In this unit, students have defined, classified English nasals, laterals and approximants and mastered their pronunciation and transcription. 41 The syllable 8 THE SYLLABLE \<$>\ QUICK OVERVIEW This unit brings a lesson on the English syllable, the nature of the syllable, the structure of the English syllable, syllable division. It analyses strong and weak syllables, the vowel "schwa", close front and close back vowels and syllabic consonants. -^~| AIMS The aim of this unit is to learn about the nature and the structure of the English syllable, students are going to analyze the nature of the syllable, name the structure of the syllable, and divide the syllables accordingly. Students will apply the differences between strong and weak syllables and master the pronunciation and transcription of weak and unstressed syllables. Students will read about the English vowel "schwa" and complete the text with missing vowel sounds in weak/unstressed syllables. In the final part of this unit, students will watch the video about Schwa and imitate the articulation in front of the mirror. Students will learn and practise transcription of the vowel Schwa in individual words as well as in transcribed connected speech. KEYWORDS Nature and structure of the English syllable, syllable division, strong and weak syllables, unstressed syllables, close front and close back vowels, vowel Schwa, syllabic consonants. The syllable is a very important unit in every language; all the young children learn to speak by dividing longer words into syllables, clapping their hands, counting how many syllables each word has, etc. It is somehow natural for people to count the syllables in words without even knowing what a syllable is. And by tapping or clapping, they can simple count the syllables and say how many syllable word they have uttered and this is one of the most important factors for the future practice of sentence stress, rhythm and finally intonation. 42 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 8.1 The nature and the structure of the syllable According to Peter Roach, syllables can be defined both phonetically and phonol-ogically. Phonetically, syllables are described as consisting of a centre which has little or no obstruction to airflow and which sounds comparatively loud: before and after this centre, there will be greater obstruction to airflow and less loud sound. A minimum syllable is for example a simple vowel sound you can find in words such as are, err, or. Some syllables have onset - there is more than just a silence preceding the centre of the syllable - words such as: bar, key, more. Some syllables may have no onset but have a coda - words such as: am, ought, ease. Some syllables have onset and coda - words such as: run, sat, fill. If we look at syllable from the phonological point of view, we might say syllables are quite different as it involves looking at all the combinations of English phonemes - the study of the possible phoneme combinations of a language is called phonotac-tics. If the words begin with a vowel sound, we call this a zero onset and if the word begins with two consonant sounds, we call this consonant cluster. You can find consonant clusters in words such as: spin, stick, skin, sphere, smell, snow, splay, spray, sclerosis, skewer, string, stew - we call them initial consonant clusters. The words can also end in consonant clusters such as: helped, banks, bonds, twelfths, fifths, prompts and we call them final consonant clusters. There is a special case which we call syllabic consonant and it is when the word has two syllables, the second one is weak = there is no stress and contains no vowel sound, e.g. the word bottle - 'botl - we call the last consonant / a syllabic consonant. COMPREHESNION CHECK Some one-syllable words are just a single vowel sound (V), for example oh and eye. If we add one or more consonant sounds (C) to the beginnings of these words, they are still only one syllable. Look at the table below and model the pronunciation: V cv ccv oh /oo/ no /nou/ snow /snoo/ oh /o<>/ low /loo/ slow /slau/ eye hul lie /lai/ fly /ri;../ air tel where /wes/ swear /sweo/ or law fall floor 43 The syllable QUESTION Similarly, if we add just one consonant to the words below, we can get a completely different word. See the words below, add a consonant to the end of the words given but be careful, you have to think of sounds, not spelling. E.g. if I add consonant t to the word bell, then I get a word belt. Chain, rain, hell, fill, ten, learn, wool, hole. Activity T. individually or in pairs, divide the words into the correct column. Ant, cook, dad, doctor, grandfather, officer, passenger, sister, teacher, vegetable, chocolate, uncle, restaurant, interesting, general, Wednesday, colonel. 1- syllable words: 2- syllable words: 3- syllable words: 4 and more syllable words: 8.2 Strong and weak syllables In unit 9, Peter Roach addresses the importance of strong and weak syllables stating that in English, one of the most noticeable features is the fact that some syllables are strong and some of them weak and that it is crucial to study strong and weak syllables, their distribution, appearance in words pronounced in English as well as their undeniable importance for the aspects of connected speech such as stress and intonation (81, 2009). So what do we mean by 'strong' and 'weak' syllables? Let's take the word father -'fa:5a - where the first syllable is stressed, louder and more prominent and the second one including the vowel sound 'schwa' is unstressed, quieter and less prominent and also shorter than the first syllable containing the long vowel sound. There are other ways to characterise strong and weak syllables and most commonly they have something to do with stress but there are some vowel sounds which appear in unstressed = weak syllables such as i, u or a. If the vowel is strong, then the syllable will always have a coda. Weak syllables have very limited number of possible peaks. Weak syllables at the end of the word in words such as: better, happy, thank you, open, sharpen. We find weak syllables in the middle of the words as well such as: photograph, radio, influence, architect 44 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika (Roach, 82, 2009). See the table below for better understanding of the vowel sound Schwa which is very specific and used in thousands of words in English: Examples of the Schwa Sound IS • A schwa is represented by an upside-down e. When a schwa sound is written in a pronunciation guide, it looks like this: s. • The schwa is only found in unstressed syllables. In fact, most unstressed vowels are pronounced as a schwa. For example, you can hear the muffled /uh/ sound in the first syllable of amaze \e-'maz\ and the second syllable in gallon Vga-lsn\. • Schwas can be kind of lazy. In some words, an unstressed syllable that contains a Schwa may disappear completely. For example, when we say the word chocolate, we usually eliminate the syllable that contains the schwa. Go ahead, say chocolate. How many syllables do you hear? How about camera, interest, and several? All English vowels have a schwa sound. Take a look at the chart below for examples of each vowel. a: pleasant again balloon e: problem celebrate enemy i: duplicate president family o: parrot bottom freedom u: support circumstance album y: syringe analysis Pennsylvania Picture: source: https://blog.allaboutlearningpress.com/schwas/ Two other vowels are commonly found in weak syllables - close front and close back vowels. In strong syllables, it is very easy to distinguish between i and i: but in weak syllables the difference is not so audible. Compare these words: easy and busy, they should be transcribed as: 'i:zi and 'bizi so as you can see, the symbols for the vowel sounds are not the ones we have gone through in chapters on short and long vowels. The phonemic symbol i is not the short vowel sound in a word like bit or the long vowel in beat. We find i occurring in: • word-final position in words spelt with final 'y' or 'ey', e.g. happy, valley, happier, easiest, hurrying. • In a prefix such as those spelt 're', 'pre', 'de' if preceding a vowel and unstressed: react, preoccupied, deactivate. • In the suffixes spelt 'iate', 'ious' when having two syllables: appreciate, hilarious. • In the following words when unstressed: he, she, we, me, be, the. Additional sources: possible tutorial: unit 9.4 Syllabic consonants in Roach's English Phonetics and Phonology. For students who would like to know more or as an idea for 45 The syllable extra lesson where students can analyse words and syllables containing syllabic consonants. 8.3 Exercises Task 1: On Moodle in Tutorial 8, have a look at the PDF file, print it and practise the pronunciation of strong and weak syllables and weak vowels in unstressed syllables. Complete the tasks in the handout. See the example exercise below: weak A: au.iy weak E: ga rxfcn weak O: pplke weak U: support banana paper doctor figure w< >man under correct (- Jour su<;ar "I ate an apple and a banana in a cinema in Canada.' 1 In words like paper, sugar, colour, the final R is not pronounced in many accents, so vista I I rhymes with sister I I, for example. • Many speakers of English (especially non-native speakers) do not change vowels in weak syllables to / /. Task 2: See the PDF file on Moodle called Tongue Twisters, choose ten tongue twisters, stand in front of the mirror, clap your hands or tap your feet and practise the pronunciation of the tongue twisters. See the sentences taken from longer tongue twisters, clap your hands and count how many syllables they have. Walter walked towards the waiter. Betty bought a better bit of butter. The fat cat sat on a vet's wet hat. Task 3: Syllable structure and -s endings and -ed endings. Have a look at the pictures below and complete the tasks: 46 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Match the beginnings and ends of these phrases so that they rhyme. Then listen and repeat. 