UNIT– 3
Introduction
Speech sounds, also known as Phonemes, is the smallest recurring sound in a sentence. Merriam Webster defines speech sound as “any one of the smallest recurrent recognizably same constituents of spoken language produced by movement or movement and configuration of a varying number of the organs of speech in an act of ear-directed communication.”
The English language consists of 26 alphabets but there are 44 speech sounds (Phonemes) in the English language consisting of 20 vowel sounds and 24 consonant sounds.
Phonemes (speech sounds) are represented in writing by placing the letters used to represent the sound between two slashes, for example, the sound that you say at the beginning of the word pot is represented by /p/.
Speech Sounds can be classified into two types, viz. Consonants and Vowels.
- Consonants:
A consonant is a sound accompanied by voice, in which there is either a complete or partial obstruction which prevents the air from freely issuing from the mouth.
In words such as base, maze, bathe, rouge, bake, path, long the sounds at the end of the words are distinctive. These twenty four sounds may occur initially, medially and finally.
Consonants are perhaps more important than vowels because even if we pronounce the consonants only, most English words would be easy to understand. Consonant form the bones, the skeleton of English words and give them their basic shape. Moreover, differences of accent are mainly the result of differences in the sound of vowels; if the consonants are imperfect there will be a great risk of misunderstanding.
There are many types of consonants such as Fricatives (s,z,f,v), Plosives (stop) consonants (p and b; t and d; k and g). Nasal (m,n), Lateral and Gliding consonants.
2. Vowels:
In ordinary speech, a vowel is a voiced sound in the pronunciation of which the air passes through the mouth in a continuous stream, there being no obstruction and no narrowing such as would produce audible friction. All English vowels are voiced. Vowels like consonants can also occur initially or finally.
The following list consists of some words with vowel speech sounds:
Feel, fill, tall, bull, fool, mile, bat, toil, cart, pear, poor, butter, pier.
The qualities of vowels depend upon the position of the tongue and lips. It is convenient to classify them according to the position of the main part of the tongue. The position of the tip has no great effect on vowel quality. The tip of the tongue is supposed to be touching or near the lower teeth.
- Front vowels are the vowels which are produced with the front of the tongue raised in the direction of the hard palate. Ex. Feed.
- Back vowels are the vowels which are produced with the back of the tongue raises in the direction of the soft palate. Ex. Food.
- The vowels which are intermediate between the front and the back vowels are known as central vowels. Ex. Bird.
A preposition is a word that connects the noun/pronoun in a sentence to the other parts of the sentence such as the verbs and adjectives. It determines the relationship between the nouns, pronouns and the other words in a sentence.
They help one understand the relationships of logic, space and sequence between the different parts of a sentence.
Below are few examples of prepositions commonly used in the English language:
- I just came back from the U.S.
- The book is inside the drawer.
- The kid threw a stone into the lake.
A preposition cannot be plural or possessive. Sometimes prepositions can also act as nouns, verbs and adverbs.
Types of Prepositions
- Prepositions of Time:
These prepositions indicate when something happens, will happen or has happened in any point in time.
Prepositions of time include at, on, in, before, during, after.
Examples:
- John was born on the 7th of August.
- David left his job in 2012.
- Amy ate lots of fruits during her pregnancy.
2. Prepositions of Place:
These prepositions usually indicate the position of a particular thing or person. The three most common prepositions of time are on, at and in.
These prepositions may also indicate the time along with place but depending on their use it can be easily ascertained what they are referring to.
Examples:
- The ball is in the court.
- The clothes are on the top shelf.
- I was at the supermarket just yesterday.
3. Prepositions of Direction or Movement:
Prepositions of movement indicate the direction in which a person or an object is moving.
‘To’ is the most commonly used preposition of movement.
Examples:
- I went to shop for groceries but all the shops were closed.
- He took his dog to the park.
The other prepositions of direction or movement are across, though, over, down, up, past, around.
4. Prepositions of Manner:
Prepositions of manner describe the way in which things take place or means by which things happen.
Prepositions of manner include by, in, like, with, on.
Examples:
- I like travelling by car.
- She went to the school in a taxi.
- Jacob sings like a professional.
- He reacted with pity when he saw the poor cat.
5. Preposition of Agents or Instruments:
Preposition of Agents or Instruments describe the action conducted by a person or object on another person or object.
Most common prepositions of these types are by and with.
Examples:
- The song was recorded by James.
- He cuts his hair with a clipper.
6. Prepositions of Possession:
Prepositions of Possession indicate the owing or owning of an object. It also can be used when something is own to someone. Prepositions of possession include of, with and to.
Examples:
- This is the car of my niece.
