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TIL
Voice Quality
voice-qual.htm
by
U Kyaw Tun (UKT) (M.S., I.P.S.T., USA)
and staff of Tun Institute of Learning
(TIL) . Not for sale. No copyright. Free
for everyone. Prepared for students and
staff of TIL Research Station,
Yangon, MYANMAR :
http://www.tuninst.net ,
www.romabama.blogspot.com
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HV-indx.htm
UKT 160218: Never forget that in BEPS
we are dealing with two different
writing systems:
the Abugida-Akshara, and Alphabet-Letter.
The Akshara is a syllable, whereas the
Letter is mute.
The Letter, as in Georgian Letter
"Tan" is mute. To give it a
sound, you couple it with a
"vowel-giver"
"An":
თ ‹t› (mute) +
ა ‹a.› (pronounceable) -->
თა ‹ta.›
(pronounceable)
The Akshara, as in Bur-Myan
{ta.} is pronounceable as it already
contains an inherent vowel:
{ta.} + virama 'vowel killer'
-->
{t}
You'll note that the Georgian vowel-giver
ა ‹a.› and Bur-Myan 'vowel killer'
are inverse of each other in shape.
Is it just a coincidence? I wonder!
Ancient phoneticians
Voice quality - VQ: definition
& measurement: oratory
Voice-box
- the Larynx
Phonetic Description of VQ -
John Laver's pioneering work
Phonation or voicing
Supralaryngeal and muscular tension
settings
Supra-glottal phonation
Fiber-optic laryngoscopy
Graphemes & Phonemes :
confusing terminologies
Tongue tip articulation :
retroflex sounds
Fricative Sibilant and Thibilant
consonants
- tongue tip-down
& tip-up /s/
Aksharas with no discernable POA :
- differentiate Abugida-Akshara &
Alphabet-Letter systems
UKT 160211: I don't
write unless I have reliable background
info. In going over what I have
written years ago, I try to get hold of
the original source. One of my sources is
Wikipedia, and I usually give the date on
which I had read the article, and whenever
I find the Wikipedia has changed its
position, I also correct what I have
written years ago. This is an old piece
I am going through, and you will find I
have left out some older material and
have added new ones. In spite of my renewed
efforts, I still feel that
there are still many
perplexing issues in my understanding
and I will have to go over this file again.
¤ Akshara means the one-to-one correspondence
(mapping) between
{sa} and
{sa.ka:}
¤ In case there is discrepancy take:
{ré:tau. a.mhûn/ hpût-tau. a.þän}
'What is written is permanent (correct);
What is read is just transient
(prone to error)'.
English (Eng-Lat) is notoriously lacking
the feature of one-to-one mapping. If they
could not pronounce a consonant cluster,
they just make one of the consonant mute.
That is how the Celtic Gnome has lost his
G, and is pronounced /nəʊm/.
If we are to transcribe in Bur-Myan we
would get
{ngoam:} or
{ngoän:} 'a small bird whose egg is supposed
to be very nutritious'. No wonder the
diminutive gold miner is keeping all gold
to himself.
Passages worthy of note:
•
Not all phonation types are mutually
exclusive, on the contrary, some of them
work together to modify phonation.
• English and French are
intonation languages; Chinese and
Thai are tonal languages. --
Bur-Myan (Burmese-Myanmar) is a
pitch-register language.
• The
glottal "fricatives"
{ha.} are actually unaccompanied phonation
states of the glottis, without any
accompanying manner, fricative or
otherwise. However, they are called
fricatives for historical reasons.
UKT notes :
•
Faucalized voice :
{aip-ngeik-þän}
•
grapheme &
phoneme :
cf. morpheme
•
intonation
•
lexeme :
{a.Daip~pèý aim} 'unit of meaning'
•
morpheme : different from word
{waad}
• obstruents and sonorants
(sonority hierarchy)
• pharynx
•
phonation types
• phone
•
phonology
•
pitch (music)
•
pitch accent
•
pitch-register (lingusitic)
•
prosody
•
sibilant vs. thilibant
•
strident consonant
•
strident vowel
•
tenuis consonant
•
VOT (voice onset time or vibration
onset time)
•
vowel register
•
vowel tone
• word
{waad} - TIL-coined word
Contents of this page
- UKT 160203:
"Give me a place to stand, and I will
move the Earth"
- A remark of Archimedes (287? - 218 BC)
quoted by
Pappus of Alexandria
Collection or Synagoge,
Book VIII, c. AD 340
Greek text:
Pappi Alexandrini Collectionis
Edited by Friedrich Otto Hultsch, Berlin,
1878
UKT 160204: Archimedes was probably not
a phonetician, but a scientist and a thinker
who engrossed in his thinking did not even
notice that he had no clothes on!
I always compare the sound-producing
air-stream, flowing from the lungs to
the lips or nostrils, to that of water
flowing along a stream (or pipe) with
various obstructions such as weeds
(comparable to vocal cords), weirs
(comparable to soft palate), stones,
and water-falls.
I imagine (scientists also
daydream) that the ancient sages
{ra.þé.} 'holy persons' aka Rishis
(not travelling musicians or bards)
such as:
¤ Panini पाणिनि
«Pāṇini»,
{pa-Ni.ni.} 520-460BC
-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panini
- 070910
and those before him such as
¤ Yāska
यास्कः
«yāska» ,
{yaaS~ka.}
-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaska
- 080620,
The line of ancient sages
{ra.þé.} had lived in the mountains with
rivers flowing in the deep valleys below
them - few still do in the Mon State in
Myanmarpré - studying the various aspects
of Nature such as the "power of human
voice". A notable study that I have
observed years ago right on the Shwédagoan
Pagoda platform is the ability of the human
eye to look unprotected directly at the Sun
even at noon.
Based on the above speculation, and
the theory of Rev. F. Mason, that,
Magadhi-Asokan has changed into Magadhi-Myan,
we can easily transform Magadhi-Myan
(Tibeto-Burman of Bronze Age) to Skt-Dev
(Indo-European of Iron Age).
The name of the earlier sage:
{yaaþ~þa.ka} -->
{yaaþ-ka.}
-->
{yaaS~ka.}
यास्कः
«yāska».
These phoneticians had lived along the great
Bronze-Age Saraswati River studying the
human voice, over four thousand years before
the invention of IPA by the modern phoneticians
and linguists.
According to the present day studies,
(Saswati Pai k, GIS Development,
www.gsbkerala.com/saraswati.htm),
Saraswati River had flowed for 2000 years,
between 6000 and 4000 B.C., from Himalayas
in the north to empty into the Arabian Sea.
The river was obliterated within a short
span, in the Quarternary period of the
Cenozoic era, through a combination of
destructive catastrophic events. The decline
of the river appears to have commenced between
5000 and 3000 B.C., probably precipitated by a
major tectonic event in the Siwalik Hills of
Sirmur region.
As a material scientist, I neither do nor
don't believe in reincarnation. Yet being
brought up as a Buddhist, in a land as
mysterious as the land known as Myanmarpré -
can you imagine a land where 'wild pythons
live freely in the precincts of many pagodas -
I sometimes imagine that I must have lived
many, many previous lives before. Maybe,
I was one of those ancient sages, perhaps a
student of Panini (who had lived along a
river and Hindu by religion) or Shin Kic-si
(Buddhist grammarian praised by Gautama
Buddha himself). Or, how could I explain why
I was always interested in the study of
languages -- I had tried typing Bur-Myan
(Burmese-Myanmar) on my father's English
typewriter even before I was a teenager.
Then from about the age 76, a retired
university chemistry teacher and researcher,
I have turned my attention to Linguistics.
Without a chemistry laboratory to work in,
I had felt like a fish out of water. Now, my
attention to Linguistics has kept my mind
sharp, but "a crazy old man" as my
grownup grandson Kan Tun would tease me.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160218: From ancient times to the
present, philosophers and scientists,
come across questions which has us. We
all seem to know what mean by Quality
in the Voice of Humans, females and
males, yet there is no clear cut definition
and no objective instrumental analysis.
The following is from a conference of
surgeons - not linguists and phoneticians
- on VQ.
From: DEFINING AND MEASURING VOICE
QUALITY, Jody Kreiman, Diana
Vanlancker-Sidtis, & Bruce Gerratt,
in Sound to Sense: 040611-040613,
at MIT:
-
http://www.rle.mit.edu/soundtosense/conference/pdfs/fulltext/Saturday%20Posters/SB-Kreiman-STS.pdf
160218
Downloaded pdf in TIL SD-Library<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160218)
Although voices provide listeners with
significant information about speakers,
defining and quantifying voice quality
remain elusive goals. The ANSI (American
National Standards Institute) standard
definition of quality (that attribute of
auditory sensation in terms of which a
listener can judge that two sounds similarly
presented and having the same loudness and
pitch are dissimilar) is often criticized
because it specifies what quality is not,
rather than what it is. ...
The most common approach is simply to
create a long list of terms to describe
voices, and then ask listeners to assess
quality by indicating the extent to which
a voice possesses each feature. This
approach to measuring voice quality depends
on descriptive traditions rather
than theory, and has changed very little in
nearly 2000 years. Many common terms have
been in use for centuries. Familiar labels
like "harsh", "clear",
"bright", "smooth",
"weak", "shrill",
"deep", "dull", and
"hoarse" can be found in Roman
writings on oratory (Austin, 1806), as
well as in modern studies of voice quality.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160212
Before we go into Voice Quality, we should
know something about the organ that produces
voice-sounds. It is the larynx. It is
colloquially known as the voice-box,
is an organ in the neck of mammals, reptiles,
and amphibians.
The following is based on:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larynx
070909, 160212
The larynx houses the vocal folds, and is
situated just below where the tract of the
pharynx splits into the trachea and the
esophagus. The most important role of the
larynx is its protecting function; the
prevention of foreign objects from entering
the lungs by coughing and other reflexive
actions. Sound is generated in the
larynx, and that is where pitch and volume
are manipulated. The strength of expiration
from the lungs also contributes to loudness,
and is necessary for the vocal folds
to produce speech.
Vocal folds are found only in mammals, and a
few lizards. As a result, many reptiles and
amphibians are essentially voiceless; frogs
use ridges in the trachea to modulate sound,
while birds have a separate sound-producing
organ, the syrinx.
[16]
The vocal folds can be held close together
(by adducting the arytenoid cartilages), so
that they vibrate (see phonation). The muscles
attached to the arytenoid cartilages control
the degree of opening. Vocal fold length and
tension can be controlled by rocking the
thyroid cartilage forward and backward on the
cricoid cartilage, and by manipulating the
tension of the muscles within the vocal folds.
This causes the pitch produced during phonation
to rise or fall.
Fine manipulation of the larynx is used in
a great way to generate a source sound
with a particular fundamental frequency, or
pitch. This source sound is altered as it
travels through the vocal tract, configured
differently based on the position of the
tongue, lips, mouth, and pharynx. The process
of altering a source sound as it passes
through the filter of the vocal tract creates
the many different vowel and consonant sounds
of the world's languages.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160218
See The Phonetic Description of
Voice quality, John Laver, Univ. of
Edinburgh. Cambridge Univ. Press,
First published 1980. ISBN 0 521 231 760.
The html version is in TIL library.
The pdf version is in the TIL SD-Library
- JLaver-PhonDescripVQ1980<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160218)
- MCoadou-LiverpoolVQ<Ô> /
bkp<Ô>
Definition of VQ: Perceived
characteristic ‘acoustic colouring’ of voice,
derived from a variety of laryngeal and
supra-laryngeal features that are not unique
to one individual but form clusters of
identifiable voice types. Examples of voice
types:
• Whisper voice • Modal voice
• Breathy voice • Pressed voice
• Creaky voice • Tense voice
• Harsh voice • Nasal voice
Abstr: from Marion Coadou -
Voice Quality according to Laver's
model
"Voice Quality is a concept which
is quite difficult to define. This study
proposes a description and a definition
of it according to John Laver’s model.
Moreover, very few studies focused on
the variation of voice quality according
to accents. This pilot study aims at
describing the voice quality of the accent
of Liverpool thanks to a perceptual analysis
called the Vocal Profile Analysis
scheme.* The results show that the VPA scheme
is a useful tool in order to determine some
features of the voice quality of the Liverpool
accent. Finally, to our knowledge, there is
no study that compares voice quality across
several accents of the British Isles. This
is why, this study is part of a larger project
that will try and identify the voice quality
features of some British accents using the
VPA scheme."
* From:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/ ...
160219
The Vocal Profile Analysis Scheme (VPAS)
(Laver et al. 1981) is the vocal
perceptual scheme most often used by
British speech and language therapists.
...
UKT: From time to time, I have come across
very neat sets of papers on the internet.
Though I would like to give credit to the
authors concerned, I am unable to do so. I
can only give the source. This section is
written based on two such sources. They have
been downloaded, reformatted to suit TIL
requirements, and are available in the TIL
library for research purposes.
• Introduction to VQ,
http://dea.brunel.ac.uk/cmsp/Home_Emir_Turajlic/introduction.html
080109
UKT 160203: I could not access the online
paper for many years.
There's no doubt I must have heard all the
above voice types. Do I know which is which?
No. The following online links will let
you hear the voice types.
• EGG and VQ,
http://www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/page10.htm
080107, 101030, 160203.
The whole set of these papers have been
downloaded and are in TIL library. I have
gone through Chapter 1, from which the
following sound files are taken.
The links to all the downloaded sound <))
have been changed into .mp3 and
link chk 160203
The little figures in blue (given below)
are highly stylized drawings of the muscles
of the larynx used for
opening and closing the glottis.
• Whisper
<))
Whisper sound quality is produced through
turbulences generated by the friction of
the air in and above the larynx with
vocal folds not vibrating. Apart from the
rather seldom linguistic uses, whisper is
widely used paralinquistically to signal
secrecy and confidentiality.
• Modal voice
<))
The neutral mode of phonation is modal
voiced (vd) phonation. The modal phonation
of a male speaker occurs at an average of
120 Hz, while for a female speaker it is
approx. 220 Hz.
It is normally regarded as a compound
phonation type, voiceless (vl) +modal. Vocal
fold vibration is inefficient and, because
of the incomplete closure of the glottis, a
constant glottal leakage occurs which causes
the production of audible friction noise. The
vibration frequency is just below the value
of typical modal voice.
• Creaky voice
{ak-þän}
<))
Creak phonation (also called vocal fry)
is also produced with vibrating vocal folds
but at a very low frequency.
See also
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocal_fry_register
160205
UKT 160205: It sounds a person speaking or
singing with a Cracking sound
{ak-þän}.
• Harsh voice
{a-þän}
<))
It is due to the very strong tension
of the vocal folds (especially medial
compression and adductive tension), which
results in an excessive approximation of
the vocal folds. When the whole larynx is
subjected to this extremely high tension,
the upper larynx becomes highly constricted
with the ventricular folds pressing on the
upper surfaces of the vocal folds, making
their vibration ineffective. Harsh phonation
is therefore irregular in both cycle
duration and amplitude. The characteristic
frequency is above 100 Hz. A lighter degree
of tension is sometimes described as a
tense voice.
• Falsetto
<))
The frequency of vibrations in falsetto
phonation is noticeably higher than in modal
voice. The vocal folds are stretched
longitudinally, thus becoming relatively thin.
Consequently, the vibrating mass is smaller and
the generated tone higher. The adduction
of the folds is high and the medial compression
is also strong. The glottis often remains
slightly open, resulting in low subglottal
pressure (due to constant glottal leakage) and
the generation of the audible friction noise
component.
Not all phonation types are mutually
exclusive, on the contrary, some of
them work together to modify phonation.
Only modal and falsetto are incompatible
because they use the structure of the larynx
differently.
Voice quality is an effect of vocal tract
anatomy, laryngeal anatomy and
vocal habits.
This is illustrated in the following examples.
The characteristic sound of the voice is
brought about by the mode of vibration of the
vocal cords and folds.
Differences in the degree and manner of
glottal closure distinguish modal voice,
breathy voice and whispery voice.
The quality of the voice depends on the
degree of tension in the larynx and pharynx,
and on the vertical displacement of the
larynx: a raised larynx produces a thin
tense voice, and a lowered larynx a booming
voice.
Perceptual importance: In English,
apart from distinguishing voiced and
voiceless (vl) sounds, voice quality does not
make linguistic contrasts, but conveys
information about the speaker.
In some languages such as Gujerati
[an Indian language that is of interest to
me because of its connection to Pali, and
Jainism a contemporary of the Buddhism] and
Mazatec differences in voice quality
or pitch trajectory are used
to convey linguistic meanings.
