INTRODUCTION.

This topic number 7 deals with The English phonological system. The English vowels. Phonetic symbols and the English and the
Spanish phonological systems compared being this important part of the teaching-learning process of English. Always taking
into account this academic knowledge is linked to the didactic aspects found in the curriculum of both the previous educative
system LOGSE (Organic Law for the Quality of Education) established on March 8th 2002 and the current one LOE (Organic
Law of Education), 2/2006, May 3rd BOE n.106 May 4th, 2006 which regulates our present educative organisation: ESO,
Bachillerato and Vocational Training.
The pronunciation of a language is essential. It is through the acquisition of a good pronunciation that our students will be able
to achieve a right level of accuracy on the English language. Grammar long ago was considered to be the most important task of
our teaching process, nowadays is just considered one part of our teaching-learning task. Nowadays, communication is the main
goal when learning a language. Thus, we have the task of providing this essential information in contextualised situations to
allow our students get some of the basic competences such as: linguistic competence, competence to learn how to
learn and autonomous competence.

Language is a means of communicating information by the organisation of sounds. The study of speech sounds in spoken
language is divided into two different but related disciplines: Phonetics and Phonology.
Phonetics deals with how speech sounds are made, transmitted and received. In phonetics, most speech is produced by an air
stream which it is modified by the various organs of speech.
Phonology, on the other hand, deals specifically with the ways those sounds are organized into the individual languages.
Phonology is, in effect, a sub-category of phonetics. In Phonology we define a Phoneme as a unit of significant sound in a given
language by The Oxford English Dictionary. They are minimal contrastive sound units that cant be broken into smallest units.
A given phoneme can be realised as a number of different sounds depending on the phonological context in which it is found.
Phonemes can be divided into:
Segmental features: Vowels and consonants (feature that is deeply developed in this topic 8)
Prosodic features: stress, rhythm and intonation.
Teachers must train students in the use of both types of phonemes by practicing pronunciation in contexts.
In order to talk about the sound system of a language we need to be able to write down the sounds of the language in a
reasonably way. Thus, a commonly accepted descriptive system is required. I will use the alphabet of the International
Phonetic association (IPA)
1.1. The sound sounds procucing system
Sound is produced when air is set in motion.
1.1.2. The speech production mechanism consists of:
lungs
speech production
larynx where a set of muscles called the vocal folds (or vocal cords) are
located
s the sound in various ways.
The Articulators or Organs of Speech:
1. Lips 2. Teeth 3. Alveolar Ridge 4. Hard Palate 5. Soft Palate (velum) 6. Uvula 7.
Tip of the tongue 8. Blade of the tongue 9. Front of the tongue 10. Back of the
tongue 11. Nasal cavity 12. Oral cavity 13. Pharynx 14. Larynx
The lower surface of the vocal tract consists primarily of the different parts of the
tongue and the lower lips.
technically as the front of the
tongue (actually the forward part of the tongue that lies underneath the hard palate when the tongue is at rest).
soft palate when it is at
rest.

SOUND CLASSES The sounds of language can be grouped into classes, based on the phonetic properties that they share.
Sounds fall into two major classes - vowels and consonants.
Consonantal sounds, which can be voiced or voiceless, are made with a narrow or complete closure in the vocal tract. The
airflow is either blocked momentarily or restricted so much that noise is produced as airflows past the constriction.
Vowels.

Vowels are produced with little obstruction in the vocal tract and are generally voiced. They are more sonorous than
consonants, and so we perceive them as louder and longer lasting.
Vowels differ from consonants in that there is not noticeable obstruction in the vocal tract during their production. Air escapes
through the mouth and/or nose.
Vowels are determined by changes in position of the lips, tongue and palate. These changes can be very slight and difficult to
detect. The vowel chart shows the positions of the tongue and jaw in articulating vowels.
To make a complete description of English vowels from an articulatory point of view we must consider:
o
QUANTITY; short and long
o
DEGREE OF OPENING: high or close when the tongue is raised as high as possible; high mid; low mid; low
or open, the tongue as low as possible.
o
POINT OF ARTICULATION: front, when the front tongue is raised towards hard palate; central, an intermediate
position between front and back; back, the back tongue is placed near the soft palate.
o
SHAPE OF THE LIPS: round and unround lips.
When teaching vowels in our classroom we must consider that vowels are more difficult to transcribe than consonants and they
are essential elements in English phonology as they make up the greatest difference between English varieties.
ARTICULATORY DESCRIPTION OF THE ENGLISH VOWELS
/i:/ - the centre of front of the tongue is raised to a height below and behind the close front. Possible occurrences:

/e/ in these

/ee/ in tree

/ea/ in beach

/ie/ in yield

/ei/ in receive

/e/ in scene

/i/ in police

/eo/ in people

/ey/ in key

/ay/ in quay
The lips are only slightly spread. It can be found in the Spanish Word vino.
/i/ Short /i/ is pronounced when the front of the tongue is raised towards the palate. Possible occurrences:

