varied terminology

Question 1

phonetics

Answer 1

Phonetics is the scientific study of speech. The central concerns in phonetics are the
discovery of how speech sounds are produced, how they are used in spoken language,
how we can record speech sounds with written symbols and how we hear and
recognise different sounds. Phonetics focuses on how speech is physically created and received, including study of the human vocal and auditory tracts, acoustics, and neurology.

Question 2

phonology

Answer 2

phonology studies how those sounds are put together to create meaning. Phonology studies the rules in any given language that govern how those phonemes are combined to create meaningful words.

Question 3

lenis

Answer 3

A lenis sound is a weakly articulated one. In general, the term lenis is used of
voiced consonants (which are supposed to be less strongly articulated than voiceless
ones). Weak aspiration, e.g. /b/, /d/, /v/, etc. normally with voiced consonants

Question 4

fortis

Answer 4

strongly articulated. strong aspiration, /p/, /t/, /sh/, etc. Normally coincide with unvoiced consonants.

Question 5

accent (stress)

Answer 5

accent may refer to

prominence given to a syllable, usually by the use of pitch.

Question 6

accent

Answer 6

refers to a
particular way of pronouncing: for example, you might find a number of English
speakers who all share the same grammar and vocabulary, but pronounce what they
say with different accents such as Scots or Cockney.

Question 7

allophone

Answer 7

one of a set of multiple possible spoken sounds (or phones) used to pronounce a single phoneme.[1] For example, [pʰ] (as in pin) and [p] (as in spin) are allophones for the phoneme /p/ in the English language.

Question 8

dialect

Answer 8

to identify
different varieties of a particular language, but the word ‘accent’ is used for varieties
which differ from each other only in matters of pronunciation while ‘dialect’ also
covers differences in such things as vocabulary and grammar.

Question 9

diphthong

Answer 9

The most important feature of a diphthong is that it contains a glide from one vowel
quality to another one. BBC English contains a large number of diphthongs.

Question 10

stressed syllables

Answer 10

volume, length, higher pitch, quality, may sound clearer

Question 11

vowel reduction

Answer 11

unstressed vowels reduce - often to /ə/, /iː/ to /i/ and /uː/ to /ʊ/

Question 12

segmental

Answer 12

a phoneme is a unit of sound or segment.

Question 13

suprasegmental

Answer 13

A suprasegmental is a vocal effect that extends over more than one sound segment in an utterance, such as pitch, stress, or juncture pattern. to refer to aspects of sound such as intonation
that did not seem to be properties of individual segments (i.e. the vowels and
consonants of which speech is composed). suprasegmental features are to be found in speech, but pitch, loudness, tempo, rhythm
and stress are the most commonly mentioned ones.

Question 14

homophone

Answer 14

If two different words are pronounced identically, they are homophones. In many
cases they will be spelt differently (e.g. ‘saw’ – ‘sore’ – ‘soar’.

Question 15

intonation

Answer 15

‘intonation’ refers simply to the
variations in the pitch of a speaker’s voice used to convey or alter meaning. intonation is said to convey emotions and attitudes.

Question 16

monophthong

Answer 16

This word, which refers to a single vowel

Question 17

tone unit

Answer 17

In the study of intonation it is usual to divide speech into larger units than syllables. pre-head, head, tonic syllable, tail.

Question 18

tonic syllable

Answer 18

A tonic syllable is one which
carries a tone, i.e. has a noticeable degree of prominence. In theories of intonation
where only one tone may occur in a tone-unit, the tonic syllable therefore is the point
of strongest stress.

Question 19

triphthong

Answer 19

A triphthong is a vowel glide with three distinguishable vowel qualities – in other
words, it is similar to a diphthong but comprising three rather than two vowel
qualities.

Question 20

co-articulation

Answer 20

how phonemes join and overlap

Question 21

semi-vowel

Answer 21

/w/ /j/ (made without any restriction to airflow so are like vowels).