Languages and dialects have characteristic
voice qualities; personal voice quality
enables a listener to recognize a particular
individual. Furthermore, the quality
of someone's voice also conveys emotions,
attitudes, and health.
UKT 160203: As a side note I must add:
Astrologers and Palmists in Myanmarpré
are "trained" observers of the
human behaviour. By noting the way the
client walks, hangs her hands and
positions her palm, the way her facial
muscles twitch when speaking, by
the slowness or rapidity of her
voice, etc. he is quite aware of who
you are, what your profession is, your
health and so on. He can guess the purpose
of your visit. He is not a trickster - he
in his own way is a therapist whom you can
trust.
Bur-Myan is described as pitch-register
language. It is said to have 3 pitch-registers.
{a.} (1 eye-blink),
{a} (2 blk),
{a:} (2 blk + emphasis)
Including Mon-Myan gives 4 pitch-registers:
{a:.} (1/2 blk),
{a.} (1 blk),
{a} (2 blk),
{a:} (2 blk + emphasis)
It was formerly described together with
Thai as a tonal language. Thai is said
to have 5 tones.
Note: The term "
pitch" can mean many things.
The term "pitch trajectory" is
no better. A similar word is
pitch-register.
Anatomy of human voice: In order
to understand different voice types it
is beneficial to link them to the voice
producing anatomy. For this purpose the
author of the website refers to myoelastic
aerodynamic theory of vocal fold vibrations.
For a model of human voice production system,
see -
POA-con.htm (link chk 160203)
It is consisted of the sub-glottal
area (containing diaphragm, trachea
and lungs), larynx (containing vocal
folds) and supra-glottal area
(vocal tract). The vocal folds are
made of muscles tendon and mucous, and
are of variable mass and elasticity.
In-between the fold, the glottis of
variable geometric properties controls
the airflow towards the vocal tract.
For the informative purpose only: Above
the vocal folds there is a pair of what is
commonly referred to as fake vocal folds
but they are rarely used and hence are not
considered in this project.
Vocal tract is consisted of oral and nasal
cavity, pharyngeal cavity and larynx tube.
The human voice is a series of puffs of air
separated by (partial) closure of the vocal
folds between each puff. Voice is
thereby produced by the vibrations of the
vocal folds activated by the air pressure
from the lungs and is characterised by the
shape and the physiology of the vocal folds
and larynx.
During the phonation cycle, air pressure
from the lungs builds up under closed
vocal folds. Built up air pressure
forces vocal folds to open and release
air. Vocal folds close due to their
elasticity and a sudden drop in pressure.
The air pressure builds up and
the cycle is repeated.
The main factors affecting the
vibrations are:
• Pressure and airflow: The respiratory
system
• Active muscle contraction and position
of arytenoid cartilages
• Elastic properties of vocal folds, mass
length and elasticity
So phonation can be defined as a
self-sustaining quasi-periodic oscillation
of vocal folds that arises from the
interaction of muscular aerodynamic forces
in the vocal tract. A single cycle of
opening and closing is at 100Hz rate for
a male speaker. As such it is too
rapid for the human ear to be able to
discriminate each individual cycle of
oscillations. However, we are
sensitive to the change in overall rate of
vibration and perceive it as changes in
the pitch of the voice.
The intrinsic muscles of the larynx may
be categorised by function: their effect
on the shape of the glottis and on the
vibratory behaviour of vocal folds.
The following are the basic features of
laryngeal adjustments to the different
phonological settings:
a) abduction or adduction of vocal
folds
b) constriction of supra-glottal
structures-adjustment of length,
c) stiffness and thickness of the
vocal folds,
d) elevation and lowering of larynx.
The glottal flow excites the vocal tract
resonator. Vocal tract provides two
paths for the excitation air flow, through
nasal and/or oral cavity. This is
controlled by velum. The more open
it is, the more nasal the sound. Velum
together with other articulators (lips,
tongue and jaw) controls the spectral shape
of the resonator. It is important
to be aware that source excitation and the
vocal tract are not linearly independent
systems. ... ...
Contents of this page
- UKT 080311, 160203
In writing on Phonation, I have to keep
reminding myself what is meant by
"phonation" in various fields,
and I can sum up that the word can mean
differently to different authors, with
the result that all is confusion.
From Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonation
160211
The term phonation has slightly
different meanings depending on the
subfield of phonetics. Among some
phoneticians, phonation is the
process by which the vocal folds
produce certain sounds through
quasi-periodic vibration. This is the
definition used among those who study
laryngeal anatomy and physiology
and speech production in general. [UKT ¶]
Phoneticians in other subfields, such as
linguistic phonetics, call this process
voicing, and use the term
phonation to refer to any oscillatory
state of any part of the larynx that
modifies the airstream, of which voicing is
just one example. Voiceless and supra-glottal
phonations are included under this definition.
UKT: Voicing can mean :
• In phonetics, voice (phonetics) is a
characteristic of phonation. I have split
up the Wikipedia article into 2 parts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonation
080311, 160203
The first part on voicing, and state of
the glottis, is in my notes as
phonation. The second part on
supra-glottal phonation and phonation in
familiar languages [what is written on
English & French is more reliable than
on what is written on non-European
languages such as Korean], has been
incorporated into the text below.
• In music, voicing (music) is a
representation of a chord.
• In the construction of musical instruments,
the process of manipulating the mechanics of
an individual note in order to change or
refine the timbre or volume of that note.
Read
phonation types (EGG measurements),
phonology in my notes.
For phonation types (EGG measurements), see
-
http://www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/
080311, 160203
As with consonants, the vocal cords may
or may not be vibrating regardless of what
the rest of the vocal tract is doing.
Vowels are almost always voiced.
(UKT ¶)
UKT 160203: According to Peter Ledefoged
Bur-Myan has voiceless vowels.
See:
http://hctv.humnet.ucla.edu/departments/linguistics/VowelsandConsonants/vowels/chapter12/burmese.html
080322
However, I must insist that the basic
vowels shown below are of the same kind
being produced deep down in the throat.
Unlike the consonants, it is difficult
to categorizHd them as voiced
(vd.) and voiceless (vl.). To be
consistent with the current view that
Vowels are almost always voiced, I will
have to insist that Burmese vowels
are voiced.
What Peter Ledefoged is referring to as
voiceless vowels are words and
syllables beginning consonants,
semi-nasals:
1. 
{nga.}/{gna.},
2. 
{Ña.}
true nasals: 3.
{na.},
4. 
{ma.}
Eng-Lat speakers speakers recognize the
"true nasals" easily because
they are present in their language.
However the "semi-nasals" are
difficult for them, e.g. the
{nga.}/
{ng} is present in the coda of their
syllables or words such as <sing>
/sɪŋ/ (DJPD16-490). It has no
"g" sound in them. The word
<sing> should be pronounced as
{sïn} without the "g" sound.
The problem can be traced to the digraph
ng they have to use. When
{nga.} is in the onset, they have to change
it to gn . The English word
<gnome> should have been pronounced
{gnoäm:}, but they silence g
and pronounce it as /nəʊm/
(DJPD16-229).
English speakers are in a worse position
with
{nga.} in the onset of the syllable.
They have to change ng to
gn and silence the
g .
As for Nya'gyi
{Ña.}/
{Ñ}, they are totally ignorant. The Hindi
speakers are also ignorant of Nya'gyi.
These unfortunate circumstances complicate
the transcription (pronunciation) Eng-Lat
to Bur-Myan. I have found that giving the
transliteration in IPA and IAST complicates
the problem more, and I am using Romabama
as transcription language in place of IPA
and IAST whenever necessary:
1. absence of velar /ŋ/ & /ɲ/
in English. These sounds are favourite
sounds in Burmese.
2. to the English and Hindi speakers,
the palatals are affricates and not
plosive-stops. Thus,
Bur-Myan
{sa.} is
{kya.}, and
{hsa.} is
{hkya.} as in <church> to them.
3. absence of tenuis
{kya.} (or
{sa.}) in English. The English speakers
pronounce it
{hkya.} (or
{hsa.}).
4. the tendency of Burmese
speakers to end the final sound as voiced
and with emphasis.
Thus when they pronounce <sing>,
they habitually emphasize the g .
In order to remedy
this situation I have to rewrite
/
{hsïn~g}/ as
{sïn}
Because of these complications, when a
Bur-Myan speaker attempts to pronounce
English words with velar and palatal
consonants in accordance with our maxim
{ré:tau. a·mhûn/ hpût-tau. a·þän//}
the result is disastrous.
The r1c5
{nga.} has been touted as a
nasal consonant, which is not
strictly true. In the onset of syllables
it has a g-like sound as has been
noted by J. M. Haswell (1874),
-
MonMyan-indx.htm >
MV1874-indx.htm >
has-conso.htm (link chk 160208)
and R. C. Temple (in 1876) in the Pegu
dialect of Mon-Myan. Since at present,
the inhabitants of the Irrawaddy Delta --
like myself and my relatives in Kungyangoan
-- are the descendants of the Peguans, I
must insist that
is {gna.}. I rely on the view of native
English speakers, an American and a Britisher,
as representative of how Bur-Myan sounds
are heard by the Westerners.
The whole situation reminds me of two
English words <sing> /sɪŋ/
(DJPD16-490) and
<sign> /saɪn/ (DJPD16-488) in
which the positions of n and
g of "digraph" has
been changed.
Ladefoged has listed r1c2
{nga.} modified with Hahto
{ha.hto:} into a monosyllabic medial as
a voiceless vowel. His second
voiceless vowel involves Nya'gyi
{Ña.}, which I have found to be an Awag
approx-palatal. Please note that my
view on the position of Nya'gyi
{Ña.} is open to question, and I may have
to correct it.
The glottal
{ha.}, which can form
Hahto
{ha.hto:}-medial marked with the Hahto-sign
,
is without a POA 'place of articulation'
for it is articulated deep down in the
glottis.
Ledefoged's examples:
-
http://hctv.humnet.ucla.edu/departments/linguistics/VowelsandConsonants/vowels/chapter12/burmese.html
080322
are from column#5 of Myanmar-akshara
consonant-matrix of the Wag 'the
plosive-stop' section in which the cells
are numbered row-column. Application of
{ha.hto:} can produce at least 3 allophones
each differentiated from each other in
vowel time-durations of 1 eye-blk, 2 blk,
and 2 blk + emphasis:
Wag velar r1c5
--
{nga.} /ŋ/ -->
{ngha.} (1 blk),
{ngha} (2 blk),
{ngha:} (2 blk + emphatic)
Wag palatal r2c5
{ña.} /ɲ/
* ↛
{Ñha} (1 blk),
{Ñha} (2 blk)
Wag dental r4c5
{na.} /n/ -->
{nha.} (1 blk),
{nha} (2 blk)
Wag labial r5c5
{ma.} /m/ -->
{mha.} (1 blk),
{mha} (2 blk),
{mha:} (2 blk + emphasis)
* In the Awag 'the approximant' section,
we find under the palatal column
{Ña.}:
approx-palatal
{Ña.}
At present the Palatal Nya'lé
{ña.} is used for Pal-Myan words only,
and according to U Hoke Sein
PMD0420-0723, there only 3 vowels that
can become its intrinsic vowels:
{ña.}
{ña}
{ñé}. The most nasalized consonant in
Myanmar akshara matrix is
{ña.} , and it cannot be further nasalized
by application of the
{ha.hto:}.
Important note: In Bur-Myan
none of the consonants of row#2,
{sa.},
{hsa.},
{za.},
{Za.},
{ña.}, can be nasalized further by
{ha.hto:}.
However,
#1 Nya'gyi
{Ña.} can be modified with
{ha.hto:} to
{Ñha} (1 blk),
{Ñha} (2 blk).
#2 Both Nya'gyi
{Ña.} and Nya'lé
{ña.} can be under Virama
{a.þût} to
{Ñ} &
{ñ}, resptly.
#3 As codas
{ñ} and
{Ñ} behave very differently:
- 
{kyiñ:} 'narrow' - nasal ending sound
- 
{kræ{Ñ:} 'ground' - non-nasal ending
sound
In IPA
{ya.} /j/ is in Palatal column. However,
in order to make room for
{Ña.}/
{Ñ} /iː/ in the Palatal column,
I have to move the
{ya.}/
{y} /j/ to the Velar. Note that it
can form monosyllabic Yapin
{ya.pïn.}-medial marked with Yapin-sign
.
However, non-Bur-Myan such as Engl-Lat
speakers and Hindi-Dev speakers cannot
articulate this sound and ended up with
a di-syllabic Hanging-consonant
{ya.hswè:} with mark
.
For various hanging consonants, see
¤ Mon-Myan Language: Speech and Script -
MonMyan-indx.htm (link chk 160207)
Ledefoged's examples are:
Wag r1c5: plosive-stop velar:
---
{nga.} -->
{ngha:} 'to borrow'
<))
Awag approx-palatal
- -
{Ña.} -->
{Ñha} 'to be considerate'
<))
Wag r4c5: plosive-stop dental
--
{na. } -->
{nha} 'nose'
<))
Wag r5c5: plosive-stop bilabial -
{ma.} -->
{mha.} 'from'
<))
You can have more than one medial taken
together:
{ma.} -->
{mhya.} 'to share'.
The examples are words or syllables ending
with a voiceless sound. They are not
voiceless vowels.
This failure to differentiate the basic
aksharas from the monosyllabic medials
by the Western phoneticians (in fact
the above 4 sounds given by Ladefoged)
had given me great difficulty in
understanding what was meant by voiced (vd.)
and voiceless (vl.). Moreover, the problem
was compounded because what we could hear
was only one word or syllable -- not that
of the "complete" compound word.
For example,
{ngha:} could be from
{ngha:rûm:} or
{hkyé:nga:}. Such compound words are
known as
{sa.ka:hpo sa.ka:ma.} in which only one
syllable has the direct meaning. Now
place your finger lightly on your throat
(Adam's Apple). When I pronounce
{ngha:rûm:} I could feel no vibration for
{ngha:} part (voiceless), but when I
pronounce
{hkyé:nga:} I could feel a slight
vibration (voiced). However, when my
assistant U Tun Aung repeated the
experiment on himself, he could not
feel the difference. He reported that
both are voiceless.
{sa.ka:hpo sa.ka:ma.} n.
combination of words consisting of a
stem, to which a mutant form which by
itself is meaningless is coupled for
euphonic effect. - MED-2006-101
UKT 160206: I have worked Ladefoged's
collection as compound words
{sa.ka:hpo sa.ka:ma.}. Male voice
collections are my own:
Wag
r1c5: plosive-stop velar:
{nga.} -->
{ngha:} 'to borrow'
<)) -->
{ngha:rûm:}
<))
Awag approx-palatal:
{Ña.} -->
{Ñha} 'to be considerate'
<)) -->
{Ñha-ta} 'to be considerate'
<))
Wag r4c5: plosive-stop dental:
{na. } -->
{nha} 'nose'
<)) -->
{nha·hkaung:} 'nose cavity'
<))
Notice the "mid-dot
schwa" in
{nha·hkaung:}.
r5c5: plosive-stop labial:
{ma.} -->
{mha.} 'from'
<)) -->
{a.rhé.mha.} 'from east'
<))
--- my addn:
{ma.} -->
{mhya.} 'to share' -->
{mhya.ta.} 'to share'
<))
A few languages have contrastive voiceless
vowels (that is, the word can mean
something different if your vocal cords
aren't vibrating during the vowel). English
has a few environments where vowels may be
(non-contrastively) voiceless.
Contents of this page
From:
http://www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/page11.htm
160205
UKT 160205: EGG (Electroglottographic
recordings are different from EEG
(Electroencephalogram).
EGG also stands for European
Garden Gnome.
The phonation type is seldom limited to just
one phonetic segment, but on the other hand
can be changed during speaking. Thus,
phonation type is primarily regarded as a
laryngeal setting. The laryngeal settings
constitute the main set of parameters
describing voice quality . Despite the
articulatory movements which produce a given
speech sound, the articulators can be set in
some particular positions for longer
stretches of speech.
In Laver's framework (1994) the supralaryngeal
settings, which describe the positions of the
articulators, are divided into:
• longitudinal
• latitudinal
• velopharyngeal settings
The supralaryngeal settings are summarized
in Table
2. [page 8]
The auditory effects of supralaryngeal
settings manifest themselves primarily
in the modification of the frequency
spectrum of a produced sound. The changes
affect the vocal tract formants (frequency
and bandwidth of eigenresonances) and the
shape of the spectrum. The supralaryngeal
settings provide extra-linguistic
information, for example about a speaker's
habitual and social factors, but are
language-dependent (the deviations from the
neutral settings that are recognized as the
use of a particular setting differ between
languages). The effects of supralaryngeal
settings are described below.
