Speech can be broken into minimal pronounceable units into which
sounds show a tendency to cluster or group. These smallest phonetic
groups arc generally given the name of syllables. Being the
smallest pronounceable units, syllables form morphemes, words and
phrases. Each of these units is characterized by a certain syllabic
structure. Thus a meaningful language unit phonetically may be
considered from the point of view of syllable formation and
syllable division.
The syllable is a complicated phenomenon and like a phoneme it can
be studied on four levels - articulatory, acoustic, auditory and
functional. The complexity of the phenomenon gave rise to many
theories.
We could start with the so-called expiratory (chest pulse or
pressure) theory by R.H. Stetson. This theory is based on the
assumption that expiration in speech is a pulsating process and
each syllable should correspond to a single expiration. So the
number of syllables in an utterance is determined by the number of
expirations made in the production of the utterance. This theory
was strongly criticized by Russian and foreign linguists. G.P.
Torsuyev, for example, wrote that in a phrase a number of words and
consequently a number of syllables can be pronounced with a single
expiration. This fact makes the validity of the theory
doubtful.
Another theory of syllable put forward by O. Jespersen is generally
called the sonority theory. According to O. Jespersen, each sound
is characterized by a certain degree of sonority which is
understood us acoustic property of a sound that determines its
perceptibility. According to this sound property a ranking of
speech sounds could be established: <the least sonorous>
voiceless plosives à voiced fricatives àvoiced plosives à voiced
fricatives à sonorants à close vowels àopen vowels <the most
sonorous>. In the word plant for example we may use the
following wave of sonority: [pla:nt]. According to V.A. Vasssilyev
the most serious drawback of this theory is that it fails to
explain the actual mechanism of syllable formation and syllable
division. Besides, the concept of sonority is not very clearly
defined.
Further experimental work aimed to description of the syllable
resulted in lot of other theories. However the question of
articulatory mechanism of syllable in a still an open question in
phonetics. We might suppose that this mechanism is similar in all
languages and could be regarded as phonetic universal.
In Russian linguistics there has been adopted the theory of
syllable by LV Shcherba. It is called the theory of muscular
tension. In most languages there is the syllabic phoneme in the
centre of the syllable which is usually a vowel phoneme or, in some
languages, a sonorant. The phonemes preceding or following the
syllabic peak are called marginal. The tense of articulation
increases within the range of prevocalic consonants and then
decreases within the range of postvocalic consonants.
Russian linguist and psychologist N.I. Zhinkin has suggested the
so-called loudness theory which seems to combine both production
and perception levels. The experiments carried out by N.I. Zhinkin
showed that the arc of loudness of perception level is formed due
to variations of the volume pharyngeal passage which is modified by
contractions of its walls. The narrowing of the passage and the
increase in muscular tension which results from it reinforce the
actual loudness of a vowel thus forming the peak of the syllabic.
So the syllable is the arc оf loudness which correlates with the
arc of articulatory effort on the speed production level since
variations in loudness are due to the work of all speech
mechanisms.
It is perfectly obvious that no phonetician has succeeded so far in
giving an adequate explanation of what the syllable is. The
difficulties seem to arise from the various possibilities of
approach to the unit. There exist two points of view:
1. Sоme linguists consider the syllable to be a purely articulatory
unit which lacks any functional value. This point of view is
defended on the ground that the boundaries of syllables do not
always coincide with those of morphemes.
2. However the majority of linguists treat the syllable as the
smallest pronounceable unit which can reveal some linguistic
function.
Trying to define the syllable from articulatory point of view we
may talk about universals.
When we mean the functional aspect of
the syllable it should be defined with the reference to the
structure of one particular language.
The definition of the syllable from the functional point of view
tends to single out the following features of the syllable:
a) a syllable is a chain of phonemes of varying length;
b) a syllable is constructed on the basis of contrast of its
constituents (which is usually of vowel - consonant type);
c) the nucleus of a syllable is a vowel, the presence of consonants
is optional; there are no languages in which vowels are not used as
syllable nuclei, however, there are languages in which this
function is performed by consonants;
d) the distribution of phonemes in the syllabic structure follows
by the rules which are specific enough for a particular
language.
2. The structure and functionsof syllables in English
Syllable formation in English is based on the phonological
opposition vowel - consonant. Vowels are usually syllabic while
consonants are not with the exceptions of [l], [m], [n], which
become syllabic in a final position preceded by a
noise consonant: bottle [bσtl], bottom [bσtm], button [b/tn] and
[r] (in those accents which pronounce [r]) perhaps [præps].
The structure of English syllables can be summarized as
follows:
• Many syllables have one or more consonants preceding the nucleus.
These make up the syllable onset: me, so, plow.
• Many syllables have one or more consonants, following the
nucleus. They make up the syllable coda. They are traditionally
known as closed syllables: cat, jump.
• The combination of nucleus and coda has a special significance,
making up the rhyming property of a syllable.
The English language has developed the closed type of syllable as
the fundamental one while in Russian it is the open type that forms
the basis of syllable formation.
The other aspect of this component is syllable division. The
problem of syllable division in case of intervocalic consonants and
their clusters, like in such words as city, extra, standing and
others.
Let us consider the first word ['sit.i]. There exist two
possibilities:
a) the point of syllable division is after the intervocalic
consonant:
b) the point of syllable division is inside the consonant.
In both cases the first syllable remains closed because the shot
vowel should remains check The result of instrumentally analyses
show, that the point of syllable division in such words is inside
the intervocalic consonant. EPD indicates the point of division
after the consonant.
The second case. There are two syllables in the word extra but
where should the boundary between them fall?
1) [e - kstrə]. It is unlike that people would opt for a division
between [e] and [kstrə] because there are no syllables in English
which begin with consonant sequence [kstr].
2) Similarly, a division between [ekstr] and [ə] would be
unnatural.
3) [ek - strə], [eks - trə], [ekst - rə] are possible. People
usually prefer either of the first two options here, but there no
obvious way of deciding between them.
In some cases we may take into account the morphemic structure of
words. For example, standing consists of two syllables; on phonetic
grounds [stæn - diŋ). on grammatical grounds [stænd - iŋ].
Now we shall consider two functions of the syllable.
The first is constitutive function. It lies in its ability to be a
part of a word itself. The syllables form language units of greater
magnitude that is words, morphemes, and utterances. It this respect
two things should be emphasized. First, the syllable is the unit
within which the relations between distinctive features of phonemes
and their acoustic correlates are revealed. Second, within a
syllable (or syllables) prosodic characteristics of speech are
realized, which form the stress pattern of a word and the
intonation structure of an utterance. In sum, the syllable is a
specific minimal structure of both segmental and suprasegmental
features.
The other function is distinctive one. In this respect the syllable
is characterized by its ability to differentiate words and
word-forms. One minimal pare has been found in English to
illustrate the word distinctive function in the syllabic: nitrate —
night-rate. There analogical distinction between word combinations
can be illustrated by many more examples: an aim - a name; an ice
house - a nice house, etc. Sometimes the difference in syllable
division may be the basic ground for differentiation in such pairs
as I saw her rise.- I saw her eyes; I saw the meat — I saw them
eat.
Theories on syllable formation and division
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Для автора это очень важно, это стимулирует его на новое творчество!