Variegated varietals

Happy Sunday (especially since the Bears are about to clinch this round of the playoffs)

Last Saturday evening I was prepping some veggies for dinner, and Del was happily sitting at my feet and playing with a lime, babbling all the while. I didn't manage to get a recording of her (yet!), but I did glance at the clock and take a five-minute language sample to get a more official measure of the sounds, syllable types, and length of utterances she is making these days. I will do my best to write out what it sounded like, then I will show a broad phonetic transcription of her sounds, followed by a brief analysis of her vocal development to date. This is approximately what I was listening to as I chopped carrots and peeled sweet potatoes:

Aaaaajeejeejivezivaaavai! Aaaavv. Vvvvvvv. Aheyaijai! Yay. Ayayayayaaaaaa! Abibibibibai. Awawawawaaaaa! Vvvvvv. Aaaayayaya! Zzzzzzz. Ahdadadadi. Aivaivadee! Tladadadee. Sfadadee. Gagagudaydeedee!

Phonetic transcriptions:
/a::ʤiʤiʤɪvəzɪvavaɪ/
/a::v/
/v::/
/aheɪjaɪʤaɪ/
/jeɪj/
/ajajajaja::/
/abɪbɪbɪbɪbaɪ/
/awawawawa::/
/v::/
/a::jajaja/
/z::/
/adadadadɪ/
/aɪvaɪvadi/
/dladadadi/
/zvadadi/
/gagagʊdeɪdidi/

Her longest utterance during that five minutes was eight syllables long. Syllable shapes include sustained, or prolonged, vowels (written as V:), sustained continuant consonants (written as C:, this refers to any consonant sound you can sustain such as /m, n, f, v, s, z/), the common and prevalent consonant-vowel syllables (written as CV), and the newly introduced vowel-consonant syllable (VC; seen only once here in the syllable /a::v/). Before I explain more about her sounds, let's review some of the basic concepts and terms used when discussing sound production. Refer the the following diagrams as you read along to help make better sense of everything. The first diagram includes all of the consonant sounds of English and is generally referred to as a Phoneme Chart. The second shows the relative spacing of vowels in English and is referred to as the Vowel Chart. Things are about to get pretty "linguistic-y," so if you came for the video that's not here, this is probably a good time to bail!

PLACE, MANNER, VOICING
When we describe the phonetic properties of consonant sounds in any language, we identify them by their place of articulation, the manner in which they are produced, and whether they are voiced or voiceless. In the phoneme chart, place of articulation is shown along the top column. The far left corresponds to the front part of the vocal tract (i.e., the lips) and moves back in the mouth as you move to the right of the chart. Manner of articulation is shown running from top to bottom in the left-most column. I'm not quite sure if there is any reason for the order of the different manners of articulation. When there is a pair of symbols in one box of the phoneme chart, this indicates a voiced/voiceless pair of phonemes. In such a pair, the left symbol is always voiceless and the right symbol always voiced. For example, /p/ is a voiceless bilabial plosive (or stop), and /b/ is a voiced bilabial plosive. Listen to their difference as you say the words "pop" and "bob" to yourself. That difference between those two words is referred to as a voicing contrast.

Vowel sounds on the other hand are described by the approximate location where they are produced inside of the mouth (e.g., high, middle or low; front, center, or back) and if they are produced with lip rounding (i.e., /o, u/) or not. We can't explain vowels by their articulators because there is no contact between articulators like there is for consonants. We try to describe the relative location of the tongue in the mouth (as best we can. . .vowels are very tricky!) We don't specify voicing with respect to vowels because in English all vowels are produced with vocal fold vibration. We also don't talk about manner because they are all produced the same way, as continuants with a steady steam of air flowing through vibrating vocal cords.

PLACE
Place of articulation, as mentioned in a previous post, refers to where in the mouth a sound is produced, and if any part or parts of the tongue are also included in the creation of that sound. For example, the phoneme /b/ is produced with two lips coming together and apart, so it has a bilabial (or two lip) place of articulation. The sound /v/ in English is made with the upper teeth on the lower lip, so this is referred to as having a labiodental (or lip and teeth) place of articulation.

MANNER
Manner of articulation describes how a sound is made. For example, a plosive (or stop) consonant is made by temporarily stopping (or blocking) the flow of air coming from the lungs and through the vocal folds with two articulators. Stops can be either nasal (i.e., with air flowing through the nose) or oral (i.e., with air flowing through the mouth). A bilabial stop consonant stops the air at the lips to produce /b, p/ or /m/. Other manners of articulation include fricatives, which involve forcing air through tightly constricted articulators and causing turbulence, such as for the sounds /f, v, s/ and /z/. In English we also produce affricates, which are a combination of stop and fricative consonants such as the sounds in "church." This sound is produced as a combination of /t/ and the sound in "shush." We also have approximates, where articulators come close together and air flows smoothly such as for the sounds /w, j/, and our lateral approximant /l/, which is produced with air flowing off the sides of the tongue and can be heard in the word "like." Then there is the infamous /r,/ which so many people have difficulty producing, and has inspired loveable cartoon characters such as Elmer Fudd ("Why that wascly wabbit!").

So far, for place, Del has produced bilabial, labiodental, alveolar, and velar sounds. For manner she has used stops (nasal and oral), fricatives, affricates, and approximants. She favors voicing over voiceless sounds (although I have heard her use /t/ and /p/, there are no voiceless consonants produced in this language sample), and has yet to venture into the elusive and tricky land of L and R.

As always, I will try to capture her amusing and intriguing vocal play on video for your viewing enjoyment. Next post will be much shorter and accompanied by a video of some kind!