Definitions in Phonetics and Phonology

It is very important to understand what we mean with the terms "Phonetics" and "Phonology". In this exercise, you will have to create THE PERFECT DEFINITION on these terms. This is the way to follow:

1. Read the definitions that I provide in this entry
2. Extend the definitions by means of REWRITING them and ADDING EXTRA INFORMATION
3. It is very important that we follow a chain to do this. That is, the first person to post a comment modifies MY definition. The second person to post a comment modifies the 1st person's definition. The third person to post a comment modifies the 2nd person´s definitions, etc.

That way, we will create a "snow ball" that should lead to the perfect and complete versions of the definitions.

THESE ARE THE STARTING DEFINITIONS:
1. Phonetics is a field of knowledge that studies sounds.
2. Phonology is a field of Linguistics that studies sounds.

Together with your definitions, you must use a list of references (books, articles, web pages) that you have used to add your "snow ball")

The Perceptual System

Our perceptual experience is motivated by the displacement of the gas molecules that appear in the air. If there is no air, there is no sound. When an object starts to vibrate, this movement causes the displacement, these gas molecules run into each other and produce soundwaves.

The physical properties of these soundwaves are:
- Frequency
- Amplitude
- Phase angle

Of the three, frequency is the characteristic which mostly influence in our perception of a sound. That is, our auditory system is especially sensitive to changes in frequencies.

However, other important factors are:
- duration
- amplitude
- previous sounds
- our attention at the moment the sound is produced

Let´s now speak about 3 important features related to sound perception:
1) Amplitude (Volume): The wider the amplitude of the soundwave, the louder the perception we receive. However, there is not a one-to-one correlation between amplitude (volume) and perception: background noise, the listener's characteristics and frequency can influence on a better or worse reception of sounds

2) Simultaneous sounds: When two sounds are combined, the resulting sound depends on the difference in the frequency of the two sounds.

English Pronunciation and English Spelling are very different. The reason is, of course, historical. The language suffered different dialectal changes before it become one unified form, roughly speaking, of course. At least, the form we mostly see described in dictionaries and books is the so-called standard form of the English language, whether it be American or British, the two major standards.

As I say, the spelling was not so distant from its pronunciation some centuries ago. This convergence towards one unified form originated in the many different dialects spoken in the British Isles 500 years ago. The phenomenon is known as the Great Vowels Shift. You should have a look at that and maybe still wonder why "moon" evolved from /o:/ to /u:/ but "foot" became /U/ as in should... Any idea? Posts are welcome!!!

Introduction to English Phonetic Symbols

Learning how to transcribe English sounds is a very useful skill. It helps us "write" how sounds are pronounced when we are, for example, editing a paper on some linguistic issue. English transcription can be done from two different perspectives:

a) We can transcribe broadly, meaning that we merely state how sounds are pronounced phonologically. Phonologically refers to the general pronunciation of sounds, common to all varieties of one standard and without taking into account possible influences across sounds. This is a Phonological Transcription (Phonemic Transcription). The sounds we transcribed are called "phonemes". /b/ is a symbol which refers to the main articulatory traces of the first sound in "birthday": bilabial, plosive, voiced.

b) We can transcribe narrowly, meaning that we include much more details occurring to sounds, such as influence from neighboring sounds, from their position in the utterance, etc. This is called Phonetic Transcription (Allophonic Transcription). The sounds we transcribed are called "allophones" and are closer to the real pronunciation by a human. This closeness is, of course, gradual, as we may ignore some aspects of pronunciation. [b^] is a symbol which refers to the specific articulatory traces of the sound /b/ when it is pronounced in final position and the release stage of the plosive feature is not happening.

Have a look at this video to review these phonetic symbols and how they sound: