2.Articulatory classification of speech sounds.

VOWELS

Classification: according to the horizontal movement of the tongue; to the vertical movement; to the position of the lips; to the degree of the muscular tension of the articulatory organs; to the force of articulation at the end of a vowel; to the stability of articulation; to the length of a vowel.

according to the horizontal movement : close (high), mid and open (low) to the position of the lips, whether they are rounded, spread or neutral: rounded and unrounded.

to the degree of the muscular tension of the articulatory organs: tense and lax. All the long vowels are believed to be tense, while short vowels are lax. to the force of articulation at the end of a vowel: free and checked. Free vowels are pronounced in anopen syllable with a weakening in the force of articulation towards their end. These are long monophtongs and diphthongs and unstressed short vowels. Checked vowels are those in the articulation of which there is no weakening of the force of articulation. to the stability of articulation : monophtongs and diphthongs, diphthongoids. to the length long and short (differs from the positional length).

CONSONANTSAn indispensable constituent of a consonant is noise. The source of noise is in obstruction. 3 types of obstruction: 1)complete occlusive, 2) constriction, 3)occlusion-constriction.According to the type of obstruction and the manner of the production of noise: occlusives(plosives and nasal), constrictives ( Fricatives and oral sonants), occlusive-constrictive.According to the active speech organ which forms an obstruction: labial (bilabial – p, b, m, w, labio-dental – v, f) , lingual (forelingual – t, d, n, s, z, r, mediolingual – j) , Backlingual – k, g). According to the place of obstruction: dental, alveolar (t, d, n, l, s, z), post-alveolar(r) , palatal (j) , palato-alveolar (t) , velar. According to the presence or absence of voice: voiced (b, d, g, v, z) and voiceless (p, t, k, f, s, t).According to the force of articulation : lenis(muscular tension is weak) and fortis(is strong).

According to the position of the soft palate: oral(p, b, t, d, k, g, f, v,) and nasal (m, n).

3. The phoneme as a linguistic unit. Its definitions and functions.

The phoneme - the smallest linguistically relevant unit of the sound structure of a given language which serves to distinguish one word from another. The phoneme is a minimal abstract linguistic unit realized in speech in the form of speech sounds opposable to other phonemes of the same language to distinguish the meaning of morphemes and words.

Firstly, the phoneme is a functional unit .In phonetics function is usually understood as a role of the various units of the phonetic system in distinguishing one morpheme from another, one word from another or one utterance from another. The opposition of phonemes in the same phonetic environment differentiates the meaning of morphemes and words: e.g. bath-path, light-like. Sometimes the opposition of phonemes serves to distinguish the meaning of the whole phrases: He was heard badly - He was hurt badly. Thus we may say that the phoneme can fulfill the distinctive function.

Secondly, the phoneme is material, real and objective. That means it is realized in speech in the form of speech sounds, its allophones. The phonemes constitute the material form of morphemes, so this function may be called constitutive function.Thirdly, the phoneme performs the recognitive function, because the use of the right allophones and other phonetic units facilitates normal recognition. We may add that the phoneme is a material and objective unit as well as an abstract and generalized one at the same time.

Basic functions of the phoneme are:

1. Constitutive – phoneme constitutes words, word combinations etc. 2. Distinctive – phoneme helps to distinguish the meanings of words, morphemes

3. Recognitive – phoneme makes up grammatical forms of words, sentences, so the right use of allophones

3. The classification of English consonant sounds

4. Manifestation of phonemes in speech. Phoneme and allophone

Allophones of a certain phoneme are speech sounds which are realizations of one and the same phoneme and witch can’t distinguish words.

allophones of the same phoneme, no matter how different their articulation may be, function as the same linguistic unit. Phonemes differentiate words like tie and die from each other, and to be able to hear and produce phonemic differences is part of what it means to be a competent speaker of the language. Allophones, on the other hand, have no such function: they usually occur in different positions in the word (i.e. in different environments) and hence cannot be opposed to each other to make meaningful distinctions.