ENG 141 Spoken English Course Guide PDF

COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Course Developer/Writer Iyere Theodore.O. PhD Department of English School of Arts and Social sciences National Open...

COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Course Developer/Writer Iyere Theodore.O. PhD Department of English School of Arts and Social sciences National Open University of Nigeria, Victoria Island, Lagos. Course Editor Professor V.O. Awonusi, Department of English, Faculty of Arts, University of Lagos, Lagos. Programme Leader Professor Christine I. Ofulue, Faculty of Arts National Open University of Nigeria Lagos. NATIONAL OPEN UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA ii COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 National Open University of Nigeria Headquarters 14/16 Ahmadu Bello Way Victoria Island Lagos Abuja Office No. 5 Dar es Salaam Street Off Aminu Kano Crescent Wuse II, Abuja Nigeria e-mail: [email protected] URL: www.nou.edu.ng Published by: National Open University of Nigeria 2008 First Printed 2008 ISBN: 978-058-329-7 All Rights Reserved iii COURSE GUIDE ENG 141 CONTENTS PAGES Introduction…………………………………………… 1 What You Will Learn in this Course…………………. 1 Course Aims………………………………………….. 1 Course Objectives…………………………………….. 2 Working Through this Course………………………... 2 Course Materials……………………………………… 2 Study Units…………………………………………… 2 – 3 References/Further Readings…………………………. 3 – 4 Presentation Schedule………………………………… 5 Assignment File………………………………………. 5 Assessment…………………………………………… 5 Tutor-Marked Assignments (TMAs)…………………. 5 – 6 Final Examination and Grading………………………. 6 – 9 Course Marking Scheme……………………………… 9 Tutors and Tutorials………………………………….. 9 – 10 Summary……………………………………………… 10 iv Introduction Welcome to ENG 141: SPOKEN ENGLISH. ENG 141 is a three - unit course that is taught in the first semester of the B.A English Programme. It introduces you to the basic concepts and techniques of spoken English. It is also designed to equip you with the ability to speak English in a variety of social and academic situations, and to enhance your understanding of academic and non-academic spoken discourse. What You Will Learn In This Course Throughout the duration of this course, you will be exposed to activities and techniques that will help to increase your confidence and stimulate further learning in speech communication. The course lays particular emphasis on your ability to recognize and articulate the sounds used in spoken English. Subsequently, special practices aimed at learning the relevant articulatory skills and extracting information from listening texts are also provided – these skills are used as the basis for developing your ‘discussion skills.’ The Spoken English course will also empower you, intellectually, to take responsibility for your own learning, by encouraging you to work independently on weaker areas of your listening and/or speaking skills. This is why practical guidance is provided, and your progress is monitored. Contact session with your tutorial facilitator will offer you the opportunity to clarify the grey areas as regards the human organs of speech, and the articulation of the sounds of English. Course Aims The aims of this course are to: i) give you a thorough grounding in spoken English, ii) introduce you to the sound system of English, iii) develop your pronunciation skills so that your speech is intelligible to the hearer, iv) expose you to features of segmental and non-segmental sound system of English and v) correct your pronunciation problems ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Course Objectives Upon the successful completion of this course, you should be able to: i) articulate English sounds and pronounce English words correctly, ii) describe in detail, major features of English pronunciation, iii) identify and correct pronunciation errors, iv) develop your articulatory skills and abilities especially as an audience centered communicator, and v) recognize and use stress and intonation correctly. Please note that the self assessment exercises and tutor marked assignments in this book are essential to the accomplishment of these objectives. Working Through This Course This course guide is divided into Modules and units. Within each unit, there are self assessment exercises. You are expected to answer these self assessment questions. Additional requirements for the course will include a final examination. The course guide tells you briefly what the course is all about, what you are expected to know in each unit, what course materials you need use, and how you can work your way through these materials. Course Materials The main components of the course are: 1. The Course Guide 2. Study Units 3. References 4. Assignments 5. Presentation Schedule Study Units There are fifteen units in this course spread through five modules. These are as follows; Module 1 Fundamental Concepts and Definitions Unit 1 Speech in Human Communication Unit 2 The English Sound System Unit 3 Introduction to Phonetic Transcription Unit 4 The Human Organs of Speech ii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Module 2 The English Consonants Unit 1 Parameters for the classification of the Consonants. Unit 2 Detailed description of the English consonants Module 3 Detailed Description of the English Vowels Unit 1 Parameters for the classification of the English vowels Unit 2 Detailed descriptions of the vowels Module 4 The Syllable and Stress in Spoken English Unit 1 The Syllable Unit 2 Word Stress Unit3 Emphatic and Sentence stress Unit 4 Problems in Phonemic Analysis Module 5 Intonation in Spoken English Unit 1 Definition and Functions of Intonation Unit 2 Patterns of Intonation; the Falling tune and Rising tune. Unit 3 Patterns of Intonation; the Falling-Rising tune and the Rising-Falling tune. Each of the units presented above contains a number of pronunciation practices as well as a tutor marked assignment. These are all designed to give you a thorough pronunciation practice, and test you on the materials you have just covered. They will help you to evaluate your progress as well as reinforce your understanding of the material, theses exercises will assist you in achieving the stated learning objectives of the individual units and of the course. A recording of all the practice material is available on cassettes and CDs. The symbol
in the text indicates exactly what is recorded. References/Further Readings The following texts are useful for the course. It is important that you buy some of them (at least, two). Abercrombie, D. (1967) Elements of General Phonetics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Awonusi, S. (2001). Coping with English Pronunciation. Lagos: Obaro and Ogbinaka Publications iii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Bamgbose, A (1971). The English Language in Nigeria. In Spencer (ed). The English Language in West Africa. London: Longman Bamgbose, A (1982). Standard Nigerian English. Issues of Identification. In Kachru (ed). The Other Tongue: English across Cultures. London: Pergamon Press. Carr, P. (1999). English Phonetics and Phonology: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. Couper-Kuhlen (1986). An Introduction to English Prosody. London: Edward Arnold. Cruttenden, A. (1997). Intonation. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cruttenden, A. (2001). Gimson’s Pronunciation of English. 6th ed., Revised and edited version of A. C. Gimson’s original book. London: Edward Arnold. Elugbe, B. (2000). Oral English for Schools and Colleges. Ibadan: Heinemann http://www.ex.ac.uk/-bosthause/Lecture/hockett.htm Kreidler, C. W. (1989). The Pronunciation of English. Oxford: Blackwell. Ladefoged, P. (1993). A Course in Phonetics. 3rd. Ed., New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers. Ogbulogo, C. (2002). Oral English Manual. Lagos: Sam Ironanusi Publications. Roach, P. (1999). English Phonetics and Phonology; A self-contained, comprehensive pronunciation course. 3rd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wells, J. C. (1986). English Accents and their implications for Spelling Reform. In Simplified Spelling Society Newsletter, J3 www.bbcenglish.co.uk iv ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Presentation Schedule Your tutorial facilitator will inform you of important dates for the early and timely completion and submission of your TMAs and attending tutorials. You should remember that you are required to submit all your assignments by the stipulated time and date. You should guard against lagging behind in your work. Assignment File In your assignment file, you will find the details of the assignments you must submit to your tutor for marking. The marks you obtain for these assignments will count towards the final mark you obtain for this course. Further information on assignments will be found in the assignment file itself, and later in this course guide in the section on assessment. There are many assignments for this course, with each unit having at least one assignment. These assignments are basically meant to assist you to understand the course. Assessment There are two aspects to the assessment of this course. First is the tutor – marked assignments; second is a written examination. In handling these assignments, you are expected to apply the information, knowledge and experience acquired during the course. The assignments must be submitted to your tutor for formal assessment in accordance with the deadlines stated in the assignment file. The work you submit to your tutor for assessment will account for 30 percent of your total coursework. At the end of the course, you will need to sit for a final examination of three hours duration. This examination will account for the other 70 percent of your total course mark. Tutor Marked Assignments (TMAs) There are fifteen (15) tutor-marked assignments in this course. Each assignment will be marked over ten (10). The best three (that is the highest three of the 10 marks) will be counted. This implies that the total mark for the best three (3) assignments will constitute 30% of your total course work. The assignments for the units in this course are contained in the assignment file. You will be able to complete your assignments from the v ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH information and materials contained in your references, reading and study units. When each assignment is completed, send it together with a TMA (Tutor-Marked assignment) form to your tutor. Ensure that each assignment reaches your tutor on or before the deadline given in the assignment file. If for any reason you cannot complete your work on time, contact your tutor before the assignment is due, to discuss the possibility of an extension. Extensions will not be granted after the due date unless there are exceptional circumstances warranting such. Final Examination and Grading The final examination for ENG 141; Spoken English will be of three hours’ duration and have a value of 70% of the total course grade. The examination will consist of questions which will reflect the practice exercises and tutor-marked assignments you have previously encountered. All areas of the course will be assessed. It is important that you use adequate time (between the completion of the last unit and sitting for the examination) to revise the entire course. You may find it useful to review your tutor-marked assignments and comment on them before the examination. The final examination covers information from all aspects of the course. Course Marking Scheme Table 1: Course marking scheme ASSESSMENT MARK Assignments Best three marks of the Assignments @ 10% each on the average = 30% of course marks. Final Examination 70% of overall course marks. Total 100% of course marks Table 2: Course Overview. This table brings together the units, the number of weeks you should take to complete them, and the assignments that follow them. vi ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Title of work Week’s Assessment Activity (end of unit) Course Guide Module1 Fundamental Concepts and Definitions Unit 1 Speech in Human 1 Assignment 1 communication Unit 2 The English Sound System 2 Assignment 2 Unit 3 Introduction to Phonetic 3 Assignment 3 Transcription Unit 4 The Human Organs of 4 Assignment 4 Speech Module 2 The English Consonants Unit 1 Parameters for the 5 Assignment 5 classification of Unit 2 English Consonants: 6 Assignment 6 Detailed Description of the English Consonants Module 3 Detailed description of the English Vowels Unit 1 Parameters for the 7 Assignment 7 classification of Unit 2 The English vowels. 