1 Ms Fox's —-____ a fridges 2 My niece's b boxes 3 The witch's c pieces 4 Mr Bridge's d phones 5 Mr Jones e kisses 6 Chris's f plans 7 Anne's g switches Write the third person forms of the verbs from the box in the correct part of the table below. Then listen, check and repeat. wnteh smg go get dance kiss come wash see close push pull 1 syllable 0 2 syllables Oo Match the beginnings and ends of these rhymes. 1 The people queued 2 The thing you missed 3 The man controlled 4 She saw the child 5 The boat that crossed 6 The man who drowned 7 The snow we rolled 8 Her voice was soft 9 The points we scored 10 Wc never planned was never found, are on the board, and then she smiled, to build on sand, was on the list, until she coughed, g the nation's gold, h to buy the food, i was nearly lost, j was hard and cold. Write the past tense of the verbs from the box in the correct part of the table. Then listen, check and repeat. h«e walk need wash wait waste help taste phone dance end ask 1 syllable 0 -ed = extra syllable Oo INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Listen to the Audio unit 8 from the seminar handouts on consonant clusters and complete the tasks. The key will be given to you by a tutor. SUMMARY In this unit, students we explained the features of the English syllable and its importance for learners of English. They applied the theoretical fact into their practical knowledge and realisation of English syllables by clapping their hands and tapping their feet while reciting tongue twisters. They have analysed a handout about strong and weak y 47 The syllable vowels and features of unstressed syllables. Students have modelled and mastered phonemic transcription of single words as well as sentences. 48 Mgr. Márie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 9 STRESS, WORD STRESS, SENTENCE STRESS QUICK OVERVIEW In this unit, students are going to learn about stress, word stress and sentence stress in English and its importance in English pronunciation practice. This unit classifies the stress in simple words, the nature of stress, levels of stress, placement of stress within a word. Students are going to learn about, revise and practise complex words stress with complex words, suffixes, prefixes, compound words, and the variability of stress and word-class pairs. The seminar brings pronunciation practice of stress in simple and complex words and the differences in word stress in word-class pairs. AIMS In this unit, students are going to revise and master the differences between strong and weak syllables and unstressed syllables. They will read the article about the English vowel Schwa and its importance for correct stress placement and complete comprehension questions. Students will watch the video about the correct articulation of the English vowel Schwa and will try and master its pronunciation. Students will listen to short rhymes, identify stressed and unstressed syllables, and then they will clap their hands to imitate the sentence stress. Students will characterise stress carrying suffixes, prefixes and compound words. This unit also brings the transcription practise, students will model the transcription of the stress mark, and then they will complete individual words or whole sentences with stress marks, marking word stress and sentence stress. Students will also use stress marks to mark the differences in word stress in word-class pairs. KEYWORDS Primary stress, secondary stress, stress mark, stressed and unstressed syllables, complex word stress, stress carrying suffixes, prefixes, compound words. 49 Stress, word stress, sentence stress 9.1 Word stress In this unit, we will consider the importance of the word stress and consequently the sentence stress for correct pronunciation of English words, phrases and sentences. Word stress and sentence stress have an undeniable role in English intonation, the mixture of stressed and unstressed syllables makes English one of the most phonic languages in the world. Stress also changes the quality of certain vowels and this unit introduces different levels of stress. We have mentioned stress couple of times before in this study support so now we will have a look at stress in more detail, solemnly because studying word and sentence stress is crucial for further studies of other aspects of speech such as rhythm and intonation. We can all distinguish the nature of stress, people usually know that the first syllable in words father, close, table is stressed, the middle syllable in apartment, relation, potato is stressed and the final syllable in about, receive, perhaps is stressed, and can further make difference by clapping their hands or tapping their feet to distinguish stressed and unstressed syllables in more-syllable words. We mark the stress by a small vertical line just before the stressed syllable in phonemic and phonetic transcription. DEFINITION We study stress from two points of view - production and perception. The production of stress is generally believed to depend on the speaker using more muscular energy than is used for unstressed syllables, i.e. the muscles that expel the air from the lungs are often more active producing higher subglottal pressure. From the perceptual point of view, all stressed syllables have one characteristic in common, and that is prominence (Roach, 93-94, 2009). So what makes a syllable prominent? See the points to remember below. POINTS TO REMEMBER • stressed syllable is louder • vowel sounds in stressed syllables have different length - careful, short vowels do not become long vowel • every voiced syllable is said on some pitch - it is related to the frequency of vibration of the vocal folds and to the musical notion of low and high-pitched notes. It is essentially a perceptual characteristic of speech; a pitch is noticeably different from other sounds in syllables • by making a movement of pitch - rising and falling - the syllable further becomes even more prominent and has a huge effect on what is being said and how is it said 50 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika • a syllable will be more prominent if it has a vowel different in quality from neighbouring vowels (Roach, 94, 2009). COMPREHENSION CHECK How many factors have an influence on the prominence of a syllable? According to Peter Roach, when it comes to levels of stress, we distinguish two main types - primary stress and secondary word stress. Compare the words around - where the primary stress is placed on the second syllable and does not have any secondary words stress. And the words photographically, we place the primary word stress on the third syllable but less prominent stress which is still stronger than the rest of the syllables is placed on the first syllable and we call it a secondary word stress (2009). He makes the following summary of ideas on stress placement in nouns, verbs and adjectives, so if we want to place the stress somewhere in the word, we should take the following ideas into consideration: • whether the word is morphologically simple or complex (containing any affixes = prefixes or suffixes or both) or a compound word • what is the grammatical category • how many syllables the word has • what the phonological structure of those syllables is Activity 1: On Moodle, in Tutorial 9, there are two files with a theory on placing stress in two-syllable and three-syllable words. Choose one file, read it, note down the most important features, create a list of at least five words and try to describe, define and demonstrate what you have learned about after reading the first of the second file. You should be able to demonstrate the pronunciation and mark the stress in the phonemic transcription. Activity 2: Stress pattern practice - see the pictures below and complete the tasks: 51 Stress, word stress, sentence stress Put these words into the correct columns, according to the stress pattern. Oo Ooo oOo Oooo 00O0 Plumber Electrician Doctor Journalist Musician Shop assistant Teacher Soldier Novelist Architect Carpenter Actor Policeman - f frerfran Lecturer Florist Businessman Artist Farmer Scientist Researcher Gardener Designer Write the full words in the correct column, according to their stress pattern. Mon Tues Thu Sat today tomorrow Apr Jul Aug Sept Oc Nov holiday 2nd 11th 13 30 13th 30th 17 70 afternoon Oo oO Ooo oOo ooO 9.2 Complex word stress The difference between simple and complex words is that the simple words consist of one grammatical unit, e.g. care, love, have and the complex words consist of two or more grammatical units, e.g. careless, lovely, having. Complex words are of two major types and Peter Roach divides them into: • words made from a basic word form (which we call stem) with the addition of an affix and • compound words, which are made of two and sometimes more independent English words - ice-cream, armchair, blackbird. Affixes are of two types - prefixes - preceding a word stem - un + pleasant = unpleasant, and suffixes which come after the word stem - good + ness = goodness. Let's divide the affixes into couple of groups for better understanding and easier comprehension, each explanation is followed by small task you should complete individually. The following suffixes are not all possible suffixes we have in English, but there are so many of them that here are only the productive suffixes (working well with many stems). 