TERMINOLOGY WEEKS 2 & 3

Question 1

stop

Answer 1

articulatory gesture in which complete closure of the articulators occurs so that the airstream cannot escape through the mouth

Question 2

plosive/oral stop

Answer 2

articulatory gesture with the airstream completely obstructed and the nasal tract is blocked off by raising the soft palate

Question 3

nasal stop

Answer 3

articulatory gesture with the airstream completely obstructed in the oral cavity and the velum down so that air can pass through the nose

Question 4

fricative

Answer 4

articulatory gesture with close approximation of two articulators so that the airstream is partially obstructed

Question 5

sibilant

Answer 5

higher-pitched hissing fricative sound (usually +strident)
Usually marked on a spectrogram with a high amplitude of noise

Question 6

approximant

Answer 6

articulatory gesture with one articulator close to another but without the vocal tract narrowed enough to produce a turbulent airstream

Question 7

lateral approximant

Answer 7

articulatory gesture with obstruction of the airstream at a point alongthe centre of the vocal tract, with incomplete closure between one or both sides of the tongue and the roof of the mouth

Question 8

formant

Answer 8

an overtone that represents frequencies reinforced by the shape of the vocal tract and that gives a vowel its particular quality

Question 9

suprasegmentals

Answer 9

variations in stress, pitch and length that are superimposed on syllables

Question 10

stress

Answer 10

prominence of a syllable resulting from increased loudness, modification of segmental properties and pitch variation

Question 11

frequency

Answer 11

property of a sound corresponding to the number of complete cycles of a pattern of air pressure variation in a second

Question 12

pitch

Answer 12

an auditory property of sound on a scale from low to high , subjective interpretation of frequency

Question 13

intonation

Answer 13

the pitch pattern in a sentence - it conveys meaning differences/is contrastive (but not phonemic)

Question 14

trill

Answer 14

articulation in which articulators make multiple instances of repeated contact, driven by airflow / aerodynamic force in the same way that vocal fold vibration is driven by airflow

Question 15

tap

Answer 15

articulated with a rapid brush of the articulator over the articulatory surface, driven by a single tap of an articulator against the articulatory surface (rapid muscle contraction)

Question 16

lateral

Answer 16

articulated with airflow over the sides of the tongue

Question 17

affricate

Answer 17

a phone consisting of a stop immediately followed by a fricative

Question 18

glottal stop

Answer 18

sound (lack of sound) that occurs when the vocal folds are held tightly together
Examples: when you cough you hold the air in your throat to stabilize your chest and abdomen / because of the muscular contractions in your chest and abdomen

Question 19

front vowel

Answer 19

highest point of the tongue is in the front of the mouth

Question 20

back vowel

Answer 20

tongue is closest to the back surface of the articulatory tract

Question 21

rounded

Answer 21

of a vowel, produced with rounding of the lips

Question 22

unrounded

Answer 22

of a vowel, pronounced without rounding of the lips

Question 23

citation style

Answer 23

careful speech, the type of speech used to show someone how to pronounce a word

Question 24

connected speech

Answer 24

the style of speech used in normal conversation, as articulatory gestures are continuous by nature and are not entirely discrete / separate from each other

Question 25

phonology

Answer 25

the description of the systems and patterns of sounds that occur in a language

Question 26

minimal set

Answer 26

group of words in which each differs from all the others by only one sound

Question 27

movement from one vowel to another within a single syllable

Answer 27

diphthong

Question 28

characterizes sounds according to whether or not they are in distinctive phonetic contrast or not, conveying meaning differences

Answer 28

distribution

Question 29

characteristic of sounds that can be used to differentiate meaning of words in a language

Answer 29

distinctiveness/contrast

Question 30

describes a phonetic difference that is contrastive & differentiates distinct words

Answer 30

phonemic

Question 31

status of two sounds where one can be substituted for another in the same environment without changing the meaning, without a contrastive distribution

Answer 31

free variation

Question 32

complementary distribution

Answer 32

status of allophones of a phoneme where one allophone occurs in one environment and the other occurs in another environment, never occurring in the same environment (mutually exclusive)

Question 33

allophone

Answer 33

a sound that is a variant of a phoneme

Question 34

diacritic

Answer 34

small mark added to a phonetic symbol to modify its value
E.g. devoicing diacritic, dentalization diacritic

Question 35

broad transcription

Answer 35

transcription that uses the simplest set of possible symbols (phonemic transcription)

Question 36

narrow transcription

Answer 36

transcription that shows phonetic detail, either by using more specific symbols or by representing allophonic differences

Question 37

impressionistic transcription

Answer 37

transcription showing only the phonetic value of sounds, without phonological analysis

Question 38

aspiration

Answer 38

a period of voicelessness after a stop articulation and before the start of the voicing of a following vowel

Question 39

nasal plosion

Answer 39

release of a stop preceding a nasal consonant with lowering of the soft palate for the nasal

Question 40

homorganic

Answer 40

describes two consonants that have the same place of articulation

Question 41

lateral plosion

Answer 41

the effect of built-up air pressure released by lowering the sides of the tongue - caused when a homorganic stop immediately follows a lateral approximant to make [l] syllabic

Question 42

obstruent

Answer 42

natural class of sounds consisting of affricates, fricatives and stops

Question 43

velarization

Answer 43

secondary articulation of the voiced alveolar lateral approximant /l/ made with an upward arching of the back of the tongue

Question 44

liquid

Answer 44

a term for the approximants /r/ and /l/ (approximants that are not glides/semivowels)