8 Assignment 8 Detailed description of the vowels Module 4 The Syllable and Stress in Spoken English Unit 1 The Syllable 9 Assignment 9 Unit 2 Word stress 10 Assignment 10 Unit 3 Emphatic and Sentence 11 Assignment 11 stress Unit 4 Problems in Phonetic 12 Assignment 12 Analysis Module 5 Intonation in Spoken English Unit 1 Definition and function of 13 Assignment 13 Intonation Unit 2 Patterns of Intonation; the 14 Assignment 14 falling – tune and rising tune. Unit 3 Patterns of Intonation; the 15 Assignment 15 falling – rising tune, and the rising – falling tune. vii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH How to get the most from this course 1) In distance learning, the study units replace the university lecture. This is one of the great advantages of distance learning; you can read and work through specially designed study materials at your own pace, and at a time and place that suites you best. Think of it as reading the lecture instead of listening to the lecturer. In the same way a lecturer might give you some reading to do. The study units tell you when to read and which are your text materials or recommended books. You are provided exercises to do at appropriate points, just as a lecturer might give you an in- class exercise. 2) Each of the study units follows a common format. The first item is an introduction to the subject matter of the unit, and how a particular unit is integrated with other units and the course as a whole. Next to this is a set of learning objectives. These objectives let you know what you should be able to do, by the time you have completed the unit. These learning objectives are meant to guide your study. The moment a unit is finished, you must go back and check whether you have achieved the objectives. If this is made a habit, then you will significantly improve your chance of passing the course. 3) The main body of the unit guides you through the required reading from other sources. This will usually be either from your reference or from a reading section. 4) The following is a practical strategy for working through the course. If you run into any trouble, telephone your tutor or visit the study centre nearest to you. Remember that your tutor’s job is to help you. When you need assistance, do not hesitate to call and ask your tutor to provide it. 5) Read this course guide thoroughly. It is your first assignment. 6) Organize a study schedule – Design a ‘Course Overview’ to guide you through the course. Note the time you are expected to spend on each unit and how the assignments relate to the units. Important information; e.g. details of your tutorials and the date of the first day of the semester is available at the study centre. You need to gather all the information into one place, such as your diary or a wall calendar. Whatever method you choose to use, you should decide on and write in your own dates and schedule of work for each unit. 7) Once you have created your own study schedule, do everything to stay faithful to it. The major reason that students fail is that they get behind in their coursework. viii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH If you get into difficulties with your schedule, please let your tutor know before it is too late for help. 8) Turn to Unit 1, and read the introduction and the objectives for the unit. 9) Assemble the study materials. You will need your references for the unit you are studying at any point in time. 10) As you work through the unit, you will know what sources to consult for further information. 11) Visit you centre whenever you need up– to– date information. 12) Well before the relevant due dates (about 4 weeks before due dates) visit your study centre for your next required assignment. Keep in mind that you will learn a lot by doing the assignment carefully. They have been designed to help you meet the objectives of the course and, therefore, will help you pass the examination. Submit all assignments not later than the due date. 13) Review the objectives for each study unit to confirm that you that you have achieved them. If you feel unsure about any of the objectives, review the study materials or consult your tutor. When you are confident that you have achieved a unit’s objectives, you can start on the next unit. Proceed unit by unit through the course and try to space your study so that you can keep yourself on schedule. 14) When you have submitted an assignment to your tutor for marking, do not wait for its return before starting on the next unit. Keep to your schedule. When the assignment is returned, pay particular attention to your tutor’s comments, both on the tutor marked assignment form and also the written comments on the ordinary assignments. 15) After completing the last unit, review the course and prepare yourself for the final examination. Check that you have achieved the unit objectives (listed at the beginning of each unit) and the course objectives (listed in the course guide). Tutors and Tutorials There are 12 hours of tutorials provided in support of this course. However, tutorials are not compulsory, but demand driven, and are meant to be problem solving sessions. You will need to contact your tutor for more information about these tutorials, together with the name and phone number of your tutor. Your tutor will mark and comment on your assignments, keep a close watch on your progress and on any difficulties you might encounter, and provide assistance to you during the course. You must mail your tutor marked assignment to your tutor before the due date (at least two ix ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH working days are required). They will be marked by your tutor and returned to you as soon as possible. Do not hesitate to contact your tutorial facilitator by telephone or e– mail. The following might be circumstances in which you will find help necessary. Contact your tutorial facilitator if: you do not understand any part of the study units or the assigned readings. you have difficulties within the exercises. You have a question or problem with an assignment, with your tutor’s comments on an assignment or with the grading of an assignment. You should try your best to attend the tutorials if you have problems. This is the only chance to have face-to-face contact with your tutor and ask questions which are answered instantly. You can raise any problem encountered in the course of your study. To gain the maximum benefits from course tutorials, prepare a question list before attending them. You will learn quite a lot from participating in the discussions. Summary ENG 141 aims at equipping you with the pronunciation skills required in English which can be easily understood by other educated speakers of English locally and internationally. Upon completion of this course your articulatory skills should be well developed, particularly because of your ability to master the techniques needed for the correct articulation of English sounds and words. You will also be able to overcome pronunciation problems that you may have. We wish you success in the course x ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Course Code ENG 141 Course Title Spoken English Course Developer/Writer Iyere Theodore.O. School of Arts and Social Sciences National Open University of Nigeria, Victoria Island, Lagos. Course Editor Professor V.O. Awonusi, Department of English, Faculty of Arts, University of Lagos, Lagos. Programme Leader Christine I. Ofulue, Ph.D, Department of English, School of Arts and Social Sciences National Open University of Nigeria Lagos. NATIONAL OPEN UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA xi ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH National Open University of Nigeria Headquarters 14/16 Ahmadu Bello Way Victoria Island Lagos Abuja Office No. 5 Dar es Salaam Street Off Aminu Kano Crescent Wuse II, Abuja Nigeria e-mail: [email protected] URL: www.nou.edu.ng Published by: National Open University of Nigeria 2008 First Printed 2008 ISBN: 978-058-329-7 All Rights Reserved xii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH CONTENTS PAGES Module 1 Fundamental Concepts and Definitions…………………………………… 1 Unit 1 Speech in Human Communication…………… 1 – 12 Unit 2 The English Sound System…………………… 13 – 21 Unit 3 Introduction to Phonetic Transcription………. 22 – 29 Unit 4 The Human Organs of Speech……………….. 30 – 36 Module 2 The English Consonants……………………. 37 Unit 1 Parameters for the Classification of English Consonants…………………………... 37 – 47 Unit 2 Detailed description of English Consonants…. 48 – 69 Module 3 Detailed Descriptions of the English Vowels 70 Unit 1 Parameters for Classification of the English Vowels………………………………………... 70 – 76 Unit 2 Detailed Description of the Vowels………….. 77 – 101 Module 4 The Syllable and Stress in Spoken English 102 Unit 1 The Syllable………………………………..…. 102 – 109 Unit 2 Word Stress……………………………..……. 110 – 118 Unit 3 Emphatic and Sentence stress………………... 119 – 125 Unit 4 Constraints in analyzing English Syllables and Stress………………………..………………… 126 – 132 Module 5 Intonation in Spoken English………………. 133 Unit 1 Definition and Functions of Intonation…….... 133 – 139 Unit 2 Patterns of Intonation: The Falling Tune and Rising Tune………………………................... 140 – 147 Unit 3 Patterns of Intonation: The Fall-Rise Tune and the Rise-Fall Tune…………………. 148 – 152 xiii ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH MODULE 1 FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS AND DEFINITIONS Unit 1 Speech in Human Communication Unit 2 The English Sound System Unit 3 Introduction to Phonetic Transcription Unit 4 The Human Organs of Speech UNIT 1 SPEECH IN HUMAN COMMUNICATION CONTENTS 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Objectives 3.0 Main Content 3.1 What is Speech? 