Deck 3: The Sounds of Language

Question 1

Describing a culture in terms of emics involves

A)creating a phonetic transcription of a language.
B)getting an insider's point of view.
C)getting an outsider's point of view.
D)comparing one culture to another.

Answer 1

getting an insider's point of view.

Question 2

When the vocal cords are open and relaxed, the sound produced is called

A)voiceless.
B)voiced.
C)articulated.
D)unarticulated.

Answer 2

voiceless.

Question 3

The English word "shadow" has how many phonemes?

A)2
B)3
C)4
D)6

Answer 3

4

Question 4

The following sets of English language words would be used to identify _____________. [ɹod]/[ɹot] road/rote
[tin]/[din] teen/dean
[æd]/[æt] add/at

A)allophones of a phoneme
B)morphological rules
C)cultural focus
D)phonemes

Question 5

Which of the following words in English is a minimal pair?

A)to/two
B)through/three
C)only/lonely
D)bye/dry

Question 6

When the vocal cords are close together and vibrating, the sound produced is called

A)voiceless.
B)voiced.
C)articulated.
D)vibratory.

Question 7

"Approximant" on the IPA chart describes

A)a manner of articulation.
B)the fact that linguists can only approximately describe the sounds of language.
C)a sort of reduplication.
D)a place of articulation.

Question 8

Rules of complementary distribution of phones are concerned with

A)what is physically possible given the human vocal apparatus.
B)the sounds that linguists have encountered in human languages all over the world.
C)patterns in the occurrence of allophones of a phoneme.
D)discovering minimal pairs and using them to identify phonemes in a particular language.

Question 9

When we notice that an American English speaker puffs air when they say "pit", but not when they say "spit", and that this pattern holds true across a variety of utterances and for a variety of speakers, we can conclude that

A)[p] and [pʰ] are allophones of /p/.
B)/p/ and /pʰ/ are allophones of [p].
C)/p/ and /pʰ/ are phonemes in English.
D)the mechanics of producing a bilabial plosive at the beginning of a word require you to puff air, no matter what language you may be speaking.

Question 10

Variant forms of phonemes, such as the p of pit and spit in English are called

A)phones.
B)phonemes.
C)allophones.
D)marked sounds.

Question 11

The area where the vocal cords modify the air, creating sound waves, is called

A)the larynx.
B)the uvula.
C)the epiglottis.
D)Fred.

Question 12

The area above the vocal cords where sound waves take on distinctive shapes and become recognizable speech sounds is called

A)the epiglottis.
B)the supralaryngeal vocal tract.
C)the uvular.
D)the retroflex.

Question 13

Below, the word _____ has an open vowel.

A)[bit]-beat (The drummer keeps the beat.)
B)[pand]-pond (We swim in the pond.)
C)[tek]-take (Take a left at the next intersection.)
D)[tu]-too (I use the IPA chart too!)

Question 14

The study of the physical properties of sounds and the nature of the sound waves that they produce is known as

A)acoustic phonetics.
B)auditory phonetics.
C)articulatory phonetics.
D)descriptive phonetics.

Question 15

A predictable pattern of allophone distribution in a language is referred to as conditioned variation. Another technical term for this is

A)complementary variation.
B)complementary distribution.
C)contrastive distribution.
D)technical distribution.

Question 16

The detailed description (as opposed to analysis)of the sounds of a language is called

A)phonotactics.
B)phonemics.
C)phonetics.
D)phonography.

Question 17

From the rule below, which of the following words can you hypothesize would be challenging for a Korean speaker learning English? The following rules hold true for Korean:

A)car
B)cold
C)bull
D)battle

Question 18

When Ottenheimer tried to understand the difference between nʈu "hermit crab" and ntu "arrow" in Shinzwani, the most important information she gathered had to do with

A)the complementary distribution of allophones for the phoneme [ʈ].
B)a difference in the place of articulation of a consonant.
C)the rounding or unrounding of the lips in producing a the vowel [u].
D)a difference in manner of articulation of a consonant.

Question 19

When I compare the Hindi words kʰʊl (which means "to open")and kʊl (which means "total")in, I am working to

A)identify phonemes in Hindi.
B)compare pulmonic and nonpulmonic consonants.
C)analyze conditioned variation of allophones of the phoneme /k/.
D)analyze conditioned variation of allophones of the phoneme /ʊ/.

Question 20

The area in the human vocal apparatus between the velum and the pharynx is called the

A)glottis.
B)uvula.
C)alveolar ridge.
D)epiglottis.

Question 21

A minimal pair is a pair of words in which a difference in sound makes a difference in meaning, and it is the clearest and easiest way to identify phonemes in a language.

Question 22

The linguistic term for sounds that accompany speech but are not directly part of language is

A)paralanguage.
B)manner of articulation.
C)conditioned variation.
D)the American Usage System.

Question 23

Describe the difference between /s/ and [s]. Use the appropriate linguistic terminology, and briefly define each linguistic term.

Question 24

When you cannot find the pattern of complementary distribution among allophones in a language, you should consider the possibility that the variation among those allophones is conditioned by

A)social usage.
B)neighboring phonemes.
C)rules of engagement.
D)intuition.

Question 25

The units of analysis in phonetics are phonemes, and the units of analysis in phonemics are phones.

Question 26

The term for a speech sound made by lowering the velum and resonating air in your nasal cavity is

A)trill.
B)affricate.
C)fricative.
D)nasal.

Question 27

Briefly describe the way a phonetic chart may be useful for learning a new language with phonemes which are unfamiliar to you.

Question 28

Nasalization, alteration of pitch, and lengthening, are examples of

A)allophones.
B)supersegmentals
C)paralanguage.
D)articulatory phonetics.

Question 29

Prosodic elements, such as tone of voice, breathiness, or loudness have universal meanings across cultures.

Question 30

The sounds mhm , shhh , and tsk-tsk in English are examples of

A)allophones.
B)ideophones.
C)vocal segregates.
D)speech substitutes.

Question 31

Knowing the rules of complementary distribution of allophones in a language can be a useful tool for understanding and predicting the kinds of accents its speakers will have when speaking other languages.

Question 32

A click is pronounced by releasing air inward, rather than outward.

Question 33

Describe an event or activity in etic terms, then provide a second description of the same event drawing on an emic understanding of that event or activity. Make very clear which description is etic and which is emic.