UNIVERSITY ON THE NIGER

COMMUNICATION IN ENGLISH 1
GST 111

By
Edadi Ilem Ukam, Ph.D.
Kalu Mba Idika, Ph.D.
 THE SOUND SYSTEM OF ENGLISH
Learning Objectives
At the end of the topic, students should be able to:

1. Define speech sounds, vowels, consonants, stress and intonation

2. Differentiate between vowels and consonants, and between stress and
intonation.
3. Classify vowels and consonants.

4. Draw the vowel and consonant charts.

5. Place stress and intonation appropriately in their spoken English.

 The Sound System of English: An Overview
SPEECH SOUNDS

Speech sounds, are different from other sounds made by humans: singing, chewing,
shouting, laughing, and so on. Other sounds such as the rotation of fans, the sound of
vehicles and generators, the barking of dogs, the chattering of monkeys and the
mewing of cats, among others, are not, as a matter of fact, speech sounds because there
is no inherent sound-meaning association generated from them.

In the words of Onuigbo (1996, p. 1), speech sounds are language sounds which are
associated and accompanied with meaning when heard by humans.

The speech sounds of English are the segments (vowels and consonants) and
nonsegments or suprasegments (stress and intonation), which when properly combined
together in the order of the convention of a language, form meaningful utterances.
 The Sound System of English: An Overview
(contd)
Many second language learners of English do not know that there are differences
between the letters of the alphabet and the sounds: they speak the language
following the letters without noticing that there is no one-to-one relationship
between English letters and sounds. However, there are differences between
them, and one must know the differences so as to appropriately pronounce English
words and sentences.

One sound may represent many letter symbols as in the long vowel
/i:/ in words like
‘be’,
‘see’,
‘peak’,
‘foetus’,
‘machine’
 The Sound System of English: An Overview
(contd)
And one letter may also represent as my sounds as possible. The letter ‘a’ can be
pronounced as:
/ɪ/ as in the word ‘village’,
/e/ as in ‘many’
/ɒ/ as in ‘want’
/æ/ as in ‘mat’
/eɪ/ as in ‘gale’
Having a knowledge of the vowels and consonants, on the one hand, and stress
and intonation, on the other, will help the learner to speak the language correctly.
 CHARACTERISTICS OF SPEECH SOUNDS
For a sound to be recognised as a speech sound, it needs to satisfy the following
conditions:

• Speech sounds are only made by human beings. This means that only humans
produce speech sounds; other sounds produced by other living creatures are not
characterised as speech sounds.

• All speech sounds are produced using the vocal organs (or articulators) such as the
teeth, lips, palate, velum, trachea, nose, tongue and mouth. These processes do not
include other possible human noises like clapping of hands.

• Speech sounds are articulated, that is, the human organs of speech can be opened,
narrowed or completely closed, touching each other in order to produce a particular
sound. These articulatory behaviours or manifestations do not involve other human
noises like laughing, crying, coughing, shouting, and many others.
ORGANS OF SPEECH
 THE VOWEL SOUNDS
A vowel is a speech sound, which when produced, results in the vibration of vocal
cords, although without audible friction. In producing the vowel sounds, therefore,
there is usually no contact between the organs; as such there is free flow of air without
obstruction.

The egresive air from the lungs goes out freely without obstruction of air by any of the
organs in the mouth.

Even though the lips will be rounded, forming a circle as if they want to touch each
other, the roundness does not make both of them to touch each other so as to obstruct
the flow of air from the lungs.

And no matter how the tongue, the most moveable organ, rises, it does not, by any
means, touch any of the organs in a way that it will also obstruct the airstream.
 THE VOWEL SOUNDS (contd)
It may be necessary and interesting to know that all the vowel sounds in English
are voiced and oral. They are voiced because there is always vibration of the vocal
cords when they are pronounced; and they are oral because they are all produced
through the oral cavity. None of the vowel sounds can be articulated through the
nose as with some consonants such as / m, n, ŋ /.

The place of vowel in the syllable structure is equally very important. The vowel is
the nucleus of the English syllable, and that is probably why it is sometimes
referred to as the peak of prominence. As the peak of prominence, therefore, the
vowel is the obligatory element of the English syllable structure
 TYPES OF VOWELS
According to Onuigbo (1996) and Ukam (2020), vowel sounds are grouped into
two main types:
1. The monophthongs
2. The diphthongs.

You should note that other authorities (like Eka, 1996; Roach, 2009) have grouped
the vowels into three, thereby including the third type called triphthongs.

For us, we shall only discuss the first two here, since the triphthongs, according to
Ukam (2020), have only “one peculiar characteristic: all moving or gliding towards
the direction of the schwa, a weak central vowel /ə/” (pp. 45-6).
 TYPES OF VOWELS (cont)
MONOPHTHONGS
The term mono means one. A monophthong, also known as pure vowels, therefore,
is a vowel with only one unchanging quality, that is, there is no movement of one
vowel quality to another as done with the diphthongs. The monophthongs are
further classified into two:
The monophthongs are described as pure vowels because the organs of speech
used in their articulation stay in the same position from the beginning of their
production till their completion.
1. short vowels: / ɪ, e, æ, ɒ, ʊ, ʌ, ə /.
2. long vowels:: / i:, a:, ɔ:, u:, ɜː /.
While the short vowels are relatively short in their production, the long vowels are
relatively long in their production.
 TYPES OF VOWELS (cont)
DIPHTHONGS
The term diphthong means “double sounds”. Therefore, diphthongs, also known as
impure vowels, deal with a situation where the tongue glides or moves uninterruptedly
from one vowel quality to another different vowel quality altogether.