3.2 Factors that can affect the quality of speech 3.3 Differences between speech and writing 3.4 Advantages of spoken language over written language 4.0 Conclusion 5.0 Summary 6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignments 7.0 References/Further Readings 1.0 INTRODUCTION A spoken language is a human language in which the words are uttered through the mouth. Almost all languages are spoken languages. Computer languages and sign languages are not spoken languages. Everybody wishes to have a command over communication skills while interacting with people or delivering speech before an audience. However, the success of any spoken communication activity is based on the simple method of listen, understand, and speak. The term ‘spoken language’ is often used in contrast to written language; the world's most widely spoken languages all have written forms. The difference between the spoken and written versions of a language can sometimes be quite extreme. 1 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit, you should be able to: explain the difference between writing and speech. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 3.1 What is speech? According to Knowsley (2004), “speech is the universal means of oral communication. It distinguishes humans from the rest of the animal kingdom. Speech (not writing) is considered by linguists as the primary material for study.” There are many varieties of spoken language, many of which are used even on individual basis. It may interest you to know that speech is innately acquired – unlike writing, which is a skill which has to be learned. It is also a known fact that speech is used constantly by everyone for a variety of functions, from the passing of information to the sharing of emotions. Furthermore, legal, religious, medical and technical languages are all varieties of spoken occupational jargon. There are no designated human speech organs, but respiratory and digestive organs are adapted to produce speech. Indeed, speech and writing are two separate systems and an individual’s linguistic competence depends on the ability to make a clear distinction between the two. Listed below are some speech-related expressions that are commonly used in the study of language. Speech community: This is used to describe a group of people with shared language. The group includes all the speakers of a single language or dialect, and they may be widely dispersed geographically. Speech recognition (understanding of speech by computer): This refers to a system of computer input and control in which the computer can recognize spoken words and transform them into digitized commands or text. With such a system, a computer can be activated and controlled by voice commands or take dictation as input to a word processor or a desktop publishing system. 2 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Speech synthesis (computer’s imitation of speech): This refers to computer – generated audio output that resembles human speech. Sign Language and Speech A sign language is a language which uses gestures, motion and expression instead of sound to convey meaning: combinations of hand shapes, movements of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions. Sign languages are used by people who are deaf or hearing-impaired. Contrary to popular belief, sign language is not international. Wherever communities of deaf people exist, sign languages develop. As with spoken languages, these vary from country to country. They are not based on the spoken language in the country of origin. And like spoken languages, they developed in antiquity: sign languages are not new, and are no more or less amendable than any spoken language. 3.2 Factors that can affect the quality of speech There are several factors that can affect the quality of a person’s speech. Among these are: 1. Diseases and disorders of the lungs or the vocal cords, including paralysis, respiratory infections, and cancers of the lungs and throat. 2. Diseases and disorders of the brain, including alogia, aphasias and speech processing disorders, where impaired perception of the message (as opposed to the actual sound) leads to poor speech production. 3. Articulatory problems, such as stuttering, lisping, cleft palate, ataxia, or nerve damage leading to problems in articulation. Tourette syndrome and tics can also affect speech. 4. Problems in the perception of sound and auditory information can affect speech. In addition to aphasias, anomia and certain types of dyslexia can impede the quality of auditory perception, and therefore, expression. Hearing impairments and deafness can be considered to fall into this category. Thus, it is clear that speech has both expressive and receptive elements. The purpose of speech can be to convey meaning or to increase social bonds between individuals and/or groups (it is often both). For the latter, shallowness is not a problem. The success of a speech act depends on numerous factors, including the presence or absence of a variety of speech disorders, the ability of the speaker to express the intended 3 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH message, and the ability and willingness of the audience to play the role of recipient. An important concept that needs to be mentioned here, which can also affect the quality of one’s speech is Glossophobia. Glossophobia is used to refer to the fear of public speaking. The term is derived from the Greek ‘glosso’, meaning ‘tongue’, and ‘phobia’, which means ‘fear or dread’. It is believed to be the single most common phobia affecting as much as 75% of all people. Glossophobia is considered a social phobia and may be linked to or sometimes precede a more severe anxiety disorder. The symptoms include intense anxiety prior to or simply at the thought of having to verbally communicate with any group, avoidance of events which focus the group’s attention on individuals in attendance, and may even include physical distress, nausea, or feeling of panic in such circumstances. Many people have been known to report stress-induced speech disorders which are only present during public speech. 3.3 Differences between speech and writing As mentioned in 3.1 above, speech and writing are two separate systems and an individual’s linguistic competence depends on the ability to make a distinction between the two. Speech quite normally includes false starts, hesitations, repetitions, and ‘fillers’ with no lexical meaning such as ‘ums’ and ‘ers’, and all sorts of sounds which have no connection with writing as a means of communication. Speech is also normally accompanied by many other non-verbal features which affect communication – such as intonation and stress, facial expressions, physical gestures, and even bodily posture. Interestingly, in the study of language, speech is considered primary and as a system which is entirely separate from writing, especially because humans acquire speech due to their innate programming. Unlike writing which is a skill that must be learnt in the same way as driving, sewing, or cooking. It may also interest you to know that there are still some societies in the world which have no written form of language, but which depend entirely on speech. Sign language, among the profoundly hearing-impaired (i.e. the deaf and dumb), is a system which can perform all that a spoken language can in terms of communication. In this case, the hands are adapted instead of respiratory and digestive organs in order to communicate. 4 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH The organs used in speech are as follows: lips teeth tongue palate glottis uvula nose trachea lungs pharynx Speech is normally a continuous stream of sound, and is not broken up into separate parts like writing. This is particularly true because people do not speak in sentences or paragraphs, and some of what is said may not even be distinct ‘words’. It has been observed that most people usually make up the content of what they are saying quite spontaneously, without any planning or long deliberation. It is also important to state that speech cannot be revised or edited in the same way as writing, and although most people (unconsciously) employ a wide range of speech varieties in their everyday conversation, their speeches may often be quite inexplicit – because the participants in a conversation can rely on the context for understanding. Language change takes place far more rapidly in speech than in writing. From our discussion above, we can summarise the characteristics of speech as follows: Speech is time-bound…both participants are usually present. No time-lag between production and reception, and recipient is available for further reaction on the part of the speaker. Intonation and pause divide long utterances into manageable parts, but sentence boundaries are often unclear. Participants can rely on extra linguistic cues as facial expression and gesture to aid meaning. Contraction, slang, obscenities and meaningless vocabulary are much more tolerated. Lengthy co-ordinate sentences are normal and are often of considerable complexity. There is the use of intonation – which includes contrasts of loudness, tempo, rhythm, pause, and other tones that cannot be written down. How writing differs from speech The Written language A written language is the representation of a language by means of a writing system. Indeed, writing is clearly a system of human intercommunication by means of conventional visible marks. Written language is an invention, whereas spoken language has evolved along with homo sapiens. Children will instinctively learn or create 5 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH spoken (or gestural) languages. However, written language must be taught. Written language always appears as a complement to a specific natural language (English, French, American Sign Language, etc.) and no purely written languages (with the exception of computer languages, which are not natural languages) exist. Nevertheless many extinct languages are in effect purely written, since the written form is all that survives. Interestingly, written English and spoken English are obviously very different things; Writing consists of marks on paper which make no noise and are taken in by the eye, while speaking is organised, meaningful sound taken in by the ear. T.S. Eliot once remarked that ‘an identical spoken and written language would be practically intolerable; If we spoke as we write, we would find no one to listen, and if we wrote as we speak, we would find no one to read. The spoken and written language must not be too near together as they must not be too far apart’ There is no doubt that aspects of written and spoken language are often studied as separate domains and much has been written about how the two mediums differ. Written texts may be neatly classified as planned, organized and transactional while spoken communication is often presented as unplanned, less structured and interactive in nature. However, features