52 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika POINTS TO REMEMBER Suffixes carrying primary stress themselves: -ee - refugee -eer - mountaineer -ese - Portuguese -ette - cigarette -esque - picturesque Suffixes that do not affect stress placement: -able - comfortable -age - anchorage -al - refusal -en - widen -ful - wonderful -ing - amazing -ish - devilish (This applies to adjectives; verbs with stems of more than one syllable always have the stress on the syllable immediately preceding -ish.) -like - birdlike -less -powerless -ly - hurriedly -ment - punishment -ness - yellowness -ous - poisonous -fy - glorify -wise - clockwise -y - (adjective or noun) - fun, funny 53 Stress, word stress, sentence stress Suffixes that influence stress in the stem: -eous - advantage - advantageous -graphy - photo - photography -ial - proverb - proverbial -ic - climate - climatic -ion - perfect - perfection -ious - injury - injurious -ty - tranquil - tranquillity -ive - reflex - reflective INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT See the list of suffixes above and think of another word with the same stress pattern. Create the list either by writing your words next to the listed suffixes above or by composing your own list where you can apply the theoretical knowledge from above, apply it by looking up the words with the same stress pattern and compile your own list of words containing suffixes. Prefixes: stress in words with prefixes is governed by the same rules as those for words without prefixes. Below you can see some exercises on word stress you can do this as a comprehension check after reading about complex word stress. Circle the word with a different stress pattern than the others: Example money (machine) mountain message 1 answer agree allow attract 5 complete common careful crazy 2 middle minute mission mistake 6 pronounce provide promise prefer 3 compare correct copy collect 7 shampoo shoulder shower shopping 4 garden granny guitar grammar 8 reason remove receive review 9.3 Compound words Compound nouns can be broken into two words and both words make sense in English and can exist independently in English. Compounds are written in different ways - some- 54 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika times as one word - armchair, sometimes with the words separated by a hyphen - gear-change, fruit-cake. Sometimes as two words, separated by a space - desk lamp, coffee table. Most common type of a compound is the one which combines two nouns and stress is usually placed on the first syllable - 'typewriter, 'suitcase, 'car-ferry, 'sunrise, 'tea-cup. Some compounds with a first adjectival element and the -ed morpheme have stress on the second element - bad- 'tempered, half- 'timbered, heavy- 'handed. Compounds in which the first element is a number in some form also tend to have final stress: three- 'wheeler, second- 'class, five- 'hander. Compounds functioning as adverbs are usually final-stressed: head- first, North- 'East. Compounds which function as verbs and have an adverbial first element take final stress: down- 'grade, back- 'pedal. 1. Stress in compound words: write the words in bold in the correct columns: There's a good shopping centre. You can find almost anything there. 1'here arc bookshops, shoe shops, a travel agent's, a post office, a hairdresser's, a supermarket, everything... and there arc a few snack bars if you want a hamburger or something. Oh, and there's a sports centre too, with a swimming pool and a playground for the kids. But be careful with your handbag; I had my credit card stolen there once! Oo Ooo Oooo bookshops shopping cen+re. 2. Stress in longer words: suffixes with penultimate stress - A: Here are is a list of beginnings and endings which do not change the stress of the shorter word: -able (drinkable) in-/im- (impossible) -ness (happiness) -al (musical) -ise (civilise) -ship (friendship) er (player) -ish (childish) un- (unhappy) -rul (helpful) -less (childless) under- (underpay) -hoed (childhood) -ly (friendly) -big (boring) -meal (employment) Use the beginnings and endings in A opposite to make longer words from the words below. Listen and check if you get the same words as on the recording. Then listen again and repeat. Example child cMiSnoodj jAjWfeK^ ^MI^M^. ehfrtess 1 believe..........„.........._.................____.......„........._________.................___________________________......._________........................_________.......................................... 2 enjoy_____...........__________.................................____....._____....._____________........_............______________.............................'____............_________________ 3 care --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 55 Stress, word stress, sentence stress INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT 1. Stress in longer words: suffixes with ante-penultimate stress: write the words from the box in the correct column according to their stress pattern. economics economy physics chemistry geography fd^ograii/ mathematics /nucBa'mEetiks/ sociology history/'histn/ geology photography nation nationality Oo Ooo 0O00 00O00 00O0 f.ccMoiurcS DEFINITION Variable stress: stress position sometimes varies because of two main reasons: the stress might change due to other words preceding or following the word in question or not all the speakers agree on stress placement in a particular word. Compare: bad- 'temperedx a 'bad-tempered 'teacher half- 'timbered x a 'half-timbered 'house heavy- 'handed x a 'heavy-handed 'sentence 9.4 Word-class pairs Word-class pairs: in English we have several dozen pairs of two-syllable words which are spelt the same and the only difference is the level and position of stress and their word class (noun, adjective or verb). Most of them appear to consist of prefix + stem. As defined by Roach: the rule is as follows: if a pair of prefix-plus-stem words exists, both members of which are spelt identically, one of which is a verb and the other of which is either a noun or an adjective, then the stress is placed on the second syllable of the verb but on the first syllable of the noun or adjective (Roach, 110, 2009). Some common examples are given below: Abstract, conduct, contract, contrast, desert, escort, export, import, insult, object, perfect, permit, present, produce, protest, rebel, record, subject. 56 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Abstract Conduct Contract Contrast Desert Escort Export Import Insult Object Perfect Permit Present Produce Protest Rebel Record Subject 9.5 Exercises Task 1: See the PDF file in Tutorial 9 "Pronunciation poems", print it and master the pronunciation, paying attention to correct articulation of all vowel and consonant phonemes and stress placement. You can find it easier to mark the stress in all words so that you know which syllable should be stressed and more prominent, thus carrying the rhythm and making it very easy for you to read aloud and sound like a native English speaker! 57 Stress, word stress, sentence stress Task 2: See the units 22, 28, 29, 30 and 31 for further practice of word stress, complex words stress, compound words stress in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. Some of the exercises are copied above for you to practice straightaway. Task 3: Create a list of word-class pairs. See the words above, copy them into two columns, one column representing nouns and the other representing verbs. Insert the stress mark accordingly and fill in the transcription of the nouns and the verbs. Repeat the words after your teacher when in class and master their pronunciation at home, ideally, in front of the mirror with the created list at hand. 2 I SUMMARY In this unit, students deepened their knowledge of word stress, complex words stress, stress marking, levels and nature of stress. Students were shown how stress is crucial for future studies of aspects of connected speech such as rhythm and mainly intonation. Students have analysed and completed numerous exercises and created a list of word-class pairs. They have also improved their ability to mark the stress, pronounce the stressed syllable with prominence and transcribe the words including the primary and secondary stress mark. 58 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 10 WEAK FORMS QUICK OVERVIEW This unit outlines weak forms of pronunciation, in weak/unstressed syllables and their usage in connected speech. Students will read the text and practise linking, they will transcribe individual words as well as whole texts using phonemic symbol Schwa where appropriate. AIMS Students will develop their ability to identify weak forms and demonstrate their ability to find them in transcribed texts and identify them in audio units. This unit also states the importance of weak forms in connected speech; students have to be able to distinguish between strong and weak forms of pronunciation and show the ability to transcribe given words or whole texts using weak forms of pronunciation. KEYWORDS Strong forms, weak forms, linking, word stress, sentence stress, elision. 10.1 Strong and weak forms of pronunciation The following theoretical background is taken from Unit 12 on Weak forms in English Phonetics and Phonology, the text is structured and the main points are numbered so it is very easy to look for specific information you will need for the practical part of this unit and for the tasks in the Tutorial 10 on Moodle. 59 Weak forms WEAK. FbfcMS 1. 'the' Weak forms: 69 (before consonants) 'Shut the door' '[At da do: fli (before vowels) 'Wait for the end' wert fe Oi 'end I. 'a', 'an' Weak forms: and Weak form: 3 (before consonants) 'Read a book' 'ri:d 9 'buk 9n (before vowels) 'Eat an apple' 'i:t an 'aepl an (sometimes n after t, d, s, z, J) 'Come and see' 'kAm an si: 'Fish and chips' 'fl{ 0 'tjips Weak form: bat 'It's good but expensive' its gud bat iks'pensiv i. 'that' (This word only has a weak form when used in a relative clause; when used with a demonstrative sense it is always pronounced in its strong form.) Weak form: flat 'The price is the thing that annoys me' fla 'prais iz fla '9irj flat a'noiz mi i. 