专八英语语言学笔记纲要（3）
Chapter 3 Phonologyl What is phonology?
n Phonology is the study of sound systems and patterns.
n Phonology and phonetics are two studies different in perspectives, which are concerned with the study of speech sounds.
n Phonology focuses on three fundamental questions.
u What sounds make up the list of sounds that can distinguish meaning in a particular language?
u What sounds vary in what ways in what context?
u What sounds can appear together in a sequence in a particular language?
l Phonemes and allophones
n A phoneme is a distinctive, abstract sound unit with a distinctive feature.
n The variants of a phoneme are termed allophones.
n We use allophones to realize phonemes.
l Discovering phonemes
n Contrastive distribution – phonemes
u If sounds appear in the same environment, they are said to be in contrastive distribution.
u Typical contrastive distribution of sounds is found in minimal pairs and minimal sets.
l A minimal pair consists of two words that differ by only one sound in the same position.
l Minimal sets are more than two words that are distinguished by one segment in the same position.
u The overwhelming majority of the consonants and vowels represented by the English phonetic alphabet are in contrastive distribution.
u Some sounds can hardly be found in contrastive distribution in English. However, these sounds are distinctive in terms of phonetic features. Therefore, they are separate phonemes.
n Complementary distribution – allophones
u Sounds that are not found in the same position are said to be in complementary distribution.
u If segments are in complementary distribution and share a number of features, they are allophones of the same phoneme.
n Free variation
u If segments appear in the same position but the mutual substitution does not result in change of meaning, they are said to be in free variation.
l Distinctive and non-distinctive features
n Features that distinguish meaning are called distinctive features, and features do not, non-distinctive features.
n Distinctive features in one language may be non-distinctive in another.
l Phonological rules
n Phonemes are abstract sound units stored in the mind, while allophones are the actual pronunciations in speech.
n What phoneme is realized by what allophones in what specific context is another major question in phonology.
n The regularities that what sounds vary in what ways in what context are generalized and stated in phonology as rules.
n There are many phonological rules in English. Take the following ones as examples.
l [+voiced +consonant] – [-voiced]/[-voiced +consonant]_
l [-voiced +bilabial +stop] – unaspirated/[-voiced +alveolar +fricative]_
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