of written language can easily be found in spoken language just as written texts can exhibit aspects of conversation. It is also important to know that Speech is believed to be innately acquired – unlike writing, which is a skill that has to be learned. Furthermore, speech is used constantly by everyone for a variety of functions; from the passing of information to the sharing of emotions. Writing systems, on the other hand, convey meaning by two means. The first is by the use of symbols which represent sounds and function as surrogates of speech. The second is by the use of symbols that add no phonetic information. These two together are combined in different proportions in different scripts. It becomes obvious therefore, that speech and writing are two separate systems and your linguistic competence depends on your ability to make a clear distinction between the two. At this point, it will be useful to present Crystal’s (2004) tabulated differences between speech and writing: 6 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Main sounds versus letters Differences permanency first and final drafts purposes of language interaction between listener and speaker Speech comes before writing historically Which comes Many languages lack a written form first: speech or Many individuals cannot use written language writing? Children automatically learn to speak but have to be taught how to read Characteristics Repeating first draft status vocabulary grammar of Spoken intonation Language Characteristi cs of Written final draft status density of content grammar Language neutrality of social roles punctuation Unique Written Vocabulary Some words are never really said in ordinary speech 7 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Figure 1. Source: Crystal, David (2004) “Language and the Internet” 8 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH 3.4 Advantages of spoken language over written language Language is an ever evolving process on planet Earth varying from culture to culture and place to place depending on the needs of the civilization that existed at that timeline. Written language evolved from hieroglyphs – cave wall art (pictographs) – stone or clay tablets – papyrus – paper of arious and writing implements. Commented [U1]: This is not clear at all. Language is a system of conventional spoken or written symbols by means of which human beings, as members of a social group and participants in its culture, communicate. Language so defined is the peculiar possession of humans. Other animals interact by means of sounds and body movements, and some can learn to interpret human speech to an extremely limited extent. But no other species of being has conventionalized its cries and utterances so that they constitute a systematic symbolism in the way that language does. In these terms, then, humans may be described as the ‘talking animals’. Language has a structure or a series of structures and this structuring can be analyzed and systematically presented. When language is spoken, a complex series of events takes place. These events are on many planes of experience: physical (the sound waves); chemical (the body chemistry); physiological (the movements of nerve impulses and of muscles); psychological (the reaction to stimuli); general cultural (the situation of the speaker in respect to the cultural system of his society); linguistic (the language being spoken); and semantic (its meaning). The spoken word is intimate, tied to the very breath and health of the speaker. The written word makes possible the autonomous survival of knowledge - with an oral tradition, it disappears when the oralists have all been killed; but, as people have noted for a long time, writing is impersonal, does not carry emotional intonations as well as speech, and lacks the identifying characteristics (pitch, tone, timbre, rate, etc.) that links speech to a speaker. Certainly, writing displays styles - some people insist they can recognize any particular writer's writing - but it is also not as idiosyncratic as speech. Even on the phone, we immediately know the voices of our loved ones. They are distinctive and unique. Writing is a form of human communication by means of a set of visible marks that are related, by convention, to some particular structural level of language. This definition highlights the fact that writing is in principle the representation of language rather than a direct representation of thought and the fact that spoken language has a number of levels of structure, including sentences, words, syllables, and phonemes (the smallest units of speech used to distinguish one word or 9 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH morpheme from another), any one of which a writing system can "map onto" or represent. Indeed, the history of writing is in part a matter of the discovery and representation of these structural levels of spoken language in the attempt to construct an efficient, general, and economical writing system capable of serving a range of socially valuable functions. Literacy is a matter of competence with a writing system and with the specialized functions that written language serves in a particular society. Let me re-emphasise that languages are systems of symbols; writing is a system for symbolizing these symbols. A writing system may be defined as any conventional system of marks or signs that represents the utterances of a language. Writing renders language visible; while speech is ephemeral, writing is concrete and, by comparison, permanent. Both speaking and writing depend upon the underlying structures of language. Consequently, writing cannot ordinarily, be read by someone not familiar with the linguistic structure underlying the oral form of the language. Yet writing is not merely the transcription of speech; writing frequently involves the use of special forms of language, such as those involved in literary and scientific works, which would not be produced orally. In any linguistic community the written language is a distinct and special dialect; usually there is more than one written dialect. Scholars account for these facts by suggesting that writing is related directly to language but not necessarily directly to speech. Consequently, spoken and written language may evolve somewhat distinctive forms and functions. Notwithstanding the foregoing discussions, most contemporary linguists work under the assumption that spoken language is more fundamental, and thus more important to study than written language. Reasons for this perspective include: Speech appears to be a human universal, whereas there have been many cultures and speech communities that lack written communication; People learn to speak and process spoken languages more easily and much earlier than writing; A number of cognitive scientists argue that the brain has an innate "language module", knowledge of which is thought to come more from studying speech than writing, particularly since language as speech is held to be an evolutionary adaptation, whereas writing is a comparatively recent invention. 10 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Of course, linguists agree that the study of written language can be worthwhile and valuable. For linguistic research that uses the methods of corpus linguistics and computational linguistics, written language is often much more convenient for processing large amounts of linguistic data. Large corpora of spoken language are difficult to create and hard to find, and are typically transcribed and written. The study of writing systems themselves is in any case considered a branch of linguistics. SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Summarise in your own words, the differences between spoken language and written language 4.0 CONCLUSION Human communication can be realized at two levels; speech and writing. In speech, humans articulate sounds and pronounce meaningful words through the mouth. Speech is considered primary because every normal human being possesses the natural ability to speak, unlike writing which is a more deliberate skill that has to be systematically taught and learned. The importance of speech as the primary medium of human interaction in different communication situations can therefore, not be overemphasized. 5.0 SUMMARY In this unit we have studied the meaning of speech and analysed closely the factors that can affect the quality of a person’s speech. We also studied the advantages of speech over writing. 6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENTS 1. How would you define speech? 2. Mention any three advantages of speech over writing. 7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS Abercrombie, D. (1967). Elements of General Phonetics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Awonusi, S. (2001). Coping with English Pronunciation. Lagos: Obaro and Ogbinaka publications. 11  ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Bamgbose, A. (1998) ‘Torn between norms: innovations in world Englishes’. World Englishes 17, 1: 1-14. Carr, P. (1999). English Phonetics and Phonology: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell Crystal, D (2004). Language and the Internet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Elugbe, B. (2000). Oral English for Schools and Colleges. Ibadan: Heinemann Knowsley LEA (2004) “Speech” http://www.buzzin.net/english/speech.htm 12 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH UNIT 2 THE ENGLISH SOUND SYSTEM CONTENTS 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Objectives 3.0 Main Content 3.1 Definitions and Problems in pronunciation 3.2 How the sounds differ from the letters of the alphabet 3.3 The Sounds of English 4.0 Conclusion 5.0 Summary 6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignments 7.0 References/Further Readings 1.0 INTRODUCTION Has this truth ever occurred to you - that Language starts with the ear? Well, it may interest you to know that when a baby starts to talk he does it by hearing the sounds his mother makes and imitating them. Thus, the phenomenon called ‘speech’ has a lot to do with hearing and imitating. – indeed, this is what gives us the gift of ‘speech’. 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit you should be able to: distinguish the sounds of English from the letters of the alphabet. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 3.1 Definitions and Problems in pronunciation It is essential to first define the term pronunciation before analyzing the problems associated with it. The Wikipedia online dictionary defines pronunciation as the way a word or a language is usually spoken; the manner in which someone utters a word. This definition is echoed in the American Heritage Dictionary which sees it as a way of speaking a word, especially a way that is accepted or generally understood. It also says that pronunciation could be regarded as a graphic representation of the way a word is spoken, using phonetic symbols. Pronunciation- “pro·nun·ci·a·tion /prə ˌnʌn siˈeɪ ʃən/ – noun” is also defined as the following: 1. the act or result of producing the sounds of speech, including 13 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH articulation, stress, and intonation, often with reference to some standard of correctness or acceptability. 