'than' Weak form: flan 'Better than ever' 'bete flan 'eva '. 'HIS1 (when it occurs before a noun) Weak form: iz (hiz at the beginning of a sentence) 'Take his name' 'teik iz 'neim (Another sense of 'his', as in 'it was his', or 'his was late', always has the strong form.) i. 'her' (When used with possessive sense, preceding a noun; as an object pronoun, this can also occur at the end of a sentence.) Weak forms: 9 (before consonants) 'Take her home' 'teik a heom ar (before vowels) 'Take her out' 'teik ar 'aot 'your' Weak forms: J9 (before consonants) 'Take your time' 'teik ja 'taim jar (before vowels) 'On your own' 'on jar aun 1. 'ski;', 'hi:', '\vi:', 'you' This group of pronouns has weak forms pronounced with weaker vowels than the i: and u: of their strong forms. 1 will use the symbols i and u (in preference to I and U) to represent them. There is little difference in the pronunciation in different places in the sentence, except in the case of 'he'. Weak forms: ' s h f.' Ji 'Why did she read it?' 'wai did Ji 'ri:d It 'Who is she?' hu: 'iz Ji 'nr.' i (the weak form is usually pronounced without h except at the beginning of a sentence) 'Which did he choose?' 'witj did i 't|u:z 'He was late, wasn't he?' hi waz 'leit 'woznt i hau kan wi get flea wi 'ni:d flaet 'daunt wi 'we' wi 'How can we get there?' 'We need that, don't we? 'you' ju 'What do you think?' 'wDt da ju '8ir)k 'You like it, do you?' ju 'laik it 'du: ju 11. 'him' Weak form: im 'Leave him alone' 'li:v im a'teun 'I've seen him' aiv 'si:n im 12. 'her' Weak form: a (h9 when sentence-initial) 'Ask her to come' 'a:sk 9 ta 'kAm 'I've met her' aiv 'met a 13. 'them' Weak form: flam 'Leave them here' 'li:v flam 'hia 'Eat them' 'i:t flem 14. 'us' Weak form: as 'Write us a letter' 'rait as a 'lete 'They invited all of us' Oei in'vartid 'd:I av 9s The next group of words (some prepositions and other function words) occur in their strong forms when they are final in a sentence; examples of this are given. (19 is a partial exception.) 15. 'at' Weak form: at 'I'll see you at lunch' ail 'si: ju 9t 'lAnf In final position: aet 'What's he shooting at?' wots i 'fu:tir) aet 16. 'for' Weak form: fg (before consonants) 'Tea for two' 'ti: fa 'tu: far (before vowels) 'Thanks for asking' 'Baerjks far 'aiskiQ In final position: frj: 'What's that for?' wots 'fleet fo: 17. 'from' Weak form: frgm 'I'm home from work' aim haum frgm 'w3:k In final position: from 'Here's where it came from' 'hiaz wear it 'keinn from 18. 'of' Weak form: av 'Most of all' 'meust ev 'o:l In final position: ov 'Someone I've heard of 'SAmWAn aiv 'h3:d dv 19. 'to' Weak forms: ta (before consonants) 'Try to stop' trai ta stop tu (before vowels) 'Time to eat' 'taim tu 'i:t In final position: tu (It is not usual to use the strong form tu:, and the pre-consonantal weak form t9 is never used.) '1 don't want to' ai 'daunt 'wont tu 20. 'as' Weak form: az 'As much as possible' az 'mAtf 9Z 'posib{ In final position: aez 'That's what it was sold as' 'flaets 'wDt it waz sauld aez 60 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 21. 'some' This word is used in two different ways. In one sense (typically, when it occurs before a countable noun, meaning "an unknown individual") it has the strong form: '1 think some animal broke it' ai 'Birjk SAtn 'seniml 'brauk it It is also used before uncountable nouns (meaning "an unspecified amount of") and before other nouns in the plural (meaning "an unspecified number of"), in such uses it has the weak form sem. 'Have some more tea' 'haev sem 'mo: 'ti: In final position: SAtn 'I've got some' aiv 'got SAm 22. 'there' When this word has a demonstrative function, it always occurs in its strong form flea (fleer before vowels), e.g. 'There it is' 'Sear it 'iz 'Put it thcte' 'put it 'dee Weak forms: fle (before consonants) 'There should be a rule' fle 'fud bi 9 'ru:l Oar (before vowels) 'There is' der iz In final position the pronunciation may be 08 or flea. 'There isn't any, is there?' fler iznt eni 'iz fla or fler iztjt eni 'iz flea The remaining weak-form words are all auxiliary verbs, which are always used in conjunction with (or at least implying) another ("full") verb. It is important to remember that in their negative form (i.e. combined with 'not') they never have the weak pronunciation, and some (e.g. 'don't', 'can't') have different vowels from their non-negative strong forms. 23. 'can', 'could' Weak forms: ken, ked 'They can wait' 'flat kan 'welt 'He could do it' 'hi: ked 'du: it In final position: kaen, kud 'I think we can' ai '6ir)k wi kaen 'Most of them could' meust ev flam kud 24. 'have', 'has', 'had' Weak forms: ev, 8z, ad (with initial h in initial position) 'Which have you seen?' 'witj 8v ju 'si:n 'Which has been best?' witf 8z 'bi:n 'best 'Most had gone home' 'maust ad 'gon 'heum In final position: heev. haez, haed 'Yes, we have' 'jes wi 'haev 'I think she has' ai 8tnk fi 'haez '1 thought we had' ai Bo:t wi 'heed 25. 'shall', 'should' Weak forms: fal or J|; Jed 'We shall need to hurry' wi f] 'ni:d ta 'lwi '1 should forget it' 'ai fed fe'get it In final position: fasl, fud 'I think we shall' at '8irjk wi 'feel 'So you should' 'sau ju fud 26. 'must' This word is sometimes used with the sense of forming conclusion or deduction, e.g. 'she left at 8 o'clock, so she must hav arrived by now'; when 'must' is used in this way, it is rather les likely to occur in its weak form than when it is being used in i more familiar sense of "obligation". Weak forms: mas (before consonants) 'You must try harder' ju mas 'trat ha:da mast (before vowels) 'He must ear more' hi mast 'i:t 'mo: In final position: mASt 'She certainly must' fi 'S3:tnli 'mASt 27. 'do', 'does' Weak forms: 'do' da (before consonants) 'Why do they like it?' 'wai cts flei latk it du (before vowels) 'Why do all the cars stop?' 'wai du a:l fla 'ka:z 'stop 'does' dez 'When does it arrive?' wen dez it e'raiv In final position: du:, dAZ 'We don't smoke, but some people do' wi: daunt 'smauk bet 'SAm 'pi:pj 'du: '1 think John does' ai 'Qirjk 'd3on dAZ 28. 'am', 'are', 'was', 'were' Weak forms: em 'Why am I here?' wai am ai 'hia a (before consonants) 'Here are the plates' 'hier a fla 'pleits or (before vowels) 'The coats are in there' fle 'kouts or in flee w82 'He was here a minute ago' hi wez 'hier a 'mmit a'gau we (before consonants) 'The papers were late' fle 'peipaz we 'leit war (before vowels) 'The questions were easy' fla 'kwestfenz war 'i:zi In final position: aem, a:, woz, w3: 'She's not as old as I am' fiz 'nDt az 'auld sz at asm '1 know the Smiths are' ai 'nau fle 'smi8s a: 'The last record was' fle la:st 'reko:d wuz 'They weren't as cold as we were' flei 'wa:nt az keuld sz 'wi: w3: 61 Weak forms 10.2 Exercises Task 1: See the PDF files on Moodle in Tutorial 10 about strong and weak forms of pronunciation and complete the tasks in the handout called Strong and weak forms. The key will be given to you by a tutor or your answers will be checked in the lesson. INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Task 2: See the Pronunciation rhymes 1-3 on Moodle in Tutorial 10 - it is an additional exercise but it is crucial for further intonation practice. Print it, underline the stressed syllables and after reading it aloud, try practising reciting one of them, paying attention to strong and weak syllables, thus to stressed and unstressed places on each line of the poem. Stand in front of the mirror and imagine, there is an audience and you are an actor. Master the poem reciting and have a laugh with your classmates. You can also evaluate each other's performances, saying what is brilliant and where you should improve. Task 3: Have a look at Audio unit 12 in English Phonetics and Phonology, listen to the recordings and complete the tasks such as sentences for repetition - here it is really vital that you try repeating the sentences after the person in the recording, stopping the recording anytime you need more time. When you transcribe the sentences from the first exercise, make sure that you write the phoneme Schwa for any unstressed - weak syllable you hear. The other exercises give you an opportunity to define, model and master weak forms in pre-vocalic and pre-consonantal forms, their transcription and pronunciation. EXTRAS Task 4: For further practice of differences and specific features between strong and weak forms of pronunciation have a look at units: 34, 35, 36 and 37 in English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate. See the example exercises below: 62 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Circle the word are if you think the /r/ is pronounced. Then listen, check and repeat. There(gre)a lot of books in the picture. Some ^ of them are on the desks and some are on the shelves. There are some trees outside the windows. The windows are open. There are some pens on one of the desks. Exercises What are the things in the picture? Write them in the correct column according to the rhythm (there are two phrases in each column). Use these words: bowl, bottle, jar, packet, bag, pot, carton, kilo. Then say the phrases aloud. oOoO oOoOo oOooO oOooOo A boid o( soiip INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Have a look at Audio unit 13 in the seminar handouts. These exercises give you an opportunity to revise and check your progress. You are going to read unfamiliar words from transcription, transcribe unfamiliar words, master stress marking and placing sentence stress. You will improve you pronunciation of stressed syllables and revise weak forms of pronunciation by repeating them and transcribing them. SUMMARY In this unit, students have defined the differences between the strong and weak forms of pronunciation. They have improved their ability to distinguish between strong and weak forms, have identified weak forms in transcribed words, and have mastered the pronunciation and transcription of weak forms in individual words as well as in connected speech. 