Syllabic structure of English words

Chapter III

This chapter will be concerned with the syllable as a phonetic and phonological unit. We will attempt to show what is included into the notion of the syllable and what are the approaches to the problem of the syllable. Finally we will try to describe the essential characteristics of the English syllabic system with the aim of providing a useful piece of information on the subject for the would-be teachers of English.

It is generally known that speech is a continuum. However, it can be broken into minimal pronounceable units into which sounds show a tendency to cluster or group themselves. These smallest phonetic groups are generally given the name of syllables. Being the smallest pronounceable units, the syllables form language units of greater magnitude, that is morphemes, words and phrases. Each of these units is characterized by a certain syllabic structure. Consequently we might say that a meaningful language unit has two aspects: syllable formation and syllable divisipn which form a dialectical unity.

Before we look at the English syllable in detail let us consider a fairly general problem of the syllable. Here we should note that the study of the syllable has for a long time occupied an important place in linguistics as a field of theoretical investigation. Besides, a considerable body of experimental work has been done. But though phonetics has progressed far enough the problem of the. syllable is still an open question in phonetics.

It is necessary to mention that the syllable is a fairly complicated phenomenon and like the phoneme it can be studied on four levels: acoustic, articulatory, auditory and functional, which means that the syllable can be approached from different points of view. The severe complexity of the phenomenon gave rise to many theories. Let us consider some of the most current ones.

Talking about the analysis of articulatory or motor aspect of the syllable we could start with the so-called expiratory, or chest pulse or pressure theory which was experimentally based by R.H.Stetson (74). This theory is based on the assumption that expiration in speech is a pulsating process and each syllable should correspond to a single expiration so that the number of the syllables in an utterance is determined by the number of expirations made in the production of the utterance. This theory was strongly criticized by Soviet and foreign linguists. G.P.Torsuev, for example, writes that in a phrase a number of words and consequently syllables can be pronounced with a single expiration (31). This fact makes the validity of the pulse theory doubtful.

Another theory most often referred to is the theory of sylla-ble put forward by O.Jespersen. It is generally called the sonority theory and is based on the concept of sonority. According to O.Jespersen 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. This starts with the open vowels as the most sonorous, continues through the close vowels, the sonorants, the voiced fricatives, the voiced plosives, the voiceless fricatives and ends with the voiceless plosives as the least sonorous. In any sequence the most sonorous sounds tend to form the center of the syllable and the least sonorous — the marginal segments. Thus in the word plant, for example, the sequence passes from the minimally sonorous [p], through [1] with a greater degree of sonority to the maximum sonorous [a:]. It continues with decreasing sonority through [nj to a second minimum with [t]:

It is true that this principle seems to be very general but there are, on the other hand, syllables in many languages which contradict it. In terms of sonority variation a sequence such as an English [stops] stops should have three syllables instead of its actual one. According to V.A. Vassilyev, the most serious drawback of this theory is that it fails to explain the actual mechanism of syllable formation and syllable division (79). Besides, the concept of sonority with which the theory operates is not very clearly defined, which makes it still less consistent.

Further experimental work aimed at the description of the syllable as a phonetic phenomenon resulted in a lot of other theories, such as F. de Saussure's theory, the theory of the Rumanian linguist A Rosetti, and the theory of the Czech linguist B.Hala. The existence of such a variety of approaches to the problem of the syllable means that it is not an easy matter to describe it. That is why the theories referred to above are unable to explain more than a restricted aspect of the phenomenon, for example, the sonority theory accounts only for perceptibility of sounds, the pulse theory takes into consideration only the force of expiration, etc. Summarizing we could state that the question of articulatory (or physiological) mechanism of syllable formation is still an open question in phonetics. We might suppose that this mechanism is similar in all languages and could be regarded as phonetic and physiological universal.

In Soviet linguistics there has been adopted the theory of the syllable sketched in & very general way by L.V.Shcherba (40). It is called the theory of muscular tension. The point is that in most languages there is a syllabic phoneme in the centre of the syllable which is usually a vowel phoneme or, in some languages, a sono-rant. The phonemes preceding or following the syllable peak are called marginal. The energy, that is the tension of articulation, increases within the range of prevocalic consonants and then decreases within the range of postvocalic consonants. Therefore the syllable can be defined as an arc of articulatory (or muscular) tension.

