25. The phonemic status of English diphthongs and triphthongs

Are the English diphthongs and triphthongs monophonemic (UK) or biphonemic (US) combinations?

Criteria for diphthongs:

- articulatory indivisibility (one articulatory effort);

- morphological indivisibility (impossible to separate a nucleus and a glide by a morpheme boundary);

- syllabic indivisibility (no syllabic boundary);

- duration (the same length as that of a long monophthong).

Criteria for triphthongs:

- articulatory and syllabic (a point of syllable division between the glide [i] or [u] and the following vowel [ə], which is effected by a decrease in the force of articulation and the intensity of sound at the end of the glide [i] or [u] and by a fresh increase in the force of articulation and intensity at the beginning of [ə]).;

- morphological (in some cases there's no boundary).

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26. The unstressed vocalism of the English language

Unstressed vocalism is a definite system formed by the vowels occurred in unstressed syllables.

V in an unstressed syllable is shorter, weaker, and less distinct, i.e. reduced, or obscured. Reduction is the weakening of a sound due to a decrease in the tenseness of the speech organs resulting in the loss of some essential characteristics by the sound (final stage - zero reduction).

1. Core of the unstressed vocalism - neutral vowel phoneme (schwa). May be oppesed to other unstressed vowels and to the diphthong [oʋ] (temper-tempo).

2. (Ward) Semi-weak vowels (Vs that lie in an intermediate position between the strong vowels and the neutral /ə/ ).

In rapid colloquial style – [fə`netiks].

In a more careful style of speech – [ fo`netiks].

In full style – [foʋ`netiks].

(Torsuyev) Semi-weak Vs are products of partial reduction: [e], [æ], [a:], [ɒ], [ɔ:], [з:], [oʋ] (collect - [kɒᵊ`lekt]).

3. Vs of full formation (used in all styles): [i:, i, u, ʋ, ɔi]. Vowels of constantly full formation are also used in some structural words which have no weak forms: on [ɒn], not [nɒt].

Vowel gradation - certain alternations between stressed and unstressed vowels in different derivatives from the same root, or in different grammatical forms of the same word, or in different allomorphs of the same morpheme.

Tendencies:

- practically any V of FF may alternate with shwa: man [mæn] – postman [poʋstmən];

- [i:] with [i]: compete [kəm`pi:t] – competition [,kɒmpi`tiʃn];

- [e] with [i]: definite [`definit] – define [di`fain];

- [ei] with [i]: day [dei] – Sunday [`sʌndi].

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27. Accommodation and reduction of English vowels

Reduction is shortening or weakening of vowel sound in unstressed positions, determined by the position of a vowel, the stress structure of a word or the tempo of speech:

- quantitative (decrease of vowel quantity when its length is shortened under the influence of: sentence stress, position in a word: knee - need - neat);

- qualitative (loss of vowel quality under the influence of word and sentence stress: analyze ['ænƏlaiz] – analysis [Ə'nælisis]);

- qualitative + quantitative (in unstressed form-words: to).

Non-reduced unstressed vowels are often retained in compound words and borrowings.

Nasalization before or after [n, m]: man, can.

A fully back variant of vowel becomes slightly advanced after the sonorant [j] (noon – new)

Dark [l] makes a preceding vowel a bit more open (smell, tell – test)

Positional length, e.g. knee-need-neat.

Zero reduction:

- in notional words within a sequence of unstressed syllables (history ['histƏri] -> ['histri]);

- in notional words within unstressed syllables preceding the stressed one (correct [kƏ'rekt] -> [k'rekt]);

- in unstressed form words within a phrase (Has he done it? [hæz hi˙ 'dɅn it] -> [z i 'dɅn it]).

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