Voicing
All sounds can be grouped into voiced or voiceless (or unvoiced). Voicing is concerned with the vibration of the vocal folds. To tell if a sound is voiced or voiceless, touch your throat gently. When you say a voiced sound, you can feel a vibration or buzzing in your throat. For example, when we say /z/, there is a vibration, but when we say /s/, there is no vibration. All vowels are voiced sounds. Sonorants are also voiced. Sonorants are nasals (/m/, /n/, and /ŋ/), liquids (/l/ and /r/), and semivowels (/w/ and /j/). Some obstruents are also voiced, which are /b/, /d/, /g/, /v/, /ð/, /z/, /ʒ/, and /dʒ/. The rest of the obstruents are voiceless: /p/, /t/, /k/, /f/, /θ/, /s/, /ʃ/, /tʃ/, and /h/. In fact, almost all obstruents have a pair of sounds that have an identical place and manner of articulation, but differ in voicing. These are the pairs that differ only in voicing: /b/ and/p/, /d/ and /t/, /g/ and /k/, /v/ and /f/, /ð/ and /θ/, /z/ and /s/, /ʒ/ and /ʃ/, and /dʒ/ and /tʃ/. Each pair sound is produced exactly the same way except for voicing. The voiceless sound /h/ has no voiced counterpart.
Voicing for grammar
In the history of the English language, voicing was used for grammar purposes such as to change the part of speech and to make a plural noun form. Regarding the change of the part of speech, voicing can change a noun into a verb or an adjective into a verb.
From noun to verb
These are examples where voicing was used to make a noun to a verb.
From /f/ to /v/
belief – believe
life – live
proof – prove
strife – strive
thief – thieve
half - halve
safe - save
grief - grieve
From /θ/ to /ð/
bath - bathe
breath - breathe
mouth– mouthe (to move lips)
sheath - sheathe
wreath - wreathe
loath - loathe
teeth - teethe (for a baby to grow teeth)
From /s/ to /z/
abuse - abuse
house - house
misuse - misuse
excuse - excuse
use - use
In the examples with “from /s/ to /z/”, the noun and verb forms have the same spelling, but differ in voicing.
From adjective to verb
In the following examples, the adjective and verb forms have the same spelling, but differ in voicing.
From /s/ to /z/
close (adj.) - close (v.)
diffuse (adj.) - diffuse (v.)
From singular to plural
Voicing was also used to make the plural noun forms, as these examples show:
knife – knives
leaf – leaves
wife – wives
The following words in their singular forms end with the /θ/ sound. But in their plural forms, they can be pronounced either voiced /ðz/ or voiceless /θs/ For instance, ‘bath’ can be said either as /bæθs/ or as /bæðz/. These are such words:
bath - baths [θs], baths [ðz]
mouth - mouths [θs], mouths [ðz]
oath - oaths [θs], oaths[ðz]
path - paths [θs], paths[ðz]
truth - truths[θs], truths[ðz]
youth - youths [θs], youths[ðz]
Voice assimilation
When we consider each phoneme independently, we can decide whether the sound is voiced or voiceless. While there is this canonical distinction between voiced and voiceless consonants, this distinction is not always kept in actual speech situations. As a non-native speaker, you must have been taught to pronounce /haftu/ for the phrase, “have to”, and /justu/ for the phrase “used to.” You might have wondered why, since the /v/ in “have to” is a voiced phoneme sound and “used” alone is pronounced as /juzd/.
The reason is the phenomenon called the assimilation of voice. Assimilation is a phonological process where sounds change to adapt to neighboring sounds. Assimilation happens for various reasons, like an assimilation in manner or place. And an assimilation in voice means neighboring sounds agree in voicing. The assimilation of voice happens because the vibration of the vocal cords is not something that can be switched on and off very swiftly. So, in a cluster of consonants differing in voicing, the consonants have to be either all voiced or all voiceless. This means that the same sound can be voiced or voiceless depending on the influence of its phonological environment. It also means that a voiceless consonant phoneme can become voiced, and a voiced consonant phoneme can become voiceless in the actual speech environment. Consider for example these two sounds: “his dog”’ and “his pet.” The ‘D’ in “dog” is a voiced sound, so the ‘S’ in “his dog” is assimilated to the voiced /z/ sound. By contrast, the ‘P’ in “pet” is a voiceless sound, so the ‘P’ in “his pet” is assimilated to the voiceless /s/ sound. With this knowledge, we can understand why “have to” and “used to'' are pronounced as /haftu/ and /justu/. The voiced /v/ and /z/ in “have to” and “used to'' respectively are followed by a voiceless consonant /t/. In this situation, /v/ and /z/ become voiceless /f/ and /s/.
Voicing of -s or -es
Knowing whether a sound is voiced or voiceless is especially useful to pronounce grammar particles like -s, -es, -ed, which we use to indicate plurality, possessiveness, and tense. How these grammar particles sound depends on the last sound of the word the particles are attached to. When the last sound is voiced, the grammar particle is also voiced, and when the last sound is voiceless, the grammar particle is also voiceless. That is, the voice of grammar particles follows the basic principle of the assimilation of voice: consonants in a cluster should be either all voiced or all voiceless. An exception to this rule is that, when the last sound is similar to the grammar particle sound, one syllable is added to the word. Let’s examine these rules in detail.
