Sounds in English free essay sample

If the word is, however, followed by a vowel, [r] is reinserted: the car is mine. The same insertion takes place when an affix is attached to a base ending in a (normally) silent [r]: hear [h? c] /hearing [h? cr? o]; Moor [m? c] /Moorish [m? cr? †¢]. This type of [r] is called â€Å"linking r†. B. The English Stops 1. The oral plosives. In terms of their place of articulation they are bilabial, alveolar and velar. a. [p] is a voiceless, bilabial, fortis plosive. Its variants include an aspirated plosive if the consonant is followed by a stressed vowel and occurs in syllable-initial position. Being a bilabial stop, [p] is produced by completely blocking the airstream at the level of the lips and by suddenly releasing the air with an explosion. Except for the aspirated variant, the phoneme is pretty similar to its Romanian counterpart. It is distributed in initial, medial and final position: pane, appear, lip. We will write a custom essay sample on Sounds in English or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page It is spelt p: plane or pp5: opposite and only exceptionally gh in hiccough. The letter p is silent when followed by another obstruent or a nasal in word-initial position: psalm, pterodactyl, pneumatic. b [b] is the voiced, lenis counterpart of [p]. Voicing and force of articulation are the features that contrast the two phonemes, [b] being like [p] a bilabial sound. It is distributed in all three basic positions; initial, medial and final: bet, above, cab. It is spelt b: about or bb:abbot. The letter is silent in final position after m: limb, crumb, dumb and in front of t in words of Latin origin where the sound has long been lost: debt, doubt, subtle. The variants of [b] include partially devoiced allophones in initial position: big, blow, bring and laterally or nasally released allophones when [b] is followed by the lateral l: bless or by a nasal consonant: ribbon.