Phonetics and Phonology
Acoustic phonetics The study of sound waves made by the vocal
organs
Active articulators Part of the vocal tract that can be moved
Passive articulators Part of the vocal tract that cannot be moved
Allophone A contextually determined variant
pronunciation of a phoneme
Alternation Correspondence between two allophones
revealed when the same morpheme is
pronounced in different ways depending on the
context
Articulary phonetics Study of how the vocal tract produces speech
sounds
Complementary distribution Predictable, nonoverlapping distribution
Distinctive features Formal representation of a phonetic dimension
relevant to phonological contrast and
alternation
Fundamental frequency Basic rate of vibration of a complex sound,
correlated with pitch
Intonation The use of pitch to convey meaning
Manner of articulation The type of constriction that is made for a
speech sound: stop, fricative, affricative,
approximant, vowel
Minimal pair Two distinct words that differ only in single
sound in the same position
Obstruent A speech sound that is made audible by
obstruction of the airflow in the vocal tract: oral
stops, fricatives, affricatives
Phoneme One of the contrastive sounds of a language; a
label for a group of sounds that are perceived
by the speaker to be the same
Phonology The study of how languages organise sounds
into different patterns
Pitch track A graph of changes in fundamental frequency
over time
Place of articulation The area of the vocal tract at which a
constriction is made
Sonorant A speech sound that is made audible by
resonance of air in the vocal tract, rather than
by obstruction of airflow
Sonority Relative openness of the vocal tract
Source-filter theory Conception of speech sounds as a combination
of a sound source and (larynx) and a sound filter
(resonance in vocal tract)
Stress A prominence relation between syllables.
(longer, louder, higher-pitched)
Suprasegmentals Aspects of speech that influence stretches of
sound longer than a single segment: length,
tone, intonation, syllable structure, stress
Acoustic phonetics The study of sound waves made by the vocal
organs
Active articulators Part of the vocal tract that can be moved
Passive articulators Part of the vocal tract that cannot be moved
Allophone A contextually determined variant
pronunciation of a phoneme
Alternation Correspondence between two allophones
revealed when the same morpheme is
pronounced in different ways depending on the
context
Articulary phonetics Study of how the vocal tract produces speech
sounds
Complementary distribution Predictable, nonoverlapping distribution
Distinctive features Formal representation of a phonetic dimension
relevant to phonological contrast and
alternation
Fundamental frequency Basic rate of vibration of a complex sound,
correlated with pitch
Intonation The use of pitch to convey meaning
Manner of articulation The type of constriction that is made for a
speech sound: stop, fricative, affricative,
approximant, vowel
Minimal pair Two distinct words that differ only in single
sound in the same position
Obstruent A speech sound that is made audible by
obstruction of the airflow in the vocal tract: oral
stops, fricatives, affricatives
Phoneme One of the contrastive sounds of a language; a
label for a group of sounds that are perceived
by the speaker to be the same
Phonology The study of how languages organise sounds
into different patterns
Pitch track A graph of changes in fundamental frequency
over time
Place of articulation The area of the vocal tract at which a
constriction is made
Sonorant A speech sound that is made audible by
resonance of air in the vocal tract, rather than
by obstruction of airflow
Sonority Relative openness of the vocal tract
Source-filter theory Conception of speech sounds as a combination
of a sound source and (larynx) and a sound filter
(resonance in vocal tract)
Stress A prominence relation between syllables.
(longer, louder, higher-pitched)
Suprasegmentals Aspects of speech that influence stretches of
sound longer than a single segment: length,
tone, intonation, syllable structure, stress
