The syllable as a unit of speech. The function of the syllable

Speech is a continuum. However, it can be broken into minimal pronounceable units into which sounds show a tendency to cluster or group themselves. These smallest phonetic groups are generally given the name of syllables.

The syllable is one or more speech sounds forming a single uninterrupted unit of utterance which may be a commonly recognized subdivision of a word or the whole of a word. Being the smallest pronounceable units, the syllables form language units of greater magnitude, that is morphemes, words and phrases. Each of these units is characterized by a certain syllabic structure.

Consequently we might say that a meaningful language unit has two aspects:

- syllable formation

- syllable division (which form a dialectical unity)

The syllable is a fairly complicated phenomenon and like the phoneme it can be studied on four levels: acoustic, articulatory, auditory and functional, which means that the syllable can be approached from different points of view.

The expiratory, (chest pulse or pressure) theory (теория выдоха) [experiment - Stetson 1951].

This theory is based on the assumption that expiration in speech is a pulsating process and each syllable should correspond to a single expiration so that the number of the syllables in an utterance is determined by the number of expirations made in the production of the utterance.

BUT! This theory was strongly criticized by linguists. G.P. Torsuev, for example, writes that in a phrase a number of words and consequently syllables can be pronounced with a single expiration [Торсуев 1960]. This fact makes the validity of the pulse theory doubtful.

The sonority theory / the prominence theory (теорія відносної сонорності) and is based on the concept of sonority.

The least sonorous sounds which have the least carrying power, are those for which the mouth is closed (voiceless oral stops), while the most sonorous sounds are those for which the mouth is wide open (low vowels). All other sounds are ranked in between these two extreme points of the sonority scale: (from the highest degree to the lowest)

By this theory the syllable is treated as the combination of a more sonorous sound with a less sonorous one. All the sounds with the greatest degree of sonority (vowels and sonorants) are at the peak of the syllable, by which the syllable may be marked as a unit, because the rest of the sounds surrounding the peak cling to it.

BUT! According to V.A. Vassilyev, the most serious drawback of this theory is that it fails to explain the actual mechanism of syllable formation and syllable division [1970]. Besides, the concept of sonority with which the theory operates is not very clearly defined, which makes it still less consistent.

The theory of muscular tension (теория мускульного напряжения). L.V. Shcherba [1963]

In speaking, muscular tension imputes follow one another. Each impulse has its strongest point – the peak of prominence – and its weakest prominence – the valley of prominence. Valleys of prominence correspond to points of syllabic division. The end of one syllable and the beginning of the next one can be ascertained by determining the type of consonants which take part in forming the syllables.

Up till now we have spoken about theories which try to define the syllable on either of the two levels of production or perception.

The loudness theory. N.I. Zhinkin. This theoty seems to combine both levels.

According to this theory the syllable could be thought of as the arc of loudness which correlates with the arc of articulatory effort on the speech production level since variations in loudness are due to the work of all the speech mechanisms.

The definition of the syllable from the functional point of view existing in modern linguistics tends to single out the following features of the syllable:

a) a syllable is a chain of phonemes of varying length;

b) a syllable is constructed on the basis of contrast of its constituents (which is usually of vowel-consonant type);

c) the nucleus of a syllable is a vowel, the presence of consonants is optional; there are no languages in which vowels are not used as syllable nuclei, however, there are languages in which this function is performed by consonants;

d) the distribution of phonemes in the syllabic structure follows the rules which are specific enough for a particular language.

Now we shall consider three very important functions of the syllable.

The first function is known to be the constitutive function (конститутивна функція) of the syllable. It lies in its ability to be a part of a word or a word itself. The syllable forms language units of greater magnitude, that is words, morphemes and utterances. In this respect two things should be emphasized. First, the syllable is the unit within which the relations between the distinctive features of the phonemes and their acoustic correlates are revealed. Second, within a syllable (or a sequence of syllables) prosodic characteristics of speech are realized, which form the stress-pattern of a word and the rhythmic and intonation structures of an utterance. In sum, the syllable is a specific minimal structure of both segmental and suprasegmental features.

The other function of the syllable is its distinctive function (смислорозрізнювальна / дистинктивна функція). In this respect the syllable is characterized by its ability to differentiate words and word-forms. To illustrate this a set of minimal pairs should be found so that qualitative and/or quantitative peculiarities of certain allophones should indicate the beginning or the end of the syllable. So far only one minimal pair has been found in English to illustrate the word distinctive function in the syllable, that is ['nai-treit] nitrate – ['nait-reit] night-rate.

The distinction here lies in:

1. the degree of aspiration of [t] sounds which is greater in the first member of the opposition than in the second;

2. allophonic difference of [r]: in the first member of the opposition it is slightly devoiced under the influence of the initial [t];

3. the length of the diphthong [ai]: in the second member of the opposition it is shorter because the syllable is closed by a voiceless plosive [t].

The third function of the syllable is the identificatory function (ідентифікативна функція): the listener can understand the exact meaning of the utterance only when the correct syllabic boundary is perceived:

an aim — a name

mice kill — my skill

an ice house — a nice house

peace talks — pea stalks

plate rack — play track

Sometimes the difference in syllabic division might be the basic ground for differentiation sentences in such minimal pairs as:

I saw her eyes. — I saw her rise.

I saw the meat. — I saw them eat.