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i&
Phonology and Phonetic
Transcription
Many people think that learning phonetics means simply learning to use pho-
transcription. But there is really much morc to the subject than learning to
a set of symbols. A phonetician is a person who can describe speech, who
lands the mechanisms of speech production and speech perception, and
knows how languages use these mechanisms. Phonelic lranscriplion is no
than a useful tool that phoneticians use in the description of speech. II is.
'ever. a very important tool .
In Ihis chapler, we will be concerned with the phonetic transcrip'ion of care-
ful speech- the style of speech you usc to show someone how CO pronounce a
word. This is called the citation style of speech. Transcriptions of citation style
Me particularly useful in language documentati on and lexicography, and also
as the basic phonetic observations described in phonology. In Chapter 5, we
will discuss phonetic transcription of connecled speech-the style that used in
..-mal conversation. When phoneticians transcribe a citation speech uUerance,
we are usually concemed with how the sound .. convey differences in meaning.
For the most part, we describe only the significant articulations rather (han the
4etails of the sounds. For example. when saying the English word lie, some peo
pie pronounce the consonant with the blade of the tongue against the alveolar
ridge, Olhers with the tip of the tOngue. This kind of difference in articulation
not affect the meaning of the word and is not usually transcribed. We will
begin by consideri ng just this simplest form of transcri ption, sometimes called a
brood trunscription.
In order to understand what we transcribe and what we don't. it is necessary
understand the basic principles of phonology. Phonology is the description of
systems and pattems of sounds that occur in a language. II involves studying
a language 10 determine its distinctive sounds, that is, those sounds that convey a
difference in meaning. Children have to do this when they are learning to speak.
Tbey may not realize at first that, for exampl e. there is a difference between the
consonants at the beginnings of words such as white and right. They later reali ze that
these words begin with two distinct sounds. Eventually, they leam to distinguish
aU the sounds that can change (he meanings of words.
33
2 Phonology and Phonetic Transcription
When two sounds can be used to differentiate words, they are said to
belong to different phonemes. There must be a phonemic difference if two words
(such as white and right or cat and bat) differ in only a single sound. There are,
however, phonetic variations that cannot be used to distinguish words, such as
the differences consonants at the of the word pop.
For the first the lips must opcn be a puff of air
before the After the final consonant, a puff of air, but
it is not you could say pop lips for hours, if
it happened word you said before The sound at the
end would consonants in this bilabial stops.
They are but the differences between them cannot be used to change
the meaning of a word in English. They both belong to the same phoneme.
We cannot rely on the spelling to tell us whether two sounds are members
of different phonemes. For example, the words phone andfoam begin with the
same sounds, although they have different spellings. To take a more complex ex-
ample, the words key and car begin with what we can regard as the same sound,
despite the fact that one is spelled with the letter k and the other with c. But in
this case, the two sounds are not exactly the same. The words key and car begin
with slightly sounds. If you whisper consonants in these
two words. hear the difference, be able to feel
that your roof of the mouth for each word.
This example there may be very subtle
of a phoncrne. at the beginning of
but it is not changes the meaning
both members of the same phoneme.
between members
slightly different,
English. They are
We noted other small changes in sounds that do not affect the meaning in
Chapter 1, where we saw that the tongue is farther back in true than in tea, and
the n in tenth is likely to be dental, whereas the n in ten is usually alveolar. In
some cases, the members of a phoneme are more different from one another. For
example, most Americans (and some younger speakers of British English) have
a t in the middle of pity that is very different from the t at the end of the word
pit. The one more like a d. Consider I play. You can say
just the first in this word without but still hear the I
(try doing say the whole word typically voiceless,
