Phonetics and its Connection with Linguistic and Social Sciences

The Subject matter of Theoretical Phonetics.

Phoneticsstudies the sound system of the language, i.e. segmental phonemes, word stress, syllabic structure and intonation. It is primarily concerned with speech production (how sounds are made by speakers), speech perception (how sounds are perceived by listeners) and speech analysis (how sound waves can be processed and described). It follows from this, that phonetics is a basic branch of linguistics: no language description is complete without phonetics, the science concerned with the spoken medium of language.

The subject matter of theoretical phoneticsisthe study of the sound patterns of language, of how a spoken language functions as a “code” (phonology). Theoretical Phonetics regards phonetic phenomena synchronically without any special attention paid to the historical development of English. The course of theoretical phonetics is aimed at discussing those problems of modern phonetic science which are strongly concerned with English language teaching. The teacher must be sure that what he teaches is linguistically correct.

The process of communication is actualized throughout three stages: psychological, physiological and acoustic. Consequently, there are three branches of phoneticseach corresponding to a different stage in the communication process. The branch of phonetics that studies the way in which the air is set in motion, the movements of the speech organs and the coordination of these movements in the production of single sounds and trains of sounds is called articulatory phonetics.

Acoustic phonetics studies the way in which the air vibrates between the speaker’s mouth and the listener’s ear. Acoustic phonetics presents special interest for research work and applied linguistics. The development of computing technique will give rise to all sorts of teaching machines.

The brunch of phonetics investigating the hearing process is known as auditory phonetics. Its interests lie more in the sensation of hearing, which is brain activity, than in the physiological working of the ear or the nervous activity between the ear and the brain. This branch of phonetics is of great interest to anyone who teaches or studies pronunciation.

Phonetics and its Connection with Linguistic and Social Sciences

The study of phonetics has educational and social values for almost everyone, realizing the importance of language in human communication.

As phonetics is one of the branches of linguistics it is closely connected with its other branches.

Connection with Grammar.Many Soviet linguists of the past considered phonetics to be an integral part of grammar along with morphology and syntax, and grammar reference books in those years contained a chapter in phonetics.

Connection of phonetics with morphology is revealed in the fact that establishing grammar categories, morphology often applies to phonetic rules:

1) vowel shift in formation of

a) irregular plurals: foot [fut] – [fi:t];

b) forms of irregular verbs: swim [swim] – swam [sw æ m] – swum [sw ʌ m];

2) rules, regulating the reading of flexions of some grammatical categories:

a) forms of past tense of regular verbs: played [pleid], worked [w ɜ:kt], wanted

[w ɒ ntid];

b) plural form and possessive case of nouns: tables [teiblz], books [buks], boxes

[b ɒ ksiz], boy’s [b iz], cat’s [k æ ts], Alice’s [æ lisiz].

Phonetics is also connected with syntax. This connection is revealed in the fact that any sentence being read has always a definite prosodic contour. There are some tendencies in intonation of such syntactic structures as questions of different types, direct addresses, the author’s words, enumeration, greeting, saying good –bye, parenthesis.

Connection with Lexicology,to be precise with the word stock of the language. First of all, this connection is revealed in the fact that any word cannot exist without its sound shape. Besides, with the help of vowel and consonant shift there appears the formation of different parts of speech: wise [waiz]- wisdom [wizd ə m], breath [bre θ ] – breathe [ bri:ð ].

The change in accentual structure of the word may also bring change of the part of speech: contest (n) [`k ɒ ntest]- contest (v) [k ə n`test], import (n) [`imp ə t] – import (v) – [im`p ɔ: t].

Phonetics also defines the sound form of borrowed words: their accented structure and sound composition. For example, Russian name Бородино is pronounced with the last stressed syllable and vowel sound [o] in stressed position. In English it is pronounced as [, b ɒ r ɒ ` di:n ] (Borodino), i.e. with two stresses, main and secondary, according to the rhythmical tendency of accentuation of poly syllabic English words, and with diphthong [əu] at the end of the word, as letter o in final position in English is not reduced.

Connection with Stylistics. There areStylistic Devices based on repetition of sounds (rhyme – repetition of final sounds of a syllable, alliteration – repetition of certain sounds or their combinations, assonance – repetition of vowel sounds.

ONOMATOPOEIAis a combination of speech-sounds, which aims at imitating sounds produced in nature (wind, sea , thunder ).by things (machines, tools), by people (sighing, laughter, patter of feet) and by animals.

However, the closest connection of phonetics with stylistics is observed at the intonation level. With the help of intonation means a speaker can express his/her feelings and emotions, attitude to the situation or the subject of conversation.

Phonostylisticsis a new trend in phonetics that has been lately established for the purposes of studying prosodic and sound peculiarities of texts, belonging to different genres: narrative and scientific prose, fairy tale, poetry, public and spontaneous speech and others.

Connection with Dialectology.One of the phonetic research deals withthe sound and intonation peculiarities of speech of the speakers of dialect and regional types of pronunciation in comparison with the Received Pronunciation.

Phonetics is interested in the way people’s pronunciation forms vary in different social situations. Sociophonetics,quite a new branch of Phoneticsdeals with the way language and its variations function in the speech community, social environment.

Phonetics comes into contact with a number of non-linguistic sciences which study the process of speech production and speech perception.

Connection with Anatomy and Physiology of a human.It is necessary for some specialists to know the anatomy and functions of the articulators in speech production to teach sounds and also in handling of applied problems.

For those who work in speech therapy, which handles pathological conditions of speech, phonetics forms an essential part of the professional training syllabus. Phonetics also enters into the training of teachers of the deaf and dumb peopleand can be of relevance to a number of medical and dental problems.

The knowledge of the structure of sound systems, and of the articulatory and acoustic properties of the production of speech is indispensable in the teaching of foreign languages. The teacher has to know the starting point, which is the sound system of the pupil’s mother tongue, as well as the aim of his teaching, which is a mastery of the pronunciation of the language to be learnt. He must be able to point out the differences between these two, and to arrange adequate training exercises.

Specialists in the field of applied Linguistics cooperate with criminal investigators, working out the programmes of a person’s identity by voice. There is an opinion, that voiceprint is as unique as one’s fingerprints.

In our technological age phonetics has become important in a number of technological fields connected with communication. For the recent 10-15 years there have been changes in computing technologies of voice simulation and recognition. For instance, in the experimental stage are devices for “reading” the printed page, that is for converting the printed symbols or letters into synthetic speech. Within the bounds of possibility is the automatic or phonetic typewriter, which will convert speech directly into printed words on paper.

Psycholinguistics studies the acquisition of language by children, the extent to which language mediates or structures thinking, the extent to which language is influenced and itself influences such things as memory, attention, recall and constraints on reception.

The field of phonetics is thus becoming wider and tending to extend over the limits originally set by its purely linguistic applications. On the one hand, the growing interest in phonetics is doubtless partly due to increasing recognitions of the central position of language in line of social activity. It is important, however, that the phonetician should remain a linguist and look upon his science as a study of a spoken language. It is its application to linguistic phenomena that makes phonetics a social science in the proper sense of the word, not withstanding its increasing need of technical methods, and in spite of its practical applications.

Questions and tasks:

1. What does Phonetics study?

2. What are the three branches of phonetics? Give detailed definitions of them.

3. Reveal the connection of phonetics with linguistic sciences.

4. Reveal the connection of phonetics with non- linguistic sciences.