The longitudinal modifications of the
vocal tract result from vertical
displacements of the larynx and from
the lips' protrusion or retraction.
The change of vocal tract length has
auditory and acoustic correlates in
voice quality (section 24).
• Protruded jaw
<))
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/protr.wav
101030
• Retraced jaw (laterally offset jaw)
<))
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/retra.wav
101030
The latitudinal adjustments involve changes
in the cross-sectional area at a given
location in the vocal tract. These changes
strongly influence the transmission
characteristics of the vocal tract (section 24),
and have recognisable correlates in voice
quality (e.g. "smiling" voice).
• Open jaw
<))
-
http://www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/openj.wav
101030
The velopharyngeal settings describe the
position of the velum which in its neutral
setting facilitates nasality only on
certain segments. The other (open or closed)
position of the velum during the production
of speech segments is regarded as the
specific (nasalized or denasalized) setting.
The coupling of the nasal resonator
dramatically changes the spectral
characteristics of the vocal tract. Additional
formants and antiformants are produced while
the high frequency components are suppressed.
• Pharyngalized voice
{a-þän}
<))
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/pharyn.wav
101030
• Nasalized voice
{nha-þän}
<))
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/nasal.wav
101030
UKT 160210: We categorize singing voices as:
{yauk~kya: a / maim~ma. nha //}
'males sing with throaty voice, females
with nasal'.
According to Laver (1980, 1991) the
muscular settings can give rise to two types
of voice: tense voce is created by increased
muscular tension, whereas lax voice is
caused by an overall decrease in muscular
tension (compared to the neutral setting).
Muscular tension influences all aspects of
speech production. In respect to the voice
source, tense voice (as described in section
7.5) is loud, high-pitched, with harsh
phonation and higher subglottal pressure.
Lax voice on the other hand is soft,
with lower pitch, low subglottal pressure
and breathy phonation.
Contents of this page
In the last few decades it has become apparent
that phonation may involve the entire larynx,
with as many as six valves and muscles working
either independently or together. From the
glottis upward, these articulations are:
1. glottal (the vocal cords), producing the
distinctions described in
phonation types in my notes.
2. ventricular (the 'false vocal cords',
partially covering and damping the glottis)
3. arytenoid (sphincteric compression
forwards and upwards)
4. epiglotto-pharyngeal (retraction of the
tongue and epiglottis, potentially closing
onto the pharyngeal wall)
5. raising or lowering of the entire larynx .
See
larynx in my notes.
6. narrowing of the pharynx . See
pharynx in my notes.
Until the development of fiber-optic
laryngoscopy, the full involvement of
the larynx during speech production was
not observable, and the interactions
among the six laryngeal articulators is
still poorly understood. However, at least
two supra-glottal phonations appear to be
widespread in the world's languages. These
are:
harsh voice
('ventricular' or 'pressed' voice
{a-Na-þän) or
{a-þän}
<))
(link chk 160203)
-
http://www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/harsh.wav
101102],
which involves overall constriction of
the larynx, and
faucalized voice ('hollow'
or 'yawny' voice
{aip-ngeik-þän}),
which involves overall expansion of
the larynx.
UKT 101102, 160210: I am unable to get
a recording of faucalized voice:
the only description is that it is
contrastive to harsh voice .
Based on this I suggest that:
¤ faucalized voice - similar to
a Burmese Buddhist monk reciting
Paritta
{pa-rait~ta.} in his spare time.
¤ harsh voice - the same monk
reciting Kammavaca
{kûm~ma.wa-sa.} 'giving commands in
the name of the Buddha'.
It makes me wonder what is it that would
be called "normal" by the Western
phoneticians or doctors who are also
phoneticians. The following are what I take
to be vowels
{a} and
{i} uttered by "normal" speakers.
Both are front vowels.
•
{a} आ
<))
(link chk 160203)
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/norme.wav
101102
UKT 160203: The minimum time of duration
is 2 eye-blinks. But you can lengthen
it as has been done above. However,
{a.} 1 blk and
{a:.} 1/2 blk (found in Mon-Myan) cannot
be lengthened.
•
{i} ई
<))
(link 160203)
-
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/behe.wav
101102
UKT 160203: The minimum time of duration
is 2 eye-blinks. But you can lengthen it
as has been done above. However,
{i.} cannot be lengthened. Rhotic speakers
can be expected to modify
{i} ई to
{iRi} ॠ .
Contents of this page
The advantage of this method is the direct
examination, however, the disadvantage is
because it is invasive. I had watched a
U-tube video on the Internet (080314, 160210)
how the McGrath Video Laryngoscope was used.
The person was under general anaesthesia!
It is definitely not a tool to see how the
vowels are produced. If you would like to watch
the video online
-
http://www.wanderings.net/notebook/Main/McGrathVideoLaryngoscope
080314, 160210
The following is downloaded from another
source
-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fszreF5XTok
160210
and stored in TIL SD-Library
-
McGrath<Ô>/
bkp<Ô>
Faucalized voice, also called
hollow or yawny voice
{aip-ngeik-þän} is the production of speech
sounds with an expanded laryngeal cavity.
It contrasts with harsh voice
{a-Na-þän}, in which the larynx is
compressed. [UKT ¶]
UKT 160210: The word "faucalize"
is derived from a part in the interior of
the mouth:
"fau·ces pl.n. used
with a sing. or pl. verb 1. The
passage from the back of the mouth to the
pharynx, bounded by the soft palate, the
base of the tongue, and the palatine
arches". - AHTD
Stiff voice: The term stiff
voice describes the pronunciation of
consonants with a glottal opening narrower,
and the vocal cords stiffer, than what
occurs in modal voice (or
"normal" voice). Although there
is no specific IPA diacritic for stiff
voice, the voicing diacritic (a subscript
wedge) may be used in conjunction with
the symbol for a voiced consonant.
One language with stiff voice is Thai:
stiff voice [b̬âː]
(crazy );
tenuis [pâː] (aunt );
aspirated* [pʰâː]
(cloth). [Notice the onsets which
correspond to :
{pa.} (Thai "aunt"),
{hpa.} (Thai "cloth"),
{ba.} (Thai "crazy").]
UKT 160210: What IPA has described as
aspirated [pʰâː], is
not aspiration in Bur-Myan. What are
taken as allophones of /p/,
{pa.} &
{hpa.}, are regular basic consonants.
They are easy for us to articulate and
we hear them clearly and separately.
From Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonation
160211
with some of my additions.
In languages such as French, all
obstruents occur in pairs, one
modally voiced and one voiceless :
plosive-stop: [b] [d] [g] -->
[p] [t] [k]* .
fricative:
-----
[v] [z] [ʒ] --> [f] [s] [ʃ]
UKT 160211: A correction is called for,
for plosive-stop:
*plosive-stop: [b] [d] [g] -->
[pʰ] [tʰ] [kʰ]
- tenuis [p] [t] [k] are unknown :
only the ordinary voiceless [pʰ]
[tʰ] [kʰ] are known in English
and possibly in French.
In English, every voiced fricative
corresponds to a voiceless one. [UKT ¶]
For the pairs of English plosive-stops,
however, the distinction is better
specified as
VOT (voice onset time
vocal-fold vibration onset time) rather than
simply voice: In initial position [onset
of the syllable] /b d g/ are only partially
voiced (voicing vibration
begins during the hold of the consonant),
while /p t k/ are aspirated (voicing
doesn't begin until well after its
release). [UKT ¶]
Certain English morphemes (compare
with phoneme
{sa.ka:yu-nic}) have voiced and voiceless
allomorphs, such as the plural, verbal, and
possessive endings spelled -s
(voiced in kids /kɪdz/ but
voiceless in kits /kɪts/) and
the past-tense ending spelled -ed
(voiced in buzzed/bʌzd/ but
voiceless in fished/fɪʃt/.
UKT: it should be noted that there are two
allophones for each:
phoneme
{sa.ka:yu-nic} /p/ -
{pa.} [p] &
{hpa.} [pʰ]
phoneme
{sa.ka:yu-nic} /t/ -
{ta.} [t] &
{hta.} [tʰ]
phoneme
{sa.ka:yu-nic} /k/ -
{ka.} [k] &
{hka.} [kʰ]
The Western idea of taking [pʰ tʰ
kʰ] as "aspirated forms" is
contrary to the Eastern idea of taking them
to be usual sounds in their own right. Thus
for /p t k/ we have six,
{pa. hpa.} {ta. hta.} and {ka. hka.}
Certain English morphemes have vd. and vl.
allomorphs, such as the plural, verbal, and
possessive endings spelled -s (voiced
in <kids> /kɪdz/ but voiceless in
<kits> /kɪts/ and the past-tense
ending spelled -ed (voiced in
<buzzed> /bʌzd/
but voiceless in <fished>
/fɪʃt/.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160216
In any branch of learning, you can easily
get confused because of different authors
tend to use the same word with different
meanings. Just keep cool and bear it, and
if you are a Bur-Myan speaker think of a
suitable term you would use for a specific
term.
terminology n. pl.
terminologies 1. The vocabulary
of technical terms used in a particular
field, subject, science, or art;
nomenclature. 2. The study of
nomenclature. -- AHTD
Each branch of learning (or discipline of
knowledge), has its own terms (vocabulary),
and it is a must for all new comers to
learn and understand them. For one like me,
who has dabbled in a number of branches,
unless I keep myself informed of the meanings
and understand them to the best of my ability
(memorizing them is useless), I usually get
into trouble with those who are really from
that field (my peers). I always thank them,
whenever someone pointed out how misinformed
I am. I never claim myself to be an expert,
and that is what I always tell my friend
U Tun Tint (of MLC) that I am just an
"ignorant cow-herd boy" with a
catapult in hand throwing smallest of all
pebbles at my patient friends and peers (with
no intention of hurting them) who are experts
in their fields.
Here are some words which have always
confused me.:
('wordform', 'word' and 'morpheme', and
'syllable') from:
http://www.sil.org/linguistics/GlossaryOfLinguisticTerms/ComparisonAndContrastOfWordfor.htm)
http://www.sil.org/linguistics/GlossaryOfLinguisticTerms/Index.htm
080314, 160216
The SIL (Summer Institute of
Language or SIL International) glossary
is handy as a "quickie".
However, it hasn't been updated since
040105, and I am no longer referring to
it.
At present I usually refer to Wikipedia,
the online encyclopaedia.
Words ending in suffix <-eme>
Definitions:
- 1. a suffix used principally in linguistics
to form nouns with the sense “significant
contrastive unit,” at the level of language
specified by the stem, e.g. : morpheme;
tagmeme. (tentative transliteration:
{aim} )
--
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/-eme
160215
•
Grapheme : TIL tentative term:
{sa-yu-nic) /
{sa-aim}
- A grapheme is the smallest unit
used in describing the writing system
{sa} of any given language.
-- Wikipedia 160216.
•
Phoneme : TIL tentative term:
{sa.ka:yu-nic} /
{sa.ka:aim}
- A phoneme /ˈfoʊniːm/
is one of the units of sound that distinguish
one word from another in a particular
language. -- Wikipedia 160216.
•
Lexeme : TIL tentative term:
{a.Daip~paaý-yu-nic} /
{a.Daip~paaý-aim}
- A lexeme is a unit of lexical meaning
that exists regardless of the number of
inflectional endings it may have or the
number of words it may contain. It is a
basic unit of meaning, and the headwords
of a dictionary are all lexemes.
-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexeme
160216
Note: TIL tentative term is derived from
the word
/
{a.Daip~paaý} 'meaning dependent on
culture'. I, as a former editorial writer
of newspapers usually avoid politically
sensitive terms, which means that
"Lexeme" would have to be in
conformity with times and politics. As an
xample I avoid using the word
"Aryan" because of its politically
sensitive implications.
•
Morpheme : In linguistics, a
morpheme is the smallest grammatical
unit in a language. In other words, it is
the smallest meaningful unit of a language.
The field of study dedicated to
morphemes is called morphology.
• An allomorph is a linguistics
term for a variant form of a morpheme. The
concept occurs when a unit of meaning can
vary in sound (phonologically) without
changing meaning. It is used in linguistics
to explain the comprehension of variations
in sound for a specific morpheme. -- Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allomorph
download 070911
• Wordform: the smallest unit of
'speech or writing', that has distinctive
meaning and which can occur by itself. In
most orthographies, it is separated from
other wordforms by a white-space.
•
Word:
{waad}, the smallest unit of syntax, that
has distinctive meaning, and which can
occur by itself.
• Syllable:
{sa.ka:þûn-su.} smallest unit of
pronunciation, "that has no inherent
distinctive meaning", and which
cannot occur by itself unless it is in
monosyllabic word.
UKT 160211: If we go along with our
definition of Akshara in Abugida-Akshara
system, the above "that has no
inherent distinctive meaning" is
unacceptable. Each Akshara is a syllable
by itself because each has an inherent
vowel in it. Thus,
{ta.} /ta/ 'to long for' as "a child
longing for his mother who is not home".
The akshara,
{ta.} /ta/, whether as as glyph ( grapheme
{sa-aim}), or sound (phoneme
{sa.ka:aim), keeps its inherent vowel
/a/ unless the vowel is killed by the virama
{a.þût}.
However, this rule is kept only in
Bur-Myanmar, but not in Hindi-Dev. My Indian
friends in Deep River, On., Canada,
particularly Mr. Hashad Patel was shocked
when I pronounce the name Asoka with an /a/
ending. They insisted that since
{ka.} क is the coda, it automatically
loses its inherent vowel, and I should
pronounce the name as Asok. The trouble is,
in Hindi a non-sense word: <tana>
{ta.na.} कन
Hindi-Dev:
{ta.na.} कन will be pronounced
as /tan/
Bur-Myan:
{ta.na.} कन will be pronounced
as /ta.na./
With a virama
{a.þût} :
{ta.na.} कन +
् -->
{tûn} तन्
Bur-Myan has two words:
{ta.na.} &
{tûn}, whereas Hindi-Dev has only one.
Because of such difficulties, I have to
come up with definitions for use with my
work on BEPS languages. And, because they
are not recognized by MLC, and I keep on
forgetting, I have to put them in pix
format as shown below, and stored in PIX
of the main Book-Candle index.htm .
Contents of this page
Retroflex consonants
- UKT 160217
One of my sources on Phonetics is a series
of papers by Russell of Univ. of Manitoba,
Canada. The following is one such paper:
The tongue tip may be curled back to perform
a retroflex approximant, whatever the tongue
body is doing. The "R-colouring"
that this adds to the vowel is often called
rhoticization. --
http://www.umanitoba.ca/faculties/arts/linguistics/russell/138/sec3/morevowl.htm
The following is a paper on pronunciation
involving tongue tip articulation of row#3
(retroflex), and row#4 (dental).
Identification of Hindi dental and
retroflex consonants by native English and
Japanese speakers (A) , by John S. Pruitt,
Dept. of Psychol., Univ. of South Florida,
in J. of Acoustical Soc. of America,
May 1994, vol 95, issue 5, pp.3011-3012:
UKT 160217: I can no longer get the exact
paper, instead of which what I could get
is:
Perceptual Assimilation of Hindi Dental
and Retroflex Stop-Consonants by Native
English and Japanese Speakers,
J. S. Pruitt , R. Akahane-Yamada, &
W. Strange, ...
- www.icacommission.org/Proceedings/ICA1998Seattle/pdfs/.../2991_1.pdf.
-
http://www.icacommission.org/Proceedings/ICA1998Seattle/pdfs/vol_4/2991_1.pdf
- Downloaded pdf paper in TIL SD-Library -
JSPruitt-HindiRetroflexDental<Ô> /
bkp<Ô>
"Previous research has shown that
English speakers have great difficulty
distinguishing dental and retroflex stop
consonants of the Hindi language (which
occur in five pairs of stop consonants
in Hindi). [UKT ¶]
UKT 160217: The five pairs of
plosive-stops:
velar plosive-stop:
palatal plosive-stop/affricate
retroflex plosive-stop :
{Ta.} ट ,
{Hta.} ठ ,
{ða.} ड ,
{Ða.} ढ ,
{Na.} ण
dental plosive-stop :
{ta.} त ,
{hta.} थ ,
{da.} द ,
{Da.} ध ,
{na.} न
bilabial plosive-stop :
"While both dental and retroflex
consonants, in almost all of the manner/
voicing contexts of Hindi, occur as
allophones in English, they do not occur
phonemically. Unlike English, Japanese
includes an alveolar-retroflex distinction
(the Japanese /d/ versus the flapped /r/).
