陈新仁《英语语言学实用教程》配套题库【课后练习】(英语语音)【圣才出品】

第2章英语语音

课后习题详解

Check your understanding.

State whether each of the following statements is True or False.

(1) [i:] and [i] are allophones of the same phoneme.

【答案】F

(2) Not all English phonemes have allophones.

【答案】T

(3) The same set of vowels is used in all languages.

【答案】F

(4) All syllables must contain at least one vowel.

【答案】F

(5) The marking of word stress is arbitrary for the most part in English.

【答案】F

(6) English is a tone language.

【答案】F

In-Class Activities

1. In order to discover the phonemes used in the sound system of a language, scholars once designed a method based on the notion of minimal pairs, like “pat”

vs. “fat”. Three requirements were proposed for identifying a minimal pair: (1) the two words are different in meaning; (2) the two words are different because of just one phoneme; and (3) the phonemes that make the two words different occur in the same phonetic environment. By phonetic environment we mean the sound(s) preceding and that/those following it, e. g. the phonetic environment of [I] in [pit] is [p_t] and that of [P] is [#_it] (#stands for a word or syllable boundary). The contrasting sounds in words forming a minimal pair are said to be in contrastive distribution, as in [bit] vs. [beit] and [pit] vs. [bit].

Ask

(1) What is the phonetic environment of [t] in [pit] ?

Key: [i_]

(2) Are the following pairs of words minimal pairs?

a. desk vs. task;

b. leave vs. leak

Key: a. No.

b. Yes. ( li:v vs. li:k )

2. Allophones as the realizations of the same phoneme are technically said to be in complementary distribution; in other words, they are found in different phonetic environments. For instance, the allophones of the phoneme /l/, clear [l] and dark [?], occur as follows:

Clear [1]: occurs before vowels or after initial consonant(s) like /b/, /s/, /k/, //,

/f/, /p/, /sp/.

Dark [?]: occurs elsewhere.

Ask

(1) Characterize how the allophones of the phoneme/k/are complementarily distributed.

Key: [k h ] in initial position; [k]after /s/; [k¬] in final position.

(2) Is there any other way of characterizing the complementary distribution of clear [l] and dark [?]?

Key: [l] before vowels; [ł] elsewhere.

3. A phoneme can be further analyzed into a set of distinctive features. For example, /p/is defined as composed of such distinctive features as [plosive] + [bilabial] + [breathed] because each of them can distinguish/p/from some other phonemes. However, the property of aspiration contained in the allophone [P h] does not distinguish of meaning and therefore is not a distinctive feature in this case. Ask

(1) What distinctive feature makes/f/and/v/different?

Key: [voiced].

(2) Can you specify the distinctive features for the following phonemes?

a. /y/;

b. /k/;

c. /n/

Key: a. /y/ [fricative] + [voiceless] + [palatal]

b. /k/ [velar] + [voiceless] + [plosive]