Articulatory Phonetics

Tags: speech-processing

A description of speech sounds in terms of the physical actions performed in their production. This mostly just involves [see page 4, classifying] sounds based on how vocal-tract is modified.

Note: All sounds are either consonants or Vowels.

Consonants

Articulatory phonetics can classify consonants based on the Voice-Place-Manner. This impacts the positioning of symbols in the [see page 11, IPA] language system, and we often label symbols based on VPM labels.

Voice

Degree of Voice

Voiced
Voiceless

Quality of Voice

Voice [see page 5, quality] can be classified as:

Quality	Meaning
Modal	Normal
Creaky	Often found in smokers.
Falsetto	Putting pitch into different range by stressing muscles.
Breathy	Creating a lot of turbulence at voice.

Place of articulation

Where the constriction in the vocal tract is. For a list of possible places see file:///root/.config/emacs/org/docs/unidocs/COM3502-w04-articulory-phonetics.pdf and [see page 7, here].

Articulation involves the constriction of an **active** [articulator](/brain/20201020202757-articulators/) and a passive articulator.

Manner of articulation

How the air-stream is being modified?
How strong the constriction is?
How much turbulence is there (narrow=high, wide=low)?

The degrees of structure includes:

Closure (Stops)

Articulation in firm contact. I.E. the airstream is [see page 9, completely] blocked.

Stops made with a velic closure (using the velum) are called oral stops. Stops made without a velic closure and with airflow through the nasal cavity are called nasal stops.

Sounds produced through this are either [see page 9, plosive] or affricates.

Narrowing (Fricatives)

Articulators are close together but not touching.

Airflow [see page 10, flows] through different channels depending on the fricative.

Fricative	Flows Through
Median	narrow channel in the center of the cavity
Lateral	A narrow space at the sides of the tongue.

Note: the difference between voiced and voiceless fricatives is that voiced fricatives show energy at low frequencies due to the you voicing the sounds.

Approximants

Sonorants do not have the structure needed to narrow enough to make turbulence.

Approximants [see page 10, can be]:

Approximant	Meaning
Lateral	complete closure on the midline.
Median (AKA semi-vowels, glides)	No complete closure.

Taps and Trills

Closure in a tap/flap causing a series of rapid tap-like closures. (eg. vrrrrrrrrroom).

Vowels

Articulatory phonetics can classify Vowels based on the vowel-height, vowel-location and lip-position. These qualities impact the positioning of symbols in the [see page 15, vowel quadrilateral].

Vowel Height

How [see page 14, high/low] the tongue is in the oral cavity. These are further divided into:

Height	Meaning
Close/High	Tongue is raised close to the roof.
Open/Low	Wide gap between highest point of tongue and roof of oral cavity.

Note: Vowels can also be mid, half-close, half-open.

Vowel Location

Tongue is towards the front or back of the oral cavity. These are further divided into:

Location	Meaning
Front	Raising the front part of the tongue towards the hard palate.
Back	Raising the back part of the tongue towards the soft palate.
Central	Raising central part of tongue towards the junction of the hard/soft palates.

The mid-central vowel is called the schwa.

Lip Position

Whether the lips are Rounded or Unrounded.