2. an accepted standard of the sound and stress patterns of a syllable, word, etc.: He said the pronunciation of “curl” is /kɜrl/ - Spelled Pronunciation[kurl. 3. the conventional patterns of treatment of the sounds of a language: the pronunciation of French. 4. a phonetic transcription of a given word, sound, etc.: The pronunciation of “pheasant” is /ˈfɛz ənt/ ” Source: Dictionary.com Unabridged (v1.1) The various definitions presented above, confirm the following facts about the term pronunciation: it is an act of speech; the act of articulating a sound or word it also consists of the transcription of sounds; a phonetic transcription of sounds. You may have heard the term Received Pronunciation. What does it mean? Received Pronunciation (RP) is a form of pronunciation of the English language which has been long perceived as uniquely prestigious among British accents and is the usual accent taught to non-native speakers learning British English. Received Pronunciation is also sometimes referred to as the Queen’s (or King’s) English, because it is spoken by the monarch, or BBC English, because it was traditionally used by the BBC. Yet, nowadays, these are all slightly misleading. The queen, Elizabeth 11, speaks an almost unique form of English, and the BBC is no longer restricted to one type of accent. It is important to state clearly that RP is an accent (a form of pronunciation), not a dialect (a form of vocabulary and grammar). It shows a great deal about the social and educational background of a person who uses British English. A person using an RP accent will typically speak Standard English although the reverse is not necessarily true. It is a known fact that no two people speak exactly alike, and this phenomenon is known as idiolectal differences. But when these differences spread over wide geographical areas to include grammatical 14 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH usage, vocabulary and pronunciation, they are called dialects. When the differences are limited to pronunciation, they are known as accents. At present, there are as many different kinds of English as there are speakers of it. Examples include American English, Australian English, Nigerian English, and South African English. The main problem of English pronunciation therefore, centres on the question - ‘How do we decide the sort of English to use as a model?’ Interestingly, no one accent can be described as intrinsically superior to another. This is because different accents serve the different communicative needs of different societies. However, it has been generally argued that the ideal variety is the Standard British English, which in the spoken form is referred to as the Received Pronunciation (RP) – see our discussion above. This is the variety which is used for the mass media, official business and instruction in various institutions of learning in Nigeria. It is called the Educated Nigerian English. A good user of the Educated Nigerian English accent cannot be easily identified in terms of his region or locality in the country. You also need to know that in Nigeria today, there is a tradition of speaking English for general communicative purposes. So, you must strive to acquire the pronunciation accent of the Educated Nigerian English; therefore, your aim should be to acquire a perfect English pronunciation. Unless this is your aim, you will not make all the progress of which you are capable. 3.2 How the sounds differ from the letters of the alphabet It is a well known fact that the alphabet which we use to write English has 26 letters, but it may interest you to know that (British) English has about 49 sounds. Inevitably, English spelling will not be a reliable guide to pronunciation (in spoken English) because Some letters have more than one sound Sometimes letters are not pronounced at all in some English words The same sound may be represented by different letters The letters of the English alphabet The English language has been written using the Latin alphabet from around the 7th century. Since the 5th century, the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc (a kind of alphabet) had been used, and both alphabets continued to be used in parallel for some time. In the year 1011, a writer named Byrhtferð presented the Old English alphabet which was a reordering of the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet. This was what he presented: 15 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH ABCDEFGHIKLMNOPQRSTVXYZÞÐÆ In Modern English orthography, ‘þ’ and the other two listed above are obsolete, although þ continued its existence for some time, its lower case form gradually becoming graphically indistinguishable from the minuscule ‘y’ in most handwritings. On the other hand, ‘u’ and ‘j’ were introduced as distinct from ‘v’ and ‘i’ in the 16th century, and ‘w’ assumed the status of an independent letter, so that the English alphabet is now considered to consist of the following 26 letters: Listen attentively to their pronunciations as follows:
Letter Letter name (IPA) A a [eɪ] B bee [bi:] C cee [si:] D dee [di:] E e [i:] F ef [ef] (spelled eff as a verb) G gee [dʒi:] H aitch [eɪtʃ] I i [aɪ] J jay [dʒeɪ] K kay [keɪ] L el [el] M em [em] N en [en] O o [əʊ] P pee [pi:] Q cue [kju:] R ar [ɑr] S ess [es] T tee [ti:] U u [ju:] V vee [vi:] W double-u [dʌb(ə)l ju :] X ex [eks] Y wy [waɪ] Z zed [zed]; zee [zi:] in American English 16 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Subsequently, when writing English we use the 26 letters of the alphabet. However, when speaking there are roughly 49 different sounds in English. These sounds are called phonemes. If you are concentrating on the sounds of English, you need 49 characters to represent all of them. One way of doing this is to use the 'phonemic alphabet', which has some extra characters to represent the sounds in English for which there is no clear equivalent letter or letters. 3.3 The Sounds of English There are 49 sounds in English. These sounds are made up of consonants and vowels, and there is a system for writing all the sounds of English. It is called the International Phonetic Association (IPA) system. If you know this system you can pronounce any English word perfectly (without the assistance of your tutorial facilitator) by looking in a learner's dictionary (for example, an English Pronunciation Dictionary). Please be reminded of the fact that the letters of the alphabet can be a poor guide to pronunciation. Phonetic symbols, in contrast, are a totally reliable guide. Each symbol represents one sound consistently. Here are the various sounds presented in two distinct categories; vowels and consonants. The Vowels in the Received Pronunciation of British English are as follows:
Short vowels ɪ - bit, silly ɛ - bet, head æ - cat, dad ɒ - dog, rotten ʌ - cut, nut ʊ - put, soot ə - about, clever Long vowels i: - cream, seen ɜ: - burn, firm(also shown as əː) ɑ: - hard, far 17 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH ɔ: - corn, faun u: - boob, glue Diphthongs aɪ - spice, pie ɛɪ - wait, fate ɔɪ - toy, joy əʊ - oats, note aʊ - clown, vow ɔə - bored, poured ɪə - deer, pier ɛə - hair, bear ʊə - cure, fuel There are also vowel sequences (three vowels pronounced together), and they are called Triphthongs. They are formed by the addition of the / ə / sound to some diphthongs. Here are the five triphthongs in English:
aiə as in tyre auə as in tower eiə as in greyer əuə as in grower ‫כ‬iə as in royal All these categories will be discussed extensively in the section that gives a detailed description of the English vowels. The Consonant sounds are as follows: 18 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH
p - pip, pot b - bat, bug t - tell, table d - dog, dig k - cat, key g - get, gum f - fish, phone v - van, vat θ - thick, thump, faith ð - these, there, smooth s - sat, sit z - zebra, zap ʃ - ship ʒ - treasure, leisure h - hop, hut tʃ - chip dʒ - lodge, judge m - man, mummy n - man, pan ŋ - sing, wrong l - let, lips r - rub, ran w - wait, worm j - yet, yacht The consonants will be discussed extensively in the section that gives a detailed description of the English consonants. SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Write out all the sounds of English as they have been presented in this unit, and give one example of a word where the sound occurs. 4.0 CONCLUSION We now know that the sounds of English are, indeed, different from the letters of the English alphabet. We can therefore, say that the letters of the English alphabet are the graphic representations of the sounds of English on paper. Interestingly, though, English spelling cannot be regarded as a reliable guide to English pronunciation. 5.0 SUMMARY 19 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH In this unit, you studied the interesting and captivating differences between the sounds of English and the letters of the English alphabet. The unit also presented insightful information about the way these sounds are pronounced in words. 6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENTS Think carefully and write out ten pairs of English words that are pronounced alike but spelt differently. See the following ten examples: 1. i) Male - Mail 2. ii) Seen - Scene 3. iii) Sun - Son 4. Knight - Night 5. No - No 6. See - Sea 7. Quay - Key 8. Hair - Hare 9. Here - Hear 10. Fare - Fair 7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS 20 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Abercrombie, D. (1967). Elements of General Phonetics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Awonusi, S. (2001). Coping with English Pronunciation. Lagos: Obaro and Ogbinaka publications Carr, P. (1999). English Phonetics and Phonology: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. Couper, K. (1986). An Introduction to English Prosody. London: Edward Arnold Cruttenden, A. (2001). Gimson’s Pronunciation of English. 6th ed., Revised and edited version of A. C. Gimson’s original book. London: Edward Arnold. http://www.ex.ac.uk/-bosthause/Lecture/hockett.htm http://www.celt.stir.ac.uk/staff Jones, D. (2000). English Pronouncing Dictionary. Oxford: OUP Ogbulogo, C. (2002). Oral English Manual. Lagos: Sam Ironanusi Publications. www.bbcenglish.co.uk 21 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH UNIT 3 INTRODUCTION TO PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION CONTENTS 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Objectives 3.0 Main Content 3.1 Transcribing spoken English 3.2 The technique of Phonetic Transcription 4.0 Conclusion 5.0 Summary 6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignments 7.0 References/Further Readings 1.0 INTRODUCTION Can you recall what you studied in the first unit about written English and spoken English? Well, among other things, we mentioned that written English and spoken English are two different communication concepts in the English language. Writing consists of marks on paper which make no noise and are taken in by the eye, while speaking is organised sound, taken in by the ear. Language starts with the ear, and transcription of spoken English simply refers to the graphic representations of our utterance on paper – using the phonetic alphabet recommended by the International Phonetic Association. 