Assignment #2: Unit 2 – Phonology posted Jan 29 due Feb 4

Winter 2010
LING101 LecB3: Intro to Linguistic Analysis
Short Answer Assignment #2
Assignment #2: Unit 2 – Phonology
A.M. Tessier
posted Jan 29
due Feb 4
Remember: assignments do not form part of your grade! See the syllabus for details.
1. Finding minimal pairs
For each of the following words and contexts, find an English minimal pair.
in both the English and IPA spellings
Example:
voiceless and voiced alveolar stops, at the ends of words
‘bet’ [bɛt]
‘bed’ [bɛd]
… For some of these pairs, you may not be able to think of real words – so, use
made up ones. As long as they could be grammatical words of English!
… For others of these pairs… you may not even be able to make up a minimal pair –
it might be that one of the sounds actually sounds bad in that context no matter
what! (Here, if you are not a native speaker, you should use the judgement of a
native speaker! That is – ask one what they think of your made-up words – could
they be words of English?) … If you think that is the case for any of the pairs we
have seen: does that mean they are not phonemes of English?
1.
alveolar lateral and palatal central approximants, between vowels
2.
labial and velar nasals, at the end of a word
3.
voiced and voiceless velar stops, before a lateral
4.
voiced and voiceless alveolar stops, before a lateral
5.
voiceless labio-dental and post-alveolar fricatives, before a back vowel
6.
labial and alveolar nasals, before a stop
7.
voiceless alveolar stops and fricatives, after a stop
8.
glottal stops and fricatives, in any context you can come up with…
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Winter 2010
LING101 LecB3: Intro to Linguistic Analysis
Short Answer Assignment #2
A.M. Tessier
2. Allophones in Kikuria
Here are some words of Kikuria (spoken in Kenya and Tanzania). What I want you to
focus on is the distribution of the voiced stops: [b] and [g], vs the voiced fricatives: [β]
and [ɣ] – check your full IPA chart, and you will see those two are voiced bilabial and
velar fricatives, respectively. Look carefully at their distribution, and answer the
following questions:
1. Here are three pairs of sounds:
a) b vs. β
b) g vs ɣ
c) β vs ɣ
The Kikuria data above provides evidence that two of these pairs are allophones of the
same phoneme, and one pair are different phonemes. Which are the different phonemes –
and tell me how you know?
2. For the two pairs that are allophones, how do you predict their distribution? Describe
the pattern in words, and then write some rules like we are doing in class (i.e. some
change / some environment.)
3. Finally: ... what about the fourth pair? [b] vs [g]? Do you think they are allophones or
phonemes? ... This one takes a bit of thinking about.
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Winter 2010
LING101 LecB3: Intro to Linguistic Analysis
Short Answer Assignment #2
A.M. Tessier
3. Old English allophones
This question will only be answerable after next Tuesday’s class (Feb 2).
Here are some words of Old English. Compare the distribution of [s] and [z]:
1.
3.
5.
7.
9.
[fæst]
fast
2.
[sæd]
sad
4.
[stɪkka]
stick
6.
[sɛndan]
send
8.
[wi:s]
wise
10.
moss
12.
story
14.
11. [mɑs]
13. [spi:l]
[wi:za]
leader
[wozan]
to be
[ri:zan]
to rise
[ælzyndrij]
separately
[gle:zan]
to gloss
[tʃe:zan]
to choose
[glɪzjan]
to glitter
1.
Making no assumptions about the basic form of [s] and [z] in OE, write a
rule or rules to predict their distribution in these words.
2.
If you choose either [s] or [z] as the basic form, can you write fewer or
simpler rules? If so, show this. Explain how you knew which one to choose as
the basic form.
3.
As we discussed in class: the simpler rule(s) you came up with in 2 above will
only work to describe the phonology of OE if our assumption of the basic form
is right. So: imagine that a misguided speaker of OE tried to produce a word
with whichever sound you assumed is not the basic form. Show how your rule
would produce an ungrammatical (ill-formed) word of OE.
4.
You will by now have noticed that the distributions of [f] and [v] and [s] and
[z]are related. Still making no assumptions about underlying forms: write a
single rule or rules that capture their allophonic distribution.
5.
… It’s okay if the rule you wrote in 2 makes predictions about other sounds
that you can’t test. But tell me what those predictions might be?
6.
What about modern-day English? Are these three pairs of sounds (s/z, f/v,
allophones or phonemes today? … Even if they are now phonemes, are
their distributions at all predictable as they were in old English?
Note: If you are not a native speaker of English, you may not be able
to answer question 6 very easily… but you can ask a native speaker what
they think! If this native speaker is NOT in this class (or in any linguistics
class) that will be best – think how you can find out from them whether
these pairs of sounds are allophones or phonemes without them knowing
those concepts!
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