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Syllables

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Investigating Spoken English

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Abstract

The chapter discusses the articulatory, perceptual and psycholinguistic evidence for syllables in speech and argues for the relevance of this unit in the cognitive system of any language including English. The activities bring to conscious awareness the distributional patterns in organizing vowels and consonants into English syllables and mention processes influencing how speakers divide words into syllables. In addition to discussing various useful phonetic characteristics of syllables like sonority or duration, the chapter concludes that the syllable is a phonological concept whose features can be fruitfully investigated through these phonetic aspects.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    However, both Italian and Finnish, and also Japanese, have true geminates, or long consonants, that partially balance the lack of complexity in consonantal clusters.

References

  • Tuller, Betty, and J.A. Scott Kelso. 1990. Phase transitions in speech production and their perceptual consequences. In Attention and performance 13: Motor representation and control, ed. Marc Jannerod, 429–451. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

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  • Wells, John C. 1990. Syllabification and allophony. In Studies in the pronunciation of English: A commemorative volume in honour of A.C. Gimson, ed. Susan Ramsaran, 76–86. London and New York: Routledge.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of English and American Studies, Faculty of Arts, Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Nitra, Slovakia

    Štefan Beňuš

  2. Institute of Informatics, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia

    Štefan Beňuš

Authors
  1. Štefan Beňuš
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Correspondence to Štefan Beňuš .

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Cite this chapter

Beňuš, Š. (2021). Syllables. In: Investigating Spoken English. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54349-5_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54349-5_8

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-54348-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-54349-5

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

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