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit, you should be able to transcribe simple words and phrases in English. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 3.1 Transcribing Spoken English There are lots of things to be careful about when doing the transcription of spoken English. The most important is to pay attention to the sounds, and do not be distracted by the spelling of the word or expression. English spelling is not designed to faithfully represent the sounds of words and is frequently quite misleading in this respect, so it is best to try to ignore it. 22 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH It is important to mention that phonetic symbols are a visual aid – you can see that two words differ or are the same in pronunciation. For example, you can see that ‘son’ and ‘sun’ must be pronounced the same way because the phonetic symbols are the same. This implies that phonetic transcription will enable you to use your eyes to aid your ears. All of these show clearly that although speaking a language is a performance skill, knowledge of how the language works (e.g.; phonetic transcription) is of great value. This means that your knowledge of the 49 sound of English will be of great value to you in this course. From our foregoing discussion we have been able to establish the following facts; the letters of the English alphabet can be a poor guide to pronunciation and transcription. Phonetic symbols, in contrast, are a totally reliable guide, especially because each symbol represents one sound consistently. Now, at the risk of repeating some of what we have already said, here are some other good reasons why you should know the English phonetic symbols. You can use dictionaries effectively. The second bit of information in dictionaries for English language learners is the word in phonetic symbols. It comes right after the word itself. Knowing these symbols enables you to get the maximum information from dictionaries. You can become an independent learner of English, because you can find out the pronunciation of a word by yourself without asking the tutorial facilitator. Better still, you can easily write down the correct pronunciation of an English word that you hear. This aspect is very important because if you cannot correctly use the phonetic symbols for this purpose, you will end up using the sound values of letters in your own language and this will perpetuate pronunciation errors in your spoken English. Phonetic symbols are a visual aid. You can easily see that two words differ, or are the same, in pronunciation. For example you can see that 'seen' and scene' must be pronounced the same because the phonemic symbols are the same. In other words, you can use your eyes to help your ears. Phonetic symbols, arranged in a chart, are part of every student's armoury of learning resources. Just as you have a dictionary for vocabulary and a grammar book for grammar, so you need reference materials for pronunciation: the phonemic symbols and simple, key words that show the sound of each symbol will always be very good and simple resource materials for the learning of spoken English. Although speaking a language is a performance skill, knowledge of how the language works is still of great value. So, getting good knowledge of spoken English depends to a very great extent on how 23 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH good you are in the knowledge of the phonetic symbols of the English language. Now, take another look at the inventory of English sounds listed in unit 2: 3.3. 3.2 The Techniques of Phonetic Transcription /fəunetik trænskrip∫n/ When we transcribe a word or an utterance, we give a direct specification of its pronunciation in the written format. If ordinary spelling reliably indicated actual pronunciation, phonetic transcription might be unnecessary; but often it does not. This is obvious when we consider a language such as English, whose spelling displays blatantly irregular characteristics of continuous speech that are not reflected in the orthography. For you, a passive acquaintance with phonetic transcription will enable you to extract precise and explicit information on pronunciation from a dictionary. The truth is, without this information, you risk being misled either by an inadequately trained ear or by the dazzling effect of the ordinary spelling. Indeed, with phonetic transcriptions, dictionaries tell you about the pronunciation of words. Phonetic transcription is necessary, because the spelling of a word does not tell you how you should pronounce it. “Phonetic transcriptions are usually written in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), in which each English sound has a special symbol” (antimoon.com). For example, the phonetic transcription of ‘no’ is /nəu/ and for ‘do’ it is /du:/. Note that even though both words have a letter ‘o’, their phonetic transcriptions are different. That is because they are not pronounced in the same way. In a dictionary, it looks like this: Source: [Longman Active Study Dictionary of English] cited in http://www.antimoon.com/how/pronunc-trans.htm 24 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Not all dictionaries give the pronunciations of words. If you are serious about learning Spoken English, you should obtain a dictionary that treats just the pronunciation of English. It is important for you to know that the 49 phonemes in British English are based on the sounds of Received Pronunciation, and you do not need to have a perfect English accent in order to transcribe words correctly. You also need to know that the best technique to use is to start learning the consonant symbols first. The reason is simple; the consonants are the easiest because most of them have the same form as a letter of the alphabet (17 out of the 24 consonants are reflected). Study the following examples carefully, and you will observe that almost all the consonant sounds have the same form as a letter of the alphabet:
very /verɪ/ fast /fa:st/ rough /rʌf/ safer /seɪfə/ divide /divaɪd/ giving /gɪvɪŋ/ Ambiguous spellings and their implications for transcription Some English spellings are entirely ambiguous. If you see the spelling height, you will need to remember that you must get the correct sounds that make up the word. When transcribed, the word becomes /haɪt/. There are so many homographs (same spelling, different pronunciation and meaning) in the English language; they include - bass, bow, buffet, does, gill, lead, live, minute, putting, read, resume, tear, tinged, wind, wound. Interestingly, as soon as we transcribe them, we show the difference in pronunciation. You will need to always remember this interesting phenomenon in your attempt at transcribing English words. Always bear this in mind – that your pronunciation will differ in some ways from that of your friends or the tutorial facilitator. This is generally due to difference in regional dialect or sometimes a matter of age. Now, try and pronounce each of the words in every group and see if you can match the transcriptions on the right with the appropriate English 25 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH words on the left: 1. pat, pick, pit, spite / pɪt / 2. pet, pant, part, pat / pæt / 3. put, pat, pot, port / pɒt / 4. part, pat, pit, port /pɑ:t / 5. pork, pot, port, pet / pɔ:t / 6. punt, pot, put, pat / pʊt / 7. putt, part, pot, pat / pʌt / 8. peat, peak, spite, pit / pi:t / 9. fit, feat, flight, fought / fi:t / 10. feat, fit, fish, fat / fɪt / Here are some pertinent questions that some students have asked concerning transcription. The relevant answers are written below the questions. Is it important for the learners of English to know all the phonetic symbols? To be frank with you, yes. Every profession has specialist knowledge that is not widely known outside the profession. If you are a doctor, you will be able to name every bone in the human body, which most people can't do. If you are a student learning the English language, then you should know the phonetic symbols, which most people don't. Interestingly, you can learn these symbols by themselves and one day you might be required to transcribe in English using the symbols. So, it is best to be prepared. Is it difficult to learn phonetic symbols? No. This is because 19 of the 49 symbols have the same sound and shape as letters of the alphabet. This means that some words, such as 'pet', look the same whether written with phonetic symbols or letters of the alphabet. That leaves just 30 to learn. Compare that with the hundreds of different pieces of information in a grammar book or the thousands of words in even a small dictionary. It is a very small learning load. Moreover, it is visual and shapes are easy to remember. What is the best way to learn phonetic symbols? Most learners of English learn grammar from the textbooks which focus on the key areas of the subject, because they are unlikely to have been 26 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH exposed to any serious formal study of English grammar. They learn by being taught, and this is a very effective way of learning. It is also possible to learn phonetic symbols in the same way. You just need to keep a good English Pronouncing dictionary by your side as you learn the symbols. Which phonetic symbols are the easiest to learn? The consonants are the easiest, because most of them have the same form as a letter of the alphabet (17 out of 24). Therefore, it is best to start by learning a large number of consonant symbols and a small number of easy vowel symbols such as /e/ and /ɪ/. Note, however, that the sound /j/ represents the initial sound of 'yellow', not the initial sound of 'judge'. Experience shows that students are very likely to make mistakes with the symbol /j/, so it needs special attention. Don't I need to have a perfect English accent in order to use phonetic symbols? No. It is true that the 49 phonemes in British English are based on the sounds of Received Pronunciation, an accent which is not frequently heard nowadays. Researches have shown that most native-speaker learners do not have this accent but still use phonetic symbols. When the symbols are arranged in a chart, each one occupies a box. This indicates that the real sound that you actually hear can vary up to certain limits, depending on the influence of other sounds and on individual ways of speaking. There is not just one perfect way to say each sound - there is an acceptable range of pronunciations. The point is that words such as 'ship', sheep', 'sip' and 'seep' should sound different from each other, not that each sound is pronounced exactly like the sounds of Received Pronunciation. Learning phonemic symbols will help students to understand the importance of length and voicing. Simply knowing that the symbol (:) indicates a long sound can be very helpful. There is no end to our study of grammar and vocabulary but phonetic symbols are limited, visual and physical. They may seem challenging at first but it is like learning to swim or ride a bicycle. Once you can do it, it is easy and you never forget. 