and very I in lay. Say the I of lay, and you'll
hear that voiced.
examples that a phoneme single sound, but a
name for There is a group 01 group of I sounds
that occur in English. It is as if you had in your mind an ideal t or I, and the
ones that are actually produced are variations that differ in small ways that do
not affect the meaning. These groups of sounds-the phonemes-are abstract
units that form the basis for writing down a language systematically and un-
ambiguously. (Peter Ladefoged's book Vowels and Consonants has an extended
discussion of the relationship between written language and phonology in which
k speCulates lhatlhe development of phonemic analysis was partly due to the
-.mg systems used by European linguists.}
We often want to record all-and only- the variations between sounds that
a difference in meaning. Transcriptions of this kind are called pItonDnjc
-.scriptions. Languages that have been written down only comparatively
~ o t l y (such as Swahili and most of the other languages of Africa) have.
lid) phonemic spelling syStem. There is very little difference betwcco a written
..-sian of a Swahili sentence and a phonemic transcription of that sentence .
.. because English pronunciation has changed over the centuries while the
.Iling has remained basical ly the same. phonemic transcripti ons of English
8lIIC different from wri nen texts.
THE TRANSCRIPTION OF CONSONANTS
We can begin searching for phonemes by considering the contrasting consonant
munds in English. A good way is to find sets of words that rhyme. Take. for
cumpJe. aU the words that rhyme with pie and have onl y a single consonant at
IIIe beginning. A set of words in which each differs from all the others by only
-.e sound is called a minimal set. The second column of Table 2. 1 li sts a set of
*s k.ind. There are obviously many other words that rhyme with pie, such as
~ . try, spry, but these words begin with sequences oflwo or more of the sounds
already in the minimal set. Some of the words in the li st begin with two conso-
..,.t!euers (thigh. thy, shy). but they each begin with a single consonant sound.
SIIy, for example. does nOt contain a sequence of two consonant sounds in the
way that spy and try do. You can record these words and sec the sequences in spy
md try for yourself.
Some consonants do not occur in words rhyming wi th pie. If we allow using
the names of the letters as words. then we can find another large set of canso--
DanIS beginning words rhyming with pea. A li st of such words is shown in the
third column or Table 2.1. (Speakers or British English wi ll have to remember
that in American English, the name or the last leiter of the alphabet belongs in
this set rather than in the set of words rhyming with bed.)
Even in this set of words, we are still mi ssing some consonant sounds that can
crast with others only in the middles or at the ends of words. The letters ng often
represent a single consonant sound that does nOl occur at the beginning of a word.
You can hear thi s sound at the end of the word rang. where it contrasts with other
nasals in words such as ram and ran, though the vowel sound in rang is a little dif-
ferent in most varieties of English. 1bere is also a contrast between the consonants
in the middles of mission and vision. although lhere are very few pairs of words
that are disti nguisbed by thi s contrast in English. (One such pai r for some speakers
invol ves the name of a chain of islands--Aleurian versus allusion.) Words illus-
trating these consonants are given in the fourth col umn of Table 2.1 .
Most of the symbol s in Table 2. 1 are the same letters we use in spelling these
words, but there are a few differences. One difference between spelling and
DTn 2 Phonoiogy and Phorlf'lic
p
j (y)
------ -----------
Symbols for transcribing English consonants. (Alternative symbols that may
be found in other books are given in parentheses.) The last column gives
the conventional names for phonetic in the firs! colurnn.
pie
tif'
kye
by
dye
guy
mv
nigh
fie
vie
thigh
thy
sigh
shy
lie
wily
ryf'
pea
tea
key
bee
D
me
knee
fee
V
thee
sea
Z
she
lee
we
ye
he
ram
ran
rallg
listen
mi.zzen
mission
vis'on
lowercase p
lowercase
lowercase k
lowercase iJ
lowercase d
lowercase g
lowercase
lowercase n
cng (or angrna)
lowercase f
lowercase v
trletd
eth
lowercdse :,
lowercase z
esh (or long 5)
long (or yogh)
lowercase I
lowerc.ase w
lowercase r
lowercase)
lowercase
Note dlso tile fOllowing:
(ts)
d3 (dz)
chi(me)
Ji(ve)
chea(p:
G
phonetic usage occurs with the letter ,which is sometimes used to represent
















