Phonetics Study Guide

📖 Core Concepts Phonetics – scientific study of how speech sounds are produced (articulatory), transmitted (acoustic), and perceived (auditory). Phone – the smallest physical speech sound; a concrete acoustic‑articulatory event. Phoneme – an abstract mental category of phones that distinguishes meaning in a language. Place of articulation – where in the vocal tract the constriction occurs (labial, coronal, dorsal, etc.). Manner of articulation – how the airstream is obstructed (stop, nasal, fricative, affricate, approximant, etc.). Voicing – whether the vocal folds vibrate during the segment (voiced vs. voiceless). Source‑Filter Model – speech = source (laryngeal vibration) + filter (vocal‑tract resonances). Formants (F₁, F₂) – resonant frequencies of the vocal tract that shape vowel quality. --- 📌 Must Remember Cardinal vowels are auditory targets, not purely articulatory positions (Ladefoged). Stops: complete airflow blockage → pressure burst on release; oral when velum ↑, nasal when velum ↓. Nasals: oral closure + lowered velum → airflow through nose. Affricates = stop + fricative at same place. Sibilants are high‑pitched fricatives that direct airflow toward teeth. Glottalic airstreams: Ejective – upward glottal movement, compressed air expelled. Implosive – downward glottal movement, air drawn in. Clicks use a velaric airstream (dual tongue closures, rarefaction). Phonation types: Modal voice – regular periodic vibration. Breathy voice – slightly apart folds, noisy waveform, reduced F₁ amplitude. Creaky voice – tightly together, low tension, irregular low‑frequency pulses. Voiceless glottal stop – folds tightly closed, no vibration. Vowel classification relies on height (high ↔ low), backness (front ↔ back), and rounding. First two formants ($F1$, $F2$) are the primary acoustic cues for vowel identity. --- 🔄 Key Processes Speech Production Pipeline Lexical retrieval → phonological encoding (map word → phoneme sequence). Articulatory specification (assign each phoneme its feature set). Motor planning (muscle‑command generation). Articulation (actual movement → acoustic signal). Coarticulation (Gestural Model) Overlap of independent gestures → smoother transitions, especially at fast rates. Source‑Filter Generation Source: vibration of vocal folds (periodic for voiced, turbulent/noisy for voiceless). Filter: shape of supraglottal vocal tract (tube sections) → resonances (formants). Inverse Filtering Record speech → mathematically remove predicted vocal‑tract filter → isolate glottal source spectrum. --- 🔍 Key Comparisons Stop vs. Nasal – Stop: oral closure + velum raised (no airflow); Nasal: oral closure + velum lowered (air flows through nose). Labial vs. Coronal vs. Dorsal – Labial: lips; Coronal: tongue tip/blade (dental, alveolar, post‑alveolar); Dorsal: tongue body (palatal, velar, uvular). Pulmonic vs. Glottalic vs. Velaric – Pulmonic: lung air (most sounds); Glottalic: glottal movement (ejectives, implosives); Velaric: tongue‑generated rarefaction (clicks). Modal vs. Breathy vs. Creaky Voice – Modal: moderate tension, regular vibration; Breathy: looser folds, noisy airflow; Creaky: tight folds, low‑frequency irregular pulses. Fricative vs. Sibilant – Fricative: turbulent airflow anywhere in mouth; Sibilant: turbulence directed at teeth, high‑pitched (e.g., /s/, /ʃ/). --- ⚠️ Common Misunderstandings “All labial sounds are bilabial.” → Labiodentals (lower lip + upper teeth) are also labial. “All glottal stops are voiceless.” → The voiceless glottal stop is a closure without vibration; a voiced glottal fricative (/ɦ/) does vibrate. “Clicks are ejectives.” → Clicks use a velaric airstream, not glottalic. “Higher F₁ means higher vowel.” → Higher F₁ indicates a lower (more open) vowel. “All nasals are voiced.” → Nasals are typically voiced, but voiceless nasals exist cross‑linguistically. --- 🧠 Mental Models / Intuition Tube‑Model Analogy: Think of the vocal tract as a set of connected tubes; changing tube length/diameter shifts resonances (formants) like a flute changing pitch. Gesture Overlap: Visualize each phoneme as a “hand” moving to a target; at fast speech the hands (gestures) swing past each other, creating coarticulation. Source‑Filter Separation: Like a sound source (speaker) feeding into a filter (equalizer) – the source sets raw sound, the filter colors it. --- 🚩 Exceptions & Edge Cases Velar stop absence: Almost all languages have a velar stop, but some (e.g., Hawaiian) lack a voiceless velar fricative. Uvula‑based consonants: Present in 19 % of languages; not universal. Pharyngeal consonants: Only fricatives and approximants are possible due to anatomical constraints. Pulmonic ingressive phonemes: None attested phonemically, though used paralinguistically (e.g., affirmations). --- 📍 When to Use Which Identify place → look at articulator (lips → labial; tongue tip/blade → coronal; tongue body → dorsal). Determine manner → check airflow obstruction: complete (stop), partial + turbulence (fricative), complete + nasal airflow (nasal), stop + fricative (affricate). Choose airstream mechanism → default to pulmonic; only consider glottalic for ejectives/implosives, velaric for clicks. Select phonation analysis → if waveform shows periodicity → voiced; if noisy with no periodicity → voiceless; if low‑frequency irregular pulses → creaky. Vowel classification → measure F₁ (height) and F₂ (backness): low F₁ = high vowel; high F₂ = front vowel. --- 👀 Patterns to Recognize High F₁ & Low F₂ → back, low vowel (e.g., /ɑ/). Low F₁ & High F₂ → front, high vowel (e.g., /i/). Burst followed by silence → voiceless stop. Burst + frication at same place → affricate. Continuous turbulence without burst → fricative. Airflow through nose + oral closure → nasal. Rapid alternating contacts → tap or flap (distinguish by direction of movement). --- 🗂️ Exam Traps Distractor: “Labial consonants are always bilabial.” – Remember labiodentals exist. Choice: “All clicks are ejectives.” – Clicks are velaric, not glottalic. Option: “Higher F₁ = higher vowel.” – Inverse: higher F₁ = more open (lower) vowel. Answer: “Voiceless stops have a voicing bar in the waveform.” – Voiceless stops show silence, not a bar. Misleading: “All nasal sounds are voiced.” – Voiceless nasals are rare but possible. ---