27 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Write any 10 English words that you know, and transcribe same using the techniques you have studied in this unit. Check the corrections of your work in any good English dictionary, or better still, check an English pronouncing dictionary. 4.0 CONCLUSION There is no regular relationship between the way English is spelt and the way it is pronounced. The concept of transcription is really meant to expose you to one of the simple ways to improve your pronunciation skill. There are some categories of words you need to know – homographs (same spelling but different pronunciation) and homophones (same pronunciation but different spelling). This will help you improve on your transcription skill. 5.0 SUMMARY Transcribing English word and sentences is an interesting exercise. It trains you on how to pay attention to the sounds of English, and not be distracted by the spelling of the given word. In this unit therefore, you studied the meaning of transcription, the techniques of transcription, and the implications of ambiguous expressions for phonetic transcription. 6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENTS Transcribe the following words. (1) feat, (2) book, (3) wet, (4) heart, (5) shirt, (6) judge, (7) cat, (8) think, (9) here, (10) see. 28 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH 7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS Anitmoon.com. http://www.antimoon.com/terms/phonemic_transcription.htm Gimson, A. C. (1997). English Pronouncing Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kreidler, C. W. (1989). The Pronunciation of English. Oxford: Blackwell. Ladefoged, P. (1993). A Course in Phonetics. 3rd. Ed., New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers. http://www.ex.ac.uk/-bosthause/Lecture/hockett.htm http://www.celt.stir.ac.uk/staff www.bbcenglish.co.uk 29 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH UNIT 4 THE HUMAN ORGANS OF SPEECH CONTENTS 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Objectives 3.0 Main Content 3.1 The Organs of Speech 3.2 The process of speech production 3.3 How the Speech Organs work 4.0 Conclusion 5.0 Summary 6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignments 7.0 References/Further Readings 1.0 INTRODUCTION Speech production is concerned with the actual speech sounds of human languages; how they are pronounced by moving various organs in the vocal tract, perceived by the human ear and their physical properties. This unit will be more concerned with relationship between the organs of speech that participate in the production of English sounds. 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit, you should be able to: draw the human organs of speech, and describe the functions of the various organs in speech production. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 3.1 The Organs of Speech All speech begins with the articulation of speech sounds. When you speak, you produce a string of speech sounds (consonants and vowels), which are arranged in sequence to give words in utterances. It is important to state here that the organs are essentially parts of the human body which, in addition to their roles in speech production perform important functions in respiration or chewing. However, our concern for now is with their roles in sound production. 30 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Source: Roach (2000:8)English Phonetics and Phonology 3.2 The Process of Speech Production Some people may think that the tongue, the teeth and the lips are the only organs necessary for the production of speech, but the issue is, can anyone really produce any speech sound by simply moving the tongue or altering the shapes of the lips? I do not think so. In fact, by the time the tongue, teeth and lips become involved, the process of speech production has gone a long way. The process of speech production therefore starts from the lungs which serve as the ‘power house’ from which the air flows. Figure 1 is a diagram showing a side view of the parts of the throat and oral cavity as well as the nasal cavity which are all very important to recognise in spoken English. 3.3 How the Speech Organs work When we speak, we breathe normally and as the air stream flows out from the lungs through the narrow space of the wind – pipe, some 31 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH sounds are produced. Other organs along the throat and in the oral cavity modify the sound according to the message which the speaker wants to send. It may also interest you to know that the various organs are all encapsulated in three cavities; the oral cavity, the nasal cavity and the pharyngeal cavity. Let us study these cavities one after the other to really understand how the organs in them function in speech production. The Oral Cavity: This is the mouth. Within this cavity, there are a number of organs which are very important in the production of speech sounds. The tongue is one of the organs here, and may be described as the most active articulator. It is the most flexible organ because it moves easily and can, in contact with other organs of speech in the oral cavity, create a total or partial obstruction during the production of consonants. On the other hand, its distance from the top of the oral cavity influences the quality of the vowel. Although the tongue has no obvious natural division like the palate, it is useful to think of it as divided into four parts as shown in Figure 1 in the preceding page. The back of the tongue lies under the soft palate when the tongue is at rest; the front lies under the hard palate; the tip and the blade (middle) lie under the alveolar ridge. The tip and blade of the tongue are particularly mobile, and can touch the whole of the lips, the teeth, the alveolar ridge and the hard palate. The front of the tongue can be flat on the bottom of the mouth or it can be raised to touch the hard palate. When you say the vowel /a:/, you will observe that the front of the tongue is flat on the bottom of the mouth, but when you say /æ / as in ‘cat’ the front rises a little; now say / e / as in ‘met’, and you will observe that the front rises again. If you go on to say / Ι: / as in ‘see’, you will see that the front rises to a very high position behind the teeth and close to the hard palate. The back of the tongue, on the other hand, can be flat in the mouth, or it can be raised to touch the soft palate, or it can be raised to a position between these two extremes, especially for the vowels / ɔ, ɔ: ʊ, u:/ as in ‘pot, fought, put, boot’. Now when you say these sounds in the order in which they have been presented here, you will observe that the back of the tongue rises gradually towards the soft palate. Another important organ in this cavity is the teeth. The lower front teeth are not so important in speech except that if they are missing, certain sounds, e.g. / s / and / z / will be difficult to make. But the two upper front teeth are used in spoken English to some extent. Now, put the tip of your tongue very close to the edge of these teeth and blow; this will produce a sound like the English /θ/ in ‘thin’; if you turn on the voice during this /θ/ - sound, you will get a sound like the English /ð/in ‘then’. The palate is yet, another important organ in the oral cavity. As you can see from Figure 1, the palate forms the roof of the mouth and separates 32 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH the oral cavity from the nasal cavity. Now, if you make the tip of your tongue touch as much of your own palate as you can, you will observe that most of it is hard and fixed in position, but when the tip of your tongue is as far back as it will go, away from your teeth, you will notice that the palate becomes soft. You can easily see the soft part of the palate if you use a mirror. Turn your back to the right, open your mouth wide and say the vowel /ɑ:/, and move the mirror so that the light shines into your mouth. You will be able to see the soft palate curving down towards the tongue and becoming narrower as it does so until it ends in a point called the uvula /ju:vυlə/. Behind the soft palate, you will be able to see part of the back wall of the pharynx. When the soft palate is lowered, it allows the breath of air to pass behind itself and up into the nasal cavity, and out through the nose. This is the position of the palate for the / m /, / n / and /ŋ / consonant sounds. Apart from the raising and lowering of the soft palate, the whole of the palate, including the soft palate, is used by the tongue to interfere with the air streams. The hard, fixed part of the palate is divided into two sections as shown in figure 1: the alveolar ridge / ælviəυlə rΙ dʒ / and the hard palate. The alveolar ridge is that part of the gum immediately behind the upper front teeth, and the hard palate is the highest part of the palate, between the alveolar ridge and the beginning of the soft palate. You can touch the whole of the alveolar ridge and the soft palate with the tip of your tongue. The alveolar ridge is particularly important in spoken English because many of the consonant sounds like /t, d, n, l, r, s, z, ʃ, ʒ , tʃ, dʒ/ are made with the tongue touching or close to the alveolar ridge. The Lips: The oral cavity terminates with the lips, and it is obvious that the lips can take up various different positions when a sound is being articulated. They can be brought firmly together as in /p/ or /b/ or /m/. They can also be drawn inward and slightly upward to touch the upper front teeth as in the sounds /f/ and /v/. When speaking, some people make more lip movements than others, but it is never necessary to exaggerate these movements. In fact, it is generally believed that English can be spoken quite easily while holding a pipe between the teeth. The Vocal Cords: The air used in speech, which is usually released by the lungs, passes through the wind – pipe and arrives first at the larynx. The larynx (Adam’s apple) contains two small bands of elastic tissue lying opposite each other across the pharyngeal cavity. These are the vocal cords. They can be brought together tightly so that no air can pass through them or they can be drawn apart so that there is a gap between them through which the air can pass freely (this is their normal position 33 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH when we breathe quietly in and out). This opening and closing of the vocal cords is called voice. Some of the English sounds have voice and some do not. Now, say a long /m/ - sound and put your fingers on your neck by the side of the larynx; you will feel the vibration of the vocal cords. Now, say the word ‘may’ / meΙ /, still with your fingers on your neck. Does the vowel /eΙ/ have voice? Can you feel the same vibration for /eΙ/ as for /m/? Yes, both sounds are voiced. Now