63 Aspects of connected speech 11 ASPECTS OF CONNECTED SPEECH QUICK OVERVIEW This unit outlines the aspects of connected speech, namely rhythm, assimilation, elision and linking. Students will learn about the importance of correct pronunciation for flawless connected speech when learning a foreign language. In the practical part of this unit, students will practise linking by singing songs and rhymes, they will practise rhythm when reciting poems, they will identify assimilation and elision in spoken English when watching videos and listening to audios. AIMS The aim of this unit is to outline the aspects of connected speech. Students will sing a song to practise linking, they will recite a poem to identify and model the rhythm and sentence stress, and they will watch videos and listen to audios to examine the importance and specific features of rhythm and linking in spoken English. They will determine assimilation and elision in given texts and explain its importance and model the pronunciation. KEYWORDS _ Connected speech, linking, rhythm, assimilation, elision, songs and rhymes. 11.1 Rhythm, assimilation, elision, linking In this unit, we will be dealing with aspects of connected speech, in other words with the way any language really sounds when spoken fluently by native or advanced non-native speakers. There are many studies on connected speech phenomenon but we will have a look at four main aspects - rhythm, assimilation, elision and linking, including linking consonants. 64 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika DEFINITION Rhythm - English language as we know it today is phonic, easy to sing along with and rhythmical. English has stress-timed rhythm which means that stressed syllables will occur in relatively regular intervals whether they are separated by unstressed syllables or not, the times from each stressed syllable to the next will tend to be the same, irrespective of the number of intervening unstressed syllables (Roach, 2009). See: Example: 'wo:k 'daon dd pa:6 tu: di 'end vv dd kd 'nail Some languages have syllable-timed rhythm where it does not matter if the syllables are stressed or unstressed, there will be regular interval between them but the times will be shorter or longer in proportion to the number of unstressed syllables (Roach, 135, 2009). It is generally known fact that English speech seems to be of regular alternation between stronger and weaker sound and tends to adjust stress levels to bring this about. The effect is noticeable when it comes to stress-shift (Roach, 2009). Compare: Example: compact (adjective) - kdm 'pcekt x compact disc - kvmpcekt 'disk. DEFINITION Assimilation means that phonemes of a particular word would be realised differently in isolation and differently when a phoneme is near some other phoneme belonging to a neighbouring word. Assimilation is something that changes according to speaking and style, it is found in rapid, casual and natural speech rather than in slow, careful speech (Roach, 2009). • Regressive assimilation (Right-To-Left, Anticipatory) A sound becomes more like a following sound. Some prefer to use the term anticipatory assimilation, as the sound which changes anticipates the following sound in some way. It is also called "regressive assimilation". Example: English /inZ-prefix, as in "indecent", "import", "irregular", "illegal". • Progressive assimilation (Left-to-Right, Perseverative), a sound becomes more like the preceding sound. This is an example of progressive assimilation. 65 Aspects of connected speech Example: English plural is either /z/ or /s/ when it occurs after a non-sibilant sound. The voicing feature is taken from the final consonant of the base. Cats, dogs. • Assimilation of place - light blue, meat pie • Assimilation of manner - that side, get them, read these • Assimilation of voicing - see above DEFINITION _ Elision: to define an elision, we do not have to use many complicated words, sometimes in language, sounds just disappear - a phoneme may be realised as zero or have zero realisation or be deleted. 1. Loss of weak syllable after p, t, k - potato, tomato, perhaps, today 2. Weak vowel + n, 1 or r becomes syllabic consonant - tonight, police, correct 3. Avoidance of complex consonant clusters - George the Sixth's throne = George the Sixth throne 4. Loss of final v in o/before consonants: lots of them, waste of money. It is quite difficult to state that contracted words or grammatical words should be considered as an example of elision or not. The most common cases when grammatical or contracted words seem to be examples of elision are: had, is, will, have, not, are. DEFINITION Linking: the most familiar case is the use of linking r, the phoneme r does not occur in syllable-final position in the BBC accent, but when a word's spelling suggests a final r, and a word beginning with a vowel follows, the usual pronunciation is to pronounce r -here x here are, four xfour eggs (Roach, 2009). BBC speaker use r in similar way to link two words together when both words end with a vowel. See: we call this an intrusive r - when words do not end in r but if the next sound is a vowel, the intrusive r is used See: Example: Formula A - fo.mjohrei. Example: Media event - 'mi.didri 'vent 66 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Linking and intrusive r - are special cases of juncture, this name refers to the relationship between one sound and the sounds that immediately precede and follow it, and it has been given some importance in phonological theory (Roach, 2009). QUESTION- ASSIMILATION AND ELISION PRACTICE Activity 1: Joining words - see the pictures below and try to link the words together, paying attention to correct articulation of all vowel and consonantal sounds you have learned and mastered so far, stressed and unstressed syllables and consequently the rhythm you feel. In fluent speech, people join words together. When one word ends with a consonant and the next word begins with a vowel, imagine that the consonant is at the beginning of the next word. For example, say the first line of the chant below as if the words were divided like this: /yr> to pa teit/. Listen to the chant and repeat. The rhythm of each line is the same. The symbol _ shows where the consonant sound joins to the vowel sound of the next word. 6ot_up_at_eight, Gotona bus, Went_into work, Worked_until two. Went out for lunch, Worked_until six, Backon the bus, Switched_on the box", Slept_in_a chair. ax = television) The consonant sound /r/ is used to separate vowel sounds when there is a letter R at the end of the first word. In many accents of English, including Southern British, this final letter R is not pronounced, so the word ends in a vowel sound. For example, the word after is pronounced /a:f I a/. But if the following word begins with a vowel sound, the R is pronounced, in order to separate the two vowels. For example, the R is pronounced in after eight /a:11 orcil/. In this case, the R sounds like it is at the start of the next word, so after eight sounds like after rate. Listen to the examples. R not pronounced R pronounced sounds like ... her card her ace her race under sixteen under age under rage after nine after eight after rate tour legs four eyes four rise clear skies dear air clear rare 67 Aspects of connected speech INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Activity 2: Spell out the first names below and if possible, try to record yourself. Instead of pronouncing each letter of the alphabet separately, try to link the sounds, not the letters! Tom, Ben, Erin, Tania, Rosie. Example: tifouwem for Tom. COMPREHENSION CHECK Activity 3: Assimilation and elision exercise - see the pictures below and master the pronunciation using assimilation and elision. The sounds which most frequently change when they are at the end of a word are fdj, /t/ and /n/. They can change so much that the word sounds like another word. Listen to these examples: I've got a bad cold, (bad sounds similar to bag) We had a bad year, (bad sounds similar to badge) They shot bears, (shot sounds similar to shop) They shot cats, (shot sounds similar to shock) What's your son called? (son sounds similar to sung) My son made this, (son sounds similar to sum) The consonants /d/ and /)/ may disappear completely when the next word starts with a consonant. For example, in the phrases below, the verb may sound as if it is in the present tense. asked questions mixed paint boiled carrots used power 68 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Example torch / talk a I taupht classes this morning.............JtSSL b You taught yourself French.............iffiSsfe.. 1 a The s_yn burnt my neck. ........................................ sum / sung , , b The sun came up over the mountains. 2 a I can't beat you at this game............................. beak / beach , b I can beat Carol at tennis...........................---------- 3 a I can't get this coat clean.................................... b Is this the coat you bought? ............................... 4 a They cheat quite a lot.......................................... i" H ■111 / check 'k b They cheat people out of their money. 