a (k] sound. as in cup or hacon, and sometimes to represent an [s] sound, as in
cellar or receive. Two c's may even represent a sequence of l k] and [s] sounds
in the same word, as in accent, access A symhol that sometimes differs from
the corresponding letter is [g], which is used for the sound in guy amI but
never for the sound in age or the sound in the name of the letter g.


A few other symbols are needed to supplement the regular alphabet. The pho-
netic symbols we will use arc part of the set approved the Int(;rnalional
netic Association, a body founded in 1886 by a group of leading phoneticians
from France, Gellnany, Blitain, and Denmark. The complete set of IPA symbols
is in the char! on the inside covers of this book. It II discussed
detail later in this book. Because we often need to talk about the symbols, the
names that have been given to them are shown in the last column of Table 2.1.
The velar nasal the end of rang is written with (IJ], leHer n combined
with the tail of the letter 9 descending below the fine, Some people call this

-
The Transcnption of Consonants 37
symbol eng; others pronounce it angma. The symbol l9 J. an upright VersiOIl of
me Greek letter theta, is used for the voiceless dental fricative in words such as
dligh, thin, thimble, mouth. The symbol L 0 J. caUed elh, is derived
from an Anglo-Saxon letter. It is used for the corresponding voiced sound in
words sucb as thy, then. them, Both these symbols are asceode.rs (letter'S
that go up from the line of writing rather than descending below it). The spellin&
system of the English language does not di stinguish between (9) and r (I). They
are both written with the leIters Ih in pairs such as thigh. thy.
The symbol for the voiceless palato-alveolar (post-alveolar) fricative LJ j (long.1)
in shy, sheep, rash is both an ascender and a descender. It is like along. straight-
ened s going both above and below the line of writing. 1lle correspooding voiced
symbol [3] is like a long z descending below the line. This sound occurs in the
middle of words such as vi.1iQn. measure, leisure and at the beginning of foreign
words such as the French JeOl1, gendarme. and foreign names such as Zsa ZuI.
In earlier editions of this book, the sound at the beginning of the word rye
was symbolized by I J 1. an upside-down letter r. This is the correct IPA symbol
for this sound but as lhe two major dictionaries of American and British English
pronunciation (see "Further Reading") use a regular [r] for thi s sound. we have
done so here.
ft is unfortunate that different books on phonetics use different forms of
phonetic transcription. Thi s is nOI because phonelicians cannot agree on which
symbols to use, but ralher because different styles of transcription are more ap-
propriate in one circulUStance than in another. Thus, in thi s book, where we are
concerned with general phonetics, we have used the lPA symbol (j J for the ini
tial sound in yes, yet. because the IPA reserves the symbol I y J for another
sound, the vowel in the French word tu. Another reason for using (j 1 is thai in
many languages (German. Dutch, Norwegian. Swedish. and olhers) thi s letter is
used in words such asja, which are pronounced with a sound that in the English
spelli ng system would be written with the leiter y. Books that are concerned
only with the phonetics of English often use I y I where thi s one uses [jJ. Some
books on phonetics also use and [zl in place of the IPA symbol s {fl and [J I.
respecti vely. The first and last sounds in both church and judge are transcribed
with the digraph symbols [tI J and [d3J. These affri cate sounds are phoneti cally
a sequence of a stop followed by a fricative (hence the lPA symbols for them are
digraphs). yet they funct ion in English as if they are really a si ngle unit. com-
parable in some ways to other stop consonants. You can see that a word such as
chOQ.fe might be said 10 begin with (tI) if you compare your pronunciation of the
phrases whire shoes and why choose. In the first phrase, the [t J is at the end of
one word and the I I I at the beginning of the next; but in the second phrase, these
two sounds occur together at the beginning of the second word. The difference
between the two phrases is one of the timing of the arti culations involved. The af-
fri cate in why choose has a more abrupt fricative onsel, and the timing of the stop
and fricative is more rigid than is the liming of the sequence in white shoes.
Also, for some speakers, the final [t] of white may be said with simultaneous
18 CHAPTER 2 !anscription
[t] in the affricate [tJ
that demonstrate this
versus he cheat5 versus my chop. There are
illustrating the same point for the voiced counterpart [d3] found in jar, gentle.
age, because no English word begins with [3].
Some other books on phonetics transcribe [tf] and [d3] (as in church and
judge) with single symbols, such as [c] and [J]. These transcriptions highligbl
the fact that affricates are single units by using a single letter to transcribe t h e ~
We will see that some linguistic segments have two phonetic elements
example, vowel i is usually helpful to rpr'lrF"'"
elements in When we wish to make
we are writing consonant cluster, the
is used to tie the affricate in why choose
[tf] to distinguish [tJ] in white shoes. The
begins words an initial vowel (recall
Chapter 1 of the difference between flee east and fleeced) is written pho
cally with [?], a symbol based on the question mark. So flee east is pronou
[fli?ist], whilefleeced is [flist]. The status of glottal stop as a consonant
in English is questionable because its distribution is limited. Where other
nants may appear in a variety of positions in words (e.g. note the [k] in cat,
back, active, across, etc.), glottal stop only occurs word initially before
in American English, In London Cockney, glottal stop also appears
vowels in words I hu/ton where other dialects
[t J. In American final [t] in words like
"glottalized" SLOp, or more usually
taneous glottal [kret? D.
There is one to be considered in the
consonant contrasts of English. In most forms of both British and An
English, which does not contrast with witch. Accordingly, both why and we
Table 2.1 are said to begin simply with [w]. But some speakers of English
trast pairs of words such as which, witch; why, wye; whether, weather.
speakers will have to transcribe the first consonants of each of these
words with [hw]. Note that, phonetically, the [h] is transcribed before [
that it is the first part of each of these words that is voiceless.
TH E TRANSCRI VOWELS
The transcription vowels (the vowel phonernes) in
more difficult of consonants for two reasons.
of English differ more in lheir use of vowels than in their use of eVB.,V .....
Second, authorities differ in their views of what constitutes an appropriate
scription of vowels. -
Taking the same approach in looking for contrasting vowels as we
contrasting consonants, we might try to find a minimal set of words that
The TranSCription of Vowels 39
only in the vowel sounds. We could. for example. look for monosyllables that
begin with I h J and end with ld J and supplement this minimal set with other lists
of monosyll ables that contrast only in their vowel sounds. Table 2.2 shows five
such sets of words. You should listen to the recordings of these words OIl tile CD
while reading the following discussion of the vowels.
We will consider one fonn of British and one form of American English. The
major difference between the two is that speakers of American English pronounce
I r I sounds after vowels. as well as before them. whereas in most fonns of BritIsh
Engli sh, I r J can occur only before a vowe l. Ameri can English speakers distin-
guish between words such as heart and hOI not by making a difference in vowel
quality (as in Peter Ladefoged's form of British Engli sh). but rather by pronounc-
ing heart with an [r I and hor with the same vowel but without an [r ] following
it. In hair. hire, these speakers may use vowels similar to those in he. head,
high respectively. bot in each case with a (ollowing I r I. Most speakers of Brit-
ish English distingui sh these words by usi ng different diphthongs- movements
from one vowel to another within a single syll able.
Svmbols fOf transcribing contrasting vowels in Engl ish. Column 1 applies to
many speakers of Amerian Engl ish, Column 2 to mosl speakers 01 British
English. The laSI column gives the conyentional names for the phonetic
I in tM !irst column unless otherwise noted.
1 2
h"" h'
b,,,d
heat
''''''
lower<ase i
h,d b,d
hit kid small capital I
" "
h.""
h.y
""""
hate "d, lowefca5e t
, ,
head bed
epsilon

