Phonology and Phonetic Transcription - Department of Linguistics ...

Chapter 2, Phonetic and
Phonological Transcription
January 16, 2013

Transcription and 2 levels of speech
1. phonemic level (just phonemes)
2. phonetic level (phonetic
variation/allophones)

What does that mean?
What’s the difference between phonetic and
phonemic (phonological) transcriptions?
First a distinction between phonemes and
allophones . . .

Phonemes vs. Allophones
Some sounds are contrastive in a language, meaning
that native speakers can hear the differences between
them and these sounds make different words—like
rock and lock, and talk, and walk
Some sound differences are not contrastive—they
are complementary, meaning that native speakers
cannot hear the differences between them and they
think of them as the same sound like the /p/ in top,
pot, and spot.

Phonemes vs. Allophones
Sounds are considered phonemes if we can
find minimal pairs
Sounds are considered allophones if we
cannot find minimal pairs (two words that
differ in only one sound)
rock vs. lock; bit vs. beet, bee vs. dee
Aymara: kamisak vs. gamisak

English /r/ and /l/ vs.
English /p/ and /p h /
/rak/ /lak/
/bal/ /bar/
/p h at/
/spat/
/tap/

G g G g G g G g G g G g
Allophones revisited
All G’s even though they look slightly
different
Apples are made in America
Capital “A” in some environments and
lowercase “a” in all the rest
We use different versions of spelling depending on
the place in the word, just like we use different
sounds depending on their place in the word

Sounds are allophonic or phonemic
English
depending on your language
peel /p h il/ vs. peel /pil/
speal /sp h il/ vs. /spil/
teal /t h il/ vs. teal /til/
keel /k h il/ vs. keel /kil/
Thai
/paa/ forrest vs. /p h aa/ to split
/tam/ to pound vs. /t h am/ to do
/kat/ to bite vs. /k h at/ to interrupt

Korean:
/r/ and /l/ in Korean
[rupi] “ruby” [mul] “water”
[kiri] “road” [pal] “big”
[saram] “person” [seul] “Seoul”
[irumi] “name” [ilkop] “seven”
[ratio] “radio” [ipalsa] “barber”
Are /r/ and /l/ allophones or phonemes?

Sounds are allophonic or phonemic
depending on your language
English person’s perception of /p/ and /p h /:
/p/ [p]
[p h ]
allophones of the same
phoneme
Thai speaker’s perception /p/ and /p h /:
/p/ [p] /p h/ [p h ]
separate phonemes

1. Phonemic transcription
This level is concerned with distinctions between
sounds that change meaning or phonemes
On this level, no difference between first and second
/p/’s in “pop” so we don’t write them differently
/pap/
Difference between first /p/ in pop and first /t/ in top
That means /p/ and /t/ are different phonemes so
we do transcribe these differently
Phoneticians transcribe on this level.

transcribes distinctive phonemes. /l/ vs. /r/ in
“low” and “row”
(When transcribing phonemes, transcriptions are
written between slashes).
doesn’t document predictable phonetic detail (i.e.,
allophonic variation)
e.g. peas = /piz/
1. Phonemic transcription
This is called BROAD transcription

2. Phonetic transcription
This level is concerned with allophones: the difference
between first and second /p/ in “pop”
Transcribing allophones (such as [p] or [p h ]) is
transcribing on the phonetic level (we use brackets to
transcribe on this level)
Phoneticians transcribe on this level
(and so will you)

ecords subphonemic detail.
e.g. [p h i:z]
It is also called [NARROW]
transcription.
2. Phonetic transcription
It often uses various diacritics

Some allophonic variation in
1. Voiceless stop aspiration
2. Unreleased final stop consonant
3. Lateral velarization
American English
4. Approximant (Lateral and rhotic) devoicing
5. Vowel lengthening
6. Vowel nasalization
7. Syllabification
8. Dentalization
(some of these are easier to perceive than others

1. Aspiration

Spy, sty, sky

2. Unreleased stop (leap vs. bat)

3. Lateral velarization (leap vs. pool)

Lull vs. llul

4. Approximant devoicing( play vs. pay
vs. lull)

5. Vowel lengthening

Non-native English speaker’s “bead” and
“beat”

6. Vowel nasalization (bid vs.
bin)

7. Syllabification
When a schwa is in an unstressed position at
the end of a word, and is followed by r, l, m,
or n, it is often deleted in fast speech.
Prattle
Mother
Cousin
bottom

Alveolar consonants (t, d, n, l, r, s, z) become
dentalized (you use the tip of the tongue and push
it against your teeth) before interdentals ( ) )
Tenth
On the
At the
Is that
8. Dentalization

Transcribe the following on a phonetic
1. eighth
2. bead
3. beat
4. diabolical
5. cry
6. paint
7. play
8. butter
9. battle
10. astronomy
11. pristine
12. thinking
level