Modern functional Phonetics

Allophones are variants of one and the same phoneme which never occur (встречаться) in identical positions. They are actual speech sounds.

The phoneme is material. It means it exists in the speech of all people belonging to the language community. It exists in speech in the form of speech sounds – its allophones. All allophones of the same phoneme have several articulatory features in common. Allophones of the same phoneme should meet the following requirements (отвечать требованиям):

1. Allophones of the same phoneme must have one or more articulatory features in common, but they are different.

2. Allophones of one and the same phoneme never occur in the same phonetic environment (context) and thus they are incapable (неспособны) of differentiating words and their grammatical forms. Allophone, which is used in the isolated position or in any other position in which it’s not influenced by neighboring sounds is called the principal allophone. All the others are called subsidiary allophones. They are positionally determined (определены). Thus in a certain position we can have different allophones.

[t] – principal

Occlusive (смычный)

Plosive (взрывной)

Fore lingual (переднеязычный)

Alveolar

Fortes (сильный)

Voiceless

Aspirated

• “Tea” – slightly palatalized

• “Not they”

“Let them” – dental (assimilation)

• “Not common”

“Not clear” – not aspirated

“Store”, “Stay”, “Storm” – not aspirated (after “s”)

• “Tray”, “Tram”, “Try” – post alveolar (before “r”)

• “Little”, “Kettle” – lateral plosion (before lateral “l”)

• “Not many”, “Not clear” – nasal plosion

• “Twice” – a bit labialized (before “w”)

This inability to select the right allophone betrays a foreign accent.

Abstractional and Generalized aspect

Language is abstraction from speech. Speech is the reality of the language. Language is generalization of speech. The phoneme is an abstraction from speech, from actually pronounced speech sounds (allophones). This abstraction and generalization is subconsciously (подсознательно) made by all the members of the language community. Native speakers abstract themselves from the difference between the allophones of one and the same phoneme, from that difference that doesn’t affect the meaning. They practically don’t notice this difference, cause it doesn’t serve to differentiate the meaning. They pronounce all the proper allophones from their proper position. When native speakers abstract themselves from the non-distinctive features of the allophones, they at the same time find a combination of distinctive features, those features, that can’t be changed without affecting the meaning. Thus they form a “bundle” (целый букет) of distinctive features (релевантные звуковые характеристики, образующие фонему).

tea – [ti:]

Occlusive

fore lingual

fortes

Non of these three characteristics can be changed, cause if we change occlusive  constrictive [si:], if we change fore lingual  back lingual [ki:]

This “bundle” is sometimes called invariant (инвариант). There features that are common to all the allophones. These common features form the certain invariant, neither of these features can be changed.

It’s impossible to pronounce a phoneme cause we pronounce allophones. A phoneme can’t exist apart from speech sounds. Impossible it in isolation.

[pen], [ten]

Both are occlusive, fortes, but [p] is labial, [t] is fore lingual

This difference in articulation serves to differentiate the meaning, so we can say they are allophones of different phonemes. Those articulatory features that mark sounds and allophones of different phonemes are called distinctive or relevant features. Those that don’t serve to differentiate the meaning are called non-distinctive or irrelevant. The phoneme can perform its distinctive function if it is opposed to some other phoneme in the same phonetic context. Such are called phonologicals.

Allophones don’t have functions of differentiation the words. They usually occur in different positions of the word. They can’t be opposed to each other. We can speak about 2 types of mistakes:

• Phonological

• Phonetic

If you replace one allophone of the phoneme by an allophone of some other phoneme – the mistake is called phonological.

bed – bet