However, no research has determined
whether Japanese speakers can distinguish
the Hindi contrast. This research compared
English and Japanese speakers' ability to
distinguish these Hindi stop consonants
in four of the five manner/voicing contexts
(breathy-voiced, prevoiced,
voiceless-aspirated, and
voiceless-unaspirated). Subjects were
presented consonant-vowel syllables in
three vowel contexts (/a/, /e/, /o/) that
were produced by two native Hindi speakers.
Marked differences were found between these
two language groups that were dependent
upon the manner/voicing context of the
consonants. This research contributes to
our understanding of the role of native
language experience phonemic versus phonetic)
in the perception of non-native speech
contrasts." --
http://scitation.aip.org/getabs/servlet/... 080315
In Bur-Myan (Burmese-Myanmar), probably
because we have lost the ability to
"curl back" the tongue in rapid
speech, the tongue-tip cannot reach the
"retroflex" area of the hard
palate. There is no rhoticization described
by Russell, i.e. there is no R-colouring of
the vowel. However, we can articulate the
retroflex in slow speech. But then there is
no R-colouring.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160218
Note: Skt-Dev has three Fricative
Sibilants:
श ś [ɕ] /ʃ/ ;
ष ṣ [ʂ] /s/ ;
स s [s] /θ/.
However, what Skt-Dev has taken to be
sibilant, given by IPA /θ/ is actually
a thibilant in Bur-Myan
{þa.} . It is the same as <th> in
English word <thin>.
Bur-Myan speakers are only used to Fricative
Thibilant
{þa.}
/θ/. This sound is present in Eng-Lat
in words such as <thin>, and also in
Old-English in which it is written in
"Thorn" character þ .
However, this sound is entirely absent in
Hindi-Dev & Skt-Dev. The corresponding
consonant for
{þa.} in Hindi-Dev & Skt-Dev is स
«sa» /s/. It is the Fricative Sibilant. A
very close allophone for it, is ष
«ṣa» /ʂ/ or /s/. This sound is
known as a Hisser due to its hissing
ending sound. For transcription* of
{þa.} of Pal-Myan into Skt-Dev.
*UKT 160217: It is unfortunate that the
old Brahmin-Poannar
{braah~ma.Na. poaN~Na:} religionists had
claimed that Sanskrit is the Perfect
Language , being the language of their
Déva-god the Brahma, has preceded the Old
Magadhi of Gautama Buddha. Magadhi the
indigenous language is Prakrit the
Imperfect. Early European Indologists
being sold on this idea has even named
the script of oldest inscriptions - those
of Buddhist King Asoka - as Brahmi 'the
script of the
{braah~ma.Na. poaN~Na:}'. It is conveniently
forgotten that when the learned
{braah~ma.Na. poaN~Na:} were ordered by
the then Moslem king in the 13th century
to decipher the inscriptions, none of
them could do it. Because of this fact the
{braah~ma.Na. poaN~Na:} has no claim to
the oldest Indic script. It should
be renamed Asokan - as has been done by
F. Edgerton in his Buddhist Hybrid
Sanskrit Grammar and Dictionary
-
BHS-indx.htm (link chk 160218).
Or, following the lead of Rev. F. Mason,
A Pali grammar on the basis of
Kaccayano {kic~sæÑ:}, 1868
-
PEG-indx.htm (link chk 160218)
Old Magadhi should be named Magadhi-Asokan,
or, Magadhi-Myanmar (Mag-Myan). What is
being touted as Pali-Myan should be changed
to Mag-Myan.
From: On the Production of low
Tongue-tip /s/: A case report
- by Gloria J. Borden, and Thomas Gay,
Journal of Communication Disorders,
11 (1978), 425-431 -
www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0244.pdf
(160218),
or downloaded pdf in TIL
SD-Library -
GJBorden-LowTongue-TipS<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160218)
Abstract:
(Abstract begins)
X-ray motion pictures and
electromyography were combined to record
tongue movement and tongue muscle activity
of a normal speaker during /s/ production
[UKT¶]
UKT 160218: The phoneme /s/ referred to
above is not palatal plosive-stop
{sa}/
{c} which is present in Bur-Myan and
Pal-Myan. It is unknown in both, because
which I have to invent the dental
fricative
{Sa.}/
{S} to transcribe ष «ṣa»
[ʂ] in Skt-Myan. While going
through this pdf paper, I carefully observe
how I articulate the two: palatal
{sa}/
{c}, and dental
{Sa.}/
{S}. I found that with the dental, I could
not retroflex my tongue, and [ʂ] is
impossible for me. Unfortunately, the
study does not mention the time-duration
of vowels.
You'll note that ष «ṣa» [ʂ]
was probably absent in Sanskrit before the
speakers infiltrated into the
Indian subcontinent because, the glyph looks
like a borrowed one:
प «pa» + diagonal --> ष
«ṣa»
Note the retroflex hook on the IPA
[ʂ]
(Abstract continues)
The /s/ was in /i/, /o/, and /u/ vowel
environments and in two and three consonant
clusters. [UKT¶]
UKT 160218: "The /s/ was in /i/, /o/,
and /u/ vowel environments" means
the following pairs.
{Si.} (1 blk),
{Si} (2 blk)
{Sau} (2 blk),
{Sau:} (2 blk + emphasis)
{Su.} (1 blk),
{Su} (2 blk)
You'll note that in the onset position
of the syllables, both palatal
plosive-stop
{sa}/
{c} and dental
fricative
{Sa.}/
{S} behave exactly the same. I found that
it is only in the coda that they behave
differently, affecting the nuclear-vowel
differently primarily by lengthening or
shortening it. For example, if I were to
pronounce <siS> or <SiS>, the
nuclear vowel is lengthened and IPA
transcription becomes /siːs/.
(
Abstract continues)
Lead pellets attached to the tongue tip
and dorsum were tracked by frame-by frame
analysis of the X-ray film. Recordings
from the tongue muscles were graphed and
compared with the movement data. Results
demonstrate that this subject produces /s/
with the tongue tip down behind the lower
incisors and the blade elevated toward
the alveolar ridge. [UKT ¶]
EMG data from the tongue shows that the
tongue tip depression is not passive but
is an active part of the motor strategy
used by this subject to elevate the tongue
body. These findings suggest that speech
pathologists might well include the
tip-down strategy of /s/ production
in the therapeutic process as an alternative
to the tip-up /s/.
(
Abstract ends.)
... ... ...
Variations in the Tongue-Alveolar Ridge
Construction for /s/
Phoneticians have traditionally described
normal production of /s/ to involve, among
other adjustments, the formation of a
constriction at the alveolar ridge by
elevation of the tongue tip and blade.
[UKT ¶]
UKT 160217: In Bur-Myan, for sibilant
sounds /s/ we use the palatal plosive-stop
{sa.}/
{c}. However in Skt-Dev, in addition to
the palatal, which they pronounce as
affricate च «ca», they have ष
«ṣa». This sound is given by IPA
retroflex [ʂ]: notice the retroflex
hook. See Wikipedia:
-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retroflex_consonant
160217
An alternative method for producing the
constriction is usually described as a variant
used by some individuals (Kantner and West,
1946; Heffner, 1949; Bronstein, 1960). Kantner
and West (1946), for example, describe the
variant method as follows:
"One common variation existing in
many individuals and apparently unrelated
to any anomaly of teeth formation might
well be mentioned. These individuals place
the tip of the tongue against the inner
borders of the lower teeth, while the
blade is rolled upward, making about the
same contacts as those described above."
Anecdotal evidence suggests that this
variant /s/ may be more common that is
generally supposed. Subtelny et al. (1964)
report that a tongue tip down /s/ was used
by one-third of 30 speakers. ... In view of
the difficulty many speakers have in
acquiring an acceptable /s/ sound, and in
view of the availability of two common
methods of /s/ articulation, it is surprising
that the tip-up model is so favored
in speech pathology.
[In the method used in this study,] the
speaker was one of the authors (GJB), a
native speaker of American English. The
speech material consisted of nonsense
syllables in which /s/ was in initial
[onset] and final syllable [coda] positions,
in /i/, /ɑ/, and /u/ contexts, and in
/sp/, /st/, /sk/, [&] /spr/, /str/,
and /skr/ consonant clusters. The utterances
were produced at a comfortable speaking
rate.
UKT 160219: Notice the vowels chosen in
the study were /i/
{i.}, /ɑ/
{au:}, and /u/
{u.}. Vowel
{a.} was not included. However, in the
above consonant clusters I have used the
{a.} to make the mute letter-cluster
possess a sound.
/sp/
{Spa.},
/st/
{Sta.}, /sk/
{Ska.},
/spr/, /str/, /skr/
Results
Figure 1 shows the usual position of the
pellets during /s/ production for this
subject. The tip of the tongue was behind
the lower incisors and the dorsum bunched
up toward the alveolar ridge. The lips
were flared outward. This figure may be
contrasted with that for the tip up /s/
shown by Perkell (1969, p. 80). The movement
data showed remarkably little variation of
the /s/ constriction across contexts. The
tip of the tongue remained behind the lower
teeth for /s/ in all contexts. It was
further backed by approximately 3 mm for
the /s/ in /stu/ than for /sti/ and was in
all vowel contexts further back for /sk/
than for /sp/ and /st/. The elevation of
the tip also never varied more than 3 mm.
In general, the tip was lower for /sk/ than
for /sp/ or /st/ and lower in the context
of /u/ than /i/ or /ɑ/. The more
elevated and backed tongue positions (as for
/k/ and /u/) produced a more depressed and
backed tongue tip position. The dorsal
pellet also showed few contextual variations,
with the pellet 2-3 mm higher for /i/ than
for the /u/ and /ɑ/ contexts, but no
difference seen in the /s/ position of the
/sp/, /st/, and /sk/ clusters.
The movement data of this study showed that
this subject produces /s/ with a low tongue
tip position irrespective of adjacent vowel
or consonant cluster environment. More
interesting, however, is the question of
the whether this is a passive or active
gesture. Is the tip merely left behind upon
blade elevation or is the tip actively
depressed to facilitate the dorsal elevation?
This question, of course, can be explored by
reference to the EMG data. If the inferior
longitudinal muscle, which is responsible
for tongue tip depression, is active through
/s/ production,
Contents of this page
- UKT 160217
To understand the issues better, I have been
studying not only BEPS languages but others
as well:
¤ Mon-Myanmar ; ¤ Bangla-Bengali ;
¤ Hindi-Dev ; ¤ Néwari-Dev
From the presence or absence of certain
aksharas in an individual language, we can get
a fair notion of the pronunciation. For
example, r1c5 akshara was probably absent in
Sanskrit because at present Skt-Dev seems to
have coined it:
case 1: ड «dda» + dot added
--> ङ «nga»
Néwari was written in Asokan
(Brahmi) script at one time
until about 13th c. AD. when Asokan was
slowly displaced by Devanagari.
case 2: the word for "fish" in
Néwari is the same as "fish" in
Burmese
I have been interested on the pronunciation
of rows #1 & #2 involving columns #3,
#4 & #5. The pronunciations (involving
articulation & hearing) have become mixed
up because we are dealing with two different
linguistic groups - the Tib-Bur (Tibeto-Burman)
and the IE (Indo-European which was aka
Indo-Aryan):
---------------------------------
c3
-----------------
c4
-------------------
c5
velar plosive-stop: - -
{ga.} ग «ga» -
{Ga.} घ «gha» -
{nga.} ङ «nga»
palatal plosive-stop: -
{za.}
--------- -
{Za.}
------------ -
{ña.}
palatal affricate:
---- -
---------
ज «ja» -
----------
झ «jha» -
---------
ञ «nya»
Case of
{Ga.} घ «gha»
The pronunciation of c4 consonants of the
{wag.}-akshara, is not straight forward
for the Bur-Myan speakers and they tend
to pronounce them exactly as the c3.
For example,
{ga.} and
{Ga.} are pronounced the same in rapid speech.
However, according to Bur-Myan Buddhist monks
(and my experience as well, when I was
ordained and spent a short time as a
full-fledge monk -- as mandated by our
culture), there is a difference. This
is confirmed by Rev. U Kaw-wi-da, the
head of Toronto Burmese-Buddhist monastery.
According to him,
{Ga.}
is pronounced with a grave
h-sound . This distinction is
very important when the monks are reciting
{kûm~ma.wa-sa}.
Since, the same c4 consonants are also
present in Skt-Dev, I am curious to know,
how Hindi-Dev (Hindi is the modern version
of Sanskrit) would speak. (Though I have
heard the Hindi-Dev speakers speak, as I
have said before, I am
"phoneme-deaf"). The IAST
transcription for
{ga.}-
{Ga.} pair is: ग ga - घ
gha , inferring that घ
gha is just the aspirated form of
ग ga . Since a "grave
h-sound" is hardly aspiration, I am
taking it to be glottalization not involving
the tongue tip.
Case of
{ga.} ग «ga»,
{Ga.}/{hké} &
{nga.}/{ngé} in Peguan accent of
Mon-Myan
Refer to:
¤ Mon-Myan Language: Speech and Script -
MonMyan-indx.htm >
MV1874-indx.htm
>
has-conso.htm (link chk 160220)
&
Has-vocab-indx.htm (link chk 151223)
¤. Notes on the transliteration of
Burmese alphabet into Roman characters,
and vocal and consonantal sounds of the
Peguan or Talaing language, by
R. C. Temple, Rangoon 1876,
-
RCTemple-translit-Bur<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160220).
In >
has-conso.htm , on
('
p004cont) / pdf 029,
Rev. Haswell has stated:
"
There is no <g>
in the language save
{ngra.} which as an initial has the sound
<gn> (the <g> being fully
sounded.) As a final it has the sound
of <ng>."
In the above Haswell
is talking about /ŋ/. There is no
English syllable with /ŋ/ as the
onset. Yet /ŋ/ is present as the
coda, e.g. <king> /kɪŋ/.
When the English speakers had to
transcribe many place-names and
person-names in Myanmar that starts with
this sound, they usually use <gn>
for this sound, e.g., Gnak'aw'san
'stream where birds sing'
{nghak-au-sûm:}. However, the
transliteration has now been changed
to <ng>.
The Mon-Myan pronunciation of row#1, and
that of Bur-Myan are clearly so different
that I am hesitant to assign definite POA
for it in Romabama:
- row#1 {ka.} {hka.} {ké}/{gé} {hké} {gné}
- Listen:
bk-cndl-Mon1<)) (link chk 160220)
Case of
{þé:þé:tïn} : Shin Kic'si's solution
as 'dot above'
The IE languages of BEPS has no /ŋ/
(velar), /ɲ/ (palatal) /ɳ/
(retroflex) phonemes. And when the Buddhist
missionaries had to transcribe these Tib-Bur
sounds into Skt-Dev, they had no choice but
to follow the solution of Shin Kic'si. For
sounds ending with these grapheme, use the
{þé:þé:tïn} in effect making these aksharas
lose their POAs. Thus, the Buddhist Arahat
Ingulimala
{ïn~gu.li.ma-la.} became Angulimala.
Contents of this page
- UKT 160212
In some ways the diacritics given in
Extensions to the IPA are over-kills
for my work in BEPS. What is not realized
is that these diacritics, such as
Ħ, as in [aĦ]
for faucalized voice means very little to one
who does not know - one who hasn't heard by
his own ear - what faucalized voice is like.
Moreover these diacritics are not ASCII
compatible, and are useless as far as email
is concerned. To overcome these difficulties
I have to devise Romabama
{ro:ma.ba.ma} based on my two L1's - Burmese
and English. Even before I was born - whilst
in my mother's womb - I have been exposed to
English because my parents spoke in English
for confidential and intimate speech because
the rest of the household did not know any
English. Of course the home-language was
Burmese, because of which I claim English
to be my second L1.
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faucalized_voice
101102, 160212
Faucalized voice, also called
hollow or yawny voice
{aip-ngeik-þän}, is the production of speech
sounds with an expanded laryngeal cavity. It
contrasts with harsh voice
{a-Na-þän}, in which the larynx is
compressed.
A well known language with faucalized voice
is Korean, with its "tense"
consonants. The entire vocal tract is tense,
and the occlusion (closure, contact of mouth
parts) lasts longer than other consonants.
For this reason they are often called
fortis. There also appears to be
elements of stiff voice in the Korean
consonants, though faucalized voice is not
yet well enough described to know how common
this is.
The Bor dialect of
Dinka has contrastive modal, breathy,
faucalized, and harsh voice in its vowels,
as well as three tones.
