Syllables

Syllables

A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. For example, the word water is composed of two syllables: wa and ter. A syllable is typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants).Syllables are often considered the phonological "building blocks" of words. They can influence the rhythm of a language, its prosody, its poetic meter and its stress patterns.

Source taken from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllable

Suprasegmentals

A suprasegmental is a vocal effect that extends over more than one sound segment in an utterance, such as pitch, duration, or loudness. The suprasegmentals refer to circumstance of sound production beyond and over consonant and vowels. English is a stressed timed language. It means, at least one syllable in an english word is stressed and therefore has principal pitch,duration, or loudness as opposed to the rest of the syllable in the word.
The suprasegmentals also provide information in the comprehension. Process in longer sequences of speech sounds. Pitch plays an importantrole in determining the syntatic and semantic consequences of a phrase or sentence. Different pitch patterns in the phrase may evoke different perceptions in the meaning of the phrase.

Example: Jane write a letter
If syllables at the end of the phrase are longer in duration than at the beginning, the speaker may intend to state an emphasis that Jane write a letter, not a novel. And than, if the syllables at the beginning are louder than the end, we may think Jane who write a letter, not other people.

When pitch behaves in a form of pitch contour of the phrase or sentence, we call it intonation. Intonation help us process a variety of meanings.

Source taken from:

http://fuckyeahpolyglot.tumblr.com/post/41945080643/learn-the-international-phonetic-alphabet

Consonant

A consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are [p], pronounced with the lips; [t], pronounced with the front of the tongue; [k], pronounced with the back of the tongue; [h], pronounced in the throat; [f] and [s], pronounced by forcing air through a narrow channel (fricatives); and [m] and [n], which have air flowing through the nose (nasals). Contrasting with consonants are vowels.

- source taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consonant
- source taken from: http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://jcarreras.homestead.com/files/PhoneticsConsonantExamplesA.jpg&imgrefurl=http://jcarreras.homestead.com/rrphonetics1.html&usg=__uLX7f3ruX6bDaRfgoJKxl4IkQoU=&h=360&w=373&sz=16&hl=en&start=6&sig2=pYleKiZRhIKmfnw_lMDqZA&zoom=1&tbnid=nqSgYvAdRMiLEM:&tbnh=118&tbnw=122&ei=O7rBUaGSCsWEjAK55oHYBQ&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dconsonant%26um%3D1%26sa%3DN%26hl%3Den%26gbv%3D2%26tbm%3Disch&um=1&itbs=1&sa=X&ved=0CDYQrQMwBQ

Vowels (Monothong and dipthong)

VOWELS
 
In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as an English ah! [ɑː] or oh! [oʊ], pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! [ʃː], where there is a constriction or closure at some point along the vocal tract. A vowel is also understood to be syllabic: an equivalent open but non-syllabic sound is called a semivowel. Here is the example picture of vowels:

Source taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vowel
Source taken from: http://www.langsci.ucl.ac.uk/ipa/images/vowels.gif 



MONOTHONGS AND DIPTHONGS

All languages have monophthongs and many languages have diphthongs. A vowel sound whose quality doesn't change over the duration of the vowel is called a monophthongs. Monophthongs are sometimes called "pure" or "stable" vowels. A vowel sound that glides from one quality to another is called a diphthongs.

Here is the example picture of monothongs:

 And this is the example picture of dipthongs:

Source taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vowel
Source taken from: http://biblescripture.net/Vowels.jpeg

PRONUNCIATION

CONSONANT :

1.      Voice

2.      Place

3.      Manner

1.       VOICE

The state of vocal folds ( Vibrate or not? )

2.       PLACE ARTICULATION

In articulatory phonetics, the place of articulation (also point of articulation) of a consonant is the point of contact where an obstruction occurs in the vocal tract between an articulatory gesture, an active articulator (typically some part of the tongue), and a passive location (typically some part of the roof of the mouth). Along with the manner of articulation and the phonation, this gives the consonant its distinctive sound.

The human voice produces sounds in the following manner:

1. Air pressure from the lungs creates a steady flow of air through the trachea (windpipe), larynx (voice box) and pharynx (back of the throat).
2. The vocal folds in the larynx vibrate, creating fluctuations in air pressure that are known as sound waves.
3. Resonances in the vocal tract modify these waves according to the position and shape of the lips, jaw, tongue, soft palate, and other speech organs, creating formant regions and thus different qualities of sonorant (voiced) sound.
4. Mouth and nose openings radiate the sound waves into the environment.

Source taken from:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Place_of_articulation

3.       MANNER

How the sound is produced, the direction of the air is flowing and the circum stances affecting the tounge.

If you want to practice pronunciation using audio, these audio pronunciation files are in MP3 format and you can directly access them without even using Google Search. Just use the following URL and replace WORD with any of the English words that you are still learning to pronounce.

https://ssl.gstatic.com/dictionary/static/sounds/de/0/WORD.mp3

To give you an example, here are some sample audio pronunciation files that you can right-click and directly download to your computer.

• https://ssl.gstatic.com/dictionary/static/sounds/de/0/exaggerate.mp3
• https://ssl.gstatic.com/dictionary/static/sounds/de/0/croissant.mp3