Lecture 3

Phonology:
Organization of Speech Sounds
 Concepts
• Natural classes
• Phonemic analysis
• Contrastiveness, minimal pairs
• Allophones
• Phonological processes
• Alternation
 Natural Classes
• To determine if a set of sounds forms a
natural class:
• the sounds must share one or more
features
• the sounds must be the complete set of
sounds sharing those features in the
given data
• constitutes all sounds of a language
that have that set of features
 Natural Classes
• [m, n, ŋ] are the natural class of nasal
consonants if

1. all three are in the language's inventory; and

2. there are no other nasal consonants (e.g. [ɲ]
or [ɳ]) in the language
 Natural Classes
• Are these natural classes in English?
a. [p, t, k, ʔ]
b. [m, n, ŋ]
c. [t, d, n, l, ɹ, ɾ, s]
d. [p, b, t, k]
e. [b, m]
 Distribution

• Contrastive distribution
• Predictable (complementary) distribution
• Free variation
 Contrastive Distribution
• Sounds are contrastive if they distinguish
words with different meanings
• Minimal pairs
• two words which have different meanings
and differ in only one sound occurring in the
same environment
• e.g. [post] ‘post’ [tost] ‘toast’
• rain [n] vs. raid [d]; boot [b] vs. suit [s]
• Other examples?
 Contrastive Distribution
• The minimal pair [post]/[tost] shows that

• [p] and [t] are contrastive

• their distribution is not predictable

• [p] and [t] are different phonemes

 Contrastive Distribution
• Minimal triplets
• made, mood, mode: [med, mud, mod]
• Near minimal pairs
• sometimes minimal pairs for two sounds
are hard to find
▪ e.g. [ð] and [ʒ]
▪ near minimal pair: leather vs. pleasure
▪ immediately adjacent environment is the
same
 Complementary Distribution
• Phonemes have different phonetic
realizations depending on the phonetic
environment in which they occur


KEY POINT
Complementary Distribution: Example
• Two kinds of [p] in English
• aspirated: [phæt] pat
• unaspirated: [spæt] spat
• no minimal pairs are contrasted by [p] and [ph]
• The two kinds of [p] are predictable
variants
• word-initial /p/ is aspirated: [ph]
• /p/ after [s] is unaspirated: [p]
 Complementary Distribution
• Two sounds are allophones if they occur in
mutually exclusive environments
• one sound occurs in one set of contexts
• the other sound occurs in a different set of
contexts
• Allophones are in complementary
distribution
• Allophones are predictable forms of
phonemes
 Complementary Distribution
• surface allophones: [p], [ph]
• underlying phoneme: /p/
• predictable realizations:
• [ph] is the specific allophone (occurs in a limited
environment)
pit, pat, pass, repeat, pod
• [p] is the general allophone (occurs elsewhere)
spit, tip, tipped, erupt, tipper, tip off
 Complementary Distribution

/p/ /t/ phonemes

[p] [ph] [t] [th] allophones

Complementary and contrastive
distribution vary according to
language
 Phonological Rules
• Rules express predictable changes in form

input → output / conditioning environment

(what happens) (where it happens)
Phonological Rules
 Phonological Processes

• Natural classes and allophonic

relationships often illustrate common
phonological processes
• usually motivated by phonetic or
perceptual concerns
 Phonological Processes
• Some processes are motivated by the
drive to minimize articulatory effort
• Assimilation: sounds take on phonetic
properties of adjacent sounds (i.e. two
different sounds become more alike)
• /ɪn/ → [ɪm], [ɪn], [ɪŋ]
i[m]proper, i[n]tolerant, i[ŋ]coherent
• /z/ → [s], [z]
cat[s], dog[z]
 Phonological Processes
• Some processes are motivated by the drive to
increase perceptual distinctiveness of sounds
from one another
• Dissimilation: two similar sounds become
different
• in Greek, a stop becomes a fricative when followed by
another stop, as in /eptɑ/ → [eftɑ], “seven”

• Tongue twisters – why are they so difficult to pronounce?

• Two sounds that are similar but not exactly the same seem to be
particularly difficult to pronounce correctly right next to each
other.

• Solution?
• Make the similar sounds identical
• Make the similar sounds more different
 Tongue twisters in different
languages
She sells seashells by the seashore.
The shells she sells are surely seashells. Trentatré trentini entrarono a Trento
So if she sells shells on the seashore, tutti e trentatré trotterellando.
I'm sure she sells seashore shells. Thirty-three dwellers of Trent came into
Trent, all thirty-three trotting and
Fischers Fritz fischt frische toddling.
Fische.
The Fischer's son Fritz is
fishing for fresh fish. Un chasseur sachant chasser sait
chasser sans son chien.
Tres tristes tigres tragaban trigo en A hunter who knows how to hunt
tres tristes trastos en un trigal. knows how to hunt without his dog.
Three sad tigers were eating
wheat in three sad (lousy) dishes
in a wheat field.
 Phonological processes

• Insertion: The addition of a sound between

two others
• e.g. vowels between two consonants - English
past tense: waited, provided
 Phonological processes

• Deletion: The loss of a sound in some

context
• English n in hymn (but not hymnal)
• b in crumb (but not crumble)
 Phonological processes
• Lenition: sounds become softer or weaker
• Flapping – in American English, the /t/
between two vowels is often pronounced as
a flap, or [ɾ]. An example is /bʌtɚ/ → [bʌɾɚ],
“butter”.
• Fortition: sounds become stronger
• Aspiration - in English, as we discussed,
stops are aspirated at the beginning of a
stressed syllable, as in /pɑt/ → [phɑt], “pot”.
• Metathesis: switching the order of sounds
• “Ask”  “Aks”
 Free Variation

• A single sound can have two different

variant pronunciations in the same word
• e.g. released vs. unreleased final stops
 Allomorphy
• Alternation: affixation results in affixes
changing shapes
• stop[s]; read[z]

• Each form of the morpheme is an

allomorph
 Allomorphy

The same processes that trigger distinctions

between allophones also trigger distinctions
between allomorphs

• Allomorphs in English
• 3 allomorphs of the past tense morpheme
▪ [-d], [-t], [-əd]