"
h.d
"'d h"
GOd
"h
0 0 h.ni "',d heart (ard script 0

0 hod bod
h"
,..,
turned smpt a
, ,
h_ h.w
""'.
GO .... open 0
u u hood
(ould
UPSIlon
ou

hO<d
h", bod, ,,>d,
lowercase 0
0 0 who'd who
"""'"
hoot
""""
lowercase IJ
, ,
Hudd bod hot
"d
turned y

,
herd
""
bird hon clJrd
"
"
hide high bide height lowercase a (+I)
.0 how
bow'"
(owed (as noted aoo..tJ
" "
(. jhov Boyd (as noted above)
"
"
here beard {as noted above]
"
"
hair
"'",d
"'''''
(as noted above)
."
.,
hired h.re (as IlOted above)
Note .11:>0:
,0
io ho'"
hoe Bude cued (as noted aooye)
-
(02.2
T h ~ Transcnplion of vowels .,
Two symbols that are not ordinary letters of the alphabet. Ie J and I re I. are
used for the vowels in head and hod. respecti vely. The first is based on the Greek
letter epsilon and the second on lhe letters a and e joined together. 1lley may be
referred to by the names epsilon and ash.
Most Americans use the same vowel SQund in the words Man and hot and
can use one form of the letter o. They would transcribe these words as [bon J
and I hot I. But some East Coast Americans and speakers of British English who
do nm pronounce [r] sounds after a vowel distinguish between these words by
the qualities of the vowels and h a v ~ to use two differeD! forms of the leuer o.
They would transcribe these words as [ hOI J and l hot J.
Most speakers of British forms of Engli sh. and many Ameri can speakers.
di stinguish between pairs of words such as cat, caught; not, naught. The symbol
I :> J, an open lener 0, may be used in the second of each of these pairs of words
and in words such as bawd, boughl, law. Many Midwestern and Far Western
American speakers do not need to use thi s symbol in any of these words. as they
do not distinguish between the vowels in words such as COl and caughl . They
may have different vowels in words in which there is a foHowing [ r 1 sound,
such as horse, hoarse, but if there is no opposition between COl. caught or not,
Mughl. there is no need to mark thi s difference by using the symbol f :> I. Doing
so would simply be showing extra phonetic detail, straying from the principle of
showing just the differences between phonemes.
Another special symbol is used for the vowel in hood, could. good. Thi s
symbol. I u J, may be thought of as a letter II with the ends curled oul.
The vowel in hoe, dough. code is a diphthong. For most American English
speakers, the flrst element is very si milar to sounds that are wrinen in Spanish
or Italian with the letter o. Many speakers of English from the southern parts of
Britain use a different sound for the flrst element of the diphthong in these words.
which we will symbolize with I I. an upside-down leiter e called schwa. We will
discuss this sound more fully in a later section. The final element of tile diphthong
in words such as hoe and code is somewhat similar to the vowel [ u I in hood.
An ups ide-down letter v. 1 A J. is used for the vowel in words such as bud. hut.
This symbol is sometimes call ed wedge. Another symbol. [31. a reversed form
of the Greek letter epsi lon, is used for the sound in pen, bird. cun as pronounced
by most speakers of British English and those speakers of American English
who do not have an I r J in these words. In most forms of American Engli sh. the
r is fu ll y combined with the vowel. and the symbol 13' J is used. The tillie hook
r ' } indicates the r-coloring of the vowel.
The next three words in Table 2.2 contain diphthongs composed of elements
that have been discussed already. The vowel in hide I hald) begins with a sound
between that of the vowel in COl [kret J and that in hard [hod J or I hard J, and
moves toward the vowel [I J as in hid I hid J. The symbol [a J is used for the flrst
part of thi s diphthong. The vowel in how [au 1 begins with a similar sound but
moves toward L u J as in hood. The vowel in boy I b:>1 I is a combination of the
sound I :> I as in bawd and llJ as in hid.
f
CD
GIAPTER 2 Phonology and Phonetc Transcription
Most Americans pronounce the remaining words in Table 2.2 with one of
the other vowels followed [r], while most BritislI English speakers have
additional diphthongs in these words. In each case, the end of the diphthong is
[;:,], the same symbol we used for the beginning of the diphthong in hoe for most
British English speakers. We will discuss this symbol further the next para-
graph. Some (usually old-fashioned) British English speakers also use a diph-