say a long /f/ - sound. Is it voiced? No, it has no vibration. Subsequently, the English sounds which are not voiced – voiceless sounds – are made with the vocal cords drawn apart so that the air can pass out freely between them and there is no vibration. However, when the vocal cords are close and the air has to be ‘forced’ through them during the pronunciation of a sound, this will result in the production of a voiced sound. Some voiced consonant sounds in English have their voiced counterparts. See these examples: Voiceless / Voiced /s/ /z/ /f/ /v/ /ʃ/ /ʒ/ Pronounce these words and feel the vibration or non – vibration of your vocal cords; Seal / sΙ:l / zeal /zΙ:l / Few /fju: / view /vju: / Shine /ʃain/ genre /ʒa:nre/ It is also important to let you know that all the vowels of English are voiced. The Nasal Cavity Before discussing the importance of the nasal cavity in spoken English, it is important to mention the role played by the velum or soft palate during articulation. The velum is the continuation of the roof of the mouth also called the palate. The harder, bony structure situated towards the exterior of the mouth continues with the velum into the rear part of the mouth. The latter’s position at the back of the mouth can allow the air stream to go out through either the mouth or the nose or through both 34 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH at the same time. Thus, if the velum is raised, blocking the nasal cavity, the air is directed out through the mouth and the sounds thus produced will be oral sounds. If the velum is lowered, we can articulate either nasal sounds, if the air is expelled exclusively via the nasal cavity, or nasalized sounds if, in spite of the lowered position of the velum, the air is still allowed to go out through the mouth as well as through the nose. If we nip our nostrils or if the nasal cavity is blocked because of a cold, etc, we can easily notice the importance of the nasal cavity as a resonator and the way in which its blocking affects normal speech production. The distinction nasal / oral is essential in all languages and it will further be discussed when a detailed analysis of both English consonants and vowels is given. We have discussed the oral cavity and the organs that delimit the cavity. Now, the nasal cavity is a large air-filled space above and behind the nose in the middle of the face. It acts as a resonator in the production of consonant sounds in English. For instance, in the articulation of all nasal consonants, the soft palate is lowered and at the same time the mouth passage is blocked at some point, so that all the air is pushed out of the nose. The nasal sounds /m/, /n/, and /ŋ/ are voiced in English, and the voiced air passes out through the nose. During articulation, the soft palate is lowered for both /m/ and /n/. For /m/ the mouth is blocked by closing the two lips so that the air can flow out through the nasal cavity, while for /n/, the tip of the tongue is pressed against the alveolar ridge and the air escapes through the nasal cavity. Interestingly, for the production of /ŋ/ the back of the tongue is pressed against the soft palate so that the air passes out through the nasal cavity. These various descriptions confirm the fact that the nasal cavity performs the role of a resonator – providing the proper passage for the air that is used in the articulation of the nasal consonant sounds. SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Draw Figure 1 and label all the different parts of the speech organs. Do this several times until you can do it without looking at the diagram in the book. 4.0 CONCLUSION All languages use the air from the lungs for the production of sounds during speech. But it must be emphasized that in the production of English sounds, the small differences in the movement of the organs of speech may make all the difference between a result which sounds 35 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH English and one which does not. It is equally important to mention here that our study of the speech production process has consciously neglected the essential role the brain plays in the articulation of sounds. We chose to leave aside the discussion of the part played by the brain in the physiology of articulation only because the complexity of the analysis would have taken us too far away from the purpose of this study. 5.0 SUMMARY In this unit we have carefully outlined how the movements of the organs of speech combine together in forming the sounds of English. The various descriptions of the movement of the organs were carefully presented because what may seem to be an inconsequential difference may in fact be very important in producing and recognizing an English sound correctly. 6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENTS 1. Describe the movement of the tongue in the production of the sounds /Ι:/, / Ι /, /e/, and /æ/. 2. Describe the articulation of the following consonants: / t/, z/, /ʃ/, /dʒ/, and //ŋ/. 7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS Carr, P. (1999) English Phonetics and Phonology: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. Couper,K. (1986). An Introduction to English Prosody. London: Edward Arnold Cruttenden, A. (2001). Gimson’s Pronunciation of English. 6th ed, Revised and edited version of A. C. Gimson’s original book. London: Edward Arnold. Roach P. (2000) English Phonetics and Phonology, 2nd Edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://www.csulb.edu/phoneme/organs.html http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk MODULE 2 THE ENGLISH CONSONANTS 36 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Unit 1 Parameters for the Classification of English consonants Unit 2 Detailed description of English consonants UNIT 1 PARAMETERS FOR THE CLASSIFICATION OF ENGLISH CONSONANTS CONTENTS 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Objectives 3.0 Main Content 3.1 Place of Articulation 3.2 Manner of Articulation 3.3 Voicing (State of the Glottis) 4.0 Conclusion 5.0 Summary 6.0 Tutor Marked Assignments 7.0 References / Further Readings 1.0 INTRODUCTION A consonant is a speech sound that is produced by a partial or complete blockage of the flow of air from the lungs by any of the speech organs. You may wonder why we have to begin our analysis of English sounds with the consonants rather than vowels. The reason is simple; consonants contribute more to making English understood than vowels do. Furthermore, consonants are generally made by a definite interference of the vocal organs with the air stream, and so can be described easily. English consonants are usually classified according to their place of articulation, manner of articulation and the state of the glottis (whether voiced or voiceless). 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit, you should be able to define a consonant, describe the various parameters used for classifying a consonant, identify the speech organs used in articulating the consonants. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 37 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH 3.1 Place of Articulation Place of articulation refers to where in the vocal tract a particular sound is produced. The various articulators in the vocal tract can be divided into two groups, namely active and passive articulators. Active articulators are those organs in the vocal tract that can move freely; for example, the tongue. Passive articulators are those organs that cannot move; for example, the organs of the roof of the mouth (Elugbe 2000:21). The different points of articulation where the different sounds are produced will be described below: Listed below, are the places where articulation occurs for the production of English consonants. i) Bilabial: the two lips (labia) ii) Labiodental: the lower lip and the upper teeth iii) Dental: the tip of the tongue between the upper and lower teeth iv) Alveolar: the blade of the tongue and the aveolar ridge which is locate behind the gums v) Palato-alveolar: the blade of the tongue and behind the alveolar ridge vi) Palatal: the front part of the tongue and the hard palate vii) Velar: the back of the tongue and the soft palate viii) Glottal: the opening between the vocal cords. From front to back, the places identified above are further explained below: Bilabial This term describes the action of the lower and upper lips touching each other, as they block the flow of air from the lungs during the production of a consonant. The English sounds; [p], [b], and [m] are bilabial consonants. The sound [w] involves two constrictions of the vocal tract made simultaneously. One of them is lip rounding, which you can think of as a bilabial approximant – an approximate bilabial sound. 38 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Bilabial articulation Labiodental When articulating a labiodental consonant, the lower lip approaches or touches the upper teeth - to obstruct the flow of air from the oral cavity, so that an audible friction is heard. The English sounds, [f] and [v] are labiodental consonants. Labiodental Articulation Dental In the articulation of a dental consonant, the tip or blade of the tongue touches the upper front teeth, and partially blocks the flow of air from the lungs. The English sounds [θ] and [ð] are dental consonants There are actually two different ways of forming dental sounds: The tongue tip can approach the back of the upper teeth, but not press against them so hard that the airflow is completely blocked. 39 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH The blade of the tongue can touch the bottom of the upper teeth, with the tongue tip protruding between the teeth -- still leaving enough space for the airstream to escape. Dental Articulation Alveolar The articulation of an alveolar consonant involves the tongue tip (or less often the tongue blade) touching the alveolar ridge (the ridge immediately behind the upper teeth). The English consonants [t], [d], and [n] are formed by completely blocking the airflow at this place of articulation. The consonants [s] and [z] are also articulated at this place, as is the consonant [l]. For the English consonant [r], the tongue tip the tongue tip is curled up toward the post alveolar region (the area immediately behind the alveolar ridge). Alveolar Articulation 40 ENG 141 SPOKEN ENGLISH Palato- alveolar In the articulation of a palato-alveolar consonant, the constriction is made immediately behind the alveolar ridge, and it can be made with either the tip or the blade of the tongue. The English consonants [ʃ] and [ʒ] are made at this point of articulation, as are the corresponding sounds [tʃ] and [dʒ]. Palatal As regards the place of articulating a palatal consonant, the body of the tongue touches the hard palate. The English consonant [j] is a palatal approximant – in other words, the tongue body approaches the hard palate, but closely enough to create turbulence in the airstream. Velar In a velar consonant, the body of the tongue touches the soft palate, or velum. The consonants [k], [g], and [ŋ] are made at this place of articulation. The diagram below shows the