week 1

Question 1

accent

Answer 1

how words are pronounced

Question 2

dialect

Answer 2

variety of language
distinct grammar, vocab, pronunciation
specific to a particular group of people

Question 3

acrolect

Answer 3

prestigious dialect

Question 4

mesolect

Answer 4

middle-level dialect

Question 5

basilect

Answer 5

least prestigious dialect

Question 6

idiolect

Answer 6

one unique person

Question 7

variety

Answer 7

any distinct form of a language (dialect, register, style)

Question 8

phoneme

Answer 8

sound of a language

Question 9

allophone

Answer 9

variation of a phoneme

Question 10

primary and secondary articulation

Answer 10

how speech sounds are produced with different
tongue and lip positions

Question 11

segmentals

Answer 11

individual speech sounds

Question 12

suprasegmentals

Answer 12

intonation, stress, and rhythm

Question 13

minimal pairs and sets

Answer 13

words that differ by only one sound (bin – kin, win – shin)

Question 14

weak v. strong forms

Answer 14

strong form is usually used to stress a word; some words (like “and” or “to”) have a weak pronunciation in fast speech and a strong form in emphasis

Question 15

vowel reduction

Answer 15

unstressed vowels become shorter and weaker, often turning into a schwa (ə)

Question 16

standard lexical sets

Answer 16

groups of words with the same vowel sound, used to study
accents and pronunciation (e.g., “trap,” “bath,” “lot”)

Question 17

palatalised

Answer 17

t -> ť

Question 18

Standard lexical sets

Answer 18

Devised by J C Wells (Accents of English, 1982) for easier reference to English vowels

Question 19

additional lexical sets

Answer 19

happY lettEr commA