Elements of General Phonetics

211 Pages·1967·10.464 MB·English

by  Abercrombie, David

ELEMENTS OF GENERAL PHONETICS

ELEMENTS OF
GENERAL PHONETICS
DAVID ABERCROMBIE
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EDINBURGH
UNIVERSITY PRESS
© David Abercrombie 1967
ICDINBURGH UNIVERSITY PRESS
22 George Square, Edinburgh
First edition (cased) 1967
Reprinted 1968, 1970, 1971, 1972,
1973, 1974, 1975, 1977,1978, 1980
ISBN 0 85224 028 7
Paperback edition 1982
Reprinted 1987, 1990, 1992
ISBN 0 85224 451 7
Printed in Great Britain by
Redwood Press Limited,
Melksham, Wiltshire
British Library Cataloguing
in Publication Data
Abercrombie, David
Elements of general phonetics
1. Phonetics
I. Title
414 P221
Foreword
This book, which is based on the teaching given in the Ordinary
Course in Phonetics at Edinburgh University, is intended to provide
an introduction to the subject as traditionally understood and prac-
tised in Britain: it deals, that is to say, with phonetics as part of
general linguistics. I hope I have been able to show that it is possible
to present the subject, or at least its elements, without disfiguring
the text with the somewhat repulsive diagrams of the vocal organs
and the exotic phonetic symbols which, for the general reader, are
apt to make it seem unattractive. Although the book is on general
phonetics, I have as far as possible taken my examples from English.
My debt to the great phoneticians of the English-speaking tradi-
tion-Alexander Melville Bell, Alexander J. Ellis, Henry Sweet,
Daniel Jones, Kenneth Lee Pike-must be apparent on nearly every
page. I am indebted for help of various sorts to many friends and
colleagues as well. I owe especial thanks to Lindsay Criper and
Peter Ladefoged, who persuaded me to write the book in the first
place, and who provided constant advice and criticism while it was
being written. Particularly useful were lengthy and detailed comments
on a number of chapters from three colleagues-T. T. S. Ingram,
John Sinclair and David West-working in fields other than phon-
etics, and I am most grateful to them for taking such pains. I have
been able to avail myself of criticisms from K. H. Albrow, Trevor
Hill, Mrs Wendy I-Iilling, L. A. Iles, W. E. Jones, Mrs Jean Petrie,
Peter Strevens and Mrs Elizabeth Uldall. My wife read and criticized
the manuscript in all its stages. I was most fortunate in being able to
have the book indexed by L. A. Iles, and in having help with the
diagrams from Mrs June Baker. Miss Mary Macintyre, Mrs Grace
Stobie and Miss Alice Ainslie typed innumerable drafts of the book.
To all of these I would like to offer my very best thanks.
David Abercrombie
Edinburgh, October 1966

