week 4

Question 1

who devised IPA

Answer 1

International Phonetic Association in the year 1888

Question 2

phonemic transcription

Answer 2

1 symbol for each phoneme

broad transcription

Question 3

phonetic transcription

Answer 3

shows allophonic variants

narrow transcription

Question 4

weak v strong forms

Answer 4

grammatical words like should, can, has, were, etc. in connected speech are typically
realised in their weak forms, thus /ʃəd/, /kən/, /həz/ or /əz/, /wə/ respectively.

So transcription of

I should have paid them

as

/aɪ ʃʊd hæv ˈpeɪd ðɛm/

is clearly not a
mere sum of all the words involved transcribed as strong forms

Question 5

primary stress

Answer 5

above symbols

Question 6

secondary stress

Answer 6

below symbols

Question 7

syllabicity

Answer 7

The symbol ̩ below the syllabic sound.

Question 8

plurals, possessives and third person

Answer 8

o /-s/ after voiceless plosives,
o /-ɪz/ or /-əz/ after sibilants (/s/, /z/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/)
o /-z/ elsewhere.

Question 9

past tense

Answer 9

o /-t/ after voiceless consonants /p/, /f/, /s/, /k/, /ʃ/, /tʃ/, /θ/
o /-d/ after voiced ones /b/, /v/, /z/, /g/, /ʒ/, /dʒ/, /ð/ + vowels
o /-ɪd/ or /-əd/ after alveolar plosives (/t/, /d/).
- E.g. kept /kɛpt/, robbed /rɒbd/, landed /landɪd/ or /landəd/.

Question 10

liaison

Answer 10

linking /r/
bare /bɛ:/ but bare it /bɛ:r ɪt/, after /ɑ:ftə/ but after all /ɑ:ftər ɔ:l/

Question 11

elision

Answer 11

-schwa is also elided if followed by /n/, /r/ or /l/ + unstressed syllable in the same word;
e.g. history /hɪstri/, travelling /travlɪŋ/, federal /fɛdrəl/.

• alveolar plosives /t/, /d/ in the middle of three consonants; e.g. last night /ˈlɑ:s ˈnʌɪt/,
  locked door /ˈlɒk ˈdɔ:/, exactly /ɪgˈzakli/
• /t/ is very often elided in negative words like can’t, don’t, doesn’t, didn’t, wouldn’t,
  needn’t, etc.

Question 12

assimilation

Answer 12

• E.g. that man /ðap man/, that car /ðak kɑ:/, bad girl /bag gɜ:l/, ten pens /tɛm pɛnz/, is she
  /ɪʒ ʃi:/, dress shop /drɛʃ ʃɒp/
• Voice assimilation: some voiced word-final consonants become voiceless; e.g. have to
  /haf tu/, of course /əf kɔ:s/, newspaper /nju:speipə/.

Question 13

coalescence

Answer 13

alveolar plosives /t/ and /d/ merge with the following palatal approximant /j/ to make affricates /tʃ/ and /dʒ/

e.g. don’t you /dəʊntʃu/, would you /wʊdʒu/.