Technically speaking, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets or vowels, yet both
result to one vowel: it involves a gliding movement from one vowel to another within a
single syllable (Ladefoged, 2006, p. 39). The diphthongs of English are:

/ eɪ, aɪ, ɔɪ, əʊ, aʊ, ɪə, eə, ʊə )

Of the 44 English sounds, 20 are vowels. Of the 20 vowel sounds, 12 are monophthongs,
while eight are diphthongs.
VOWEL CHART
DIPHTHONG CHART
DIPHTHONG CHART (contd)
 TYPES OF VOWELS (contd)
S/N Vowel Words in which the Vowels Occur
Sound
Monophthongs
1 /i:/ ‘peak’ /pi:t/, ‘seat’ /si:t/, ‘weep’ /wi:p/

2 /ɪ/ ‘bin’ /bɪn/, ‘tip’ /tɪp/, ‘village’ /vɪlɪdʒ/

3 /e/ ‘pen’ /pen/, ‘many’ /menɪ/, ‘said’ /sed/

4 /æ/ ‘cat’ /kæt/, ‘plait’ /plæt/, ‘shall’ /ʃæl/

5 /a:/ ‘park’ /pa:t/, ‘plant’ /pla:nt/, ‘heart’ /ha:t/

6 /ɒ/ ‘pot’ /pɒt/, ‘cough’ /kɒf/, ‘want’ /wɒt/

 TYPES OF VOWELS (contd)
S/N Vowel Words in which the Vowels Occur
Sound
Monophthongs
7 /ɔ:/ ‘tall’ /tɔ:l/, ‘bought’ /bɔ:t/, ‘naught’ /nɔ:t/

8 /ʊ/ ‘foot’ /fʊt/, ‘woman’ /wʊmən/, ‘could’ /kʊd/

9 /u:/ ‘food’ /fu:d/, ‘beauty’ /bju:tɪ/, ‘chew’ /tʃuː/

10 /ʌ/ ‘son’ /sʌn/, ‘blood’ /blʌd/, ‘young’ /jʌŋ/

11 /ɜ/ ‘third’ /θɜːd/, ‘first’ /fɜːst/, ‘church’ /tʃɜːtʃ/

12 /ə/ ‘about’ /əbaʊt/, ‘teacher’ /ti:tʃə/, ‘famous’ /feɪməs/

 TYPES OF VOWELS (contd)
S/N Vowel Words in which the Vowels Occur
Sound

Diphthongs
13 /eɪ/ ‘gate’ /geɪt/, ‘again’ /əgeɪn/, ‘say’ /seɪ/
14 /aɪ / ‘time’ /taɪm/, ‘spice’ /spaɪs/, ‘eye’ /aɪ/
15 /ɔɪ/ ‘toil’ /tɔɪl/, ‘boy’ /bɔɪ/, ‘soil’ /sɔɪ/
16 /əʊ/ ‘go’ /gəʊ/, ‘home’ /həʊm/, ‘slow’ /sləʊ/
17 /aʊ/ ‘cow’ /kaʊ/, ‘house’ /haʊs/, ‘fowl’ /faʊl/
18 /ɪə/ ‘ear’ /ɪə/, ‘beer’ /bɪə/, ‘fear’ /fɪə/
19 /eə/ ‘air’ /eə/, ‘bear’ /beə/, ‘tear’ /teə/
20 /ʊə/ ‘tour’ /tʊə/, ‘fuel’ /fjʊəl/, ‘sure’ /ʃʊə/
 Classification of Vowel Sounds
It is important to note that, like the consonants, there are some parameters used in
describing the vowel sounds of English. There are:

a. The jaw opening

b. The position of the tongue

c. The shape of the lips

d. The height to which the tongue is raised

e. The muscular tenseness of the tongue

 Classification of Vowel Sounds (contd)
These parameters in Example (5) help to easily identify how each vowel is to be
pronounced.

• The jaw opening tells the amount of the opening or closing of the jaw. The jaw
is the bony structure that holds our teeth. When the tongue is raised to the teeth,
we produce close vowels; when the tongue is lowered, we produce open vowels;
when the jaw is at neutral position, we produce half-close and half-open vowels.

• The position of the tongue helps us to know which vowel is produced at the
front, central or back of the tongue. If the tongue is extended to the mouth, we
produce front vowels; if the tongue retracts backward, we produce back vowels;
if the tongue is neutral, we produce central vowels.
 Classification of Vowel Sounds (contd)
• The shape of the lips can change according to the nature of the vowel
being produced. It is rounded for all back vowels except /a:/, but neutral or
unrounded in front and central vowels including /a:/. You can observe it by
holding the extreme edges of your lips

• The height to which the tongue is raised shows that in the process of
pronouncing the English vowels, the tongue, an active articulator, can be
raised to different heights and directions for the pronunciation of different
vowels. But no matter the level of the rise, however, the tongue does not
rise to make contact with other articulators like the hard palate, the soft
palate, the alveolar ridge, among others, as done with the consonants.

• The muscular tenseness of the tongue describes the vowel that is long and
the other that is short.
THANK YOU FOR LISTENING