It is worth noticing that the theory has been modified by V.A.Vassilyev (79). The point is that the syllable like any other pronounceable unit can be characterized by three physical pa-rame'ters: pitch, intensity and length. Within the range of the syllable these parameters vary from minimum on the prevocalic consonants to maximum on the centre of the syllable, then there is another decrease within the postvocalic consonants. So the conclusion follows: if we take into consideration the tension of articulation and the above-mentioned acoustic data on the speech production level the syllable can be treated as an arc of articulatory effort, for example:

Up till now we have spoken about theories which try to define the syllable on either of the two levels of production or perception. The Soviet linguist and psychologist N.I.Zhinkin has sug gested the so-called loudness theory which seems to combine both levels (15). The experiments carried out by N.I.Zhinkin showed that the arc of loudness on perception level is formed due to variations of the volume of pharyngeal passage which is modified by contraction of its walls. The narrowing of the passage and the increase in muscular tension which results from it reinforce the actual loudness of a vowel thus forming the peak of the syllable. So according to this theory the syllable'could be thought of as the arc of loudness which correlates with the arc of articulatory effort on the speech production level since variations in loudness are due to the work of all the speech mechanisms.

It is perfectly obvious that the syllable is by no means a simple concept. No phonetician has succeeded so far in giving an exhaustive and adequate explanation of what the syllable is. The difficulties seem to arise from the various possibilities of approach to the unit. We could say there exist two points of view:

1) Some linguists consider the syllable to be a purely articulatory unit which lacks any functional value. This point of view is defended on the grounds that the boundaries of the syllable do not always coincide with those of the morphemes.

2) However the majority of linguists treat the syllable as the smallest pronounceable unit which can reveal some linguistic function.

We should note here that while trying to detine the syllable from articulatory point of view we may talk about universals, that is categories applicable for all languages. When we mean the functional aspect of the syllable it should be defined with reference to the structure of one particular language rather than in general terms with universal application because, as A.C.Gim-son points out, it may be found appropriate to divide a similar sound sequence differently in different languages (57).

The definition of the syllable from the functional point of view existing in modern linguistics 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);

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 the rules which are specific enough for a particular language.

Syllable formation in English is based on the phonological opposition vowel — consonant. Vowels are usually syllabic while consonants are not, with the exception of [1], [m], [n], which become syllabic if they occur in an unstressed final position preceded by a noise consonant, for example ['litl] little, ['blosam] blossom, ['ga:dn] garden.

The structure of the syllable is known to vary because of the number and the arrangement of consonants. In English there are distinguished four types of syllables.

a) open пзи]

b) closed Dd]

c) covered [nsut]

d) uncovered зи], [suk

It should be pointed out here that due to its structure the English language has developed the closed type of syllable as the fundamental one while in Russian it is the open type that forms the basis of syllable formation. The number of syllable varieties from the point of view of their structure is 23. The structure of the English syllable reveals variations in the number of pre-vocalic consonants from 1 to 3 and post-vocalic consonants from 1 to 5.

As to the number of syllables in the English word it can vary from one to eight, for example [1слт] come, ['siti] city, [Taemili] family; [sim'phsiti] simplicity, [Чп'паг1/эгэ11] unnaturally, ['inkDm,pa5ti'biliti] incompatibility, ['Aiun.telK&i'biliti] unintelligi-bility.

So far we have described some of the aspects of syllabic structure of English. As was mentioned earlier, the other aspect of the dialectical unity which characterizes the speech continuum is syllable division. The linguistic importance of syllable division in different languages is in finding typology of syllables and syllabic structure of meaningful units of a language, that is morphemes and words. It is the syllable division that determines the syllabic structure of the language, its syllabic typology.

It is easy to understand that syllabic structure of a language like its phonemic structure is patterned, which means that the sounds of language can be grouped into syllables according to certain rules. The part of phonetics that deals with this aspect of a language is called phonotactics. Phonotactic possibilities of a language determine the rules of syllable division.

As the phoneticians point out, in the English language the problem of syllable division exists only in case of intervocalic consonants and their clusters like in the words ['siti] city, [a'gri:] agree, ['ekstra] extra and others. In such cases the point of syllable division is not easily found. Let us consider the first case. Theoretically two variants are possible:

a) the point of syllable division is after the intervocalic conso
nant;

b) the point of syllable division is inside the consonant.

In both cases the first syllable remains closed according to phonotactic rules of the English language, because the short vowel should remain checked. The results of instrumental analysis show that the point of syllable division in words like ['piti] pity, ['topik] topic, ['тезэ] measure, ['bobi] Bobby is inside the intervocalic consonant (19). This conclusion is of great importance for Russian learners of English. They should keep in mind that in the Russian language the stressed syllable in the structure (C)VCV(C) is always open, for example, y-xo, мя-та, о-бувь, while in English this kind of syllable is always closed if the syllabic vowel is short and checked. So to be able to pronounce the English words of this type correctly it is necessary to make transition from a vowel to a consonant very close.

Now let us examine another type of intervocalic consonant clusters. It is the VCCV(C) type, for example [a'gri:] agree, [э'Ьглр!] abrupt and so on. To be able to determine the syllabic boundary in words of this type it is necessary to apply phonological criteria, the first of which might be the distribution of seg-mental phonemes. In the abovementioned examples the words should be divided into syllables in the following way: [э-'gri:], [з-'Ьглр1] because such combinations of consonants as [gr], [br] are permissible initial clusters for the English language. On the other hand, there are clusters that can never be found in the word initial position and consequently should be broken by syllabic boundary, for example: [ad-'maia] admire, [эЬ-'ho:] abhor.