11.2 Exercises Task 1: Have a look at Tutorial 11 on Moodle where you can find links to pronunciation practice videos from BBC Learning English official website. There is a script in PDF under each link which you can print and follow during listening and mastering the aspects of connected speech, e.g. elision, assimilation and linking. It is highly recommended that you watch as many videos on this website as possible as the whole workshop is of high quality and brings simple and accurate explanations and tip for becoming a better listener and even better speaker of English. Task 2: Have a look at Audio unit 14 - Elisions in the seminar handout by P. Roach, listen to the recordings and complete the tasks on one, two and three elisions. EXTRAS Transcribe the following text: The music of the people: The most popular dance in Brazil, samba, is often called the 'music of the people'. In the 1960s and 1970s people turned to US-style pop-music, but these days samba is back again. There are different versions of samba - some that people dance in their villages, others that they practise especially to dance at Carnival in Rio. Thousands of people go to 69 Aspects of connected speech samba schools, typically on Saturday night - to dance, to learn, or just to watch. Thirty-year-old Anna Rita goes every week with her husband, just because it's fun. Everybody loves to dance and it's a great way to meet new people. SUMMARY _ In this unit, students have defined and classified aspects of connected speech - elision, assimilation, linking and rhythm, now they can analyse, compare and discuss aspects of connected speech. Students have also watched videos on different aspects of connected speech and completed comprehension check on Moodle. Students have also mastered the pronunciation and transcription of connected speech phenomena. 70 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 12 INTONATION QUICK OVERVIEW This unit brings introduction to intonation, form and function of intonation, tone and languages, complex tones and pitch height, some function of English tones, tones on other words, the tone-unit and its structure and the pitch possibilities in the simple tone-unit. Further on, it explains fall-rise and rise-fall tones followed by a tail, high and low heads, problems in analysing the form of intonation, the attitudinal function of intonation, the accentual, the grammatical and the discourse functions of intonation. AIMS The aim of this unit is to analyze the complex system of English intonation including different forms and structure of intonation. Students will role-play dialogues to practise the attitudinal and the discourse function of intonation. They are going to analyze videos and audios to identify and classify concrete forms and functions of intonation. Students will be given assignments to create, organize and dramatize role plays to revise, practise and master English intonation but also the perfect pronunciation of all the English phonemes and aspects of connected speech. KEYWORDS Intonation, forms of intonation, functions of intonation, dialogues, role-play. 12.1 Intonation Stress was one of the features of suprasegmental phonology and in the last chapter, we will have a look at another feature of similar significance and it is intonation. The knowledge of intonation and its features is absolutely essential for learner of English language because there can be many misunderstandings and funny moments as intonation caries not only some kind of sound of language but also some message the speaker is trying to communicate. Intonation, together with body language can give simple words and sounds a brand new meaning. Intonation can have grammatical, discourse, accentual and attitudi- 71 Intonation nal features. Though this is mainly a practical pronunciation course, the knowledge of basic features of intonation is absolutely essential for correct practice and mastering English pronunciation. DEFINITION The most important part of intonation is a pitch and we describe pitch in terms of high and low and when it comes to intonation, the listeners should only be interested in some linguistic information carried by the pitch and in the fact that some speakers generally speak in a high-pitched voice and some in low-pitched voice. Pitch can also be described as a fundamental frequency of voiced sounds (Roach, 151, 2009). 12.1.1 Form and function in intonation Answer these two questions below, read the definitions and compare your answers. QUESTIONS Q: What can we observe when we study pitch variations? Q: What is the linguistic importance of the phenomena we observe? In other words - what is the form and function of intonation? We need to introduce a new term as we need a name for a continuous piece of speech beginning and ending with a clear pause - we call this - utterance. Two common one-syllable utterances are for example 'yes' and 'no'. The word we use for the overall behaviour of the pitch in a tone. Level tone is not very commonly used in one-syllable words, English speakers use moving tone more. If English speakers want to say 'yes' or 'no' in a definite, final manner they will probably use a falling tone - one which descends from a higher to lower pitch. If they want to say yes? or no? in a questioning manner they may say it with a rising tone - a movement from a lower pitch to a higher one (Roach, 152, 2009). COMPREHENSION CHECK Define the difference between a rising and a falling tone. 72 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 12.1.2 Complex tones and pitch height There are three simple tones that can be used on one-syllable English utterances: level, rise, and fall. However, other more complex tones are also used - fall-rise tone - the pitch descends and then rises again. Rise-fall - where the pitch rises and then descends again. It is important to say that each speaker normally uses low-pitched tones in normal conversation and it is only when emotions and feeling are part of the utterance when the speakers' intonation reaches the higher-pitched tones or extra-high pitch. English tones have certain functions and we will describe them only briefly as defined and stated in Roach (2009). Fall yes no: usually regarded as more or less neutral tone. If you ask someone and he answers yes with this tone, then it is neutral, with no emotions and can give an impression of 'finality'. Rise yes no: this tone conveys an impression that something more is to follow, a typical occurrence in a dialogue between two speakers whom we call A and B might be following: A: (wishing to attract B 's attention): Excuse me. B: Yes? (B's reply is perhaps an equivalent to "What do you want?) Fall-rise yes no: the fall-rise is used a lot in English and has some rather special function. In the present context we will only consider one fairly simple one, which could perhaps be described as "limited agreement" or "response with reservations". Examples: A: I've heard that it's a good school. B: Yes B's reply would be taken to mean that he would not completely agree with what A said, and A would probably expect B to go on to explain why he was reluctant to agree. Similarly: Examples: A: It's not really an expensive book, is it? B: no. Rise-fall yes no: this is used to convey rather strong feelings of approval, disapproval or surprise. It is not usually considered to be an important tone for foreign learner to acquire, although it is still useful practice to learn to distinguish it from other tones. Examples: 73 Intonation • A: You wouldn't do an awful thing like that, would you? • B: No! • A: Isn 't the view lovely? • B: Yes! • A: I think you said it was the best so far. • B: Yes! INDIVIDUAL TASK Activity 1: Read units 16 - Intonation 2, 17 - Intonation 3 in English Phonetics and Phonology for better and full understanding of English intonation. Below, we will only address different function of intonation but the comprehension check on Moodle requires you to read the above mentioned units to be able to complete the exercises on Moodle in Tutorial 12. Activity 2: Mastering intonation is mainly about repeating and imitating the native speakers and understanding what functions a particular tones have. Listen to the Audio unit 15 Tones; take your time for repetition and realisation of intonation forms in the exercises. The aim is to complete Audio unit 15 and master the English tones pronunciation. 12.1.3 Functions of intonation Roach (183, 2009) states that the best was to start looking at different functions of intonation is to ask ourselves what would be lost if we were to speak without intonation: you should try to imagine speech in which every syllable was said on the same level pitch, with no pauses and no changes in speed or loudness. This is the sort of speech that would be produced by a "mechanical speech" device. To put it in the broadest possible terms, we can see that intonation makes it easier for a listener to understand what a speaker is trying to convey. The ways in which intonation does this are very complex, and many suggestions have been made for ways of isolating different functions. These are the most commonly suggested functions of intonation: a) Attitudinal function: intonation enables to express feelings and emotions and attitudes as we speak, and this adds a special meaning to spoken language. b) Accentual function: intonation helps to produce the effect of prominence on syllables that need to be perceived as stressed, and in particular the placing of tonic 74 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika stress on a particular syllable marks out the word to which it belongs as the most important in the tone-unit. c) Grammatical function: the listener is better able to recognise the grammar and syntactic structure of what is being said by using the information contained in the intonation; for example, such things as the placement of boundaries between phrases, clauses or sentences, the difference between questions and statements and the use of grammatical subordination may be indicated. d) Discourse function: look at the act of speaking in a broader way, we can see that intonation can signal to the listener what is to be taken as "new" information and what is already "given", can suggest when the speaker is indicating some sort of contrast or link with material in another tone-unit and, in conversation, can convey to the listener what kind of response is expected. POINTS TO REMEMBER British Council on their website brings detailed explanation of attitudinal and grammatical function: • Attitudinal: in many spoken languages around the world - but especially in British English - it is easy for the listener to understand the speaker's attitude: boredom, interest, surprise, anger, appreciation, happiness, and so on, are often evident in their intonation. For instance, a server at a restaurant asks 'How's the chocolate muffin, madam?' and you reply 'mMMmmmm' with the intonation rising in the middle and falling towards the end. The server nods with a smile. Why? Because you have just expressed your appreciation for the item through the music of your voice - and without so much as a single (ordinarily meaningful) word. Another instance of a different type would be your intonation on receiving a surprise birthday cake at your work. 