UKT 160212: We know where Korean is spoken,
but do we know where Dinka aka
Thuɔŋjäŋ (Th
is akin to
{hta.} &
{da.}), is spoken. An interesting fact is
that there is a velar nasal /ŋ/ - the
same sound - transliteration-wise - as
Bur-Myan
{nga.}/
{ng} - in their language.
The Dinka are found mainly along the River Nile,
specifically the west bank of the White Nile,
a major tributary flowing north from Uganda,
north and south of the
Sudd marsh in southwestern and south central
Sudan. See Wikipedia:
-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinka_language
160212
-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nile 160212
Go back
faucal-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 160212:
My notes on these two linguistic terms
were in different sections. I am putting
them together because of the following:
¤ Grapheme is a unit of
{sa} - TIL tentative term:
{sa-yu-nic}
¤ Phoneme is a unit of
{sa.ka.} - TIL tentative term:
{sa.ka:yu-nic}
¤ Akshara means the one-to-one
correspondence between {sa} and
{sa.ka:}
¤ In case there is discrepancy take:
{ré:tau. a.mhûn/ hpût-tau. a.þän}
'what is written is permanent
(correct); what is read is just sound
(transient and is prone to error).
To my direct question, "What is the
difference between graphemes and morphemes?
", the answer I got included:
-
https://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20121102113842AAS8v1x
160212
"According to the guidelines of
morphology, the linguistics branch concerned
with the internal structure of words, a
morpheme is the very smallest meaningful
linguistic unit in the grammar of a language.
"In written language
{sa} morphemes are composed of graphemes,
or the smallest units of typography.
"In oral language
{sa.ka:}, however, morphemes
they are composed of phonemes,
or the smallest units of speech."
From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grapheme
080314, 160212
UKT 160212: the following are relevant facts
in the above two articles with
my additions.
In typography, a grapheme is the
fundamental unit in written language
{sa}. Graphemes include alphabetic letters,
Chinese characters, numerals, punctuation
marks, and all the individual symbols of
any of the world's writing systems.
Graphemes are often notated within angle
brackets, as ‹ a ›, ‹ B ›, etc.
[2]. This is analogous to the slash
notation (/a/, /b/) used for phonemes,
and the square bracket notation used for
phonetic transcriptions ([a], [b]).
In a phonemic orthography, a grapheme
corresponds to one phoneme. [UKT ¶]
UKT 160216: Indic languages, including
Bur-Myan are phonemic orthographies,
i.e. there is a one-to-one correspondence
between script
{sa} and speech
{sa.ka:}. In case there is discrepancy,
you are to pronounce according to
spelling, because
{sa} is more permanent than
{sa.ka:} which is lost as soon as it is
uttered. It is meaning of the word 'Akshara'
- the "unchanging". Contrary to
the view of Hindu religionists, 'Akshara'
has nothing to do with a 'permanent god'.
In spelling systems that are
non-phonemic -- such as the spellings
used most widely for written English --
multiple graphemes may represent a single
phoneme. These are called digraphs
(2 graphemes for a single phoneme) and
trigraphs (3 graphemes). For example,
the word <ship> contains four graphemes
(<s>, <h>, <i>, and
<p>) but only three phonemes, because
<sh> is a digraph.
In the same way that the surface forms
of phonemes are speech sounds or phones
(and different phones representing the same
phoneme are called allophones), the
surface forms of graphemes are glyphs
(sometimes "graphs"), namely concrete
written representations of symbols, and
different glyphs representing the same grapheme
are called allographs. Hence a grapheme
can be regarded as an abstraction of a
collection of glyphs that are all semantically
equivalent.
For example, in written Eng-Latin, there are
many different physical representations of
the lowercase letter "a", such as
a , ɑ, etc. But because the
substitution of any of these for any other
cannot change the meaning of a word, they are
considered to be allographs of the same
grapheme, which can be written ‹a›. Italic and
bold face are also allographic.
UKT 160212: In BEPS to keep the letters
in ASCII, the 26 glyphs of Latin Alphabet
has to represent many more glyphs of Myanmar
Akshara. Introducing ñ , è , é, helps, but
it is not enough. To overcome this difficulty,
I have to expand the 26 glyphs x 2 = 52 by
differentiating lower case letters
from upper case to avoid the use of
digraphs. Even then, I am stuck with
{nga.}.
Different glyphs can represent the same
grapheme, meaning they are allographs.
For example, the
lower cased letter a can be
seen in two variants, with a hook at the top,
and without. Not all glyphs are graphemes in
the phonological sense; for example the
logogram ampersand (&)
represents the Latin word et (English
word <and>), which contains two
phonemes.
From:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoneme
download 070908
A phoneme
{sa.ka:yu-nic} can include slightly
different sounds or
phones. For instance, the
{sa.ka:yu-nic} /p/ sound in the words
<pin> and <spin> is pronounced
differently, but is still considered the
single /p/ phoneme. [UKT ¶]
UKT 160216: I remember my cousin
Daw Hla May (at that time Lecturer in
English at Univ. of Mandalay) pointing
out to me her surprise to realize that
Eng-Latin speakers pronounce the English
word <pin> as
{hpïn} 'anus or buttock'. I was Lecturer
in Chemistry at that time in the same
university. She was quite embarrassed
to point this out to her students. If
you are an English speaker, don't ask
a Burmese girl for a "pin" -
you might get a slap on your cheek. English
speakers simply cannot pronounce the tenuis
sounds. They pronounce [pa], [ta], [ka] as
[pʰa], [tʰa], [kʰa]. However
they can pronounce
{Spa.}
{Sta.}
{Ska.} - which the Burmese cannot pronounce
well.
Two phones that belong to the same phoneme
are called allophones. A common
test to determine whether two phones are
allophones or separate phones relies on
finding so-called
minimal pairs: words that differ only by
the phones in question.
Go back:
grapheme-note-b |
Phoneme-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 070914
The concept is pitch is subjective.
And so when "intonation is described
as variation in pitch", it doesn't mean
much.
From: Wikpedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intonation_(linguistics)
070914
In linguistics, intonation is the
variation of pitch when speaking.
Intonation and stress are two main
elements of linguistic prosody.
Many languages use pitch
syntactically, for instance to convey
surprise and irony or to change
a statement to a question. Such languages
are called intonation languages.
English and French are well-known
examples. Some languages use pitch to
distinguish words; these are known as tonal
languages. Chinese, Thai, and Hausa are
examples. An intermediate position is occupied
by languages with tonal word accent, for
instance Norwegian or Japanese.
Rising intonation means the pitch of
the voice increases over time; falling
intonation means that the pitch decreases
with time. A dipping intonation falls
and then rises, whereas a peaking
intonation rises and then falls.
The classic example of intonation is
the question-statement distinction. For
example, north-eastern American English,
like very many languages (Hirst &
DiCristo, eds. 1998), has a rising
intonation for echo or declarative
questions <He found it on the street?> ,
and a falling intonation for wh-
questions <Where did he find it?>
and statements <He found it on the
street.>. Yes or no questions <Did
he find it on the street?> often have
a rising end, but not always. The
Chickasaw language [{ a Native
American language of Muskogean family. It
is agglutinative and follows the pattern
SOV.}] has the opposite pattern, rising for
statements and falling with questions.
Dialects of British and Irish English vary
substantially, with rises on many statements
in urban Belfast, and falls on most questions
in urban Leeds.
UKT: One observation made on the way I
spoke (during my first trip to the US
in 1957-59) by my American class-mates
was: whenever I asked a wh-question,
I always ended with a rising intonation.
I have made the same observation on how
other Bur-Myan speak English in Myanmarpré.
We are encouraged by our English
language-teachers (whose L1's are other
than English), to end our written questions
with a question-mark <?>, and in
speaking to end our questions with a rising
intonation [↗ ].
Transcription: In the IPA,
"global" rising and falling
intonation are marked with a diagonal arrow
rising left-to-right [↗] (U2197) and
falling left-to-right [↘] (U2198),
respectively. These may be written as part
of a syllable, or separated with a space
when they have a broader scope:
He found it on the street?
[hi faʊnd ɪt | ɑn ðə ↗stɹit ‖ ]
In the previous example, the global rise
symbol is placed between the transcriptions
for the words <the> and <street>.
Yes, he found it on the street.
[↘ jɛs ‖ hi faʊnd ɪt |
ɑn ðə ↘stɹit ‖ ]
In that example, the symbol for a global fall
was placed before the transcription for the
word <yes>, as well as between the
transcriptions for the words <the> and
<street>.
How did you ever escape?
[↗haʊ dɪdju | ɛvɚ |
ɪ↘skeɪp ‖ ]
Here, the global rise symbol is place before
the transcription for the word <how>
and the global fall symbol is placed between
the two syllables in <escape>, after the
small capital letter < I > which
represents the sound [ɪ].
More specific transcription systems for
intonation have also been developed, such as
ToBI (Tones and Break Indices),
RaP (Rhythm and Pitch) and
INTSINT (Hirst & Di Cristo, eds. 1998).
Go back
intonation-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 160221
From: Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexeme
080314
A lexeme is an abstract unit of
morphological analysis in linguistics,
that roughly corresponds to a set of words
that are different forms of the same word.
For example, in the English language,
<run>, <runs>, <ran> and
<running> are forms of the same lexeme,
conventionally written as
RUN. A related concept is the
lemma (or citation form),
which is a particular form of a lexeme that
is chosen by convention to represent a
canonical form of a lexeme. Lemmas are
used in dictionaries as the headwords,
and other forms of a lexeme are often listed
later in the entry if they are unusual in
some way.
A lexeme belongs to a particular
syntactic category, has a particular
meaning (
semantic value) [UKT ¶]
In inflecting languages, has a
corresponding
inflectional paradigm; that is, a lexeme
in many languages will have many different
forms. For example, the lexeme
RUN has a present third person singular form
<runs>, a present
non-third-person-singular form <run>
(which also functions as the past participle
and non-finite form), a past form <ran>,
and a present participle <running>.
(It does not include runner, runners,
runnable, etc.) The use of the forms of
a lexeme is governed by rules of
grammar; in the case of English verbs
such as RUN, these include subject-verb
agreement and compound tense rules,
which determine which form of a verb can be
used in a given sentence.
UKT: English is an example of inflecting
language, whereas examples of
agglutinative languages include many Tib-Bur
(Tibeto-Burman) languages, Malay, the
Dravidian languages, many Uralic languages,
Inuktitut, some Mesoamerican and North
American languages, etc. See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutinative_language
080314
A lexicon consists of lexemes.
In many formal theories of language,
lexemes have
subcategorization frames to account for
the number and types of complements they
occur with in sentences and other
syntactic structures.
The notion of a lexeme is very central to
morphology, and thus, many other
notions can be defined in terms of it. For
example, the difference between inflection
and derivation can be stated in terms of
lexemes:
• Inflectional rules relate a lexeme to its
forms.
• Derivational rules relate a lexeme to
another lexeme.
Go back
lexeme-note-b
Contents of this page
UKT 160211
Read the following Wiki article carefully,
for it differentiates spoken language
{sa.ka:} from written language
{sa}.
The concept of morpheme is not well
known to us who are used to syllable CVÇ of
the Abugida-Akshara system. Moreover,
it is applicable only to inflected
languages like English, Pali, and
Sanskrit. Since, Bur-Myan is uninflected
(see Burmese Grammar and Grammatical
Analysis 1899 , by A. W. Lonsdale,
-
BurMyan-indx.htm >
BG1899-indx.htm >
BG1899-1-indx.htm >
ch00.htm (link chk 160212)
those who have been exposed only to Bur-Myan,
and not even to Pal-Myan will have
difficulty in grasping the concept of morpheme.
The following are quotes from A. W. Lonsdale:
• The Burmese language is constructed
on scientific principles, and there
is no reason why its grammar should not be
dealt with also from a scientific standpoint.
But it may be safely said that Burmese
grammar as a science has not received
that attention it deserves.
• With regard to the grammatical treatises
by native writers, it is no exaggeration
to say that there is not one which can be
properly called a Burmese grammar. These
writers, not content with merely borrowing
the grammatical nomenclature of the Pali
language, also attempted to assimilate the
grammatical principles of the
uninflected Burmese to those of the
inflected Pali; so that they
produced, not Burmese grammars, but modified
Pali grammars in Burmese dress. The
servile veneration in which they held Pali,
the language they had adopted as the classic,
is, no doubt, directly responsible for the
composition of such works. In their endeavour
to conform strictly to Pali methods, they
often introduced unnecessary terms and
misapplied them, ignoring those grammatical
points in Burmese for which they could find
no parallel in Pali. How futile their
attempts were may be judged by the numerous
difficulties and anomalies they created,
from some of which even now teachers of the
language have not quite extricated themselves
- take, for instance, the case-inflexions.
Moreover, remember the Akshara-glyph such as
{ka.} is pronounceable, whereas Letter is
generally mute unless it is a vowel -
A E I O U (5 vowels). Others,
B C D F G H J K L M N P
Q R S T V W X Y Z (26 - 5 = 21
consonants) are mute. They are consonants.
Don't get fooled by N & M. They are
nasals and consider them mute. They are
also consonants.
Don't get fooled by "vocalic R":
it is not a consonant - it is a rhotic
vowel ऋ {iRi.} (1 eye-blink) of Skt-Dev.
It has a long companion ॠ {iRi} (2 blk).
From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morpheme
080314, 160211
UKT: the 2 articles are slightly different.
The field of study dedicated to morphemes is
called morphology.
In morpheme-based morphology, a
morpheme is the smallest linguistic
unit that has semantic meaning.
In
{sa.ka:} (spoken language), morphemes are
composed of phonemes (the smallest
linguistically distinctive units of sound),
and
In
{sa} (written language) morphemes are
composed of graphemes (the smallest units
of written language).
The concept morpheme differs from
the concept word
{waad}, as many morphemes cannot stand as
words on their own. A morpheme is free
if it can stand alone, or bound if it
is used exclusively alongside a free morpheme.
Its actual phonetic representation is the
morph, with the morphs representing
the same morpheme being grouped as its
allomorphs.
• Allomorphs of the plural-morpheme
for regular nouns:
/s/ (e.g. in cats /kæts)
/ɪz, əz/ (e.g. in dishes
/ ɪʃɨz/)
/z/ (e.g. in dogs
/dɒɡz/)
A word
{waad}, by definition, is freestanding.
When it stands by itself, it is considered
a root [TIL uses the sign √ ]
because it has a meaning of its own (e.g.
the morpheme cat ) and when it
depends on another morpheme to express an
idea, it is an affix because it has a
grammatical function (e.g. the –s
in cats to indicate that it is plural).
[1] Every word comprises one or more
morphemes. The more combinations a morpheme
is found in, the more productive it is said
to be.
[2]
Examples from Eng-Lat:
• "Unbreakable" comprises three
morphemes: un- (a bound morpheme
signifying "not"), -break-
(the root √ , a free morpheme), and
-able (a free morpheme signifying
"can be done").
Types of morphemes
• Free morphemes like
<town>, and
<dog> can appear with other
lexemes (as in <town hall>
or <dog house>) or they can stand
alone, i.e. "free".
• Bound morphemes (affixes)
like "un-" appear only together
with other morphemes to form a lexeme.
Bound morphemes in general tend to be
prefixes and suffixes. Unproductive,
non-affix morphemes that exist only in bound
form are known as "cranberry"
morphemes, from the "cran"
in that very word.
• Derivational morphemes can be added
to a word to create (derive) another word:
the addition of <-ness> to <happy>,
for example, to give <happiness>. They
carry semantic information.
• Inflectional morphemes modify a
word's tense, number, aspect, and so on
(as in the <dog> morpheme if written
with the plural marker morpheme
<-s> becomes <dogs>). They carry
grammatical information.
• Allomorphs are variants of a
morpheme, e.g. the plural marker in
English is sometimes realized as [-z], [-s]
or [-ɪz].
Other variants
•
Null morpheme
•
Root morpheme
•
Word stem
Morphological analysis:
In natural language processing for
Japanese, Chinese and other languages,
morphological analysis is the process of
segmenting a given sentence into a row
of morphemes. It is closely related to
Part-of-speech tagging [POST
done in context of computational linguistics,
using algorithms], but word segmentation
is required for these languages because word
boundaries are not indicated by blank spaces.
Go back
morpheme-note-b2
Contents of this page
UKT 070910, 160222:
The classification of sounds into
obstruents and sonorants is very
confusing for a person who is used
to the Abugida-Akshara classification,
where there is a one-to-one correspondence
between elements of speech
{sa.ka:} and script
{sa}, e.g.
{ka.}-sound /ka/ corresponds to to
{ka.}-glyph, and
{a}-sound /a/ (vowel-duration 2 eye-blink)
corresponds to
{a}-glyph. See Sonority hierarchy
given on right. You will notice that
Abugida-Akshara classification is objective,
whereas classification into
obstruent-sonorants is very subjective
depending on how the human observer
heard the sounds.