The pronunciation rule for grammar suffix -s or -es is that, when the final sound of the word is unvoiced, then the suffix ’-s’ will also be unvoiced, as it is pronounced as /s/. For example, consider the word ‘chip’. ‘P’ is an unvoiced consonant sound, so the plural will be an unvoiced sound as well as in ‘chips’ /ps/. When the last sound of the word has any of the following unvoiced consonants, /p, t, k, f, θ/, the suffix -s should sound /s/: for example, “books, boots, booths, cloths”
By contrast, when the last sound of the word is voiced, then the suffix ‘-s’ is pronounced /z/. The sound is voiced if the word ends with a vowel sound or a sonorant. It is also voiced with any of the following voiced consonants /b, d, g, v, ð/. For example, “dogs, lions, boys, girls, clothes”
Sibilants are exceptions to this rule. Sibilants are /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʧ, ʤ/. When the final sound of a word is a sibilant, the plural is made by adding an ‘-es’ and making the sound /iz/. For example, ‘wishes’, ‘buses’, ‘garages’, ‘ages’ and ‘boxes.’
Voicing of -ed
The pronunciation rule for ‘-ed’ for the verb past tense in its regular form is similar. There are three ways. If the verb base ends in a voiceless sound except for the ‘t’ (that is, voiceless obstruents /p/, /k/, /f/, /θ/, /s/, /ʃ/, /tʃ/, and /h/), the ‘–ed’ ending sounds like /t/. /t/ is blended together with the previous consonant as a consonant cluster. So /t/ is not pronounced as an extra syllable. For example,
picked, hoped, raced, watched, washed, worked, dropped, finished, stopped, laughed, coughed.
If the verb base ends in a voiced sound except for ‘d,’ then the ‘–ed’ ending sounds like /d/. So, to have the sound /d/, the word should end with a vowel sound, a nasal (/m/, /n/, /ŋ/), a liquid (/l/, /r/), a semivowel (/w/, /j/), or a voiced obstruent (/b/, /g/, /v/, /ð/, /z/, /ʒ/, /dʒ/). Like the case of ‘t’, the ‘-ed’ is blended together with the previous consonant and is not pronounced as an extra syllable. These are examples:
moved, returned, stayed, studied, married, raised, engaged, traveled.
And finally, if the verb base ends in a ‘t’ or ‘d’ sound already, then the ‘–ed’ ending sounds like “id” or “ud”. That is, it is pronounced as an extra syllable. For example,
started , graduated, visited, separated, dated, attended.
Consonant dropping in clusters
The above grammar particles in some situations create consonant clusters. Consonant clusters are two or more consonants next to each other in a word. Pronouncing consonant clusters can be challenging, even for English natives. While we should try to pronounce them all, in some situations it is also acceptable to omit one of the consonants.
When there are three or more consonants in a row at the end of a syllable, the middle one can be dropped in most cases. The first and the last consonant may not be dropped. This is especially the case when the last one is a grammar particle: without the particle, the sentence will not make sense. The dropping of the middle consonant sound happens most often when the middle consonant is a stop (/p, b, t, d, k, g/). For example,
hands /hænz/
tests /tɛsts/ or /tɛs/
asked /æskt/ or /æst/
camped /kæmt/
With the /nθs/ consonant cluster, as in the word ‘months’ we can just omit the /θ/ sound. We should not omit the final /s/ since it is a necessary grammar particle. So we can say ‘mons.’
months /mʌnθs/ or /mʌns/
sixths /sɪksθs/ or /sɪks/
twelfths /lfθs/ or /lfs/
thousandths /ndθs/ or /nz/
The same is true with /ðz/. We can omit /ð/, but not /z/. For example, “clothes” can be pronounced /kloʊz/. When /ð/ is omitted, ‘clothes’ and ‘close can become homophones
Pre-fortis clipping
In American English, the length of vowel sound is not an intrinsic feature of a vowel. Rather the length is determined by the neighboring sounds. Specifically, the length is shorter before a voiceless consonant and longer before voiced sound. This phenomenon, in linguistics, is called pre-fortis clipping. The term ‘fortis’ amounts to voiceless sound and ‘clipping’ means shortening. So, ‘pre-fortis clipping’ means the shortening of vowel sound before voiceless consonants. For example, the vowel in bad (/bæd/) is much longer than the vowel in bat (/bæt/). This change in vowel duration subtly helps listeners of English to determine which sound was spoken.
Compare the following sentences.
He hit me
He hid me
I have a big pen.
I have a Bic pen.
The vowel sounds of ‘hit’ and ‘Bic’ are shorter than those of ‘hid’ and ‘big’ due to the pre-fortis clipping.
These are examples of minimal pairs where two words differ only in the voicing of the ending sound: one is voiced, and the other is not voiced. For this reason, they differ in vowel length.
Minimal pairs for pre-fortis clipping
phase face
buzz bus
save safe
leave leaf
Ms miss
eyes ice
sing sink
felled felt
lab lap
made mate
said set
lied light
bold bolt
whirs worse
laws loss
pained paint
knead neat
ones once
falls false
Now that we have examined the three criteria for consonant classification, we are ready to study individual consonant phoneme sounds. Like vowels, consonants that are pronounced by the same manner or at proximal distance can sound similar and thus can be difficult to discern. So in this course we focus on groups of sounds that are similar in some aspects. We begin with plosives.
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