I. Position of the lips

II. Position of the tongue

III. Degree of tenseness and the character of the end of a vowel

IV. Length

V. Stability of articulation

I. a) rounded u – u: É - É:

b) unrounded

II. Most scientists divide vowels according to the

a) horizontal

b) vertical movements of the tongue

a) When the bulk of the tongue moves backwards, it is usually the back part of the tongue which is raised highest towards the soft palate. Vowels produced with the tongue in this position are called back. They are subdivided into: - fully back [É É: u: É I ]

- back – advanced [Ù u a:] ou u¶

When the bulk of the tongue moves forward, it is usually the front part of the tongue which is raised highest toward the hard palate. Vowels produced with this position of the tongue are called front. They are subdivided into:

- fully front [I: e æ eI з æ∂ aI]

- front – retracted [I au]

Vowels [∂ ∂:] are considered by British phoneticians to be central. Daniel Johes says that the central part of the tongue is raised highest and it is pronounced at the junction between “front” and “back”. Russian phoneticians consider it as mixed

b) According to the vertical movements of the tongue vowels are subdivided into:

high i: I u u:

mid, half open e ∂: Î(∂) É(u)

low, open Λ É: æ a: É É(I) a(I,u)

Each of the subclasses is subdivided into vowels of narrow variation and vowels of broad variation:

narrow variation I: u:

high

broad I u

narrow variation e ∂: o (u)

mid

broad Î(∂) ∂

narrow Λ É:

low

broad a: É æ a (I, u)

III. According to the degree of tenseness traditionally long vowels are defined as tense and short are lax. But there are different opinions this problem.

IV. According to the length vowels are subdivided into (historically) long and short. Vowel length depends on a number of linguistic factors:

(1) position of the vowel in a word,

(2) word accent

(3) the number of syllables in a word,

(4) the character of the syllabic structure,

(5) sonority.

(1) In the terminal position a vowel is the longest, it shortens before a voiced consonant, it is the shortest before a voiceless consonant

be – bead – beat

(2) A vowel is longer in an accented (stressed) syllable, than in an unaccented one

‘Forecast (прогноз) - fore’cast (предсказывать погоду)

(3) In polysyllabic words similar vowels are shorter than in one – syllable words

verse - university

∂: (longer) ∂: (shorter)

(4) In words with V, CV, CCV type of syllable the vowel length is greater than in words with VC, CVC, CCVC type of syllable

e.g. [u:] is longer in dew (CV type) than in duly (CV type)

(5) Vowels of low sonority are longer than vowels of greater sonority. It is so, because the speaker unconsciously males more effort to produce greater auditory effect while pronounciry vowels of lower sonority, thus making them longer.

e.g. I is longer than É:

I: is longer than a:

D. Jones treats quantity independently of the vowel sounds themselves. Thus he treats I: and I as positional allophones of one phonemes.

V. Stability of articulation can be treated conventionally. We can speak only of relative stability of the organs of speech, because pronunciation of a sound is a process.

According to this principle vowels are subdivided into:

(a) monophtongs or simple vowels

(b) diphtongoids

(c) diphtongs or complex vowels

(a) English monophtongs are pronounced with more or less stable lip, tongue and the mouth walls position. I e

(b) A diphthongoid is a vowel which ends in a different element. There are 2 d – ids in English I: u:

(c) Scientists define diphthongs as one simple sound.

D. Jones defines diphthongs as an unisyllabic gliding sound in the articulation of which the organs of speech start from one position and then glide to the other position. The 1^st element of a diphthong is the nucleus, the second is the glide.

Поиск по сайту: