Page 127 - DENG504_LINGUISTICS

Unit 10: Phonemes: Detailed Study

10.3 Some Major Concepts of Phonology Notes

10.3.1 Phoneme

Most linguists, until recently at least, have regarded the phoneme as one of the basic units of language.
But they have not all defined the phonemes in the same way. Some linguists like Bloomfied and
Daniel Jones have described phonemes in purely physical terms. Others like Sapir have preferred
psychological definitions. Some regard the phoneme only as abstractional fictitious unity and argue
that in a language it is not phonemes but allophones that exist in reality. Furthermore, linguists of the
Copenhagen School treat the phonemes as glassemes and regard them as algebraical units.
The term phoneme was first used in the late 1870’s notably by Kruszewski. Saussure too worked on
the phonemes. But the most notable work in this field was done by Sapir in 1927. Most phoneticians
such as Louis Jhelmslev, Bloomfield, Trubetzkoy, Daniel Jones, Roman Jakobson, and Pike have
thrown light on the phoneme.
The phoneme, according to Bloomfield, is the minimal unit of distinctive sound-feature. In Webster’s
Third New International, the phoneme is defined as the smallest unit of speech distinguishing one unit
from another, in all the variations it displays in the speech of one person or in one dialect as a result
of modifying influences, such as neighbouring sounds or stress. In Dorfman’s opinion a phoneme is
a single speech sound or group of similar or related speech sounds functioning analogously in a
language, and usually represented in writing by the same letter, with or without diacritic marks.
According to most contemporary linguists, however, the phoneme is the minimal bundle of relevant
sound features. A phoneme is not a sound; it can be realized only through one of its allophones: it is
a class of sounds, actualized or realized in a different way in any given position by its representative,
the allophone: it is an ideal towards which the speaker strives, while the allophone is the performance
he achieves; it occupies an area within which the various allophones move and operate; its outer
limits may approach but not overlap those of other phonemes, and it cannot invade the territory of
another phoneme without loss of phonemic distinction.
Thus the precise definition of a phoneme has been the subject of much discussion among linguists
and there are two major points of view. The first is the ‘classification’ theory developed by Daniel
Jones which considers the phoneme to be a group or family of related sounds, e.g./p/ in English
consisting of [p], [p ], etc. or /u/ consisting of (u:), (u) etc. The second or ‘distinctive feature’ theory
h
developed by N.S. Turbetzkoy and the Prague School considers a phoneme to be a bundle of distinctive
features, e.g. /p/ in English is considered to be made up of bilabial + stop + voiceless (aspiration is
h
therefore not distinctive and thus the allophones (p ) and (p) above are allowed for.
Depending on the point of view taken, a phoneme can be defined as “a unit, a rubric, a bundle of
sound-features”, or “the smallest contrastive linguistic unit which may bring about a change of
meaning. “Hence it is a minimum distinct functional unit. Phonemes of a language may be discovered
by forming minimal pairs, i.e. pairs of words are different in respect of only one sound segment. The
series of words pat, bat, cat, hat, sat, that, mat, supplies us with seven words which are distinguished
simply by a change in the first (consonantal) element of the sound sequence. These elements of
contrastive significance are phonemes and be symbolized as /p,b,k,h,s,ð,m/. Similarly, in the series
of words hat, hit, heat, hot, heart, the elements of contrastive significance are æ,i,i:,o,a:/
10.3.2 Phone
Any objective speech sound, considered as a physical event, and without regard as to how it fits into
the structure of any given language, is a phone. Hence a phone in phonology is ‘the smallest possible
segment of sound abstracted from the continuum of speech’.
10.3.3 Allophone

Some sounds, the native speaker thinks are the same, while others are different. The linguist has to
figure out what sounds are grouped together as the same, what it is that they all have in common
among themselves and how dissimilar are they to other groups of sound in the informant’s speech

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 121