/i/ in bit

/y/ in city, rhythm, symbol

/e/ in pretty

/ie/ in ladies

/a/ in village

/o/ in women

/u/ in busy

/ui/ in built

/ei/ in foreign
The lips are slightly spread or neutral. There is no real equivalent in Spanish.
/e/ the front of the tongue is used in the production of this short vowel, making it a front vowel. It is also a close/middle vowel in
that the position of the tongue is slightly raised. Possible occurrences:

/e/ in beg

/a/ in many

/eo/ in leopard

/ea/ in dead

/ai/ in said
The lips are slightly spread. It is similar to Spanish /e/, but not so open.
// This vowel is a front vowel since the front part of the tongue is raised when it is articulated. It is also an open (low) vowel.
This means that the tongue is in a low position with the jaw also being lowered.
Posible occurrences:

/a/ as in map

/ai/ as in plait or plaid

The lips are slightly spread. It is half way between the Spanish /a/ and /e/.

// This is a central vowel, and one which is more open than mid-ranged. The short // is pronounced with the fore part of the
back of the tongue in the highest position. It can occur in:

/o/ in son

/oo/ in blood

/u/ in but

/ou/ in nourish

/oe/ in does
The lip position is a neutral one. This vowel can be compared with Spanish /a/ in unaccented syllabes: ventag

2.2.

Manner of articulation.

PLOSIVES Formed by a closing air passage and suddenly removing the obstacle. Then, the air escapes making an
explosive sound.
/ b / / t / / d / / k / / g / /p/
AFFRICATIVE As plosives but with a slower separation of articulator organs. / / / /
NASAL
A nasal consonant is a consonant in which air escapes only through the nose. the soft palate is lowered to allow air to
pass it, whilst a closure is made in the oral cavity to stop air escaping through the mouth. There are three nasal sounds in
English. The / m / in mat, the / n / in nasal and the / / in sing.
LATERAL
When an obstacle is placed in the centre of air channel. Then, the air is free to escape at one or both sides. / l /
ROLLED A rapid succession of taps of some elastic parts of speech mechanism / r /
FRICATIVE A narrowing of air passes at some point to such an extent that the air escaping produces an audible
friction. / f / / v / / s / / z / / / / / / h / If you put your hand in front of the mouth when making these sounds. You
should be able to feel the stream of air when being pushed out.
SEMIVOWEL Voiced gliding sound in which speech organs start at a or near close vowel and immediately move away
to another vowel. / j / / w /

The English system is richer than the Spanish one. It has 24 consonants whereas the Spanish possesses 19. Furthermore,
in English there are also some clusters, that is to say, a set of consonants like sp, st, sk, or sl. Spanish has some
similar clusters: pl, pr, kr, dr, fl but most do not exist in Spanish then students tend to have some problems:

o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o

Spanish speaker tend to add a vowel e before those clusters beginning with s.
In final clusters with / t d / we either delete the final consonant or insert a vowel so cooked is not pronounced
properly.
We normally delete one of the two / s / in the following pattern: s+consonant+s: tests
More differences between the two languages that students have to confront are the following:
Although Spanish and English have some similar sounds, some are articulated in a different way. For instance,
the sound / d / is dental in Spanish but alveolar in English.
The confusion between / b / and / v / and / d / and / / as in Castilian are not so differentiated.
Spanish students tend to pronounce / s / voiceless when / z / voiced occurs.
/ h / is aspirated in English and should not be pronounce jota.
Both / / and / / are mixed and confused
The sound / w / is replaced by / g /
/ r / is different in Castilian (tongue-tip frill)
Some sounds are silent. They are not pronounced as it occurs in: comb, listen, could, island
In English consonants can be spelled in different ways.

For example the sound / t / can be written:

With one t as in team
With th as in Thames
With ed as in the past tense of regular verbs: looked
Or with ght as in eight
The sounds / v / can be spelled
With v: evil
Or with ph: nephew

As a conclusion, the study of phonetics becomes a real problem for our Spanish students as many differences between
both languages exist.
Obviouslky, it is a basic communicative element in the English language and teachers must transmit the importance of a
good pronunciation throughout the teaching-learning process in the English language classroom not only by means of
individual activities but always putting emphasis on pronunciation of new and difficult words.
Our students will need English at a certain moment of their lives: to read information on the instruction of a machine, to
understand any website when surfing the Internet, to communicate with other people either native English speakers or
people from other countries who do not speak Spanish, to travel around the world or to understand their favourite
English lyrics, activities which require a good pronunciation both to communicate and to understand English.

- ALCARAZ & MOODY. Fontica Inglesa para hispanohablantes. Marfil. 1984

- BROWN. Listening to Spoken English. Longman. 1977.
- CRDENAS, D. Introduccin a una Comparacin Fonolgica del Espaol y del Ingls, Washington.
- GIMSON, A.C. An Introduction to the Pronunciation of English. London. 1970
- JONES, D. An outline of English Phonetics. Cambridge. 1962
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