thong in words like poor, cure that can be transcribed as Some people have
a diphthong a;:,] in words as hire r had Others pronounce these
words as two syllables (like higher, liar), transcribing them as
The words in Table 2.2 are all monosyllables except for ahoy. Consequently,
none of thenl contains both stressed unstressed vowels. By the most com-
mon unstressed vowel is the one we noted at the end of some of the diph-
thongs in British English. It is often called by its German name, schwa. It occurs
at ends words such as soda I 'souL-:l. 'soudd in the middles words
such as emphasis, demonstrate ['emfgSIS, 'demgnstreltJ, and at the beginnings of
words such as around, arise r g'raund, g'rarz]. (In all these words, the symbol [']
is stress that been placed hefore the syllabic carrying the main stress.
Stress should always be marked in words of more than one syllable.)
In British English, r is usually the sale component of the -er part of words
such as broTher, brotherhood, simplerbrA50, 'sImpi;)]. In forms of
American English with r-colored vowels, these words are usually ['brA5;:}',
'brA5;:}'hud, 'srmpld'-l As with the symbol [3'-], the small hook on r d'- J symbolizes
the r-coloring. Both and are common vowels, occurring fre-
quently in unstressed monosyllables such as the grammatical function words the, a,
to, and, but. In connected speech, these words are usually t;), b;)t].
Some of other vowels also occur in unstressed syllables, but because of
differences in accents of English, it is a little more difficult to say which vowel
occurs in which word. For example, nearly all speakers of English differentiate
between the last vowels in Sophie, or patter But some accents have
the vowel [i] as in heed at the end of Sophie, pity. Others have [J 1 as in hid.
Similarly, most accents make the vowel in the second syllable of taxis different
from that in Texas. Some have i] and some [I] taxis. everybody
pronounces Texas as r 'teksgs]. (Note that in English, the letter x often represents
the sounds [ ].) Compare your pronunciation of these words with the reeord-
on the CD and uecide which unstressed vowels you use.
This is an appropriate moment to start doing some transcription exercises.
There are large munber of them at end this you
have grasped the basic principles, you should the of exercises.
SONANT D VOWEL CHARTS
So far, we have been using the consonant and vowel symbols mainly as ways of
representing the contrasts that occur among words in they also
be thought of in a completely different way. may regard them as shorthand
Consonant and Vowel Charts 43
descriptions of the articulations involved. Thus. L p J is an abbreviation for
stop and J I J is equivalent to lateral approximanl.
The consonant symbols can then be arranged in the form of a chart as in
Figure 2. 1. The places of articulation are shown across the top of the chart, start-
ing from the mOSt forward arti culation (bi labial) and going toward those sounds
made in the back of the mouth (velar) and in the throat (glollal). The manners
of articulation are sbown on the vertical axis of the chart. By conve nti on, the
voiced-voiceless di stinction is shown by putting the voice less symbols to the
left of the voiced symbols.
1be symbol r w J is shown in two places in the consonant chart in Figure 2. I .
This is because it is articulated with both a narrowing of the lip aperture. which
makes it bilabial. and a raising of the back of the tongue toward the soft palate,
which makes it velar. The affri cate symbols [tf J and (d3 ) are not listed sepa-
rately in the table even thougb they are contrasti ve sounds in English. Noc.e that
if we were to include them in the tabl e. we would have the problem of deciding
whether to put them in the palato-alveolar column (the place of the fricative
element) or in the alveolar column (the place of the stop element ). The interna-
tional phonetic alphabet avoids the inaccuracy that is inevitable when the stop
element and fricative element of the affricate have different place of arti culation
by listing only stop and fricati ve symbols in the consonant chart.
Figure 1.1 A phonetic chart 01 the English consonants we have dealt with so far,
whenever there are two symbols within a !oingle cell, the one on the leh
a vokeless sound. All other symbol s represent voiced soonds. Note
also the consonant I h I. which is not on thi s chart, and the affricates I [f. dJl.
which art sequences of symbol s on tht chart.

