Linguistics (linguistics, linguistics) studies human language. Some sections of this science constitute the theory of language. Others describe language in relation to other factors: society, evolution, and the development of thinking. Still others emphasize practice.
This article will talk about the sound side of the language. You will learn about the science of phonology, about the concept of phoneme, about sound and allophone. This will help future linguists and simply interested people to understand the theory of the sound structure of the language and not get confused in terms.
Phonology - the science of phonemes
In linguistics, there are two sections that study sounds: phonetics and phonology. The word "background" in translation from ancient Greek means "sound".
Phonetics is a descriptive science. It describes not only the sound side of the tongue (sounds, intonations, stresses, etc.), but also the work of the speech apparatus. Here, physics, physiology, and psychology.
But phonology is a narrower theoretical science. She explores the function of sounds in a language.
Some linguists consider phonology a subset of phonetics. Others argue that phonology is still an independent science.
So, phonetics studies sound. Allophone and phoneme are interested in phonology.
Phoneme concept
The problem of sounds began to interest linguists in the 19th century. Scientists have discovered that there are many of these units in the language, and they are diverse. Sound pronounced by different people is not the same. And even the same person reproduces any sound always in different ways. It was necessary to organize this diversity into one coherent system. Otherwise, phonetic chaos would exist in the language. For this, linguists have introduced a concept that would structure sounds. They singled out the smallest meaningful unit of the language - the phoneme .
One such unit combines sounds that are pronounced differently in different conditions, but at the same time perform one function. For example, they form one morpheme: root, suffix, etc.
First things first:
Why is a phoneme the smallest unit?
- It cannot be divided into smaller parts. Changes within the phoneme lead only to its transition to another. For example, if the loudness of the phoneme D is replaced by deafness, then we get the phoneme T.
Why is a phoneme a meaningful unit?
- The phoneme has a special meaningful (significatory) function. It helps to distinguish between words and morphemes. For example, the words "tank" and "side" differ in the same phoneme in the root and have different meanings.
What is the difference between a phoneme and sound?
Remember the main difference:
- Sound is a material phenomenon. This is what we hear and say.
- The phoneme is an abstraction. It is conditional and exists only in the sounds of speech.
Why are the sounds so diverse? There are several reasons:
- Speaking differences. You must admit that a man and a woman, an adult and a child, people with low and high voices will pronounce the same sound in different ways.
- The condition of the speaker. Even a condition, physical or mental, affects our pronunciation of speech units.
- Place in a word. The pronunciation depends on the "neighbors" and on the position in the word (before the stress or after, at the end of the word or at the beginning, etc.).
The phoneme combines all this diversity into generalized units. That's why there are a lot of sounds, and there are only 42 phonemes (in Russian).
Allophone - what is it?
Read aloud the chain "earth - earth - earth". Have you noticed that the vowel E sounds different in root words? Nevertheless, everywhere the same phoneme is E.
It turns out that each such abstract unit can have different sound options. These phoneme variants are called allophones.
An allophone differs from a phoneme in that it, like sound, is material. An allophone is a concrete embodiment of an abstract unit in speech.
The basic version of the phoneme
The question arises how to recognize a phoneme if it has several options. Among all possible phoneme variations, scientists distinguish one main thing - the main allophone. Her qualities in him are manifested to the highest degree.
The main allophone is an option that does not depend much on the place in the word. Such allophones are considered:
- Isolated vowels. They appear under stress.
- Soft consonants before a vowel [I] and hard consonants before a vowel [A].
The main allophones show themselves in strong positions. Vowels are strong under stress.
A weak position is that position in which the phoneme signs are "blurred". In Russian and German, consonants are weak at the end of a word. For example, voiced are stunned in this position.
But in English and French, on the contrary, the position at the end of the word is strong. Therefore, it is impossible to stun voiced consonants: this is a gross mistake.
Combinatorial and positional allophones
Allophones are divided into combinatorial and positional.
Combinatorial allophones are phoneme variants that are realized under the influence of ambient sounds. Examples of allophones:
- the consonants that stand in front of [O] and [U] and grow thin (lips are pulled "into a tube"): there is a volume, a tick - a tap;
- vowels [a], [o], [y], which are after soft consonants: sit, grater, tube;
- affricates [dz] and [d'zh '], which appear instead of [h], [c] in front of voiced noisy consonants: I would not mind a bridgehead.
Positional allophone - phoneme variations that are implemented depending on the phonetic position in the word.
The phonetic position reflects:
- how close the phoneme is to the beginning of the word;
- how close the phoneme is to the end of the word;
- how close the phoneme is to stress.
In the transcription you can see the signs [b] and [/ \]. These are allophone vowels [a] and [o].
Interesting to know
- An allophone is an assistant in finding borrowed words. In the Russian language, in most cases, two vowel allophones are found only between morphemes (call in, choke). And if the vowels are nearby, then the words are borrowed (aul, Liana).
- Unstressed vowel allophones are weaker than drums: they are more dependent on "neighbors."
- How consonants can change vowels, and vice versa. The sounds facing a vowel allophone affect him more than the others. A consonant can be changed, for example, by a labial vowel.