'Did you get that for me?' you might say - your rising intonation, particularly on 'me' at the end, expressing surprise and delight. The feeling of boredom or indifference, on the other hand, might be expressed with a flat tone, (think of a robot). Compare the 'thank you' uttered to the mailman delivering a utility bill (flat) and the 'thank you!' said when someone helps you mend a flat tyre on the side of a road (expressive, heartfelt). We often express gratitude and other emotions as much by our use of intonation as by the use of specific words. • Grammatical: There are some intonation patterns in English, which, for the most part, correspond to the use of particular grammar structures. The most common example is in the use of wh-questions (questions beginning with 'who', 'what', 'why', 'where', 'when', 'which', and 'how'), which usually have a falling intonation. 75 Intonation In a conversation with a new classmate, the following questions would sound most natural with falling intonation: 'What's your name?', Where are you from?', Why did you choose this school?', 'How long will you study here?'. Questions that require a 'yes' or 'no' answer, however, usually have upward intonation. In the same conversation with your classmate, your voice would rise at the end when asking the following questions: 'Have you studied here before?', 'Do you like the teacher?', 'Will you come back tomorrow?'. (Source: https://www.britishcouncil.org/voices-magazine/how-english-learners-can-improve-intonation, Accessed April, 2. 2019) 12.2 Exercises INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT Task 1: Have a look at Audio units 16 - The tone-unit, 17 - Intonation, 18 - Intonation: extracts from conversation and 19 - Transcription of connected speech in English Phonetics and Phonology, listen carefully to the recordings and complete the tasks mainly practising and giving you an opportunity to master intonation and transcription of connected speech. 12.2.1 Introducing tones: Task 2: Have a look at pictures below and complete the tasks: We can choose to make our voice go up or down at the end. In the conversation below, Sid said "bear" with his voice going down. Joe repeats the word with his voice going up. Try to finish the conversation and practise the fall-rise and rise-fall tone-units together or individually in front of the mirror. When in front of mirror, notice the changes in your facial expressions. 76 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Sid: Shh! Joe: What? Sid: Bear! Joe: Bear? Sid: Bear! Joe: Where? Sid: There! \ Joe: Far? Sid: No! Joe: Near? Sid: Yeah! Joe: Run? Sid: Run! The responses to the sentences below are the same but the speaker uses a different tone. Draw a line in the box to show if the voice goes up or down. Example a Let's go away for the weekend, b Let's go to Llantisiliogogogoch. 1 a I know who stole your glasses, b It was Mickey Mumpkin. 2 a I've got some bad news for you. b I'm afraid your house has burnt down. 3 a Excuse me, can you help us? b Can you take a photo of us with this camera? 4 a We're going for a picnic if you want to come, b At midnight tonight. - Where? - Where? -Who? mm -Who? - What? Hi - What! ■■ -Yes? WM -Yes. ■■ - When? ■i - When? WM 12.2.2 ASKING AND CHECKING TONES: Task 3: Read these short conversations and tick the questions. See the example in the first picture. A: Where? (A's voice goes down at the end) B: Here. A: Where? (A's voice goes up at the end.) B: Here. A: Here? (A's voice goes up at the end.) B: Yes. here. 77 Intonation 1 A: When? B: Tomorrow. A: When? B: Tomorrow. A: Tomorrow? B: Yes, tomorrow. 2 A: Which way? B: Left. A: What? B: Left. A: In front of the shop? B: Yes. 12.2.3 Tones in asking for information: Task 4: We pronounce 'open' question differently from the 'check' question. An 'open' question is where we ask for information we didn't have before and the voice usually goes down at the end. A 'check' question is where we make sure that the information we have is correct. The voice usually goes up at the end. See the examples in the conversation below: A: What's your name.'' \ B: Sonia. A: And where were you born? B: Surinam. A: Is that in South America? B: Yes, that's right. A: And how long have you lived here? B: Five years. A: I see. Are you married? >x B: No. I'm not. A: And what do you do? B: I'm a boxer. A: You're a boxer? M 78 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika 12.2.4 Agreeing and disagreeing - question tags. Task 5: Complete each sentence with an ending from the box. Then decide if they are opinions or check questions and draw lines in the little boxes. is it? isn't it? is she? isn't he? are you? aren't they? was it? wasn't he? don't you? doesn't it? have you? Example You aren't hungry,.........................H _ 1 How's your headache? It isn't getting worse, ..-.............................................. 2 Those flowers are lovely,............------------------------------- _ 3 You haven't seen my glasses anywhere,...............—............................- 4 Torsen's a great player,-----------.........—........... 5 I'm not sure. He was from Brazil,.............................-........ _ 6 I can't quite remember. You need 40 points to win,...................................-........... 7 Tennis is so boring,---------..........----------------- 8 She isn't a very good swimmer,.................................................- 9 I'm not sure. It starts at nine, ----------------------- 10 It wasn't a very interesting game,................................................ I 12.2.5 High tones: evaluative comments: Task 6: When we give an opinion about something with a very strong adjective like excellent, our voice usually goes high to show our strong feeling. If we use weaker adjectives like nice, our voice does not usually go high. Have a look at the conversation below, master the pronunciation including all the aspects of connected speech and mainly intonation, imagine the situation, individually practise each role and then try to practise the conversation in groups of three. 79 Intonation Liz: So, how was your trip? Claire: Oh, it was quite nice. Paul: What do you mean, nice? It was brilliant! Liz: Good hotel? Claire: Quite pleasant, yes. Paul: Pleasant? It was excellent! Superb! Liz: How about the food? Claire: It was OK. Paul: OK? It was absolutely delicious! Liz: And the scenery? Claire: Quite pretty. Paul: It was amazing! Beautiful! EXTRAS Task 6: See the conversation between a husband and a wife below. Practise both roles, imagine the situation, use some drama techniques, find yourself a partner and role-play this conversation in front of the class. The aim is to really master the intonation as this particular dialogue gradates and culminates towards the middle part and when the "actors" swap roles, the intonation is slightly different. Use your imagination and assign yourself a role which suits you best. You can try being a calm husband or a hysterical wife. The choice of drama techniques is solely up to you and your classmates! The main thing is to have fun while mastering English intonation! 80 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika A: I can't do all the housework and all the cooking. You've got to do more. B: You don't do all the housework and all the cooking. I cook the breakfast. A: And I clean the kitchen. B: I take the dog for a walk. A: I take the kids to school. B: I do the gardening. A: No you don't. I cut the grass. B: I dig the garden. A: Once a year, in August. Br I make you a cup of coffee every evening. A: 1 cook the supper. B: I clean the car. A: I pick up your things. B: OK. Let's change over. I'll pick up my own things. And you can clean the car. A: You can cook supper. B: You can make the coffee. A: You can cut the grass. B: You can dig the garden. A: Once a year, in August. You can take the kids to school. B: You can take the dog for a walk. A: You can clean the kitchen. B: And we'll give up cooked breakfasts. COMPREHENSION CHECK Task 7: Have a look at Tutorial 12 on Moodle, watch the videos about intonation and complete the comprehension check. SUMMARY In this unit students have learned about different aspects of intonation in English, its prominence for spoken English and its importance for learners of any language. Students have distinguished between different forms and function of intonation and practised intonating properly. 