It should be pointed out that there are cases when the distributional criteria may fail. In this case when the number of intervocalic consonants is three as in the word ['ekstra] extra we have to state the possible points of syllable division

1) ['ek-sttQ] — back street

2) ['eks-traj — six try

3) ['ekst-гэ] — mixed ray

In such cases it is the native speaker's intuition that could be relied on. The subconscious feeling of a new pronunciation effort makes him divide the words of such types into ['ek-stra]. This natural way of division is fixed in the pronunciation dictionary.

In compound words like ['taostraek] toast-rack it is the morphological criterion that counts because the boundaries of the syllable should correspond to morpheme boundaries and so such cases present no difficulty from this point of view.

Now we shall consider two very important functions of the syllable.

The first function we should mention is known to be the constitutive function of the syllable. It lies in its ability to be a part of a word or a word itself. The syllable forms language units of greater magnitude, that is words, morphemes and utterances. In this respect two things should be emphasized. First, the syllable is the unit within which the relations between the distinctive features of the phonemes and their acoustic correlates are revealed (15). Second, within a syllable (or a sequence of syllables) pro-sodic characteristics of speech are realized, which form the stress-pattern of a word and the rhythmic and intonation structures of an utterance. In sum, the syllable is a specific minimal structure of both segmental and suprasegmental features.

The other function of the syllable is its distinctive function. In this respect the syllable is characterized by its ability to differentiate words and word-forms. To illustrate this a set of minimal pairs should be found so that qualitative and/or quantitative peculiarities of certain allophones should indicate the beginning or the end of the syllable.

So far only one minimal pair has been found in English to illustrate the word distinctive function in the syllable, that is [nai-'treit] nitrate — [nait-'reit] night-rate.

The distinction here lies in:

1. the degree of aspiration of [t] sounds which is greater in the first member of the opposition than in the second;

2. allophonic difference of [r]: in the first member of the opposition it is slightly devoiced under fhe influence of the initial [t];

the length of the diphthong [ai]: in the second member of
the opposition it is shorter because the syllable is closed by a voiceless plosive [t].

It can be easily seen from the example that syllable division changes the allophonic contents of the word because, as it is generally known, the realization of the phoneme in different positions in a syllable (initial, medial, final) results in different allophones.

The analogical distinction between word combinations can be illustrated by many more examples:

an aim — a name

mice kill — my skill

an ice house — a nice house

peace talks — pea stalks

plat rack — play track

Sometimes the difference in syllabic division might be the basic ground for differentiation sentences in such minimal pairs as:

I saw her eyes. — I saw her rise. I saw the meat. — I saw them eat.

Here we should mention another phenomenon in English which sometimes illustrates the linguistic value of the syllable. The fact is the majority of phoneticians regard the length of the syllabic vowel to be a defining characteristic of the syllable. It has been proved experimentally that the duration of a vowel increases when a rising nuclear tone occurs within it. In such cases the vowel becomes free enough to indicate the syllabic boundary line, for example:

~* Isn't this day,hotter?

The ~*days are getting hotter.

The word hotter in the sentence pronounced with the falling tone has the syllabic boundary within the consonant [t] because of the checked character of the [d] vowel. When pronounced with a rising tone the vowel is prolonged so that it becomes free enough to indicate the syllabic boundary between [d] and [t]. In such cases we might say that the syllable division here is one of the factors that differentiate the communicative types of sentences. Yet the difference is not always regularly displayed because, as was mentioned above, duration of vowels in English depends on a lot of other factors. Therefore this aspect of the problem needs some further, more detailed investigation.

Summarizing we might say that at the functional level of description the syllable could be conceived of as a smallest pronounceable unit with potential linguistic importance. That is why it reveals its functional value only occasionally.

By way of conclusion we could enumerate the following peculiarities of the syllabic structure of English which should arrest

the learner's attention:

'

1) syllabic boundary is inside intervocalic consonant preceded by vowels, for example: Betty, racket, money, hotter,

2) syllabic boundary is before an intervocalic consonant if it is not preceded by the above-mentioned vowels, for example: later, speaker,

3) the sonorants [1], [m], [n] are syllabic if they are preceded by noise consonants, for example: little, blossom, sudden;

4) there cannot be more than one vowel (a diphthong or a monophthong) within one syllable;

5) the typical and most fundamental syllabic structure is of (C)VC type;

6) word final consonants are normally of weak-end type.

Russian learners of English as well as would-be teachers of English should be well aware of the regularities governing the structure of monosyllabic and polysyllabic words as well as the syllabic structure of the utterance. What matters here is that wrong syllable division on the articulatory level leads to inadequate perception of phrases and consequently to misunderstanding

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