The following are how I would classify them.
obstruent n. A sound, such as a
plosive-stop, e.g.
{ka.} /ka/, a fricative
{Ska.} /sə·ka/, or an affricate e.g.
{kya.} /kja/, that is produced with complete
blockage or at least partial constriction
of the airflow through the nose or mouth.
sonorant n. A vowel
or a voiced consonant regarded as a syllabic
sound, as the last sound in the word
<sudden> /sʌd.ən/.
Disyllables which can be mistaken to
monosyllables such as /sʌd.
ən/ are not known in Bur-Myan,
but common in IE. (UKT 160222: the second
observation needs further checks.)
The aksharas of r1, r3, r4 and r5 rows of
the akshara matrix, the Wag or
classifiable-consonants (exclusive of the
nasals), are obstruents. However, the r2
consonants
{sa.}
{hsa.}
{za.}
{Za.} are problematical. In Bur-Myan
they are plosive-stops. In Skt-Dev the
corresponding aksharas, च छ
ज झ, are affricates. Please
note I am not giving IAST transliteration
for Skt-Dev because IAST introduces
unnecessary phonetic implications
introduced by the Western phoneticians
when they came into contact with Indian
sibilant pronunciations in the bygone
centuries.
The case of
{sa.} is illuminating. It has two
pronunciations: in the coda it is
a plosive-stop [c], whereas in
the onset it is a fricative
[s]. e.g.
{þic~sa}. English <cc> is also of
this type: <success>
/sək'ses/ (transcription
from DJPD16-515). It should be noted that
since the POAs of [k] and [c] are close,
I have suggested that the transcription
could have been /səc'ses/
which calls for a palatal <c> in
English. When I posted this possibility
on a forum, almost all responses were
that English does not have a palatal
<c>, which is true if <c> has
been an onset. I insisted that coda
<c> could very well be [c], the case
being similar to the case of {sa.}.
After coming to the position that
{sa.} could very well be both a
plosive-stop and a fricative, Romabama
has to come up with a transcription for
स ष श . Here we ran
into another problem: Sanskrit and English
are IE, whereas Burmese is Tib-Bur. IE
languages such as French and German lack
the thibilant [θ] sounds which is
present in English as <th> in
<thin>. The thibilant [θ] sounds
are "heard" by the French and
Germans as [s] or [ʃ]. Taking all these
into consideration, Romabama has to adopt:
{þa.}
{Sa.}
/
{sha.} for normal akshara, and
{þ}
{S}
{sh} for "killed" akshara.
{S} ,
{sha.} /
{sh} are used for transcription of IE
languages in Myanmar - the red coloration
is to show that it is not official in MLC. Thus,
<sister> /sɪs.t|əʳ/
(US) /-t|ɚ/ -->
{siS-ta}
The case of
{sa.}/
{c} and
{Sa.}/
{S} can be explained by tongue-tip
down and tongue-tip up
pronunciations. See: On the Production
of low Tongue-tip /s/: A case report
- by Gloria J. Borden, and Thomas Gay,
Journal of Communication Disorders,
11 (1978), 425-431 -
www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0244.pdf
(160218),
or downloaded pdf in TIL
SD-Library -
GJBorden-LowTongue-TipS<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160222)
Experimenting on myself shows that the
Palatal plosive-stop
{sa.}/
{c} in Bur-Myan is tongue-tip down ,
and the Palatal affricate of Eng-Lat
& Skt-Dev is tongue-tip up
pronunciations. (UKT 160222: I still need
to observe more.)
Go back
obst-sono-note-b
Contents of this page
From:
www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/phonetik/EGG/page9.htm
080107
An airstream formed in the lungs passes
into the trachea and finally into the
larynx, which is situated on top of the
trachea. The larynx is the principal
structure for producing vibrations of
the air stream, while the oscillating
vocal folds are responsible for activating
vibrations of the air. The rapid
closing and opening of the vibrating vocal
folds periodically interrupts the air
stream and produces a glottal tone later
modified in the cavities of the vocal
tract. The larynx is a
musculo-cartilaginous structure supported
by muscles from the hyoid bone which enable
it to move up and down. When swallowing,
the larynx is moved upward and the
epiglottis folds down over it, covering the
entrance to the trachea in order to prevent
food from entering into the lungs. During
yawning the larynx is lowered and moves
down in order to widen the airway.
The non-biological function of the
larynx - the production of sound -
depends on the activity of the muscles
and the position of the cartilages of the
larynx.
The vocal folds are attached at
the front of the larynx to the thyroid
cartilage and at the back to the arytenoid
cartilages. The arytenoid cartilages can
be made to rotate in a swivelling movement
and to slide apart along the cricoid
cartilage on which they are located. The
movement of the arytenoid opens a
three-dimensional triangular space
(tetrahedron) between the inner edges of
the vocal folds, i.e the glottis. The
movement of the vocal folds in the process
of separation is called abduction. If the
folds approximate, they are adducted. The
movement of the arytenoid regulates the
abduction and tension of the vocal folds.
The vocal folds are located in the narrowest
portion of the airway, just below the
laryngeal ventricle and the ventricular
folds. The vocal folds have a layered
structure. The outermost layer is a thin
skin made up of stratified squamous
epithelium which is 0.05 to 0.1 mm thick.
Under the epithelium resides the lamina
propria, usually divided into three layers:
superficial, intermediate and deep. The
first layer, 0.05 mm thick, consists of
elastin fibres surrounded by internal
fluids. Elastin fibres allow for considerable
elongation. The intermediate layer is also
made of elastin fibres, but they are more
uniform longitudinally. The third layer is
made up of collagen fibres, which in
opposition to elastin fibres, are not
extensible. The intermediate and deep layers
together are about 1 to 2 mm thick (Titze,
1994:15-17; Hirano et al., 1981).
Those layers lie on top of the thyroarytenoid
muscle (and muscle vocalis ), which is a
major part of the vocal folds, being
approximately 7 to 8 mm thick. The muscle
fibres run longitudinally along the folds,
but are are shaped similar to a braid.
The different properties of the layers
lead to a different labelling of the
structure of the vocal folds in which the
fold consists of a body (a deep layer of
lamina propria and muscle) and a cover
(epithelium plus superficial and intermediate
layers of the lamina propria). The body-cover
model of the vocal folds' structure is used
for the modelling of vocal fold vibration .
The vocal folds are approximately 11 to 21 mm
long. The structure of the folds allows
changes in shape and thickness, but also
elasticity and/or stiffness.
Go back
opening-closing-glottis-note-b
Contents of this page
From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharynx
download 070909
The pharynx (plural:
pharynges) is the part of the neck
and throat situated immediately
posterior to the mouth and nasal cavity,
and cranial , or superior, to the
esophagus, larynx, and trachea.
UKT: Wiki's use of the term "cranial"
( cranial adj. 1. Of or relating
to the skull or cranium. [From cranium ] -- AHTD)
is misleading. It just means the "upper end".
Go online and click on the link
cranial .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cranial download 070913
It is part of the digestive system and respiratory system
of many organisms. Because both food and air pass
through the pharynx, a flap of connective tissue called
the epiglottis closes over the trachea when food is
swallowed to prevent choking or aspiration. In humans
the pharynx is important in vocalization. See a video from
throat -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CigUyfSv3w0 (160215)
It shows how food is prevented from entering the wind pipe.
See downloaded video in TIL SD-Library -
throat<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link
chk 160222)
The human pharynx is conventionally divided into three sections:
• nasopharynx -- lies behind nasal cavity; the inferior wall
consists of the superior surface of the soft palate.
• oropharynx -- lies behind the oral cavity.
• hypopharynx or laryngopharynx
Go back
pharynx-note-b
Contents of this page
From:
• Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonation
080312
Phonation is the process of producing vocal sound by the vibration of
the vocal folds that is in turn modified by the resonance of the vocal tract. It
takes place in the larynx when the vocal folds are brought together
[{adduction}] and breath pressure is applied to them in such a way that
vibration ensues causing an audible source of acoustic energy, i.e., sound,
which can then be modified by the articulatory actions of the rest of the vocal
apparatus. The vocal folds are brought together primarily by the action of the
interarytenoid muscles, which pull the
arytenoid cartilages together [{See Laver, Phonetic Description of Voice
quality, p099, in TIL library ch3-2.htm.}]
Phonation has traditionally been seen as one dimension
of phonetic voicing, the degree of glottal
tension. (A second dimension of voicing is timing, called
voice onset time, or "VOT".)
However, with recent advances in imaging technology, it has become apparent
that in many languages phonation involves more than just the glottis.
Voicing
Voiced (vd.) sound:
A voiced sound is produced when air expelled
from the lungs causes the vocal folds to vibrate.
This produces a fundamental tone accompanied by
several non-harmonic overtones. The resulting sound
is modified by movements in the vocal tract, by the volume
of the airflow and by the degree of constriction of
the vocal cords. (During speech the flow of air is
relatively small because of constrictions of the vocal cords.)
Vowels are usually voiced, as are many consonants.
Voiceless (vl.) sound: If the vocal folds are lax
and not sufficiently close to vibrate, then the sound
(usually a consonant) is voiceless.
UKT 160206: Bur-Myan speakers, can understand the distinction between vl- and vd-sounds.
The consonants of column c1
{wag}-section
{ka.}-{ta.}-{pa.} are vl. The c3 {wag}-consonants
{ga.}-{da.}-{ba.} are vd.
Bur-Myan basic nasals
{nga.}-{Ña.}-{na.}-{ma.} are voiced, but when formed into medials,
{ngha. Ñha. nha. mha.} by using "h" sound,
{ha.hto:}
they become voiceless. Please note that because of the ability of
{ha.} to
form medials (an ability considered to be those of approximants),
I have to classify
{ha.} as a pharyngeal approximant. In this instance Bur-Myan
{ha.} is
different from IPA [h]. The addition of an "h" sound, especially to <w> in
words that begin with <wh> is supposed to be "aspiration",
which I hold is different from the "h" sound in
{ha.hto:}.
The vocal vibration is varied to produce intonation and
tone. This is accomplished by varying the pressure
of the air column under the glottis as well as the tension
in the vocal folds themselves. These actions produce changes
in the frequency of vocal-cord vibration, which generates the
fundamental pitch of the voice. Tone and intonation
are not conveyed well by voiceless sounds, with their lax vocal folds,
but the changes in airflow are still audible.
Phonation as the state of the glottis:
In classic treatments of phonation, such as those
of Peter Ladefoged, phonation was considered to be
a matter of points on a continuum of tension and
closure of the vocal cords. More intricate mechanisms
were occasionally described, but they were difficult
to investigate, and until recently the state of the glottis
and phonation were considered to be nearly synonymous.
If the vocal cords are completely relaxed,
with the arytenoid cartilages apart for maximum airflow,
the cords do not vibrate. This is voiceless phonation,
and is extremely common with obstruents. (UKT: obstruents include stops,
nasals and fricatives, and affricates. The classification into obstruents and
sonorants, and our classification into {wag}, nasal, and {a.wag} consonants are
not comparable.)
If the arytenoids
are pressed together for glottal closure, the vocal cords
block the airstream, producing stop sounds such as the glottal stop.
In between there is a sweet spot of maximum vibration.
This is modal voice, and is the normal state for vowels
and sonorants in all the world's languages. However,
the aperture of the arytenoid cartilages, and therefore
the tension in the vocal cords, is one of degree between
the end points of open and closed, and there are several
intermediate situations utilized by various languages
to make contrasting sounds.
For example, Gujarati has vowels
with a partially lax phonation called
breathy voice or murmured, while
Burmese has vowels with a partially tense phonation called
creaky voice or laryngealized. Both of these
phonations have dedicated IPA diacritics, an under-umlaut
and under-tilde. The Jalapa dialect of Mazatec
is unusual in contrasting both with modal voice in
a three-way distinction. (Note that Mazatec is a tonal language,
so the glottis is making several tonal distinctions
simultaneously with the phonation distinctions.)
Javanese does not have modal voice in its plosives,
but contrasts two other points along the phonation scale,
with more moderate departures from modal voice, called
slack voice and
stiff voice.
The "muddy" consonants in Shanghainese are slack voice; they contrast
with tenuis and aspirated consonants.
Although each language may be somewhat different,
it is convenient to classify these degrees of phonation
into discrete categories. A series of seven alveolar plosives,
with phonations ranging from an open/lax to a closed/tense glottis, are:
Open glottis: [t] voiceless (full airstream) ; [d̤]
breathy voice ; [d̥] slack voice
Sweet spot: [d] modal voice (maximum vibration) ;
[d̬] stiff voice ; [d̰] creaky voice
Closed glottis: [ʔ͡t]
glottal closure (blocked airstream)
The IPA diacritics under-rg and subscript wedge,
commonly called "voiceless" and "voiced",
are sometimes added to the symbol for a voiced sound to indicate
more lax/open (slack) and tense/closed (stiff) states
of the glottis, respectively. (Ironically, adding the 'voicing' diacritic to the
symbol for a voiced consonant indicates less modal voicing, not more,
because a modally voiced sound is already fully voiced, at its sweet spot, and
any further tension in the vocal cords dampens their vibration.)
Unaccompanied phonation: It has long been noted that,
both phonologically and historically, the glottal consonants [ʔ, ɦ, h]
do not behave like other consonants. Phonetically, they have no
manner or POA other than the state of the glottis: glottal
closure for [ʔ], breathy voice for [ɦ],
and open airstream for [h].
Some phoneticians have described these sounds as neither glottal nor
consonantal, but instead as instances of pure phonation.
Register: Many languages combine phonation and tone
into a single phonological system. In Mazatec,
tone and phonation have separate lives, so that
all possible combinations of its several tones and
phonations can be utilized to distinguish words, but
Burmese tones do not contrast directly in this way.
Rather each Burmese tone occurs only with a specific phonation
that serves to make it more distinctive — or,
from a different point of view, Burmese "tone" serves
to make the phonations more distinct.
These tone-phonation hybrids are called registers.
See pitch-register (vowel register) in my notes
Go back
phonation-types-b1 |
phonation-types-b2
Contents of this page
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phone 070912
Within phonetics, a phone is:
• a speech sound or gesture considered as a physical event
without regard to its place in the phonology of a language
• a speech segment that possesses distinct physical or perceptual properties
• a particular occurrence of a speech segment
• the basic unit revealed via phonetic speech analysis
• Phonetic symbology is set off within brackets.
Go back
phone-wiki-b
Contents of this page
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonology 070913
Phonology (Greek φωνή
(phōnē), voice, sound + λόγος
(lógos), word, speech, subject of discussion), is a subfield
of linguistics which studies the sound system of
a specific language (or languages). Whereas
phonetics is about the physical production
and perception of the sounds of speech, phonology
describes the way sounds function within a given
language or across languages.
An important part of phonology is studying which sounds
are distinctive units within a language. In English,
for example, /p/ and /b/ are distinctive units of
sound, (i.e., they are phonemes / the difference
is phonemic, or phonematic). This can be seen
from minimal pairs such as <pin> and <bin>,
which mean different things, but differ only in one sound.
On the other hand, /p/ is often pronounced differently
depending on its position relative to other sounds,
yet these different pronunciations are still considered
by native speakers [{UKT: speakers whose L1 is English}]
to be the same "sound". For example,
the /p/ in <pin> is aspirated
(
{hpa.}-sound) while the same phoneme in <spin> ({pa.}-sound) is not.
In some other languages, for example Thai and Quechua,
this same difference of aspiration or non-aspiration
does differentiate phonemes.
In addition to the minimal meaningful sounds (the phonemes),
phonology studies how sounds alternate, such as the /p/
in English described above, and topics such as syllable structure, stress,
accent, and intonation.
The principles of phonological theory have also been
applied to the analysis of
sign languages, even though the phonological units
are not acoustic. The principles of phonology, and
for that matter, language, are independent of
modality because they stem from an
abstract and innate grammar.
The writing systems (UKT: Devanagari and Myanmar are
of the abugida writing system) of some languages are
based on the phonemic principle of having one letter
(or combination of letters) per phoneme and vice-versa.
Ideally, speakers can correctly write whatever they can say,
and can correctly read anything that is written.
(In practice, this ideal is never realized.)
(UKT: In formal speaking and writing in Burmese-Myanmar,
speaking and writing can be the same.)
