What does phonology do for us?Apparent design features of human spoken languageHow can it work?Intro to LinguisticsPhonological analysis. How to solve phonology problems.1) Look for patterns in the data:o Are there minimal pairs? Near-minimal pairs?o Complementary distribution? (never at the same place in the same time)2) Describe the environments and what happens:o Use features and natural classes to talk about sounds and changeso Can you describe a consistent environment for one of the sounds that are in complementary distribution?3) Write down the rules:o What it starts out as → what features change / in what environmentExamples to be done in class.Suprasegmental phonology.Restrictions on arrangements of phonemes (phonological structure): In English, the velar nasal [η] can't occur at the beginning of a word -- cf. map, nap, *ngapBasic way in which languages differ is their inventory of phonemes. For example:• German has the voiceless velar fricative [x], as in Bach "creek". o English: voiceless fricatives - [s] , voiceless velars - [k], but not both properties.• German also has the high front rounded vowel [y], as in kühn "clever". o English: high front [i], high rounded [u], but these properies are not combined.• English [θ] sets it apart from many languages, including German and French. o They have several voiceless fricatives, but not the interdental.Learning a new (or a first) language includes learning the "list" or inventory of sounds.SyllablesPhonological structure - the way phonemes are organized - includes the notion of syllable and its subparts. This structure is crucially involved in describing the possible words.• the onset = consonant(s) at the beginning of the syllable o English normally permits up to two consonantso but in addition, [s] can be added to the beginning of many syllables as well, making up to three consonantso all phonemes can occur in this position except for [ŋ]• the nucleus = vowel that is the core of the syllable o sometimes a consonant can serve as the nucleus, as in the second syllable of kitten or table• the coda = consonant(s) at the end of the syllable o English normally permits up to two consonants at the end (belt, jump, arc) o but in addition, certain sounds such as [s, t, θ] can be piled up (belts, sixths)Here's a general schema of how syllables are constructed. SYLLABLEONSETRHYMENUCLEUS CODAconsonant(s)vowel consonant(s) Rhyme = nucleus + coda, e.g. in blend rhyme = [ε] + [nd]. Restriction: minimize coda! (so, blεn-dIŋ, not blεnd-Iŋ)SonorityHuman speech involves repetitive cycles of opening and closing the vocal tract = syllables.Relatively closed position = onset , then relatively open nucleus, then closing for coda or the next syllable's onset. The degree of vocal tract openness correlates with the loudness.Speech sounds differ on a scale of sonority: vowels = most sonorous end, obstruents (stops, affricates, fricatives) = least sonorous end. In between are the liquids [l] and [r], and nasal consonants like [m] and [n].Least sonorous sounds are restricted to the margins of the syllable -- the onset in the simplest case -- and the most sonorous sounds occur in the center of the syllable -- most often a vowel.E.g., "soon" * "blend" * * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * [s][u][n] [b][l][ε][n][d]"pretending"- each syllable corresponds to a peak in sonority. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *[p][r][ə][t][ε][n][d][ I][ ŋ] "film"= one syllable BUT "fiml","pummel" = two syllables "fizm","chasm"=two * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *[f][ I][l][m] [f][ I] [m] [l] [f] [I] [z][m][p][ ][m][l] [k][æ][z][m]• No need memorize for each word: syllabification is a general property of the language. • In these last two words, the consonant serves as the sonority peak - it is syllabic (a nucleus). English permits nasals and liquids to be syllabic, at least in unstressed syllables: prism, bottom, sump'm (for "something"), cap'm (for "captain"), hidden, button, kitten, risen, bottle, little, towel, swimmer, higher, butter• For [r], the consonant can function as a vowel even in a stressed syllable: bird, fur, wordIn some dialects, such as Standard British, Boston, and Coastal Southern US, any [r] in the rhyme of a syllable (whether nucleus or coda) loses its r-ness and becomes a schwa-like vowel. These are called "r-less" dialects.• Another general property of English: restrictions on what consonants can be an onset cluster -sonority has to increase by two steps.• actual words with obstruent+liquid (two steps):brick, true, free, crab; play, blue, flea, glib• possible words with obstruent + liquid:blick, clee • impossible words with obstruent + nasal (just one step) :*bnick, *fnee, *gmue, *dmay • historical loss of initial obstruent in cluster (letter now silent):knee, knight, gnat, gnaw • This is part of our general knowledge of the language: we can distinguish blick and *bnickBut what about words like snow (obstruent + nasal onset cluster)? • Take (almost) any English onset, and tack an [s] on the front of it, ignoring sonority. snow (cf. no), stop (cf. top), spray (cf. pray)• This is a special property of [s] and no other obstruent in English: loud fricative noise: it doesn't depend on the normal syllable structure. In German (and Yiddish), it's the (alveo)palatal fricative, as in Schmutz "dirt."Syllable structure is a way in which languages differ. Hawaiian: no coda consonants, maximum of one consonant in the onset. So: borrowed words get a lot of extra vowels, to create new syllables of the proper type.ink > 'înika Norman > NolemanaPolish: allows more consonants at the beginning or end of a syllable than English. That’s why some Polish names are hard for English speakers to say: Przepiorkowski, Gdansk or Zbigniew Brzezinski.bzdura "nonsense" babsk "witch" grzbiet [gzhbjet] "back" marnotrawstw [-fstf] "of wastes" A language learner learns what structures are possible by observing the attested patterns. What does phonology do for us?Phonology of human language is an ingenious solution to a serious problem. Apparent design features of human spoken language1. Large vocabulary: 10,000-100,000 items2. Open