- He said he saw a man with a green umbrella.
- This jacket belongs to my grandfather.
Word accent or word stress may be defined as the degree of force with which a sound or syllable is uttered.
Accent marks are indicated with a vertical line (/) placed before the stressed syllable.
The first syllable is the most common place for stress as in father, any, steadily, obstinacy etc. many words are stressed on the second syllable such as about, before, beginning, magnificent etc. Some words have two stressed syllables such as half-hearted, fourteen, contradiction.
There is no simple way of knowing which syllable or syllables in an English word must be accentuated.
In English all words with more than one syllable are stressed.
Rules for Word Accent:
Accent Rule 1: All words with two or more syllables has one syllable whose vowel is accented. For instance, for-gét.
Accents are vital to spelling rules. Accented means the sound of that vowel is stressed, or louder, than those in other syllables.
Accent Rule 2: an extended word may contain more than one accent. The vowel that's stressed is called the first accent. The first accent is vital to several of the spelling rules. A second accented vowel is named the secondary accent. For instance , cón-ver-sá-tion.
Accent Rule 3: the first accent is typically on the first letter before a double consonant. For instance, for-gét-ting.
Accent Rule 4: Unaccented vowel sounds frequently have the soft /uh/ schwa sound, especially when there's just one letter within the syllable. All vowels can have the schwa sound. For instance, the a in a-boút.
Accent Rule 5: the primary accent is typically on the first syllable in a two-syllable word. For instance, páy-ment.
Accent Rule 6: the first accent on a two-syllable word is usually on the second syllable of the word that has a prefix within the first syllable and a root within the second syllable. For instance, dis-tráct.
Accent Rule 7: For two-syllable words that act as both nouns and verbs, the first accent is typically on the prefix (first syllable) of the noun and on the basis (second syllable) of the verb. For instance, pró-duce as a noun; pro-dúce as a verb.
Accent Rule 8: the primary accent is typically on the first syllable in three-syllable words, if that syllable may be a root. for instance , chár-ac-ter.
Accent Rule 9: the first accent is typically on the second syllable in three-syllable words that are formed by a prefix-root-suffix. for instance , in-vést-ment.
Accent Rule 10: the first accent is typically on the second syllable in four-syllable words. For instance , in-tél-li-gent.
The meaning of a word with a number of syllables can change with a shift of stress on different syllables. Although stress can emphasize meaning not all English words are affected by a change on stress.
There can be two ways in which a shift in stress can change the meaning of the word. First, the meaning of the word changes partially. And second, by changing the complete meaning of the word by shifting stress and transforming the word into a noun, verb or sometimes an adjective.
Below are few examples where the meaning of the word has changed partially with a shift in stress on the second syllable.
Insult – What they said felt like IN-sults.
Please don’t in-SULT me.
Perfect – This is a PER-fect record.
They need to per-FECT their strategy.
Produce – They bought a lot of bio-degradable PRO-duce.
How did they pro-DUCE so much corn in so little time.
Record – They always keep a RE-cord of their conversations.
It is important to re-CORD important data.
Suspect – The police interrogated the SU-spect for 2 hours.
I sus-PECT there will be no retaliation.
Below are examples where the meaning of the word changes completely by changing the noun into a verb or an adjective.
Address – I do not know his ADD-ress.
You should add-RESS the queen with utmost respect.
Conduct - The restaurant manager wasn’t happy about his CON-duct.
He was asked to con-DUCT the choir performance earlier.
Content- The CON-tent of you project is satisfactory.
She was not con-TENT with how the book ended.
Desert – The army marched through the DES-ert.
She said she would never des-ERT me.
Project – The PRO-ject should be completed within the given time.
We can pro-JECT the film on a white screen.
Question tags are words or phrases which convert regular imperative or declarative sentences into questions. In other words question tags are phrases used at the end of sentences to turn them into questions. They may be used to confirm information that has already been conveyed through a sentence or to ask follow up questions at the end of a sentence.
For example consider a statement “Your name is Jacob.” now if the words “isn't it?” are added at the end of the statement the statement turns into a question where the Identity of Jacob is being confirmed. And therefore the statement becomes a question, “Your name is Jacob, isn't it?” Question tags replace a period at end of a sentence with a comma and end the same sentence with a question mark.
Below are some examples question tags
- You crashed my car yesterday, didn't you?
- Jake is Brave kid, isn’t he?
- I don't need to finish this project today, do I?
There are a few rules for determining question tags for different kinds of sentences; some of them are listed below:
- The Sentence and the question tag must always be in the same tense.
- If the sentence is negative the question tag must be negative and vice-versa.
