A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics David Crystal

466 supplementary movements
supplementary movements One of the types of sound feature set up by Chomsky
and Halle (see Chomskyan) in their distinctive feature theory of phonology,
to handle variations in manner of articulation. They are subdivided
into suction and pressure types, a distinction made on the basis of the
ingressive or egressive glottal or velar movement involved in sounds with
two simultaneous closures, as in implosives, ejectives and clicks.
suppletion (n.) A term used in morphology to refer to cases where it is not
possible to show a relationship between morphemes through a general rule,
because the forms involved have different roots. A suppletive is the grammar’s
use of an unrelated form (i.e. with a different root) to complete a paradigm, as
in the present–past-tense relationship of go ~ went, or the comparative form
better in relation to good.
suppletive (n.)
suprafix (n.)
see suppletion
see superfix
supraglottal (adj.) A general term used in phonetics to refer to the whole area
of the vocal tract above the glottis.
suprasegmental (adj./n.) A term used in phonetics and phonology to refer
to a vocal effect which extends over more than one sound segment in an
utterance, such as a pitch, stress or juncture pattern. In its contrast with
‘segmental’, it is seen as one of two main classes into which phonological units
can be divided. In American structuralist theories, suprasegmentals were
analysed as phonemes and sequences of such features as morphemes, but not
all phonologists analyse these features in emic terms. Alternative terms are
plurisegmental, non-segmental and superfix.
surface grammar
see surface structure
surface structure A central theoretical term in transformational grammar,
opposed to deep structure. The ‘surface structure’ of a sentence is the final
stage in the syntactic representation of a sentence, which provides the input
to the phonological component of the grammar, and which thus most closely
corresponds to the structure of the sentence we articulate and hear. Analysing
a surface string of morphemes through constituent analysis is a universal
procedure which indicates many important facts about linguistic structure;
but it by no means indicates everything, e.g. it cannot explain how we recognize
certain ambiguous sentences, or how we intuitively relate sentences which
have different surface forms but the same basic meaning (e.g. Cats chase mice
and Mice are chased by cats). For such reasons, linguists in the late 1950s
postulated a deep or ‘underlying’ structure for sentences – a level of structural
organization in which all the factors determining structural interpretation are
defined and interrelated. The standard view was that a grammar operates
by generating a set of abstract deep structures, subsequently converting these
underlying representations into surface structures by applying a set of transformational
rules. This two-level conception of grammatical structure came