However in English, different spellings can be used
for the same phoneme (e.g., <rude> and <food>
have the same vowel sounds), and the same letter
(or combination of letters) can represent different phonemes
(e.g., the <th>/<þ> consonant sounds of <thin>
and <this> are different). In order to avoid this
confusion based on orthography, phonologists represent
phonemes by writing them between two slashes:
" /.../ " (but without the quotes). On the other hand,
the actual sounds are enclosed by square brackets:
" [...] " (again, without quotes). While the letters
between slashes may be based on spelling conventions,
the letters between square brackets are usually the IPA
or some other phonetic transcription system. ...
Development of the field: In ancient India,
the Sanskrit grammarian Pāṇini (c. 520–460 BC)
(UKT: period comparable to that of Mahavira the founder of Jainism,
and Buddha the founder of Buddhism) lived in ca. 6th century BC) ,
who is considered the founder of linguistics, in
his text of Sanskrit phonology, the
Shiva Sutras, discovers the concepts of
the phoneme, the morpheme and the root.
The Shiva Sutras describe a phonemic notational
system in the fourteen initial lines of the
Aṣṭādhyāyī.
The notational system introduces different clusters
of phonemes that serve special roles in the morphology
of Sanskrit, and are referred to throughout the text.
Panini's grammar of Sanskrit had a significant influence on
Ferdinand de Saussure, the father of modern
structuralism, who was a professor of Sanskrit.
The Polish scholar Jan Baudouin de
Courtenay, (together with his former
student Mikołaj Kruszewski)
coined the word phoneme in 1876,
and his work, though often unacknowledged,
is considered to be the starting point of
modern phonology. He worked not only on
the theory of the phoneme but also on
phonetic alternations (i.e., what is now
called
allophony and
morphophonology). His influence on
Ferdinand de Saussure was also
significant. ...
UKT: The whole Wikipedia article
should be read. You should also study
Optimality Theory , if you would
like to know more of the subject.
Go back
phonology-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 070914, 160210:
From Wikipedia:
•
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitch_(music) 070914
•
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitch_%28music%29 080103
This article includes inline
links to audio files.
Pitch is the perceived
fundamental frequency of a
sound. While the actual fundamental
frequency can be precisely determined
through physical measurement, it may differ
from the perceived pitch because of
overtones, or
partials, in the sound. [UKT ¶]
UKT 160210: Pitch and
Fundamental frequency, f0, of
the sound waves are different.
Fundamental frequency, f0, can be measured
precisely by instruments, whereas Pitch
depends on your hearing and is subjective.
Europeans heard our vowels
differently from what we, the natives, hear.
Don't rely on their description of our
spoken language. Because of the subjective
nature of perception, the little Celtic
Gnome has lost his G , and
has become a Nome! No wonder he
keeps his Gold for himself.
The human auditory perception system may
also have trouble distinguishing frequency
differences between notes under certain
circumstances. According to ANSI
(American National Standards Institute)
acoustical terminology, it is the auditory
attribute of sound according to which
sounds can be ordered on a scale from low
to high.
UKT 160210: As a down-to-earth engineer,
I would take the measurable quantity
only, the frequency. Note the use of
"perceived" -- which means what
a person (or a supposedly group of person)
hears. If we are to take a linguistic
parallel, the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapir-Whorf_hypothesis
070914) into account, we will have to say
that "perceived" means what is
allowed by the hearer's cultural background.
Chinese traditional music is
"noise" to our ears, and so is
Burmese traditional music to many
"modern" Myanmars especially the
teens. Therefore, if we are to use the
qualifier "perceived", we will
get into a gray area of "understanding".
And, nothing will ever get done.
In spite of what I have said above,
perception is still important.
Listen to Standardized pitch, the A
above middle C (A440)
<)).
Go back
pitch-note-b
Contents of this page
From:
• Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitch_accent 080317
Pitch accent is a linguistic term of convenience for a variety of
restricted tone systems that use variations in pitch to give
prominence to a syllable or mora within a word. The placement of this
tone or the way it is realized can give different meanings to otherwise similar
words. Pitch accent is often described as being intermediate between tone and
stress, but it is not a concept that is required to describe any language, nor
is there a coherent definition for pitch accent.
UKT: As with most of the linguistic terms, the term mora
is not well defined. I have taken from Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mora_%28linguistics%29 080317, what is
relevant to "pitch-accent" as applicable to Burmese-Myanmar:
"The syllable nucleus [{the peak V in CVC}] represents
one mora in the case of a short vowel, and two moras in the case of a
long vowel or diphthong. Consonants serving as syllable nuclei also
represent one mora if short and two if long. (Slovak language is an example of
a language that has both long and short consonantal nuclei.)
Description
Pitch accent is not a coherently defined term, but is used to describe a variety
of systems that are on the simple side of tone (simpler than Yoruba or
Mandarin) and on the complex side of stress (more complex than English or
Spanish). The term has been used to describe the Scandinavian languages,
Serbo-Croatian, and Japanese, as well as some dialects of Korean and Wu
Chinese [{Wu Chinese has been called Shanghainese -- Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghainese 080317}].
UKT: My understanding as of 080317 is pitch-accent is the same as "
pitch-register"
described in my notes.
Go back pitch-accent-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 160221: I base my notes on the following Wikipedia articles. My position
on the official language of Myanmarpré is "Burmese speech written in Myanmar
akshara". I differentiate "Burmese" as speech, "Myanmar" as script, and
"Myanmarpré" as the country (a geo-political unit). Boundaries of geo-political
units are bones of contention between neighbours.
From: Wikipedia:
-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Register_%28phonology%29 070914, 160221
-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burmese_language 070914, 160221
-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Register_(phonology) 080316
In phonology, a register or pitch register is a prosodic
feature* of syllables in certain languages, in which tone, vowel phonation,
glottalization, or similar features depend upon each other. Burmese, Vietnamese
and Wu Chinese aka Shanghai -dialect have such systems. Bur-Myan (Burmese
speech in Myanmar script) was considered to be a tonal language, but now taken
as a pitch-register language.
*UKT 160221: Prosodic feature means when the two syllables or
words have to be pronounced in succession there is no sudden changes in
pronunciation. There is no agreed number of prosodic variables. What a
person hears is subjective. In auditory terms, I will list the major
variables as - #1. shrillness vs. smoothness, #2. vowel-length in
eye-blinks, and #3. loudness. In summing up the major prosodic feature of a
speaker's voice is whether it is pleasing to your ears or not. However to
describe a prosodic feature objectively you can measure with instruments. In
acoustic quantities: #1. the fundamental frequency, f0 in hertz
(cycles/sec), #2. vowel-duration in milliseconds, and #3. loudness in
decibels. See Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosody (linguistics) 160221
From Wikipedia 080316
In linguistics, a register language, also known as a pitch-register
language, is a language which combines tone and vowel
phonation into a single phonological system. Burmese and the
Chinese dialect Shanghainese are examples. Burmese is often considered a
tonal language, but differences in relative pitch are correlated with vowel
phonation, so that neither exists independently.
You may come across phrases such as in a Wikipedia article 070914 such as:
"For example, the following words are distinguished
from each other only on the basis of tone":
(Note: Romabama transliteration uses IPA suprasegmentals
/ă/,
{a} /a/,
{a:} /aː/ )
• Creaky /kʰa̰/ 'fee'
-- {hka.} [kʰă]/
• Low /kʰà/ 'shake'
-- {hka} [kʰa]
• High /kʰá/ 'be bitter'
-- {hka:} [kʰaː]
• Checked /kʰaʔ/ 'draw off'
-- {hkûp}/{hkap} [kʰʌp] (MEDict065)
UKT: Since in vocal music there are two terms using the word register
, head register (head voice) and chest register (chest voice), the term
pitch-register language should be adopted instead of register language.
There are three such pitch-registers [{ I have changed from
registers }] in Burmese, which have traditionally been considered three of
the four 'tones'. (The fourth is not a tone at all, but a closed syllable,
called "entering tone" in translations of Chinese phonetics). Jones
(1986) views the differences as:
resulting from the intersection of both pitch registers and voice
registers […] Clearly Burmese is not tonal in the same sense as such other
languages and therefore requires a different concept, namely that of pitch
register. -- Wikipedia source: Robert Jones, 1986. Pitch
register languages, pp 135-136, in John McCoy & Timothy Light eds.,
Contributions to Sino-Tibetan Studies
UKT: Romabama transliteration uses IPA suprasegmentals
[ă],
{a} [a],
{a:} [aː] :
# 1. Creaky voice {la.} [lă]
# 2. Modal voice {la} [la]
# 3. (definitely not "breathy) {la:} [laː]
The so-called "checked" register with the final glottal stop does not reflect
the Burmese-Myanmar orthography. Romabama transcription is
{lût}/{lat}
-- the first syllable of compound word
{lût-hsût} (MEDict453)
Every Bur-Myan child when learning to read and write has to learn the
family of "tone
s" or "pitch-registers":
#1 #2 #3
• {a. a a:}
• {ka. ka ka:}
• {hka. hka hka:}
• {ga. ga ga:}
• {nga. nga nga:}
...
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pitch-regis-note-b
Contents of this page
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosody_(linguistics) download 070914
In linguistics, prosody describes all the acoustic properties
of speech (UKT: how we hear or what a microphone picks up --
does not depend on POA or manner of articulation) that cannot be predicted
from a local window on the orthographic (or similar) transcription.
So, prosody is relative to a default pronunciation
of a phoneme/feature bundle/segment/syllable; it does not include
coarticulation because coarticulation is predictable from the
immediate phonological or orthographic neighborhood. Qualitatively, one can
understand prosody as the difference between a well-performed play,
and one on first reading.
UKT: My understanding of the above passage on prosody and pronunciation is:
• prosody -- related to the hearer
• pronunciation -- related to the speaker
We should keep this in mind, when we continue reading this article.
Syntactically, the term generally covers intonation, rhythm, and
focus in
speech.
Acoustically, prosody describes changes in the syllable length,
loudness, pitch, and formant structure of speech sounds.
(UKT: all these changes can be measured precisely by instruments.)
Looking at the speech articulators, it describes changes in
the velocity and range of motion in articulators like the jaw and tongue,
along with quantities like the air pressure in the trachea
and the tensions in the laryngeal muscles.
Phonologically, prosody is described by tone, intonation,
rhythm, and
lexical stress.
A precise definition of prosody and its effects depends
upon the language. For instance, some languages make
lexical distinctions based on vowel duration. In such languages,
syllable length would thus be at least partly predictable
from a transcription and thus not completely prosodic.
Likewise, in tone languages such as Mandarin, the pitch
and/or intonation is at least partially predictable from
the lexical tone of a word, and thus not completely prosodic.
Similarly, the formant structure of vowels is primarily
determined by a phonological or orthographic transcription,
but not entirely. Vowels are generally more completely
realized in accented or focused syllables. From an
acoustic point of view, it means that the formant structure
is farther from the structure of a neutral vowel (typically the schwa),
and closer to the vowels that one might see in the stressed syllables
of a carefully spoken word. Thus, the precise formant structure
of vowels normally contains a mixture of prosodic
and lexical information.
The prosodic features of a unit of speech, whether a
syllable, word, phrase, or clause,
are typically called suprasegmental features because
they typically affect all the segments of the unit.
UKT: Clause, phrase, and word are
grammatical terms, whereas prosodic features
are acoustic properties. We will have to keep
this in mind as we go on reading this article.
Prosodic units do not always correspond to grammatical units,
although both may reflect how the brain processes speech.
Phrases and clauses are grammatical concepts, but
they may have prosodic equivalents, commonly called prosodic units,
intonation units, or
declination units, which are the actual phonetic spurts
or chunks of speech. These are often believed to exist
as a hierarchy of levels. Such units are characterized
by several phonetic cues, such as a coherent pitch contour,
and the gradual decline in pitch
and lengthening of vowels over the duration of the unit,
until the pitch and speed are reset to begin the next
unit. Breathing, both inhalation and exhalation, only seems
to occur at these boundaries.
Different schools of linguistics describe somewhat
different prosodic units. One common distinction is between
continuing prosody, which in English orthography
we might mark with a comma, and final prosody,
which we might mark with a full stop (period). This is
the common usage of the IPA symbols for "minor"
and "major" prosodic breaks (American English pronunciation):
Jack, preparing the way, went on.
[ˈdʒæk |
pɹəˌpɛəɹɪŋ ðə ˈweɪ |
wɛnt ˈɒn ‖ ]
Jacques, préparant le sol, tomba.
[ˈʒak | pʁepaʁɑ̃ lɵ ˈsɔl |
tɔ̃ˈba ‖ ]
Note that the last syllable with a full vowel in a
French prosodic unit is stressed, and that
the last stressed syllable in an English prosodic unit
has primary stress. This shows that stress is
not phonemic in French, and that the difference
between primary and secondary stress is not phonemic
in English; they are both elements of prosody rather
than inherent in the words.
The pipe symbols – the
vertical bars | and ‖ – used above are phonetic,
and so will often disagree with English punctuation,
which only partially correlates with prosody.
However, the pipes may also be used for
metrical breaks -- a single pipe being used
to mark metrical feet, and a double pipe to mark
both continuing and final prosody, as their alternate names
"foot group" and "intonation group" suggest.
In such usage, each foot group would include one and only one heavy syllable.
In English, this would mean one and only one stressed syllable:
Jack, preparing the way, went on.
[ˈdʒæk ‖ pɹəˌpɛəɹɪŋ |
ðə ˈweɪ ‖ wɛnt ˈɒn ‖ ]
In many tone languages with downdrift, such as
Hausa language, [ | ] is often used to represent a minor prosodic
break that does not interrupt the overall decline
in pitch of the utterance, while [ ‖ ] marks
either continuing or final prosody that creates a pitch reset.
In such cases, some linguists use only the single pipe,
with continuing and final prosody marked
by a comma and period, respectively.
In transcriptions of non-tonal languages, the three symbols pipe,
comma, and period may also be used, with the pipe
representing a break more minor than the comma, the so-called
list prosody often used to separate items when
reading lists, spelling words, or giving out telephone numbers.
It can be assumed that many people can communicate and
interpret extensively using slight colours, tonation
and rhythm in the voice to extend emotions and clever nuances
in conversation. However, it should be noted that not everyone
is assumed able to fully understand or even acknowledge
such extensive tonal characteristics in particular speech
- even in their native language. See
Sociolinguistics
Go back prosody-note-b
Contents of this page
- UKT 160213: One of the main difficulties in transcription from Bur-Myan & Pali-Myan (Tib-Bur
languages) to Eng-Lat & Skt-Dev (IE languages) is due to the Fricatives among
the Approximants, and Palatals among the Plosive-Stops. The Fricatives responsible
are:
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibilant
070911
A sibilant is a type of fricative or affricate consonant,
made by directing a jet of air through a narrow channel in the
vocal tract towards the sharp edge of the teeth.
The term sibilant is often taken to be synonymous
with the term strident,
though this is incorrect - there is variation in usage.
The term sibilant tends to have an articulatory or
aerodynamic definition involving the production of
aperiodic noise at an obstacle [UKT ¶].
Strident refers
to the perceptual quality of intensity as determined
by amplitude and frequency characteristics of the resulting sound
(i.e. an auditory, or possibly acoustic, definition).
Sibilants are louder than their non-sibilant counterparts,
and most of their acoustic energy occurs at higher frequencies
than non-sibilant fricatives. [s] has the most acoustic
strength at around 8,000 Hz, but can reach as high
as 10,000 Hz. [ ʃ ] has the bulk of its acoustic energy
at around 4,000 Hz, but can extend up to around 8,000 Hz.
The spin-off terms shibilant, and rarely thibilant,
are used to describe particular kinds of sibilant.
A thibilant is a term occasionally found
for an interdental fricative. An example of a thibilant
is the sound transcribed by the IPA symbol theta [θ]). --
Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thibilant 070914
Of the sibilants, the following have IPA symbols of their own:
• alveolar: [s], [z] (either apical or laminal)
• post-alveolar: [ ʃ ], [ ʒ ] (Palato-alveolar:
that is, "domed" (partially palatalized) postalveolar,
either laminal or apical)
• post-alveolar: [ɕ], [ʑ]
(Alveolo-palatal: that is, laminal
palatalized postalveolar; these are equivalent to
ʃʲ, ʒʲ)
• post-alveolar: [ʂ], [ʐ]: (Retroflex,
which can mean one of three things:
(a) non-palatalized apical postalveolar,
(b) sub-apical postalveolar or pre-palatal, or
(c) non-palatalized laminal ("flat") postalveolar,
sometimes transcribed [s̠ z̠] or
[ʂ̻ ʐ̻].