0
i


ii
..



:>:
rwaJ (stop)
"op
fricati ve
(central )
approximant
la[era]
(approximant )
m
P
b
r
,

0
( w)
Place of anicula[ion
"
t d
s z
,
I
"
6-==
_ 0

- >
.-

I
,
;;

"i
j
k
-


"
9
?
h
w
44 CHAPTER 2 Phonology and Phonetic Transcription
Figure 2.2 A vowel chart showing the relative vowel qualities represented by some of the
symbols used in transcribing English. The symbols [e, a, 01 occur as the first
elements of diphthongs.
front
high
mid-high
mid
mid-low
low
\
\
\
\
central
u
\
I \ I u
______ - - - - - - - L - - - -
\ I 0
\ 3 I
\ I
\ I
\ I
e \ I ~
- - - - - - ~ - - - - - ~ - - - -
\ A I
\ I
\ I
\ I
\ I
\ a I Q
o
back
The symbols we have been using for the contrasting vowels may also be re-
garded as shorthand descriptions for different vowel qualities. There are prob-
lems in this respect in that we have been using these symbols somewhat loosely,
allowing them to have different values for different accents. But the general val-
ues can be indicated by a vowel chart as in Figure 2.2. The symbols have been
placed within a quadrilateral, which shows the range of possible vowel qualities.
Thus, [i] is used for a high front vowel, [u J for a high back one, [ I ] for a mid-
high front vowel, [e] for a raised mid-front vowel, [e ] for a mid-low, and so on.
The simple vowel chart in Figure 2.2 shows only two of the dimensions of
vowel quality, and if they are taken to be descriptions of what the tongue is do-
ing, these dimensions are not represented very accurately (as we will see in later
chapters). Furthermore, Figure 2.2 does not show anything about the variations
in the degree of lip rounding in the different vowels, nor does it indicate anything
about vowel length. It does not show, for example, that in most circumstances,
[ i] and [u] are longer than [ I ] and [ u ].
The consonant and vowel charts enable us to understand the remark made
in Chapter 1, when we said that the sounds of English involve about twenty-
five different gestures of the tongue and lips. The consonant chart has twenty-
three different symbols, but only eleven basic gestures of the tongue and lips are
needed to make these different sounds. The sounds [p, b, m ] are all made with
the same lip gesture, and [t, d, n] and [k, g, I)] with the same tongue gestures.
(There are slight differences in timing when these gestures are used for making
the different sounds . but we will neglect them here.) Four more gestures are
requ.ired for the sounds in me fricati ve row. three more for the (cenlJ'al) approxi-
mants . and another one for the lateralllpproximant. making eleven in all 1be
vowel chan has fourteen symbols. each of which may be considered to require.
separate gesture. But. as we have seen, accents of English vary in the number of
vowels that they distinguish, which is why we said that English requires tJbovt
twenty-five different gestures of the tongue and lips.
All these sounds will also require gestures of the other three main c o m ~
nents of the speech mechanism-the airstream process. the phonation process.
and the oro-nasaJ process. The airstream process involves pushing air out of the
lungs for all the sounds of Engli sh. The phonation process is responsible for
the gestures of the vocal folds that distinguish voiced and voiceless sounds, and
the oro-nasal process will be active in raising and lowering the velum so as to
distingu.i sh nasal and oral sounds.
PHONOLOGY
At the beginning of this chapter. we discussed another reason why it is only
approximately true that in our transcriptions of English. the symbols have the
valUe!i shown in Figures 2.1 and 2.2. In the style of transcription we have been
using so far, we have used symbol s that show just the contrasting sounds of
English. the phonemes. From this point on. we will use slash lines II to mark off
symbol s when we are explicitly using them to represent phonemes.
As we have noted, some of the phoneme symbols may represent different
sounds when they occur in different contexts. For example. the symbol It I may
represent a wide variety of sounds. In tapluep I. it represents a voiceless alveolar
stop. But the I t I in eighfh/ellSI may be made on the teeth. because of the influ-
ence of the following voiceless dental fricative 161. This I t I is more accurately
called a voiceless dental stop, and we will later use a special symbol for tran-
scribing il. In most forms of both British and American EngliSh, the III in bitten
is accompanied by a glottal stop. and we will also be us ing a special symbol
for thi s sound. As we saw. for mOSt Americans and for many younger Brit ish
English speakers. the I t I in calty I'k<etil symbolizes a voiced. not a voice less.
