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Methods of Phonological Analysis.
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What is the aim of the phonological analysis?
Firstly, the aim of it is to establish distinctive differences between sounds, i.e. to establish relevant features.
Secondly, on the basis of this study to create the inventory of the phonemes (the phones?) and establish the phonemic system of a language.
The final aim of phonological analysis is the identification of the phonemes and their classification.
There are 2 main approaches:
1) formally distributional
It is practiced by American structuralists and it pays special attention to the position of the sound in the word or its distribution;
2) semantically distribution (sematic)
It gives special attention to meaning, it’s wildly practiced in this country.
The analysis is conducted through the system of phonological oppositions. It’s based on the following rule:
the phoneme can distinguish meaning when opposed to one another in the same phonetic context. Ex: [dei] – [thei], [ship] – [sheep] (minimal pairs)
To establish the phonemic status of a sound it is necessary to oppose one sound to another in the same phonetic context.
This procedure is called commutation test. We must find the so-called minimal pairs. A minimal pair is a pair of words which differ in once sound only. So we replace one sound by another and try to see if the meaning is the same or different and if the sound belongs to one or different phoneme.
Ex: [pin] – [sin] (1)
[phin] – [pin] (2)
[pin] – [hin] (3)
The commutation test may have 3 results:
(1) the meaning is different, so the opposed sounds belong to different phoneme;
(2) the meaning is the same, so the opposed sounds belong to the same phoneme;
(3) a meaningless word, so we can’t make any conclusion – we can’t identificate the sound
There are different types of oppositions:
1) single
the opposed sounds differ in one articulating feature only: [ p en] – [ b en]
voiceless voiced
2) double
the opposed sounds differ in 2 distinctive features: [ p en] - [ d en]
bilabial forelingual
voiceless voiced
3) triple (multiple)
the opposed sounds differ in 3 distinctive features: [pen] - [then]
voiceless voiced
bilabial interdental
occlusive stop constrictive fricative
To create the system of phonemes the sounds are opposed in 3 positions:
- initial
- middle
- final
There are some problems - sometimes sounds cannot be opposed:
Ex: [h] is never used in final position;
[n-носовое] is never in the initial position.
In such cases we rely on the knowledge of the native speaker and phonetic similarities or dissimilarities.
There is another interesting case. We have a number of different sounds occur in the same position and phonetic context but the meaning is unchanged. Ex: [калоши] – [галоши], [шкаф] – [шкап].
Such sounds are called free variants. The existence of free variants is explained by regional, stylistic and individual variations. Ex: city [‘sidi – ‘siti], letter [‘ledэ – ‘letэ]
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The semantic method of phonological analysis is widely used and it helps to create the system of the sounds of a language.
The application of this method shows that the English language has 24 consonant phonemes and 20 vowel ones. They are grouped into classes according to the distinctive features.
In English the following features are distinctive for consonants:
- place of articulation;
- manner of articulation, type of obstruction;
- presence or absence of voice (force of articulation)
The phonemic feature of vowels:
- quality => 1) stability of articulation, + 2) tongue position (horizontal, vertical)
The function of quantity and quality in the system of English vowels.
Most Russian phoneticians think that quality is decisive. But some of the British ones don’t. In Russian linguistics there is a principle that a feature can be systemic if it doesn’t depend on the context. Ex: [bit] – [bi:t] (1), [bit] – [bi:d] (2).
In the (1) example the vowels are practically the same in length, but the quality is different. In the (2) one there is some difference in length, but the difference in quality also remains, i.e. vowel quality is distinctive regardless of the position in the word.
Positional length of English vowels: [si:] – [si.d] – [si``t]
Morphology
Neutralization = weak position. Position can be weak or strong.
Phonological analysis is more difficult when the sound is in weak position or in the position of neutralization. This position means that some of the distinctive features are neutralized.
For consonants weak position in the word is the final position, or the position before other consonants.
For vowels it is the unstressed position.
Ex: зуб [зуп], activity [эk’tiviti]
This problem is tackled by the morphology (the problem of establishing of the phonemic status of speech sounds in weak positions). Its special subject is the relations between the morphemes and phonemes. Morphology studies the way sound alternate as different realization of one and the same morpheme.
minimal pairs:
‘ o bject [o] – o b’ject [э]
лук [к] – луг [г]
There exist 2 approaches/ schools that look at this question in different ways. The one is the Moscow School, Morphological school is represented by R.E. Avanesov, A.A. Reformatskiy, Kuznetsov, Panov. It’s clear from the name, that the fundamental idea of the school is the following:
1) the phoneme is the minimal component of the morpheme, which is a minimal meaningful language unit;
2) they claim, that the phonemic ‘content of the morpheme is constant.
In establishing the phonemic status of sounds they band their phon. analysis (for a vowel – stressed, for a consonant – before a stressed vowel) on the theory of strong and weak positions.
If we find a vowel in its strong position, we can establish the phonemic status of the sound (=проверить слово).
лу г – лу г а
(ищем проверочное слово)
нож [ш] – ножи
вода [в^да] – воды [вОды]
con’duct – ‘conduct
Everything depends on the relations.
The supporters of this school view the phoneme as the functional phonetic unit represented by a sequence of positionally alternating sounds.
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Ex: с
с Колей
с Тимой
с Г алей [згал’эj]
с Шурой
It’s important to mention that according to this school the difference of the allophones of the same phoneme is not limited.
Leningrad School.
The second conception is that of the Leningrad School. The supporters are Scherba, Zinder. The main idea of the school is this:
the phonemic ‘content of the morpheme is not constant, it can change. As for the difference between the allophones of the same phoneme it is limited.
Ex:
‘object [o] – ob’ject [э], where [o]-[э] are different phonemes.
луг [k] – лук [к], where [k]-[k] are the same phoneme.
вода [^] – вОды [o]
According to this reasoning the phoneme can’t lose any of its distinctive features.
гриб [п] – грибы [б] – different phonemes.
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