Lesson 2 – The Production of Speech Sounds
Articulators Above the Larynx
All the sounds we make when we speak are the result of muscles
contracting. The muscles in the chest that we use for breathing produce the
flow of air that is needed for almost all speech sounds; muscles in the larynx
produce many different modifications in the flow of air from the chest to the
mouth. After passing through the larynx, the air goes through what we call the vocal tract, which ends at the mouth
and nostrils.
Here the air from the lungs escapes into the atmosphere. We have a large and
complex set of muscles that can produce changes in the shape of the vocal
tract, and in order to learn how the sounds of speech are produced it is
necessary to become familiar with the different parts of the vocal tract. These
different parts are called articulators,
and the study of them is called articulatory
phonetics.
These
are the articulators:
a) The
larynx is the sound source since the vocal cords are located there. The larynx
is not an articulator but the vocal
cords, that are found there, are very important organs for speech
production.
b) The pharynx is a tube which begins just
above the larynx. It is about 7
cm long in women and about 8 cm in men, and at its top
end it is divided into two, one part being the back of the mouth and the other
being the beginning of the way through the nasal cavity. If you look in your
mirror with your mouth open, you can see the back of the pharynx.
c) The velum or soft palate is seen in the diagram in a position that allows air to
pass through the nose and through the mouth. Yours is probably in that position
now, but often in speech it is raised so that air cannot escape through the
nose. The other important thing about the velum is that it is one of the
articulators that can be touched by the tongue. When we make the sounds / K / and
/g/ the tongue is in contact with the lower side of the velum, and we call
these velar consonants.
d) The hard palate is often called the
"roof of the mouth". You can feel its smooth curved surface with your
tongue.
e) The alveolar ridge is between the top front
teeth and the hard palate. You can feel its shape with your tongue. Its surface
is really much rougher than it feels, and is covered with little ridges. You
can only see these if you have a mirror small enough to go inside your mouth
(such as those used by dentists). Sounds made with the tongue touching here
(such as /t/ and /d/)
are called alveolar.
f) The tongue is, of course, a very important
articulator and it can be moved into many different places and different
shapes. It is usual to divide the tongue into different parts, though there are
no clear dividing lines within the tongue. Fig. 2 shows the tongue on a larger
scale with these parts shown: tip, blade, front, back and root. (This use of the word
"front" often seems rather strange at first.)
g) The teeth (upper and lower) are usually
shown in diagrams like Fig. 1 only at the front of the mouth, immediately
behind the lips. This is for the sake of a simple diagram, and you should
remember that most speakers have teeth to the sides of their mouths, back
almost to the soft palate. The tongue is in contact with the upper side teeth
for many speech sounds. Sounds made with the tongue touching the front teeth
are called dental.
h) The lips are important in speech. They can
be pressed together (when we produce the sounds
/p/ , /b/ ), brought into contact with the teeth (as in /f/ , /v/), or
rounded to produce the lip-shape for vowels like /uw/. Sounds in which the lips are in contact
with each other are called bilabial,
while those with lip-to-teeth contact are called labiodentals.
The seven articulators described above are the main ones used in speech,
but there are three other things to remember. Firstly, the larynx could also be
described as an articulator - a very complex and independent one. Secondly, the
jaws are sometimes called
articulators; certainly we move the lower jaw a lot in speaking. But the jaws
are not articulators in the same way as the others, because they cannot themselves
make contact with other articulators. Finally, although there is practically
nothing that we can do with the nose
and the nasal cavity, they are a
very important part of our equipment for making sounds (what is sometimes
called our vocal apparatus),
particularly nasal consonants such as /m/
,/n/.
LEARNING ACTIVITY 2 - ARTICULATORS
Using the link below, complete the exercises presented.
Types of Articulators
As mentioned
before, air passes from the larynx into the pharynx. After passing the pharynx,
air moves into the vocal tract, which consists of the oral cavity and the nasal
cavity. The oral cavity, that is the mouth, generates speech sounds with the
different articulators described above.
Some articulators are active (moving) or passive
(stationary). The active articulators include the following:
F The
tongue that is divided into the tip, the blade, the front, the back, and the
root.
F The
lower lip.
The passive articulators include the following:
F The
teeth: both upper and lower teeth.
F The
roof of the mouth that is divided into the alveolar ridge, the hard palate, the
soft palate or velum, and the uvula.
F The
pharynx or back of the throat, which is used by some languages (but not
English) in producing speech sounds.
If air passes
out of the nose exclusively, the sound is called nasal sound. However, if
air passes out of both the nose and the mouth, the sound produced is nasalized.
Learning activity 3 - Articulators
F
In pairs, provide five different definitions of the term “articulatory
phonetics”.
F
In pairs, prepare a poster with the diagram of the articulators and the
subdivision of the tongue.
F
Individually, prepare a chart to
describe the different articulators and their functions.
Learning activity 4 - Articulators
Using the link below complete the exercise about articulators.
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