81 Revision unit 13 REVISION UNIT QUICK OVERVIEW In this unit, students are going to revise, evaluate and check their overall knowledge of English phonemes, aspects of connected speech and intonation. - AIMS The aim of this unit is to revise the knowledge from previous twelve units concerning identification, classification and organisation of English vowel and consonant phonemes, their pronunciation and transcription. Further on, this unit gives students and learners of English to improve their ability to distinguish different aspects of connected speech, master their pronunciation and transcription and to evaluate students' progress in the field of English phonetics and phonology. KEYWORDS Revise and check, improvement, progress, English phonemes, aspects of connected speech, intonation, pronunciation, phonemic transcription. 82 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Task 1: Read the poem below, try to articulate all the phonemes correctly, pay attention to the stress placement, rhythm, elision, assimilation and linking. See the instructions in Moodle in Tutorial 13 and complete the task there. We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes, But the plural of ox should be oxen, not oxes. Then one fowl is goose, but two are called geese, Yet the plural of moose should never be meese. You may find a lone mouse or a whole lot of mice, But the plural of house is houses, not hice. If the plural of man is always called men, Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen? The cow in the plural may be cows or kine, But the plural of vow is vows, not vine. And I speak of a foot, and you show me your feet, But I give you a boot — would a pair be called beet? If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth, Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth? Then one may be that, and three may be those, Yet the plural of hat would never be hose. We speak of a brother and also of brethren, But though we say mother, we never say methren. So our English, I think you will agree, Is the trickiest language you ever did see. Task 2: See the sentences below and fill each gap with one or more words in weak forms of pronunciation. Use the correct spelling as well as the phonemic symbols for the transcription. 83 Revision unit Example: Would you like go *° ft* canteen _ for a _ sandwich? I'm going (a)_town (b)_half (c) hour. ^| (a)____ just got a present (b)_my father. « 3 1 think they (a)___gone (b)___library 4 (a)_like (b)_glass (c)_two (d)_water. 5 They thanked me (a)_helping (b)_find the money. 6 (a)__know (b)_ Mary is? 7 Last time I saw (a)_she (b)__on (c) way (d)_town. 8 If (a)_.__been sensible (b)_listened (c)__my teacher. 9 Last night we went to a place (a)_ lots of cafes. Task 3: Match the following common phrases with their equivalents in phonemic script. 1 Do you want a cup of tea? m fa?nsija bai twi:t 2 You must be joking! m gntani tjeind.3 3 Come off it! m gDta gau tw3:k 4 Shut up! m d3a WAna kApa ti: 5 I'm worn out. Ii ai rrmf ta bed 6 Fancy a bite to eat? ■ kA mnfit 7 I'm off to bed. m Ja tAp 8 Got any change? m kanja lemija kwid 9 Got to go to work. m ja rriAS bi d3aukirj 10 Can you lend me a quid? It aim wd: naut 84 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Task 4: Read the following pairs of words and write how many identical sounds do they start with? 1 i Kate / cake 2 j Charles / chocolate 3 } - Oliver / olives _ 4 j Tom / tomatoes 5 | Susan / sugar_ 6 i Salome / salami 7 I Pat / pasta__ 8 Patty / pastry 9 Penny / pizza 10 Margery / margarine 11 Barbara / bananas_ 12 Sam / salmon_ 13 Colin / cola_ 14 Hrenda / bread__ 15 Jim / gin_ 16 Raymond / radishes Task 5: Odd one out. Each line contains either verbs or adjectives ending in -ed, or verbs or nouns ending in -s. Decide which is the odd one out in terms of the way the end is pronounced. Example: seas picks pays digs 1 picked stopped robbed taped 2 wanted shaped estimated congratulated 3 shops digs robs codes 4 judges horses names wishes 5 trapped faked hoped faded 6 wicked picked tricked licked b In each line, identify the word that has a different vowe m sun son done on 2 make leak break steak 3 cap packed patted waste 4 grave chi have ■: ; save cape 5 fool id wood r look put 6 queue tool group loud 7 give strive five hive 8 cute must muse news 85 Revision unit Task 6: Word stress: Look at the following pairs of words and decide: a) where the main stress is in the first word; b) if it stays on the same syllable in the second word, or moves. Example: The verb support has stress on the last syllable: o CD The noun supporter keeps the stress in the same place: o CD o The verb concentrate has stress on the first syllable: CD O O But in concentration the main stress moves forward: □ O CD O 1 photograph photography 2 estimate —> estimation 3 consult —» consultant 4 refer -> referral 5 physic —> physician 6 refuge —> refugee 7 capable —> capability 8 nation —» national 9 consult —> consultancy 10 ideal —» idealist 11 compute —» computer 12 astronomy —> astronomical 13 photography —> photographer 14 sentiment —> sentimental 15 approve —> approval 86 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika Task 7: Each line contains three words that rhyme and one word that doesn't. Pronounce them aloud and then choose the odd one out and underline it. Example: steel peal stalo peel 1 itert Curt shirt Bart !2 coot loot soot shoot |3 relate fete weight height spook took look rook food mood 1') revved good sewed glued chewed nude t? jerk clerk work shirk pact backed baked fact scene sign mean convene 10 laze pha.se days size m peak steak leak cheek 12 soot cut put foot 13 height tighi weight might 14 stalk work fork cork 15 quite night lied light 16 clear bear hare fair 17 barred ba ivd hard yard 18 duke spook look Luke =r 19 taught court snort coughed 20 prised missed fist kissed 87 Revision unit Task 8: Here are some names of cities and countries. Write them all in phonemic script, using phonemic symbols you have learned in unit 1 and 2. Prague Brussels Lisbon Hungary Dublin Moscow Hamburg Geneva Japan Brazil Thailand Germany Wales F.ngland Scotland Bangkok Italy Korea c hiíKi Manila Amsterdam Jakarta Greece Turkey Task 9: See the names of some countries and cities in phonemic script below and write the correctly spelled names next to them. Practise their pronunciation. 88 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika beť(d)3ir| 'paeris 'tríi5ki,>ií 'marnt/asta helrsirjki ,nju: 'p:k b3:'lin bel'greid 'brait(3)n 'wd;sd: ba:6 Jos 'aend^aíiiz Sňul 'venis Task 10: Homophones are words (or combination of words) which sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings, e.g. meet and meat. Find the pairs of homophones in the list below. side / balls / bear / bowled / cue / ducked / fort / work / grate / hair / hare / bales / week / dally / bald / bold / fought / weekly / stoke / walk / missed / air / pure / packed / pear / pore / where / pour / duct / bore / seam / quiet / sought / please / shake / wade / sheikh / pleas / weakly / bold / past 7 sighed / piece / mist / wear / seem / sight / slay / wake / win / steak / stalk / stroke / stork / daily / stake / weak / bare / holed / wine / pact / bawls / passed / wane / queue / great / heir / pair / whine / giant / sieigh / same / weighed / site / peace 89 Revision unit PŘEHLED DOSTUPNÝCH IKON Čas potřebný ke studiu □ m Klíčová slova Průvodce studiem I Rychlý náhled Tutoriály K zapamatování Řešená úloha Kontrolní otázka Odpovědi Samostatný úkol Pro zájemce Cíle kapitoly (ír m Nezapomeňte na odpočinek 1 Průvodce textem 2 I Shrnutí Dfl Definice Ol Případová studie Věta Korespondenční úkol Otázky Další zdroje Úkol k zamyšlení Pozn. Tuto část dokumentu nedoporučujeme upravovat, aby byla zachována správná funkčnost vložených maker. Tento poslední oddíl může být zamknut v MS Word 2010 prostřednictvím menu Revize/Omezit úpravy. Takto je rovněž omezena možnost měnit například styly v dokumentu. Pro jejich úpravu nebo přidávání či odebírání je opět nutné omezení úprav zrušit. Zámek není chráněn heslem. 90 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika LITERATURA: Povinná literatura: Roach, P. (2009) English Phonetics and Phonology: A Practical Course. 4th ed. Cambridge: CUP. Doporučená literatura: Biiring, D. (2016). Intonation and Meaning. Oxford: OUP. Hancock, M. (2010). English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate with answers, audio CDs. Cambridge: CUP. Vaughan, M. (2002). Test Your Pronunciation. Longman: Penguin. Wayland, R. (2018). Phonetics: A Practical Introduction. Cambridge: CUP. Wells, J. C. (2016). Sounds Fascinating: Further Observations on English Phonetics and Phonology. Cambridge: CUP. Wells, J. C. (2008). Longman Pronunciation Dictionary. 3rd ed. Pearson: Longman. Online sources: BBC Learning pronunciation course - http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/english/features/pronunciation BBC English Youtube channel - https://www.voutube.com/user/bbclearningenglish Obrázky a cvičení v této opoře - zdroj: Hancock, M. (2010). English Pronunciation in Use Intermediate with answers, audio CDs. Cambridge: CUP. Vaughan, M. (2002). Test Your Pronunciation. Longman: Penguin. 91 Mgr. Marie Machničová - Praktická fonetika SHRNUTÍ STUDIJNÍ OPORY Tento studijní distanční text přinesl studentům teoretické poznatky z oblasti fonetiky a fonologie současné angličtiny. Celá studijní opora je doplněna o LMS kurz na e-learningové platformě Moodle, který je rozdělen do 13 tutoriálů a koresponduje s třinácti kapitolami této studijní opory. Cílem tohoto textu bylo přinést studentům dostatečný teoretický základ pro pochopení fonetického a fonologického systému angličtiny, ale hlavně možnost prakticky si osvojit výslovnostní návyky a umění fonémické a částečně i fonetické transkripce. Studenti nalezli v opoře dostatečný počet cvičení a odkazů na externí zdroje, které jim dopomohou zvládnout a zlepšit se ve výslovnosti a transkripci. 92 Název: Praktická fonetika Autor: Mgr. Marie Machničová Vydavatel: Slezská univerzita v Opavě Filozoficko-přírodovědecká fakulta v Opavě Určeno: studentům SU FPF Opava Počet stran: 92 Tato publikace neprošla jazykovou úpravou.