The syllabic structure in English
Theories on syllable formation and division.
The structure of syllables in English. Open and closed syllables.
Syllable division.
Functions of the syllable.
1. Speech can be broken into minimal pronounceable units into which sounds show a tendency to cluster or group. These smallest phonetic groups are called syllables. Syllables form morphemes, words and phrases. Each of these units is characterized by a certain syllabic structure. Thus a meaningful language unit phonetically may be considered from the point of view of syllable formation and syllable division.
The syllable like a phoneme can be studied on four levels - articulatory, acoustic, auditory andfunctional. The complexity of the phenomenon gave rise to many theories:
1. Expiratory (chest pulse or pressure) theory by R.H. Stetson. It is based on the assumption that expiration in speech is a pulsating process and each syllable should correspond to a single expiration. So the number of syllables in an utterance is determined by the number of expirations made in the production of the utterance. This theory was strongly criticized by Russian and foreign linguists. G.P. Torsuyev, for example, wrote that in a phrase a number of words and consequently a number of syllables can be pronounced with a single expiration. This fact makes the validity of the theory doubtful.
2. The sonority theory put forward by O. Jespersen. According to him, each sound is characterized by a certain degree of sonority which is understood as acoustic property of a sound that determines its perceptibility. According to this sound property a ranking of speech sounds could be established: <the least sonorous> voiceless plosives à voiced fricatives àvoiced plosives à voiced fricatives à sonorants à close vowels àopen vowels <the most sonorous>. In the word plant for example we may use the following wave of sonority: [pla:nt]. According to V.A. Vasssilyev the most serious drawback of this theory is that it fails to explain the actual mechanism of syllable formation and syllable division. Besides, the concept of sonority is not very clearly defined.
3. The theory of muscular tension by LV. Shcherba (Russian linguistics). In most languages there is the syllabic phoneme in the centre of the syllable which is usually a vowel phoneme or, in some languages, a sonorant. The phonemes preceding or following the syllabic peak are called marginal. The tense of articulation increases within the range of prevocalic consonants and then decreases within the range of postvocalic consonants.
4. Loudness theory by Russian linguist and psychologist N.I. Zhinkin which seems to combine both production and perception levels. So the syllable is the arc f loudness which correlates with the arc of articulatory effort on the speed production level since variations in loudness are due to the work of all speech mechanisms.
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It is perfectly obvious that no phonetician has succeeded so far in giving an adequate explanation of what the syllable is. The difficulties seem to arise from the various possibilities of approach to the unit. There exist two points of view:
1. Sme linguists consider the syllable to be a purely articulatory unit which lacks any functional value. This point of view is defended on the ground that the boundaries of syllables do not always coincide with those of morphemes.
2. However the majority of linguists treat the syllable as the smallest pronounceable unit which can reveal some linguistic function.
Trying to define the syllable from articulatory point of view we may talk about universals. When we mean the functional aspect of the syllable it should be defined with the reference to the structure of one particular language.
The definition of the syllable from the functional point of view tends to single out the following features of the syllable:
a) a syllable is a chain of phonemes of varying length;
b) a syllable is constructed on the basis of contrast of its constituents (which is usually of vowel - consonant type);
c) the nucleus of a syllable is a vowel, the presence of consonants is optional; there are no languages in which vowels are not used as syllable nuclei, however, there are languages in which this function is performed by consonants;
d) the distribution of phonemes in the syllabic structure follows by the rules which are specific enough for a particular language.
2. Syllable formation in English is based on the phonological opposition vowel - consonant. Vowels are usually syllabic while consonants are not with the exceptions of [l], [m], [n], which become syllabic in a final position preceded by a noise consonant: bottle [bσtl], bottom [bσtm], button [b/\tn] and [r] (in those accents which pronounce [r]) perhaps [præps].
The structure of English syllables can be summarized as follows:
Many syllables have one or more consonants preceding the nucleus. These make upthe syllable onset: me, so, plow.
Many syllables have one or more consonants, following the nucleus. They make up the syllable coda. They are traditionally known as closed syllables: cat, jump.
The combination of nucleus and coda has a special significance, making up the rhyming property of a syllable.
There are six different kinds of syllables in English:
1. Closed Syllables: A closed syllable has one and only one vowel, and it ends in a consonant. Examples include in, ask, truck, sock, stretch, twelfth, and on.
2. Open Syllables: An open syllable has one and only one vowel, and that vowel occurs at the end of the syllable. Examples include no, she, I, a, and spry.
3. Silent-E Syllables: A silent-e syllable ends in an e, has one and only one consonant before that e, and has one and only one vowel before that consonant. Examples include ate, ice, tune, slope, strobe, and these.
4. Vowel Combination Syllables: A vowel combination syllable has a cluster of two or three vowels or a vowel-consonant unit with a sound or sounds particular to that unit. Examples include rain, day, see, veil, pie, piece, noise, toy, cue, and true.
5. Vowel-R Syllables: A vowel-r syllable is one which includes one and only one vowel followed by an r, or one vowel followed by an r which is followed by a silent e, or a vowel combination followed by an r. Examples include car, or, care, ire, air, and deer.
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6. Consonant-L-E Syllables: In these syllables, a consonant is followed by le. The vowel sound in these syllables is the schwa sound that occurs before the l. Examples include -ble, -cle, -dle, -fle, and -gle.
4. Now we shall consider two functions of the syllable.
The first is constitutive function. It lies in its ability to be a part of a word itself. The syllables form language units of greater magnitude that is words, morphemes, and utterances. It this respect two things should be emphasized. First, the syllable is the unit within which the relations between distinctive features ofphonemes and their acoustic correlates are revealed. Second, within a syllable (or syllables) prosodic characteristics of speech are realized, which form the stress pattern of a word and the intonation structure of an utterance. In sum, the syllable is a specific minimal structure of both segmental and suprasegmental features.
The other function is distinctive one. In this respect the syllable is characterized by its ability to differentiate words and word-forms. One minimal pare has been found in English to illustrate the word distinctive function in the syllabic: nitrate night-rate. There analogical distinction between word combinations can be illustrated by many more examples: an aim - a name; an ice house - a nice house, etc. Sometimes the difference in syllable division may be the basic ground for differentiation in such pairs as I saw her rise.- I saw her eyes; I saw the meat I saw them eat.