Contents
CHAPTER r. Introduction.
Language and medium
Aural, visual, and other mediums
Properties of the medium: indexical
Properties of the medium: aesthetic
Auxiliary devices
Medium and language
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CHAPTER 2. The Production of Speech.
20
The organs of speech
24
The pulmonic air-stream mechanism
25
The glottis
28
The glottalic air-stream mechanism
29
The velum
31
The velaric air-stream mechanism
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CHAPTER 3. The Analysis of Speech.
34
The syllable
1
37
Analysis of the syllable
2
38
Vowel and consonant
3
CHAPTER 4. Segments.
42
Description of consonants
47
Place and manner
50
Naming of consonants
55
Description and naming of vowels
58
Voiceless vowels
60
Diphthongs
60
Secondary and double articulations
65
Isolation
67
Taxonomic terms
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CHAPTER 5. Structure and System.
70
Phonology
1
73
Structure
2
Contents
Vowels, vocoids, etc.
Quantity
System
Phoneme theory
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CHAPTER 6. Voice Quality and Voice Dynamics
Three strands of the medium
Features of voice quality
Features of voice dynamics
Rhythm
Tessitura and register
Pitch fluctuation
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CHAPTER 7. Notation.
Phonetic symbols
Analphabetic notations
Alphabetic notations: iconic
Alphabetic notations : roman-based
Transcription
Non-segmental symbols
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CHAPTER 3. Assimilation.
CHAPTER 9. Stop Consonants.
Three phases of a stop
Stops and velic action
Lateral plosion
Incomplete stops
Aflrication
Aspiration
Notation
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CHAPTER IO. Cardinal Vowels.
Theory
l
Application
2
Secondary cardinals
3
Notes
List of Works Consulted
Index
I
Introduction
I. Language and medium
The best way of introducing the subject of phonetics, and of making
clear what it deals with, is to draw a distinction between language
and medium. This is a distinction which is not popularly made, and
is not immediately obvious, but a concrete illustration should make
it clear.
If we compare a piece of written English with a piece of spoken
English, regarding them simply as physical objects or events and for-
getting for the moment the fact that they convey meaning to us, it is
apparent at once that they bear no resemblance to each other what-
ever. The piece of written English consists of groups of small black
marks arranged on a white surface, while the piece of spoken
English consists of a succession of constantly varying noises. It would
hardly be possible for two things to be more diflerent. However, we
have only to recall the fact that both of them convey meaning, to be
in no doubt that, utterly dissimilar as they may be, they are both
equally English. As soon as we make explicit this identity lying
behind the complete difference, we have in fact drawn the distinction
in question: we have recognized, in effect, that the piece of spoken
English and the piece of written English are the same language em-
bodied in different mediums, one medium consisting of shapes, the
other of noises.
It is possible for the same language to be conveyed by dilferent
mediums because the language itself lies in the patterns which the
mediums form, and not in the physical objects or events, as such, of
which the mediums consist. When we distinguish language from
medium, what we are doing is to distinguish a pattern from its
material embodiment, of which, in a sense, it is independent. Lang-
uage, we could say, is form, while the medium is substance.
In addition to the property of being able to form patterns which
2 Introduction
can carry language, a medium has its own independent properties as
well. A written word, in addition to being a word, is also a shape like
any other shape, and a spoken word, in addition to being a word, is
also a sound like any other sound; and the mediums have the pro-
perties which all shapes or all sounds have, including, for instance,
aesthetic properties. Moreover a written word or a spoken word is a
product of human activity, an artefact. It has further properties which
derive from this: the mediums are not only created by human activity,
but they bear on them the stamp of the personality which created
them. Most institutionalized activity of human beings indirectly
reveals such things as mood, social status, geographical origins,
and so on, and language mediums also have the property of doing
this.
A medium, therefore, is not in itself language; it is a vehicle for
language. Linguistics is the discipline which occupies itself with the
study of language. But a language-medium is itself a many-sided
enough thing to deserve to be an object of study in its own right.
Among the aspects of a medium which merit investigation are, for
example, the way in which it is organized into patterns to act as a
carrier of language; its physical and aesthetic properties; its relation
to other mediums; its relation to the language it carries; the kind of
bodily movements involved in its production; and the extent to
which it acts as an index to characteristics of the person who makes
the producing movements. The study of the medium of spoken lang-
uage, in all its aspects and all its varieties, constitutes the subject of
Phonetics. Phonetics is concerned with the medium as used in speak-
ing all human languages (whether ‘primitive’ or ‘civilized’), and as
used in all styles of speech (whether supposed to be good or bad,
normal or abnormal). Phonetics and Linguistics, it has been said,
together constitute ‘the linguistic sciences’.1
The reason why the medium of spoken language has a subject all
to itself, when no one single subject has arisen which embraces every
aspect at once of the medium of written language (though some
subjects-typography, graphology, palaeography, and so on—deal
with selected aspects of it)1, is largely because of the exceptional im-
portance of the former as a medium; not only is it used more than
any other, but it is also ultimately the basis on which all other
mediums are constructed. Both in the mechanism of its production
and in the manner of its perception, moreover, it is extremely complex.
Finally, it needs special attention because of the extent to which
technological progress during the last century has supplemented the
resources of the medium by means of various mechanical and elec-
tronic devices. Such things as the telephone, the radio, recording