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Theoretical Framework A. Consonants

This document provides an overview of consonant sounds from an articulatory, auditory, and acoustic perspective. It defines consonants and describes their classification according to place and manner of articulation. The places of articulation discussed are bilabial, labiodental, dental, alveolar, palato-alveolar, palatal, velar, glottal, and labiovelar. The manners of articulation covered are plosives, fricatives, affricates, laterals, nasals, and approximants. A table reviews the places and manners of articulation for English consonants. The document also distinguishes between mistakes and errors in language learning and indicates the study will focus on mistakes

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Diego Cabezas
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149 views

Theoretical Framework A. Consonants

This document provides an overview of consonant sounds from an articulatory, auditory, and acoustic perspective. It defines consonants and describes their classification according to place and manner of articulation. The places of articulation discussed are bilabial, labiodental, dental, alveolar, palato-alveolar, palatal, velar, glottal, and labiovelar. The manners of articulation covered are plosives, fricatives, affricates, laterals, nasals, and approximants. A table reviews the places and manners of articulation for English consonants. The document also distinguishes between mistakes and errors in language learning and indicates the study will focus on mistakes

Uploaded by

Diego Cabezas
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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1.

Theoretical Framework
a. Consonants
As it has been stated in the previous sections all speech sounds, including consonants, can
be described from an articulatory, auditorily and acoustically point of view. From an
articulatory level, a consonant has been defined as a point in the constantly changing
stream of speech (Abercrombie, 1967:42). Vocal folds are important in this process since
they determine whether consonant sounds are voiced or voiceless. The former are produced
with vibration of the vocal folds and the latest are produced with the vocal folds wide open
so that only breaths get through (Finch & Ortiz, X: 14).

b. Classification of consonants
Consonants can be classified according to the place and manner of this obstruction.
I)

Places of articulation:

Place of

Description

Consonants

articulation
Bilabial

it is produced with the upper lip and the /p/, /b/, /m/, /w/

Labiodental

lower lip
it is formed with the upper teeth and inner /f/, /v/

Dental

lower tip
it is produced with the tip of the tongue //, //
near the surface of the upper teeth

Alveolar

It is realized with the tongue tip on or near /t/, /d/, /n/, /s/, /z/, /l/, /r/
the tooth ridge

Palato-alveolar

It is produced with the blade and alveolar //, //, //, //


ridge, accompanied by a rising of the front
of the tongue towards the hard palate.

Palatal

It is formed with the tongue on or near the /j/

Velar

hard palate.
It is realized with the back of the tongue or /k/, /g/, //
near the soft palate

Glottal

The space between the vocal folds is called /h/


glottis, and the sound produced here by air
passing through the vocal folds is called

Labiovelar

glottal.
This is a special case since it is considered /w/
a semivowel.

II)
Manner of articulation:
In order to produce sounds we have to produce obstructions in the vocal tract. If the vocal
folds vibrate, we will hear sounds defined as voicing or phonation. The air pressure that
goes through the vocal folds can have diverse realizations which differentiate from each
other in terms of intensity, frequency and quality. According to Finch & Ortiz, X:x. English
consonants can be classified according to their manner of articulation according to the
following characteristics:
Plosives: When an active articulator gets in contact with a passive one forming a
stricture closure of air flow and then a sudden explosion when this air is released,
we are dealing with a plosive consonant. In the English language six plosives

consonants can be identified.


Fricatives: it is produced when an articulator makes a sound like friction.
Affricates: An affricate sound is formed by the interaction of a plosive and a

fricative.
Laterals: It happens when the air escapes laterally over the sides of the tongue.

Nasals: A nasal sound is formed when the velum is lowered and a total closure is

produced somewhere in the mouth, so that the air escapes from the nose.
Approximants and semi-vowels: It is produced when the articulators are too pen to
cause any friction.

A review of the places and manners of articulation of English Consonants are displayed in
the following table:

Place
Labial

Labiodental

Dental

Alveolar

Alaveopalatal

Platal

Velar

Glottal

Manner
Stop
voiceless
voiced

k
d

Nasal
Voiceless
voiced

Fricative
voiceless

voiced

Affricate
Voiceless

voiced

Approximant
Voiceless
voiced

Lateral
voiceless
voiced

Mistakes
The process of learning a second language implies making mistakes. These erroneous
assumptions are important in this process since they are used to obtain feedback which
allows the learner to make new attempts that consequently approximate desired aims.
For the sake of completeness, it is necessary to make a distinction between mistakes and
errors. The term mistake, can be defined as "a performance error that is either a random
guess or a slip, in that it is a failure to utilize a known system correctly." (Brown,
1994:205). In simple words, native and non native speakers can make mistakes due to a
temporary imperfection in the process of producing speech. Mistakes can be self- corrected
whereas an error, on the other hand, cannot.
For the purpose of our investigation, the term mistake is considered the most appropriate
since, as we are going to see in the next sections, our study is based on teachers who have
already passed English Phonetics courses.
Reference
2. Brown, H. D. 1994. Principles of language learning and teaching, 3rd ed.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents.


Methodological Frame:
Justification: The first thing that needs to be pointed out is that this
investigation aroused from our own experience as EFL teachers. However, we
have noticed that in spite of having studied English syllabuses for 3 years
containing both Phonetics and Phonology back at university, the majority of our
Chilean colleagues and certainly ourselves still sound foreign.
For this reason we have decided to carry out a comparative study between two
models of pronunciation. One of them produced by a group of X EFL teachers

with X years of experience working in public schools and the other produced by
the same number of EFL teachers who have just finished their phonetics and
phonologies courses. The main objective of this study is to determine if we can
lose phonetics abilities with time. And if it is so, how much do you lose in
comparison with a just graduated EFL teacher.

Hypothesis:
EFL teachers can lose their phonetics abilities with time

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