- Question tags must never contain proper noun, they should always contain the pronoun.
- Sentences with negative meaning will have a positive question tag.
- The question tag ‘won’t you’ is used with imperative sentences.
- Question tags are always made in accordance with the main parts of the sentence.
- Each, everyone, everybody, no one, nobody, none are singular and hence but their question tag will take forms of plural verbs and plural nouns.
Question Tags for Statements (Assertive Sentences):
Assertive sentences, also known as Statements, are sentences which declare or assert a statement, feeling, incident, event, or opinion. Assertive sentences can either be affirmative or negative. They are also known as declarative sentences.
Question tags for assertive sentences generally do not require a direct answer. If the sentence is negative, the question tag will be positive and vice versa.
Some examples of question tags for assertive sentences are listed below:
- Shaq is a great basketball player, isn’t he?
- They carry your language to your room, don’t they?
- He fought against all the odds of life and became successful, Didn’t he?
- Charlie didn’t buy that book now, did she?
- Baseball is a great game, isn’t it?
Exceptions in Question Tags:
- The negative tag “am I not” is not used in any case, instead the tag “Aren’t I” is employed in its place. For example, in a sentence such as ‘I’m a fool.’ The tag ‘am I not?’ is not used, instead a very ungrammatical tag “aren’t I? Is used. Therefore the sentence will become “I’m a fool, aren’t I?” Instead of “I’m a fool, am I not?”
2. After a sentence with let’s only the tag “shall we?” can be used.
Ex. - Let’s take a stroll, shall we?
- Let's study tomorrow morning, shall we?
3. After an imperative we use "will you?" (always affirmative). We can consider "will you?" as an equivalent to "please" (more or less)
Ex.- Open the door, will you?
- Don't smoke in this room, will you?
4. In the impersonal construction to show existence (there is/are/will be, etc.) THERE acts as the subject of the question tag too.
- There are two cats in the roof, aren't there?
- There wasn't a lion in the park, was there?
Substitutions are useful to simplify sentences. Some phrases can easily be replaced by a single word containing the same meaning, thereby reducing the size of the structure of the sentence and simplifying it. They form an essential part of the vocabulary.
Some examples of one word substitutes are listed below:
- To fall apart over time - Disintegrate
2. A copy of something that is identical - Facsimile
3. A smart and educated individual - Intellectual
4. Someone who is driven by passion to do crazy things - Zealot
5. Things to be done throughout the day - Schedule
6. To leave somewhere that is treacherous - Escape
7. A person who pushes an idea or belief system they do not believe – Hypocrite
8. Someone who sees everything negatively – Cynic
9. Something that is not understandable – Incomprehensible
10. A movie or play held during the daytime – Matinee
11. Time-frame between kids hitting puberty and being an adult – Adolescence
12. A person that is unknown – Anonymous
13. Someone that you work with – Colleague
Synonyms:
Synonyms are words that carry a similar or same meaning to another word. Sometimes even though the synonym of a word has an identical meaning the word and the synonym may not be interchangeable. For example, "blow up" and "explode" have the same meaning, but "blow up" is informal (used more in speech) and "explode" is more formal (used more in writing and careful speech). Synonyms also provide variety to speech and writing.
Many words in the English language contain more than one synonym. Some examples of Synonyms:
Shallow - superficial
Stop – cease
Spontaneous - capricious
Gloomy – sad - unhappy
House - home - abode
Evil - bad - wicked
Garbage - trash - junk - waste
Present – gift – reward – award
Sniff – smell – inhale
Little – small – tiny
Under – below – beneath
Antonyms:
Antonyms are words that carry the opposite meaning to another word. They can be used to show contrast between two things or emphasize a point. Antonyms can be totally different words from their counterparts or can also be formed by adding prefixes to some words.
Below are some examples of antonyms that are commonly used in the English language:
Antonyms formed by changing entire words
Love – hate
Beginning – ending
Ugly – beautiful
Wild – tame
Extrovert – introvert
Antonyms formed by adding prefix –un
Acceptable - unacceptable
Able - unable
Do - undo
Certain – uncertain
Seen – Unseen
Antonyms formed by adding the prefix –in
Decent – indecent
Tolerant – intolerant
Human – inhuman
Curable – incurable
Expressible – inexpressible
Antonyms formed by adding the prefix –non
Sense – nonsense
Essential – nonessential
Flammable – non-flammable
Renewable – non-renewable
Entity – nonentity
Other prefixes used to form antonyms of words are –anti (Thesis - Antithesis), -ill (Literate – Illiterate), -mis (Informed – Misinformed), -dis (Assemble – Disassemble) etc.