sound. All these different sounds are pan of the It I phoneme. Each of them oc-
curs in a specific place: It I refore 161 is a dental StOp. I t I before a word final Inl
is a glottal stop, and I t I aftcr a vowel and before an unstressed vowel is a voiced
stop. None of these variations is different enough to change the meaning of a
word in English. Note also that all of these variations occur in citation speech and
are not simply the result of failing to "hit the target" when speaking quicldy.
Simi larl y, other symbols represent different sounds in different contexts. The
symbols III and Irl normally stand for voiced approximants. But in words such
as ply I plall and lry I tral /. the influence of the preceding stops makes them
voiceless. Vowel sounds also vary. The I i I in heedl hidl is usually very differenl
from the iiI in heel/hill, and much longerthan the Ii I in heal.
( 2 Phonology and Phonetic Iranscriptlon
Many of the variations we been can describcd in tcrms
of simple statements about regular sound patterns. Statements of this kind may
be considered rules that apply EngJish words. In most forms of American
English. for example, I I becomes voiced not only in catty, but on occasions
when it occurs immediately after a vowel and before an unstressed vowel (for
example, in matter, utter, divinity. .). In English nearly all kinds, it
is also a rule that whenever I tl occurs before a dental fricative, it is pronounced as
a dental stop. We can show that this is a different kind of It! by adding a small
mark under it [t (As this symbol not representing phoneme,
it is placed between [j.) The same is true of Id/, as in width [wlgo]; Inl, as
in tenth [tqJ.8]; and Ill, as in wealth [w!8]. In all these cases, the mark
] may be added undcr the mbo indi that represents a dental
articulation. Ali these transcriptions are placed between square brackets, as they
are phonetic transcriptions rather than phonemic transcriptions.
Small marks that can be added to a symbol rnodify ils value are knovvn
as diacritics. They provide a useful way of increasing the phonetic precision of
a transcription Another diacritic, r 0 ], a small circle beneath a symbol, can be
used indicate that the symbol a voiccless sound. Earlier, we notcd
that the I I I in play is voiceless. Accordingly, we can transcribe this word as
[p! ell Similarly, ply and try can be written [p! a1 1 and [ 1.
When we describe sound patterns that o(:cur in English, want be
able to say that in some sense there are always the same underlying sounds that
are changed because or tile contexts in which OCCUL The phonology a
language is the set of rules or constraints that describe the relation between
the underlying sounds, the abstract units called phonemes described at the be-
ginni of this chapter, and the phonetic forms Ihat can be observed. When
we transcribe a word in a way that shows none of the details of the pronun-
ciation that are predictable by phonological rules, we are making a phonemic
transcription.
The variants of the phonemes that occur in detailed phonetic transcriptions
are known as al]ophones. They can be described as a result of applying the pho-
nological rules the We now the
rules for different allophones of the phoneme I tI. For example, we know that in
most varieties of American English, I tl has a voiced allophone 'vvhen it occurs
between a stresscd vowcl and an 1Instressed voweL We have also illustrated rules
that make /rl and /II voiceless when they occur after Ip, t, kl. (These rules need
more refinement hefore they can considered to generally applicable.)
In addition applying rules lhat describe particular allophones of the
nemes in a transcription, there is another way we can show more phonetic detail.
We can use more specialized phonetic syrnbols. example, we noted that the
vowel III is longer than the vO'vvel/l I, as in sheep versus ship. This difference in
length is always there as long as the two vowels are in the8fUTle phonetic context
(betwcen the same sounds and wilh the same of Slress, etc. We could
transcribe this difference in length by adding a length ma.o the longer of the
Phonology 47
two sounds. The (PA provides the symbol' : J to show !hat the preceding symbol
represents a longer sound. Accordingly, we could lnlnSCribe lhe two sounds as
I i: I and III. We would sti ll be representing only the underlying phonemes in
!his particular accent of English, bUl doing so wim greater phonetic precision.
Another eumple of using more precise phonetic symbols to show more
phonetic detail has to do with me transcription of English Ir/. We mentioned
!hat in previous editions of this book, we used the upside-down r J J 1to write
the r sound of English. This was done because the lPA symbol r r J indicates a