UKT 070914: We will tentatively equate:
• /s , z/ to
{sa.} (onset),
{ za.} (Contrast from
{ca.} (coda))
• / ʃ , ʒ/ to
{þhya.} . (MLC transliteration
{rha.} is not accepted in Romabama.
/ʒ/ is not represented in Romabama.)
• /ɕ , ʑ/ to {kya.} {gya.}
• /ʂ , ʐ / (both are not represented
in Romabama)
Diacritics can be used for finer detail. For example,
apical and laminal alveolars can be specified as [s̺]
vs [s̻]; a dental (or more likely denti-alveolar)
sibilant as [s̪]; a palatalized alveolar as
[sʲ]; and a generic postalveolar as [s̠],
a transcription frequently used when none of the above apply
(that is, for a laminal but non-palatalized, or "flat",
postalveolar). Some of the Northwest Caucasian languages also have a
closed laminal postalveolar, without IPA symbols
but provisionally transcribed as [ŝ ẑ].
Only the alveolar (UKT: /s, z/) and palato-alveolar
(UKT: / ʃ , ʒ/) sibilants are distinguished in English ...
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sibilant-note-b
Contents of this page
From Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strident_consonant 080315
A sibilant is a type of fricative or affricate consonant, made by
directing a jet of air through a narrow channel in the front part of the
mouth [{Wikipedia used vocal tract which is not specific.}]
towards the sharp edge of the [{front}] teeth.
The term
The term sibilant is often taken to be
synonymous with the term strident,
though this is incorrect - there is variation in usage. The term:
• sibilant tends to have an articulatory or
aerodynamic definition involving the production of
aperiodic noise at an obstacle.
• strident refers to the perceptual quality of
intensity as determined by amplitude and frequency
characteristics of the resulting sound (i.e. an auditory,
or possibly acoustic, definition).
Sibilants are louder than their non-sibilant counterparts,
and most of their acoustic energy occurs at higher frequencies
than non-sibilant fricatives. [s] has the most acoustic strength at around 8,000 Hz,
but can reach as high as 10,000 Hz.
[ʃ] has the bulk of its acoustic energy at around 4,000 Hz, but can
extend up to around 8,000 Hz.
The spin-off terms shibilant, and rarely thibilant
[{the inclusion of "thibilant" here is misleading}],
are used to describe particular kinds of sibilant.
UKT: See Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thibilant 080315, where it is stated that
"Dental fricative or interdental fricative -
non-sibilant coronal fricative.
<thibilant> is exemplified by /θ/ with no hissing sound,
whereas <sibilant> by /s/ with hissing sound.
Symbols
Of the sibilants, the following have IPA symbols of their own:
Alveolar:
• [s], [z] (either apical or laminal).
Postalveolar: (UKT note: the term "post-alveolar"
is misleading. The prefix "post-" means "after",
which depends on how you are preceding. The IPA way of
looking at the POAs is from lips to uvula, whereas the Eastern way is from
uvula to the lips. So, according the Burmese-Myanmar way of looking at the
POAs, "Post-alveolar" is "Pre-alveolar")
• [ʃ] [ʒ] (Palato-alveolar: that is, "domed"
(partially palatalized) postalveolar, either laminal or apical)
• [ɕ], [ʑ] (Alveolo-palatal: that is, laminal
palatalized postalveolar; these are equivalent to ʃʲ, ʒʲ)
• [ʂ], [ʐ]: (Retroflex,
which can mean one of three things: (a) non-palatalized apical postalveolar,
(b) sub-apical postalveolar or pre-palatal, or (c) non-palatalized laminal
("flat") postalveolar, sometimes transcribed
[s̠ z̠] or [ʂ̻ ʐ̻].
Diacritics can be used for finer detail. For example, apical and laminal
alveolars can be specified as [s̺] vs [s̻]; a
dental (or more likely denti-alveolar) sibilant as
[s̪]; a palatalized alveolar as
[sʲ]; and a generic postalveolar as
[s̠], a transcription frequently used when none of the above apply (that
is, for a laminal but non-palatalized, or "flat", postalveolar). Some of the
Northwest Caucasian languages [{group of languages spoken in Russia, Georgia and
Turkey) also have a closed laminal postalveolar,
without IPA symbols but provisionally transcribed as [ŝ ẑ].
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From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strident_vowel 080315
Strident vowels (also called sphincteric vowels) are strongly
pharyngealized vowels accompanied by
(ary)epiglottal trill, where the larynx is raised and the pharynx
constricted, so that either the epiglottis or the arytenoid cartilages
vibrate instead of the vocal cords.
Strident vowels are fairly common in Khoisan languages [{Africa}],
where they contrast with simple pharyngealized vowels.
Stridency may be a type of phonation called harsh voice.
A similar phonation, but without the trill, is called pressed voice
or ventricular voice. The Bai language of southern China
has a register system with allophonic
strident and pressed vowels.
UKT: See register (phonlogy)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Register_%28phonology%29 080315, where
Burmese-Myanmar is described as a register language (aka)
pitch-register language: the Wiki article gives the following:
Notice that Romabama uses IPA suprasegmentals.
# Creaky register, Creaky voice {la.} /lă/
# Low register, Modal voice {la} /la/
# High register, ..., {la:} /laː/
# Checked register -- must be taken as rime, i.e. checked vowel followed by
consonant. The example given is: {lat} /læt/
There is no official symbol for stridency in the IPA, but in Khoisanist
literature a subscript double tilde (≈) is sometimes used,
as seen here on the letter <a>:
.
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UKT 101030, 160209:
Always keep in mind that the two writing
systems Abugida-Akshara (e.g. Devanagari
& Myanmar), and Alphabet-Letter (Latin)
are entirely different. The Akshara is a
syllable with an inherent vowel and is
pronounceable, whereas the Letter is mute.
Myanmar Abugida-Akshara matrix is divided
into 2 groups, the Wag
{wag} or classifiable consonants of 5x5
subgroup, and the Awag
{a.wag.} or unclassifiable consonants of 2x5
subgroup. Mon-Myan has a full compliment of
35 consonants, but in Bur-Myan 2 are missing
in the Awag
{a.wag.} subgroup.
By "classifiable" is meant that
the consonants can be classified into 5
columns, c1 tenuis, c2 voiceless, c3 voiced,
c4 deep-h , and c5 nasal c5 in Bur-Myan. In
Mon-Myan, c1 & c2 consonants have
inherent vowel
{a.}, but c3, c4, & c5 consonants have
the inherent vowel
{é} or
{è:} represented by English e .
In Bur-Myan and Mon-Myan, it is only the
tenuis consonant that can be killed by
the Virama
{a.þût}. However, in Pal-Myan and Skt-Dev,
c3 can also be killed. The tenuis consonants
are:
{ka.}/
{k},
{sa.}/
{c},
{Ta.}/
{T},
{ta.}/
{t},
{pa.}/
{p}
{Ska.},
{STa.},
{Sta.},
{Spa.}
Note: That the Abugida-Akshara and
Alphabet-Letter systems are different is
not fully recognized by most writers, e.g.
those writing for Wikipedia and for MLC
(Myanmar Language Commission) with the
result that you have to be careful in
reading their works.
From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenuis_consonant
101030
In linguistics, a tenuis consonant
is a stop or affricate which is
unvoiced, unaspirated, and
unglottalized. That is, it has a
"plain" phonation like [p, t, ts, tʃ, k],
with a voice onset time close to zero, as in
Spanish p, t, ch, k, or English
p, t, k after s, as in
spy, sty, sky.
Tenuis consonant are not normally marked
explicitly, with voiceless IPA letters such
as [p, t, ts, tʃ, k] assumed to be
unaspirated unless indicated otherwise.
However, there is an explicit diacritic for
a lack of aspiration in the Extensions to
the IPA, the superscript equal sign:
[p⁼, t⁼, ts⁼,
tʃ⁼, k⁼].
The term tenuis comes from Latin
translations of Ancient Greek grammar,
which differentiated three series of
consonants, voiced β δ γ
/b d ɡ/, aspirate φ θ
χ /pʰ tʰ kʰ/, and
tenuis π τ κ /p⁼
t⁼ k⁼/; these series have close
parallels in other IE (Indo-European)
languages.
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VOT -
Voice Onset Time
UKT 070913, 160210
Whenever you compare consonants in languages,
concentrate on PTK, the three major phonation
types of plosive-stops. These three, in order
of ease of articulation are
{pa.} /pa/,
{ta.} /ta/,
{ka.} /ka/. Though a Bur-Myan or Skt-Dev
speaker would say KTP, the order for BEPS
is PTK. In teaching English pronunciation
to a Bur-Myan speaker, always start with P
{pa.} /pa/, and proceed to
{Spa.} /spa/. It is very difficult for
most Bur-Myan speaker to pronounce
{Ska.} /ska/. You can explain the difficulty
faced by the Bur-Myan speaker to pronounce
{Ska.} /ska/ in terms of VOT (Voice Onset Time).
Refer to Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice-onset_time
160222
before you read the following.
You can understand VOT if you think of a
built-up of water behind a gate in a dam
with a patch of reeds upstream. Releasing
the gate suddenly releases the water and
the water rushing past the reeds sets them
vibrating wildly. This is comparable to
the production of a voiced (vd.) consonantal
sound like
{ba.}. If you open the gate very gradually
the stream of water flows slowly past the
reeds and they hardly vibrate. This is
comparable to the production of a tenuis
{pa.} or voiceless
{hpa.}. VOT is the time of opening the gate
suddenly and the time elapsed to set the reeds
vibrating wildly. I would describe VOT as
Vibration Onset Time, and avoid the
use of the word "Voice" which to
the Bur-Myan means the "voice of a person
speaking".
The three major phonation types of
plosive-stops are tenuis of column c1.
They are r5c1
{pa.}, r4c1
{ta.} and r1c1
{ka.}. In Bur-Myan, these are the only
three that can be killed to become a coda.
{p},
{t},
{k}.
The next set is of column c2 which is
absent in the IPA table. They are
{hpa.}
{hta.}
{hka.}. Note here that Skt-Dev speakers
have difficulty in pronouncing
{hka.} for which they substitute {kSa.}
which the Bur-Myan speaker found difficulty
to pronounce. The Eng-Lat speaker hear
{hka.} when we pronounce
{ka.}.
The pronunciation of
{ka.} - the tenuis - has VOT at or near
zero. The ordinary voiceless
{hka.} has a longer VOT or positive
VOT. Pronunciation of voiced
{ga.} has a negative VOT - which means the
vibration of vocal folds before the
"dam" is opened.
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VOT-note-b
Contents of this page
From: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_(linguistics) 070914
Tone is the use of pitch in language to distinguish words. All
languages use intonation to express emphasis, contrast, emotion, or other such
nuances, but not every language uses tone to distinguish lexical meaning. When
this occurs, tones are phonemes (discrete speech sounds), just like consonants
and vowels, and they are occasionally referred to as tonemes.
A slight majority of the languages in the world are tonal.
However, most Indo-European languages, which include
the majority of the most widely-spoken languages in the world today,
are not tonal, with the exception of the Indo-Aryan language Punjabi.
The way in which tone is used in a particular language
leads to the language being classified either as
a tonal language or a pitch accent language.
(UKT: Burmese was always described as a "tonal language",
now it is being described as a "pitch-register language".)
In a prototypical tonal language such as
Chinese, the tone of each syllable can be independent of
the other syllables in the word, and many words are
differentiated only by the tones associated with them.
In many African tone languages, since words are longer,
there are fewer minimal pairs for tone, and tone may not
be assigned to every syllable of a word. In a pitch accent language,
there is typically only one tone-accented syllable or mora per word.
For example Somali has one high tone per word.
In Japanese, pitch accent refers to a drop in pitch; words contrast depending
on which syllable this drop follows. Some words in Japanese contain no pitch
accent at all. While many linguists maintain a difference between tone languages
and pitch accent languages, the linguist
Larry Hyman has argued that there is no prototypical
pitch accent language and that all languages that use
tone phonemically should be classified as tone languages.
UKT: Since the original Wiki passage was not clear, I have rewritten as the
following:
UKT: Languages may be grouped together as:
Marginally tonal:
• Some of the
Sino-Tibetan languages, including the numerically most important ones.
Most forms of Chinese are strongly tonal (an exception is
Shanghainese, where the system has collapsed to one of pitch accent); while some of the
Tibetan languages, including the standard languages of Lhasa and Bhutan and
Burmese are more marginally tonal. However Nepal Bhasa aka
Néwari, the original language of Kathmandu, is non-tonal, as are several Tibetan dialects
and many or most of the other Tibeto-Burman languages.
Tonal:
• In the Austro-Asiatic family, some such as Vietnamese and its closest
relatives are strongly tonal.
• The entire
Tai-Kadai family, spoken mainly in China, Vietnam,
Thailand, and Laos, is strongly tonal.
• The entire
Hmong-Mien languages family is strongly tonal.
Non-tonal:
• Other languages of Austro-Asiatic family, such as Mon
{mwun},
Khmer and the Munda languages, are non-tonal.
(This article suggesting that Mon is similar to Burmese?)
...
The vast majority of Austronesian languages are non-tonal, but a small number
have developed tone. No tonal language has been reported from Australia.
With other languages we simply don't know. For example, the
Ket language has been described as having up to eight tones
by some investigators, as having four tones by others,
but by some as having no tone at all. In cases such as these,
the classification of a language as tonal may depend on
the researcher's interpretation of what tone is.
For instance, the Burmese language has phonetic tone,
but each of its three tones is accompanied by a distinctive phonation
(creaky, murmured or plain vowels). It could be argued
either that the tone is incidental to the phonation,
in which case Burmese would not be phonemically tonal,
or that the phonation is incidental to the tone,
in which case it would be considered tonal. Something
similar appears to be the case with Ket.
Some Indo-European languages are usually characterised as tonal,
such as Lithuanian, Slovenian, Serbo-Croatian, Limburgish, Swedish
and Norwegian; more correctly, however, they are pitch accent languages,
as only the tone on the stressed syllable can have any effect
on the meaning. Ancient Greek and Vedic Sanskrit were also
pitch-accent languages. (In practice, the pitch alone
only rarely distinguished the meaning in these two languages. A famous
example of such a case is from
Aristophanes'
Frogs
(l. 304), where Aristophanes refers to an actual occurrence at the performance
of Euripides'
Orestes
where an actor had pronounced galḗn' horō "I
see calm waters" with so much empathy that it came out
galên horō "I see a weasel".)
However, the Indo-European language Punjabi is clearly
a tonal language, where the tones arose as a reinterpretation
of different consonant series in terms of pitch,
as happened in most of the Chinese languages. ...
The term 'register', when not in the phrase 'register tone',
is used to indicate vowel phonation combined with tone in
a single phonological system. Burmese and Khmer, for example,
are register languages. Burmese is usually considered
a tonal language and Khmer a vowel-phonation language,
but in both cases differences in relative pitch or
pitch contours are correlated with vowel phonation,
so that neither exists independently.
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From Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word 080314
A word is a unit of language that carries meaning and consists of one
or more morphemes which are linked more or less tightly together, and has a
phonetical value. Typically a word will consist of a root
or stem and zero or more affixes.
Words can be combined to create phrases, clauses,
and sentences. A word consisting of two or more
stems joined together form a compound.
A word combined with another word or part of a word form a
portmanteau.
UKT: Compare with Akshara (Sanskrit:
akṣára ) --
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akshara 080314
It may mean:
• in Sanskrit grammar, "syllable", see
Shiksha
• a consonant grapheme, with an inherent vowel, of a script of the Asokan
Brahmic family.
• in philosophical terms is the opposite of the word
kṣara "perishable", a name of Brahma.
Depending on the language, words can sometimes be difficult to identify
or delimit. While word separators, most often spaces
[{either single white spaces or double}], are commonplace
in the written corpus of several languages, some languages such as
Chinese and Japanese do not use these. [{Bur-Myan and Pali-Myan
are also in the same situation, but probably not as bad
as in Chinese and Japanese.}] Words may contain spaces, however,
if they are compounds or proper nouns such as <ice cream> and
<the United States of America>. An extreme example is
Vietnamese, which always delimits monosyllabic morphemes, not words. Quite
oppositely, synthetic languages often combine many lexical morphemes into single words,
making it difficult to boil them down to the traditional sense of words found
more easily in analytic languages; this is especially difficult for
polysynthetic languages such as Inuktitut [{of northern Canada}]
and Ubykh [{north-western Caucasian group}], where entire sentences
may consist of single such words.
However, of all situations, the most confusing is those for languages w
ithout written forms, including sign languages, which potentially
only offer phonolexical clues as to where word boundaries lie.
Official words, however, would be documented in a dictionary of whichever
language you are categorizing them under.
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End of TIL file.
