Introduction
Phonetic transcription
Phonemic transcription
The International Phonetic Alphabet
Conclusion
Literature
Introduction
Phonetics is the study of linguistic sounds, which also studies the pronunciation of words. We model the pronunciation of a word as a string of symbols, which represent phones or segments. We are interested in phones, as they are speech sounds, which are represented with phonetic symbols [1].
There is a special system of phonetic notations, which is used to represent speech sounds in writing. This system is called transcription. Special symbols systemize and provide a certain symbol for each class it represents.
Transcription plays important role in lives of people, who deals with foreign language studying. Without transcription, there will be no foreign language teaching, no foreign language learning, no spoken languages, dialects and accents studying.
We deal with it all the time. We face with transcription during the study of foreign languages, as it shows us how the word is correctly pronounced. Transcription is a set of symbols representing speech sounds [5, p. 27] and is considered to be the problem of phonology. Transcription is connected with visual representation of speech, it gives us the opportunity to see how the word is represented visually. Aside from the problem of transcription, phonology also discuss the problem of phonological analysis. According to L.V. Borisova: ”any system of writing is not a simple record of speech utterances, it is always a generalization about them” [1, p. 42].
Phonetic transcription
Phonetic transcription (phonetic script or phonetic notation) represents visually speech sounds, shows us how the word should be pronounced.
Transcription is very important nowadays, as the pronunciation of words has undergone some changes in the course of time. Among different dialects of the language a lot of words have variations of pronunciation. Traditional orthography in English language differs from the pronunciation. For such cases phonetic transcription can provide a function that orthography cannot. Transcriptions allows people not to take into consideration orthography, but it gives us opportunity to see the right pronunciation of words in different dialects and to identify and follow changes in pronunciation that may take place over time [4].
Phonetic transcription is used in dictionaries and tell people about the right pronunciation of words. For example, phonetic transcription is necessary for English dictionaries, because the spelling of the English words may differ from their pronunciation.
Phonetic transcription is usually written with the help of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). In the IPA each symbol corresponds to a certain English sound. Let’s analyze some examples.
For example, the word no has the same transcription [no], but the word do has another transcription – [du:]. No matter that these words have the same spelling. Both these words end in the letter o, but they are pronounced differently, what their transcriptions show [3].
We should take into account that phonetic transcription is placed between square brackets [ ].
Phonetic transcription may have various aims. For example, it may aim to transcribe the phonology of a language, or even it may aim to specify the precise phonetic realization.
We should distinguish between broad and narrow transcription. Narrow transcription encodes much more information about the phonetic variations of the certain allophones of the utterance. The main difference between broad and narrow transcription is their continuum. Broad transcription – is a phonemic transcription, which doesn’t take into account allophonic differences. Moreover, it is a representation of a phonemic structure. It is not a phonetic transcription, although it sometimes coincides with it.
Phonemic transcription
To the first type of transcription belongs broad or phonemic transcription. This type of transcription is the most common type of phonetic transcription and is used in English dictionaries. It deals with such units as phonemes. It uses only the sounds that distinguish meaning in a given language and captures the underlying representation that is assumed to be stored in our mental lexicon. This type of transcription has a principle – “one symbol per phoneme”. In this type of transcription special symbols are used to denote each phoneme [2]. Thus, there are symbols for each phoneme of the language, it contains as many symbols as there are phonemes in the language.
Phonemic transcription has also name broad transcription and is opposed to narrow (phonetic) transcription.
There are some cases when we use phonemic transcription. For example, we have one word, where saying one sound instead of another changes the meaning of the word. Here we should give two different symbols in transcription for one phoneme.
For example, the word bed. If we pronounce t instead d, the meaning of the word will be changed. In order not to confuse the meaning of the words, we use separate symbols for d and t in phonemic transcriptions, because they are two separate phonemes.
Let’s analyze some examples of phonemic transcription. In these examples there are words with two different sounds that in phonemic transcription are denoted with the same symbol.
The International Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) was first published by the International Phonetic Association in 1888. The International Phonetic Association was established in Paris in 1886 by French and English language teachers led by Paul Passy [3]. Their aim was to invent a system for transcribing the sounds of speech of speech independent of any particular language and applicable to all languages. Thus, these people invented the International Phonetic Alphabet which was based primarily on the Latin alphabet.
There are several cases of usage the International Phonetic Alphabet. First of all, it is used to show the pronunciation of words in all dictionaries. Moreover, it has been used as a foundation for creating new writing systems for previously unwritten languages. The next case of its usage – the usage in some foreign language text books and phrase books to transcribe the sounds of languages which are written with non-latin alphabets. And the last case is the usage of IPA by non-native speakers of English when learning to speak English [1].
Let’s discuss the IPA in details. First of all, it represents distinctive qualities of oral language. They are: phonemes, intonation, the separation of words and syllables. But it also can represent additional qualities with the help of extended set of symbols – Extensions to the IPA. To additional qualities of speech belong tooth gnashing, lisping, and sounds made with a cleft palate.
The IPA has its aim. The aim is to provide one letter for each distinctive sound. But this aim is not achieved when the sound is complex.
The IPA has its own letters and diacritics, which can be added or removed. There were some changes of letters, diacritics and prosodic marks. According to the changes in 2005, the International Phonetic Alphabet has 107 letters, 52 diacritics, and four prosodic marks. 107 letters of IPA represent vowels and consonants, 31 diacritics modify them and 19 additional signs indicate suprasegmental qualities. To suprasegmental qualities belong length, tone, stress, and intonation.
Conclusion
In order to sum everything up, some points are needed to be distinguished:
1. the difference between phonetic and phonemic transcription is that phonetic transcription captures the actual pronunciation of a word, while in phonemic transcription different symbols for one and the same phoneme are used in order not to confuse the meaning of two different words which have the same phoneme;
2. the next difference is that for phonetic transcription there is some flexibility in how closely sounds may be transcribed. Broad transcription gives a basic idea of the sounds of a language in the broadest terms, whereas narrow transcription indicates precise details of the sounds;
3. the similarity is that neither broad nor narrow transcription makes any claims about the phonemic status of the sounds. These types of transcriptions define possible ways of producing the sounds that make up the word;
4. the most widely accepted system of symbols for transcription is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
1. Борисова, Л.В. Теоретическая фонетика английского языка: учеб. пособие для ин-тов и фак. иностр. яз. / Л.В. Борисова, А.А. Метлюк. – М. : Вышеэйшая школа, 1980. – 144 с.
2. Васильев, В.А. Фонетика английского языка. Теоретический курс / В.А. Васильев. – М. : Вышэйшая школа, 1970. – 324 с.
3. Phonetic transcription [Электронный ресурс]. – Режим доступа : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonetic_transcription.
4. Sweet, Henry. Sound Notation / Henry Sweet. – London, 1881. – p. 177-235.
5. Vrabel, T.T Lectures in theoretical phonetics in English language and method-guides for seminars / T.T. Vrabel. Ужгород : Полипринт, 2009. – 176 с.