trilled r and not the approximant r of English. One principle of the International
Phonetic Alphabet is to use the most common form of the letter for !he most
common phonetic property associated with that letter. Because trilled r is more
common in languages of the world than is approximant r. the IPA uses the un
usual symbol f J] for the unusual r sound found in English. So, you can use J J J
to give a more precise transcription of the Engli sh I rl.
Students sometimes also make the mistake of thinking that allophones are
written with diacritics while phonemes are written wi th simple phonetic sym-
bols. Consider. though, the pronunciation of the word letter. For most speakers
of American English. there is no r t J sound in thi s word. Instead, the medial
consonant sounds like a very short r d 1- It is different enough from (d 1 (compare
seedy and set! Dee) that the lPA has a unique symbol for the tap allophone of It
I and Id/. The alveolar tap sound in letter is written with the symbol {r]. a letter
derived from the letter r, Note. therefore, that transcription of allophones may
use simple phonetic symbols as well as symbols with diacritic marks.
'The term broad transcription is often used to designate a transcription that
uses the simplest possible set of symbols. Conversely, a narrow transcription is
one that shows more phonetic detail. either by using more specific symbols or
by representing some allophonic differences. A broad transcription of please and
trip would be I plizl and ItIlp/. A narrow (but still phonemic) transcription could
be I pli:zl and Imp!. This transcription would be phonemic as long as we always
used I i:1 wherever we would otherwise have had IiI. In this way, we would not
be showing any all ophones of the phonemes. A narrow al lophonic transcription
would be [pli:z J and r ttlP I. in which r I J and ({ I. are allophones of I II and Ir/.
Every transcription should be considered as having two aspects. one of which
is often not explicit. 'There is the phonetic text itself and. at least implicitly. there
is a set of conventions for interpreting the text. These conventions are usually of
two kinds. First. there are the conventions that ascribe general phonetic values to
the symbols. It was these conventions we had in mind when we said earlier that
a symbol could be regarded as an approximate specificati on of the articulations
involved. If we want to remind people of the implicit statements accompany-
ing a transcription. we can make them expli cit. We could, for instance, say that,
other things being equal. I i I is longer than III. perhaps stating at the beginning
of the transcription I i i = l i: /. We could also make explicit the rules that specify
the allophones that occur in different circumstances. a topi c we will return to in
Chapter 4.
CHAPTER 2 Phonology and Phonetic Transcription
few occasions, transcription be said to the existence
accounting for This theoretically possible in the
of a nan-ow transcription so detailed that it shows all the rule-governed alterna-
tions among the sounds. A transcription that shows the allophones in this way
is called a completely systematic phonetic transcription. In practice, it is dif-
ficult to make a transcription so narrow that it shows every detail of the sounds
some occasions. transcnptlOn not imply the existence of rules
counting for allophones because, in the circumstances when the transcription
was made, nothing was known about the rules. When writing down an unknown
language or when transcribing the speech of a child or a patient not seen previ-
does not what rules In these circurnstances, the
hols indicate only value sounds. This transcription
impression istie transcription.
We hope this brief survey of different kinds of transcription makes plain that
there is no such thing as the IPA transcription of a particular utterance. Some-
times, one wants to make a detailed phonetic transcription; at other times, it is
convenient to phonemic transcription.
a particular feature, as vowel
are not of concern and details consonants are
transcriptions take many fonns.
EXERCISES
(Printable versions of all the exercises are available on the CD.)
one wants
other times.
important.
A. Each of the following words contains an error in transcription of vowel
There is one possible but because differences in
English, sometimes alternative possihle corrections. :tYlake
correct transcription in the space provided after each word.
1. man-made ['manmeld] should be
2. football ['futboIJ
tea chest ['titfest 1
tomcat [ltomkret J
5. tiptoe [ 'tiptou]
6. avoid [ re'v::lId]
7. remam [rd'man 1
bedroom ['bedr;)m 1
umbrella
[um1brd:j
10. manage ['mrenred31