The aspects of a sound

The sound phenomena have different aspects:

(a) the articulatory aspect;

(b) the acoustic aspect;

(c) the auditory (perceptive) aspect;

(d) the functional (linguistic) aspect.

Now it is possible to show the correlation between the stages of the speech chain and the aspects of the sound matter.

Articulation comprises all the movements and positions of the speech organs necessary to pronounce a speech sound. According to their main sound-producing functions, the speech organs can be divided into the following four groups:

(1) the power mechanism;

(2) the vibration mechanism;

(3) the resonator mechanism;

(4) the obstruction mechanism.

The functions of the power mechanism consist in the supply of the energy in the form of the air pressure and in regulating the force of the air stream. The power mechanism includes: (1) the diaphragm, (2) the lungs, (3) the bronchi, (4) the windpipe, or trachea. The glottis and the supra-glottal cavities enter into the power mechanism as parts of the respiratory tract. The vibration mechanism consists of the larynx, or voice box, containing the vocal cords. The most important function of the vocal cords is their role in the production of voice. The pharynx, the mouth, and the nasal cavity function as the principal resonators thus constituting the resonator mechanism. The obstruction mechanism (the tongue, the lips, the teeth, and the palate) forms the different types of obstructions.

The acoustic aspect studies sound waves. The basic vibrations of the vocal cords over their whole length produce the fundamental tone of voice. The simultaneous vibrations of each part of the vocal cords produce partial tones (overtones and harmonics). The number of vibrations per second is called frequency. Frequency of basic vibrations of the vocal cords is the fundamental frequency. Fundamental frequency determines the pitch of the voice and forms an acoustic basis of speech melody. Intensity of speech sounds depends on the amplitude of vibration.

The auditory (sound-perception) aspect, on the one hand, is a physiological mechanism. We can perceive sound waves within a range of 16 Hz-20.000 Hz with a difference in 3 Hz. The human ear transforms mechanical vibrations of the air into nervous and transmits them to brain. The listener hears the acoustic features of the fundamental frequency, formant frequency, intensity and duration in terms of perceptible categories of pitch, quality, loudness and length. On the other hand, it is also apsychological mechanism. The point is that repetitions of what might be heard as the same utterance are only coincidentally, if ever, acoustically identical. Phonetic identity is a. theoretical ideal. Phonetic similarity, not phonetic identity, is the criterion with which we operate in the linguistic analysis.

Functional aspect. Phonemes, syllables, stress, and intonation are linguistic phenomena. They constitute meaningful units (morphemes, words, word-forms, utterances). Sounds of speech perform different linguistic functions.

14. Theory of phoneme.

The founder of the Phoneme Theory was the Russian scientist Boudoin-de-Courtenay who was the head of the Kazan Linguistic School. He defined the phoneme as a physical image of a sound. He also regarded phonemes as fictitious units and considered them to be only perceptions. This approach is called mentalistic/ physical.

Ferdinand de Saussure viewed phonemes as the sum of acoustic impressions and articulatory movements. He also viewed phonemes as disembodied units of the language formed by the differences separating the acoustic image of one sound from the rest of the units. Language in his opinion contains nothing but differences. This approach is called abstractional/ abstract.

Trubetskoy (the head of the Prague Linguistic School) defined the phoneme as a unity of phonologically relevant features. Relevant feature is the feature without which we can’t distinguish one phoneme from another. This approach is called functional.

Phonemes can be neutralized. In this case we receive an archi-phoneme. That is a unity of relevant features common to both phonemes (e.g. wetting – wedding in AmE). In case of archiphoneme we cannot distinguish one phoneme from another. Thus the distinctive function of the phoneme is lost.]

Another kind of approach to the nature of the phoneme was expressed by a British scholar, the head of the London School of Phonology, Daniel Jones. He defined the phoneme as a family of sounds.

The American Linguistic School (Blumfield, Sapir, etc) defined the phoneme as a minimum unit of distinctive sound features and as abstractional unit.

Academician L.V. Sherba defined the phoneme as a real independent distinctive unit which manifests itself in the form of its allophones.Summing up,a phoneme comprises material,real and objective features and at the same time abstractional and generalized. It exists in the material form of speech sounds(allophones).

The functions that phonemes perform in speech are:1)Constitutive(sounds constitute words,phrases and sentences);2)Distinctive(sounds help to distinguish words);3)Recognitive(allophones help to recognize words,sentences and phrases)

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