1. Фонетика як наука та її галузі. Фонетика і фонологія (Phonetics as a science and its branches. Phonetics and phonology)

Phonetics is the science which studies the characteristics of human sound-making, especially those sounds used in speech, and provides methods for their description, classification and transcription.

Three traditional branches of the subject are generally recognized:

1) articulatory phonetics is the study of the way speech sounds are made (‘articulated’) by the vocal organs;

2) acoustic phonetics studies the physical properties of speech sound, as transmitted between mouth and ear;

3) auditory phonetics studies the perceptual response to speech sounds, as mediated by ear, auditory nerve and brain.

The fourth branch – functional phonetics – is concerned with the range and function of sounds in specific languages. It is typically referred to as phonology.

Phonetics is the study of how speech sounds are made, transmitted, and received, i.e. phonetics is the study of all possible speech sounds. The human vocal apparatus can produce a wide range of sounds; but only a small number of them are used in a language to construct all of its words and utterances.

Phonology is the study of those segmental (speech sound types) and prosodic (intonation) features which have a differential value in the language. It studies the way in which speakers systematically use a selection of units – phonemes or intonemes – in order to express meaning. It investigates the phonetic phenomena from the point of view of their use.

The primary aim of phonology is to discover the principles that govern the way that sounds are organized in languages, to determine which phonemes are used and how they pattern – the phonological structure of a language. The properties of different sound systems are then compared, and hypotheses developed about the rules underlying the use of sounds in particular groups of languages, and in all the languages – phonological universals. Phonology also solves:

a) the problem of the identification of the phonemes of a language;

b) the problem of the identification of the phoneme in a particular word, utterance. It establishes the system of phonemes and determines the frequency of occurrence in syllables, words, utterances. The distribution and grouping of phonemes and syllables in words are dealt with an area of phonology which is called phonotactics.

People engaged in the study of phonetics are known as phoneticians (фонетисти). People engaged in the study of phonology are known phonologists (фонологи).

Phonetics is a biological science which investigates the sound-production aspect. Contemporary phoneticians hold the view that form and function cannot be separated and treat phonology as a linguistic branch of phonetics.

2. Використання мови в усній вербальній комунікації (Language use in oral verbal communication)

Language teachers are expected to know:

1) how oral speech is produced for successful verbal communication;

2) what language resources are used;

3) how they function to create a particular linguistic meaning.

Verbal communication is the process of transmitting a verbal message from a sender/ speaker/addressor to a receiver/listener/addressee, through a channel/medium.

For sending messages the communicators use a code: “any systems of signals used for sending messages. The senders are said to encode the message and the receivers to decode it”. Encoding is a process of putting the speaker’s thoughts, feelings, emotions, attitudes into a form recognizable by the listeners. The encoded message is then transmitted via a particular channel to a listener.

Typically in verbal communication the communicators use a verbal code – language and a system of nonverbal codes (body language, touch and spatial behaviour, appearance, etc.). Language as a code consists of the following resources: a lexicon/ vocabulary, grammar and a phonology. It exists in its two material forms: oral and written. Oral language form has its sound/phonic material substance, and written language form -graphic. When language is used for verbal communication the communicators 1) apply language skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing); 2) to put their knowledge of language resources (phonology, grammar and vocabulary) into action; 3) produce a discourse.

A discourse is a continuous stretch of language – oral or written – which has been produced as the result of an act of communication. Within the framework of theory of phonetics, we will focus on the analysis of oral discourse, namely phonic form of language.